Goodbye, Sidewinder.

Today, I came to the sad realization that I must part with my beloved Sidewinder Force Feedback Steering Wheel. I tried to keep it for as long as I could, but there comes a time when you have to let some things go.

When the red rubber grip started to separate from the rim, I cut it off and taped it. That was actually more comfortable. But for the past few months, I have struggled with a way to fix the pedals, after wearing out the springs. Nothing worked well enough; so, today, I disconnected and disassembled the wheel and pedals and placed them in the trash.

I could replace it with another one, but I think I will seriously look into a G27. If that is too far out of my budget, then I guess I'll have to find something else.

Until then, I guess I'll be playing a lot of FPS's. There is something to be said about listening to Judas Priest's "Painkiller" album, while playing "Painkiller".

The NYPD costs NYC another million.

Apparently, the Republican (term-limits don't apply to me) mayor of New York City, Micheal Bloomberg does believe in the redistribution of wealth, as long as it is not his wealth.

His method, stangely, is to take New York City's financial resources and give them to private citizens who have been victimized by the NYPD. I've mentioned previously, the Sean Bell award, the $30K for a photographier, and the $100K for the bicyclist whose attack was posted on YouTube. Well, you can now add one million more of New York City's dollars to the total, this time going to Critical Mass, for having their rights violated by the NYPD.

Yet another reason why this city is broke.

An old Thinkpad.

I was given an old IBM Thinkpad 600e. It's not the worst computer I've ever used, but I must say one thing about it; DON'T try to install any Debian based system on it!

I have tried to get the sound working on this damn thing, using every tutorial, how-to, and bit of advice I could find on the 'net. Now, I could try out Fedora/Red Hat; but first, I am going to try Slackware (Actually, Absolute Linux, because it is lightweight). I have read that it detects and loads the correct driver automatically. We'll see what happens.

Update: I HAVE SOUND! Here is how:

1) Start with a Debian install (not any of the derivative distros, and certainly not Ubuntu)
2) Follow these instructions to the letter:
http://wiki.debian.org/snd-cs46xx
3) Make sure you disable 'Quick Boot' in the BIOS.

WTF!

http://idle.slashdot.org/story/10/10/01/158239/New-York-To-Spend-275-Million-Uncapitalizing-Street-Signs?from=rss