I started having problems with my Mac Pro Superdrive. While attempting to burn CD’s it would reject the media. It started out rejecting every 4th CD. Then it rejected all media both blank and recorded. I called Apple expecting they would send me a replacement drive. No luck. Instead they had me power off the system disconnect all devices and restart, delete the preference file, restart from the OS X DVD and reset drive permissions and test the system. As impressive as these actions sound, they had no effect. I just wanted a replacement drive. The last straw was a request to reinstall the operating system.

I have spent to much time getting this system set up just like I want it and did not want to face a reinstall. So I purchased two Pioneer DVR-111D drives from newegg.com for a little less then $80 including shipping. Installed both tonight, and problem solved. Have noticed that the new drives significantly outperform the original. Perhaps that because it was faulty … or the Pioneer is a better performer.

The original drive was a Sony DW-150A. Its one of those you can reportedly hack for better performance. From my experience, don’t bother with the hack just replace it with the Pioneer for $32 plus shipping.

Its November already. Where did the year go?

Changing banks is such a pain… For the past few years I have been a Bank of America customer. There on line banking was, in my opinion the best. What made it so good was its timeliness. It made money management easy. However, all that has changed. Now, when there system is not down, the data is old and incomplete. My multiple attempts to resolve instances of missing data were met with uncaring and inept responses. It seemed like a Turing test, and Bank of America failed … they lack even nominal human intelligence.   

Its my observation, that Bank of America’s customer service deteriorated as they acquired other banks. They just got to big to care … so they can eat my dust as I move on.

• Pro C# 2005 and the .NET 2.0 Platform, Third Edition by Andrew Troelsen (954/954) FINISHED
• Programming C# : Building .NET Applications with C# by Jesse Liberty (612/612) FINISHED
• Pro ASP.NET 2.0 in C# 2005 by Matthew MacDonald and Mario Szpuszta (605/1210
• Programming Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 Core Reference by Dino Esposito (100/703)
• Programming Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 Applications: Advanced Topics by Dino Esposito (50/629)
• Head First Design Patterns by Elisabeth Freeman, Eric Freeman, Bert Bates, and Kathy Sierra (206/629)
• CLR via C#, Second Edition by Jeffrey Richter (648/648) FINISHED
• Design Patterns in C# by Steven John Metsker (12/430)
• Head Rush Ajax by Brett McLaughlin, (405/405) FINISHED
• Beginning Ajax with ASP.NET by Wallace B. McClure, Scott Cate, Paul Glavich, Craig Shoemaker (160/362)
• Understanding Ajax by Joshua Eichorn (59/330)
• Ajax, Creating Web Pages with Asynchronous JavaScript and XML by Edmond Woychowsky (0/359)

So much to read and so little time…

I successfully installed Windows XP in Parallels on my Mac Pro. All seems well. I installed NOD32 anti-virus software, Microsoft Office 2003, and Visual Studio 2005. The performance of Widows XP in Parallels is spectacular. Its significantly better then what I experience on my Compaq at work. I created a new database in SQL Express and ran script to create a series to tables and associated stored procedures. The process was so fast, I thought it failed. No sooner had I taken my finger of the mouse button and it was done. My first thought was "What went wrong?". I opened the database and to my surprise all the tables and stored procedures where in place. Visual Studio 2005 performance is nothing short of spectacular.

I just received a 3.2G workstation at work. I wonder how Visual Studio 2005 will perform on this new box compared to the Mac Pro.

Last night I successfully installed Windows XP on a Mac Pro using Apple’s latest release of Boot Camp. Boot Camp installed flawlessly. Windows XP on the other-hand could not recognize the Apple USB keyboard. I encountered this same problem with XP under the previous version of Boot Camp. Switching USB ports did not work.

What did work was using using a Microsoft keyboard. I just happen to have a Microsoft Standard Wireless Optical Desktop keyboard and mouse left over from the days when I still had a PC. I re-booted the system with the new keyboard which restarted the XP install. It completed without incident. Installing the system drivers from the drive disk created by Boot Camp worked great. Found that XP recognizes my iSite camera, however its generic driver produces an unusable washed out image. I did have to call Microsoft to register the install. Apparently, I used up my alloted install attempts. I really hate having to repeat a 40 digit number first to a computer and then again to the help-desk. Then for a reword, Microsoft returns with a 40 digit number. So much for purchasing a legal copy of XP.

What is nice about the Boot Camp install is its ability to use any drive. In my case I have a second drive of 500G. I allocated 200G for XP. Parallels would not install on my second drive.

Installed Microsoft Office 2003, Visual Studio 2005, NOD32 (because Leo Laport said its the best), and Windows Defender Beta 2. Installing Windows Defender gave me a scare. Initially I could not download the product because Microsoft could not detect that the installed copy of XP was legal. As a Microsoft Partner, I have legal copies of their software. So here is a clear case of a false positive. A second attempt after closing the browser worked. Why?

My sole reason for using XP is to run Visual Studio 2005. In my work life I principally code .NET C# and being an acknowledged work alcoholic I am compelled bring work home. Using Boot Camp means I no longer also need a PC at home. So, I can proudly admit that I have been PC free for two months.

Here is my latest toy, a Blackberry Pearl. To get this baby, I had to switch carriers from Verizon to T-Mobile. No big loss. Overall I found the Pearl really easy to use. My previous phone was Blackberry 7250. So I have some familiarity with the interface. Prior to getting the device, I had been told the Pearl keypad/system was difficult to use. On the contrary, I found it simple and faster to use. The screen resolution is significantly higher then the 7250 and consequently easier to read. It’s smaller screen actually seems larger. This unit will serve me well until the next newer toy comes along …

Downloaded <a href="https://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/j/5.0.html&quot; target="_new">mysql-connector-java-3.1.13-bin.jar</a> from the MySQL site and double clicked the mysql-connector-java-3.1.13.tar.gz on my desktop. Dragged the resulted file folder to my Library/Java/Extensions/ directory. I then dragged the mysql-connector-java-3.1.13-bin.jar out of the mysql-connector-java-3.1.13 and into the Library/Java/Extensions/ directory. Copied a little mySql connection test java code from the internet, and it successfully connected.

Here is the test code I used:

import java.sql.Connection;
import java.sql.DriverManager;
import java.sql.SQLException;

public class JdbcExample2 {

  public static void main(String args[]) {
    Connection con = null;

    try {
      Class.forName("com.mysql.jdbc.Driver").newInstance();
      con = DriverManager.getConnection("jdbc:mysql:///test",
        "root", "");

      if(!con.isClosed())
        System.out.println("Successfully connected to " +
          "MySQL server using TCP/IP…");

    } catch(Exception e) {
      System.err.println("Exception: " + e.getMessage());
    } finally {
      try {
        if(con != null)
          con.close();
      } catch(SQLException e) {}
    }
  }
}

Next I moved mysql-connector-java-3.1.13-bin.jar into System/Library/Java/Extensions/ directory and found that my test code continued to work. While looking for the mysqlJDBC.jar file, I noticed several postings dealing with connection problems when placing the jar file into this directory. Now I don’t know why it worked for me but it did. It’s definitely an unusual experience for me. Typically this type of operation would require hours of fiddling to find some little thing I failed to do.

It’s time to celebrate…

I have heard so much about TypePad that I thought I would give it a try. The 30 day trial period is nice. Hope to run the product through its paces and see how it works for me.

Paralles continues to struggle getting their product to work on the Mac Pro.

I first purchase Parallels for my Mac Book Pro, and on that system it works great. When Apple announced the Mac Pro workstation I ran right out and purchase one. My rational was that the added power of the dual Xenon chipped workstation would significantly improve my productivity, including the .NET C# coding. Thats the beauty of Parallels. It lets you run Windows XP in a window on a Mac running OS X. Its so cool. I can code C# .NET on a Mac.

Parallels runs perfectly on my Mac Book Pro. But either causes a kernel panic, or delivers a meaningless error message of “Unable to communicate with hypervisor!” on the Mac Pro. From a users perspective, what is the value of this message? How does this help get Parallels to work? In disgust I fired off a complaint to Parallels which will most likely do as much good as their error message. Maybe they will surprise me and email back a fix. I won’t hold my breath.

There is a glimmer of hope on the horizon though. VMWare announced that they will release a version of their workstation product for the Mac. I have used their PC workstation product and it is excellent. When they enter the Mac market, Parallels is gone.