Too Many Sites, Too Little Time.

I recently changed web hosts for three of my web sites and in the process added another web site. I LOVE this new host....the only problem I have .........FRUSTRATION! I am SO frustrated with the fact that I have all of these cool web sites out there but have NOTHING to put on them or do with them. I have some ideas...but that would take more time than I want to invest in to it. So the frustration goes on...

I have this blog....yes and it is separate. It is FREE. It is simple. It is easy. It helps me to help people in a practical way. My other sites though on the other hand...are cookie-cutter templates of web sites that work for certain people and for certain types of web sites. They do me no good unless I sit here and take the time to work with it and learn it and modify it to satisfaction. Another hangup on this would be the fact that I know I would never be satisfied. I am not THAT good of a web designer/programmer to ever get to that point any time soon....if ever.

I am paying good money for AWESOME hosting...although it is a LOT LESS than I was paying for not-so-good hosting. I have a real dilemma. I am using the email addresses on all three of these web sites I have. I have used so many different ones and haven't really kept track of the use of any of them. If I had, it would be a different situation. I could simply go back and change things everywhere I had signed up for something. It isn't that easy now. So do I continue to pay for the domains and keep the hosting simply for the email, or do I just ditch it all altogether anyway....or do I make time to do SOMETHING - ANYTHING with these sites....or hire somebody to do something....or DONATE or GIVE the sites to somebody??? Good question. I don't want to bother you with all this anyway...except for what I have so far.

Also, during the switch, I never put the picture of me back in the same url as it was at with my old host, so hence the broken image on the right.

I think I'm burnt out when it comes to web site design. I'm busy with other things. I very much enjoy good talented web design still....I just don't have time for it. Would anybody like to do something with my sites?

• UMPITYGRUMPITY.COM
• GETDISTRACTED.NET
• MYCOMPUTERSOLUTIONS.BIZ (Ok, this one is for my business...but would somebody like to "enhance" it for me?)
• TECHNOCHRISTIAN.COM (Right...this one is for christians involved in techno/dance music...so don't volunteer if you aren't christian.) ((Oh ya, this one hasn't been switched to my new host yet...but it WILL BE.))

So there you have it. If I don't get any response, I think I will just take out what I have up, and just design a couple pages in Front Page that just have some pretty pictures and a few good links. Might just use one web site strictly for my own global favorites.

Be blessed.

Saving PCs w/ Clean Boot Discs (More)..

Ok, I am blown away and have no clue-or atleast that is how I feel. This idea to have a perfect boot disc isn't so far fetched as one might think. No - in fact it is being done by people every day completely unknown to many who might consider themselves the "elite" techs. Either that or I've been living with my head buried in a hole and am just scratching the surface of reality. I believe that I am just getting in on something that has been a long time in the making, yet has finally just come of age. Clean boot discs that have every tool any computer tech or admin needs to go around to anybody's computer and clean it up and fix it without the need for extra discs in a big cd case.

The ONE disc would ideally include atleast the following:

• A clean bootable small version of Windows XP
• A clean bootable Dos, win95, win98, win98se, winNT, win2k, and winME boot disks
• An antivirus program that is up to date (which will actually scan an NTFS volume)
• Several spyware detection and removal tools
• Anti-Spyware protection programs that can be installed after cleaning the system
• Partitioning programs that can manage, copy, convert, move, resize, and image any partitions
• Diagnostic tools for testing, diagnosing, and rating hardware and software
• Backup software for saving files and information from a PC that may be damaged, without actually booting to the possibly damaged or infected volumes

Was there anything I left out of this list? Thats ok...because it can have it - whatever it is. Just go to www.911cd.net and read how to build everything to your hearts content all in one boot disc or boot disc set. YES, I said set....which means if all the stuff you want on it goes over the size of one full CD, you can span the files between two or more discs. You just can't go wrong.

The other site that talks about the 911 CD is www.bootcd.us and is a pretty cool site too. Both of these sites I am impressed by. Any site that can make my life easier and make my technological dreams come true gets an A+ in my book.

The thing about this though, is that it will take you time to learn about it and what all is involved - and then time to actually go through the steps to make your 911 boot disc(s). That is the part that is keeping me from doing it just yet. I've managed to make a pretty simple version of a BartPE cd already - which lacks networking because of I don't know..because I installed the correct files for the networking plugin..so.. Anyway, now that I want to make a 911 cd, I will have to set aside a lot more time. It is much more in depth and complex than just a BartPE cd. So find your next day off when you don't have anything planned - and plan for the entire day to be sitting there figuring out how to make your perfect 911 CD.

Now my perfect and ideal boot disc would be one that would fit onto a MINI-CDR and have all the things I want stored and contained within that smaller fraction of storage. That probably isn't possible...UNLESS, of course we find a way to create a CDR with a compressed volume. That way maybe we can store double the amount of information in the same space.

Be blessed.

Saving PCs Through Clean Boot Discs

Are you an old tech geek like me? Do you remember when boot disks would save the day time and again in an old DOS/Windows 3 or 95/98 world where all of the file systems were FAT16 or FAT32? You could load up CDROM and MOUSE drivers on a boot disk-load up some disk utilities, an antivirus program - anything that would be useful to working on a computer that god messed up. If you had to, you could use one disc and a boot disc and then load up several others or a CD with tools and work with the system that way. These very often came in super handy as long as you kept the disks write-protected.

Ever since Windows NT, ME, 2K and XP came out we've had a bit of a struggle us computer techs.. We don't have easy access or any at all to partitions formatted with anything other than FAT. Plus wouldn't it be nice if you could set up some sort of a way to make use of the Windows GUI-based tools now that are so indespensable? Just how hard do you think THAT is?? Well..

It is now possible thanks to BartPE - a boot-disc builder program that utilizes a custom Windows PE type system (PE=PreInstall Environment, originally made by Microsoft to help system builders set up OSes and configure them before giving them to their customers) to give you a totally true Windows-based boot disc. PE is a totally awesome technology and as a system builder myself, never thought of the potential it could have as an admin type tool. Bart did though...and he spent a lot of time developing this incredible look-alike of Windows PE based on the same technologies. What this accomplishes is an absolutely clean Windows operating environment able to run your Win32 based applications along with any DOS type programs.

This is absolutely incredible to me - and I haven't even got a disc made yet. I just know it is going to be cool, because I know what Windows PE is capable of...and this is even better. You can essentially "plug-in" any software you need. So if you have a special piece of software to do something that isn't possible with the bare PE software, you can just install it into the PE Builder system and make a new CD ISO image. It isn't technically THAT simple, however it is much easier than you might think. This makes a whole new world of things possible. It is the 21st Century Boot Disc loaded with everything you need - almost just like having a portable hard drive with a fresh clean installed Windows XP ready to plug into somebody's computer and work on their hard drive.

You have to see it to believe it. I will point you to the BartPE web site, however there are alternatives to putting it all together yourself if you have money to spend. Avast! has developed a special version of BartPE called Bart CD, which is already suited to most admin/computer tech tasks. It is a bit spendy however..and you might rather just be able to suit yourself to your own set of tools and shell, etc. Have a look at both options and decide which is right for you. Then go and Save The PCs.

Be blessed.