How important is your computer’s screen?

Answer: Very.

Off the shelf notebooks never have any kind of decent screen configuration. Laptop giants are too busy focusing their buyers’ attention to the unnecessarily huge HDDs or the unnecessarily huge RAMs.
Most laptops these days have gloss finish screens. No matter how bright these screens are, they turn into mirrors with the introduction of even minimal ambient light.
Some things about the screen that most buyers don’t know till they see their laptops, [or maybe even after that :)] are:
LED vs CCFL:
LED: Light Emitting Diode
CCFL: Cold Cathode Fluorescent Tube
These are the two kinds of LCD lighting features. According to me, LED is much better as it gives crisper colours, has lower power consumption (meaning more battery life), higher brightness range, and lower dimming over time.

Gloss vs Matte:
This is the type of the finish of the screen. As I said gloss screens have this problem of turning into mirrors. Matte screens are better in ambient light but need to be kept very clean (from personal experience).

Making these two choices and getting my computer configured for this did cost me a few bucks more, but it has given its sweet rewards as I can now enjoy working on my computer without straining my eyes at any random place.
Note: I also use my computer with a blank white document opened at full brightness as a table lamp sometimes :)

the life and times of deep_thought

“And yeah, I need these extra components also installed along with the basic configuration” said the lanky freshman undergraduate to the computer technician. The student was busy clearing his desk from the piles of books and paper on it, while the technician was working his magic. After having a first look at the components, the technician started small talk about how much did the freshman get those components from and from where. A few screws later, the computer technician whose name plate read ‘Viresh’ said that its all done, we need to power up now. With trembling fingers, the undergrad flipped the power switch; and thus deep_thought was born.

Those same fingers trembled while flipping the same switch back, in fond remembrance of the story narrated in the earlier paragraph. The fingers were not a lanky freshman’s fingers; instead they belonged to a (still lanky) junior undergraduate who was trembling as he went through his first serious parting in years. The hum of the cpu fan as it went slow and then stopped brought back lots of memories of deep_thought, as it was powered down for the last time.

Incidentally, it was the first time ever that deep_thought was given the shut down command, on any one of its more than 15 different hosted operating systems. For just over two years, deep_thought performed under the most adverse conditions that computers like him can possibly face. The owner, who we can clearly recognize as the author of this ridiculous story, must have been the worst and possibly the best thing that deep_thought was ever put through. Although for the better part of his life, deep_thought was subject to uber 50% cpu usage, it was one of the few computers of its kind who must have had a myriad of adventures as it did some of the most bizzare things imaginable.

One might feel that deep_thought was the best-in-his-league type computer, but well, a computer is just as good as their owner is. So, well deep_thought was very happy at its standing, performing to his own satisfaction. Only those who knew deep_thought well, could truly appreciate what he could do. Those high end operations of playing the latest game could never be relished by the owner, as deep_thought was a bit handicapped there. But what he lacked for in absolute configuration, he more than made up in the enthusiasm department.

The hope that I had in IBM when I bought my 8776a27 in my freshman year was more than fulfilled by deep_thought, and that is what made me believe in the brand. As deep_thought is officially out of commission, blue_gene shall enter my life  in the next 6 hours.

Notes:

deep_thought: my 8776a27

deep thought: world’s second most brilliant computer, in Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

deep throat: world’s first ever released adult movie.

URSA_minor: the computer from which I am writing this blog post.

blue_gene: my new t400

Random Stuff

Long time it seems since I have written anything here. Thought i’d unsettle the dust a bit. Also, with impending exams, I am pretty jobless. This post actually was started off in the summer, after a particularly unique experience at a party at my friend’s weekend house. I don’t really have anything much to say today, except for cribbing about heavy schedules brought on by being in junior year. So, I thought I’d just pen down (rather type down) a few random things going on, or random observations, or conclusions, or whatever.

1. Boston Legal is the best thing that ever came out on television.
2. Most girls in college get into relationships by junior year. (with reference to my thermo prof, I don’t mean to say wrong relationships)
3. Ambience and company regulates how much you get drunk more than the alcohol, or the rate of ingestion of it.
4. Too much electronics can’t kill you, unfortunately. Even if you wish so :P
5. I get to see my new Lenovo T400 within a month :D
6. Boxers are the best form of underwear ever invented.
7. JAM magazine is utterly ridiculous.
8. I think I have asperger’s syndrome.
9. I have never to date given the Shut Down command to my current computer. (aka deep_thought)
10. My new computer’s name is yet undecided :(
11. Funny as it may sound, I always end up chasing girls who are committed, or unavailable due to whatever reasons.
12. Dogs don’t like my alarm tone.
13. I hate using the multimeter in the continuity mode.
14. I got an A in PS-I. Surprise Surprise.
15. I like to make word counts on posts odd numbers, if possible prime.
16. I really would like to try a case someday, just to feel like a Thakar one day.
17. I took a whole of three hours to write this post (was watching Boston Legal side by side)

Its good to write something on the blog after all this time. Hopefully next post will have some intelligible content. Cheers till then.