As I keep searching to make the $100 upgrade possible, I am surprised by how hard it is to make this possible...

But here is one pretty good option. The nice thing about this option is - it IS an upgrade - but it limits future upgrade options and its has DDR memory - which is expensive compared to DDR2 and DDR3.

Now for the details,

CPU + Motherboard + Memory: $88 - Intel SE7501BR2 Server Motherboard w/Dual Xeon 2.4GHz CPUs, 1GB RAM, Heat Sinks & Fans
http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=SE7501BR2-KIT-R&cat=MBB

Total (+ 13% tax): $100 + Shipping? + USD coversion?

Labels: $100 upgrade

If the current motherboard cannot support the newer stuff, then I guess I can just change the motherboard :)

Motherboard option controls my expansion possibilities, so I have to carefully consider this. From doing some research, I guess AMD processors and Intel processors generally require different sockets? I thought that CPU sockets are standard (i.e. not company specific)...guess not.

Here is my Plan 1, it doesn't quite hit the $100 mark, but oh well, this is plan 1:

CPU: $60 - AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ Dual Core Processor AM2 2.7GHZ 2X512KB
http://www.bestdirect.ca/products/129509/AMD/ADO5200DOBOX/

CPU Cooling: $25 - Thermaltake TR2-R1 / AMD Socket AM2/939/754 / Aluminum / 92mm Fan / CPU Cooler
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2604150&CatId=2545

Motherboard: $44 - Biostar MCP6P-M2+ Socket AM2+ GeForce 6150 mATX Motherboard w/Video & Audio
http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=MCP6P-M2PLUS&cat=MBB

Memory: $27.50 - Kingston 2GB DDR2 RAM PC2-6400 240-Pin DIMM
http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=KVR800D2N6-2G&cat=RAM

Total (base cost + 13% tax): ~$181

Since its just an upgrade, the case, power supply, hard disk, other drives etc can stay as they are. That concludes option/plan 1. Now if only there was a way to halve that number...

Labels: $100 upgrade

I have an old desktop at home - an HP computer, with 512 MB SDRAM, 1.7 Ghz Pentium 4 Processor and 30 GB HDD, and the motherboard is an Intel i845. Since this computer isn't being used much now, I decided to make it a[n intranet] server. I already use it as a CVS repository. It runs Apache, MySQL, MSSQL and has PHP. The OS is Windows XP.

So far there is nothing really to complaint about with the machine's performance, but its only the processes running now without any load. I wanted to upgrade the hard disk and also make this a media server. Now, I felt the machine's processing power and memory could use some boost here. Afterall I am trying to run every kind of server (web, cvs, media, database and file) on this.

Looking into my upgrade options I was pretty shocked..the memory type it supports is very hard to find now! Futureshop and Tigerdirect don't even seem to have Socket 478 processors anymore. Determined not to lose hope and make something (actually no, not something but everything I want) of this machine, I decided to find a way to upgrade it and do it in less than $100!

I'll blog and post updates on how my hunt for the $100 upgrade goes. Wish me Luck! Also any ideas appreciated :)

Labels: $100 upgrade

Yesterday we went bowling to celebrate G's birthday. That was my first time and (cough) I won the first game :D

I was happy to discover it, it's not very expensive and its pretty fun.

I was wearing my Waterloo Engineering t-shirt and wow I was surprised by the response. I knew Waterloo was a respectable school, but this was a first...Two older people they asked us if we were from UW. They had a lot of respect for UW. They gave us bowling advice, best wishes in school and told us some of their life stories (thanks to Arthur!)...which was pretty different/interesting.

Oh, and I did lose the next game badly...what can I say...it was beginner's luck? To the curious minds, the birthday boy won twice and Arthur once.

Labels: birthday, bowling, celebration

After some thought, I think its best for AiBloggerBox to take a new name - something cooler than AiBloggerBox :)

Since the idea is similar to LightBox, I want the name to be similar - so people can identify it. Other things I considered when thinking of a name: its for Blogger - the name should somehow be indicative of this, something short, easy to remember, and at least a wee bit more creative than Ai-Blogger-Box.

I think BrightBox suits these criteria.

Bright is similar to Light
B for Blogger :D - hence some way of indicating this is for blogger
Easier to remember - at least its two real words now
Short - yes, shorter than before
More creative than original name - I think so :)

Yay, so there it is BrightBox! Now to go make labeling changes in the blog.

Labels: AiBloggerBox, BrightBox

The thought ran in my mind to create a pure Javascript based video player. I wondered if it were possible and where would I start. I did some quick search and found this: http://blog.nihilogic.dk/2008/04/making-javascript-video-player.html

It is a pure javascript based video player! and the idea is pretty clever. Using PHP and mplayer on the server convert a video file into individual image frames, then use AJAX and stream the individual image frames in the JSON format. Display it on the web page using javascript.

It's an awesome idea and the author has 2 test videos as well. I like it! (but I want to better it :D. May be some time...(soon? :) ))

Labels: javascript, video, video player

Since the way Version 2 works has changed a little, I thought I'd post the new setup instructions:

Go to the <head> section of your blogger template and add:
<script type="text/javascript" src="PATH_TO_AiBloggerBox_JS_FILE"></script>

That's all :)

Here is a demo:






Click these and let AiBloggerBox kick in and show you what it can do!

Labels: AiBloggerBox, BrightBox

Happy to see people interested in this project :)

A Demo of this version is available here: AiBloggerBox Demo

I have rewritten AiBloggerBox almost (using one section of my previous code) from scratch. Here are the new changes:

• Changed the mechanism through which the 'box' is created
• Absolutely no external files needed! - The javascript file is completely self sufficient. Two other image files were needed before. Overall combined file size is smaller.
  
• White border area around the images now - looks nicer :)
• Proper resizing of images - if the image was bigger than the screen size, previously the image would be clipped. Now proper resizing is done, so the entire image is visible
• Close button available - looks nicer :) (any mouse click/key press still closes the box)
• Image auto-caption mechanism available - Uses the image name to print out image caption below the image in the box. For e.g. the picture "Vacation_in_Bali.jpg" would be automatically given the caption "Vacation in Bali" - easy way to have captions without doing edit HTML!
• Easy to edit options to control white-bordering size in the box, caption on/off, close button on/off and colors. Just open the javascript file, it starts off with some variable declarations, for example one thing you will see is:
  
  var AiBloggerBox_showCloseButton = 1
  
  change this to
  
  var AiBloggerBox_showCloseButton = 0
  
  to stop showing the close button. It's that simple! (anything that starts off as AiBloggerBox_* is an editable preference - and these are all present at the very top)

I have tested it in FF3 and IE7 using 1 pure test page and this site itself. I completed coding and testing of it, so I thought I might as well release the beta. :)

I thought it would make better sense to release 2 versions of the JS file now - compressed and the normal one. The compressed one is smaller - meaning it will take less bandwidth when you put it in your site.

Compressed BrightBoxBox: BrightBox_v2.0_compressed.zip
Normal BrightBox: BrightBox_v2.0.zip

You would generally want the compressed version.

Labels: AiBloggerBox, BrightBox, javascript