27 April 2009, 9:53 am
I've been e-mailing back and forth with Linz about the possibility of adding an online component to the R&S convention planned for October in Las Vegas, to give folks who don't have the means or the inclination to travel all that way to take part in the fun. We're considering using the program "Koala", which was developed by CalTech for video conferencing: http://evo.caltech.edu We could use a little help testing the system out, to see what the upper limits of what it can do are. Would you be willing to help us out? First, you'll need to go to the web page listed above and create an account (it's all free, and only takes a few minutes). At the appointed day and time, we'd then need you to log in and join the meeting named "R&S Convention" to join into the conference. I'm tentatively thinking either May 3 or 10 at about 3pm Eastern time, to try to split the difference between east and west coast while still allowing our friends across the Atlantic to join in. At that point we could test out the features, and I could walk folks through the basics of how to use the features, if you don't feel like reading the online manual for the program -- how to view the webcast from the convention proper, how to do private text and voice chats while the main presentation is still going on, sharing files, using the community "whiteboard", etc. Could we get a show of hands for who'd be willing and able to help us out? The program itself is Java-based, so it should work equally well on Mac or PC and through firewalls and such. And if you could indicate which of those days would be best for you, we can try to plan it to get the best possible turnout... Hope to see you soon! --The Rev I noticed you didn't actually say "No", Phoenix... Oh, and if anybody has a video camera they can hook up to their computer to do streaming video, that'd be even better -- my own camcorder is so old I don't think its software is compatible with Vista, and I WOULD like to see how it works with something a little higher quality than just a webcam... @Wren -- Is the fan working properly? Have you given the insides of the computer a decent cleaning lately and blown out all the dust bunnies with a can of compressed air? Also, you might take a look at the capacitors on the motherboard -- they look like little cylinders about the size of a pencil eraser, made of plastic around the sides and metal tops. Those tops should be smooth and flat -- if they look "puffed-up" at all, you may need to replace the board (we had a big problem here at work with MPC desktops failing en masse on account of faulty capacitors...) @Wren: Might be your power source, then -- which is still considerably cheaper to replace than your motherboard...... Read More »
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