BIOS upgrade tanks my system

I have built my own computers for years. I have upgraded motherboards, CPUs, video cards, and everything else in a case, many times. Today, I needed to update the BIOS on my computer’s motherboard — something I have done many times before without difficulty.

But today, there was a difficulty. That is to say, it tanked. After the BIOS was flashed, it said “press F1 to continue.” I pressed F1. Black screen… black screen… nothing happened. A sinking feeling in my stomach set in as I realized that the software that makes the computer’s spine (motherboard) work was broken. I hit reset — hoping that just maybe the program just froze up. Nothing. Black screen. They always say that flashing a BIOS constitutes a “risk.” But this is the first time I have ever seen it actually fail.

Part of the costs of living on a small island like Kauai is that you can’t always drive to a store to get something you need. I called up the only computer parts store on the island that is likely to carry a selection of motherboards and asked: “do you have any Nforce2 chipset boards with RAID?” Their response made it obvious that they didn’t know what I was talking about. So I have put in an order with NewEgg for a new motherboard and it will probably take four or five days to get here.

So for now, I am stuck with my laptop. At least I can still check email, fill orders for SwordSearcher, and update my blog.

Blaster Virus maker arrested. He’s fat.

A 18 year-old has been arrested for making a modified version of the “Blaster” virus. [Article] The weird thing about this is that every news story I have seen or heard about this has mentioned that the guy is 6′ 4″ and 320 pounds. Yeah, that’s big. Odd though that it has to be included in every report about the guy. If he was smaller, do you think they would always mention that he was of average height and build?

Sobig Inbox Flood

My inboxes continue to be flooded with the SoBig.F virus. I’ve probably received over 250 copies of it in the last 48 hours. If you’re looking for a way to avoid these kind of infections, consider using an email client other than Outlook. I use The Bat!, and I find it to be a superior email client anyway. Of course, the best thing to do is not open attachments, even when they appear to come from someone you know.