Laptop Review: As few might be knowing I’ve purchased a Dell Inspiron 1520. Here’s a short review on it. Laptop Specifications: Processor: Intel Core2Duo T5250 @ 1.5 GHz, 2 MB L2 Cache Main memory: 2x1GB DDR2 667 MHz Dual Channel mode HDD: Fujitsu MHW2160BH 160GB SATA DVD-RW: TSSTcorp DVD+/-RW TS-L632H 8X Sound Card: Intel HDA ICH8(82801) Graphics Card: nvidia 8600m GT with 256MB RAM NIC: BroadCom BCM4401 100 WiFi: Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Bluetooth: BroadCom BCM2045 System Chipset: Intel GM965 Expansion & Misc ports: 4xUSB, 1xIEEE1394, 1xRJ-45, 1xRJ-11, 1xVGA Out, 2xExpressCard 54, 1xHeadphone out, 1xMicrophone In, 1xMedia Card reader(SD/MMC/MS Pro).

Yup! Finally my laptop is here, delivered to my office at OMR, Chennai! After all those hassles(read this and this post to know more!) I received it 12 days after my order was registered(ie, the day the amount was realized). In case you’re wondering, my Laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1520, featuring an Intel Core2Duo Processor T5250@1.5GHz, 2 GB RAM, a 160GB HDD and (my most cherished component) nVidia 8600 mGT w/ 256MB RAM(although Windows and DXDiag reports 512 MB RAM, hmm).

First up, if you haven’t read my previous post, go read it! Now, after you’ve read the post, you people can get an idea as to how pissed off and frustrated I was. The following day, ie, Tuesday, I was determined to finish off the work come no matter what! So armed with my Cheque book, 2 pens(yeah, 2, just in case any one ran out of ink!). Left my Office at 5.

Mega Post ahead: You have been warned! There’s something called fate. Answers.com defines it as “fate (fät) pronunciation n. The supposed force, principle, or power that predetermines events. The inevitable events predestined by this force. A final result or consequence; an outcome. Unfavorable destiny; doom.” The past few days have convinced me that Fate has it that I should NOT get my laptop, as early as possible.

KDE users have for a long time had the jack-of-all-trades, all-singing-all-dancing Konqueror for file management. In KDE 4 we’ll be joined by the new Dolphin which will be the default file manager. If you yearn for a change of file manager now, however, and you’re a fan of the left-right split in your file manager, you might just like Krusader. On first run, Krusader will search your system for tools it can integrate with as you can see here.

You finally got your Linux environment to crash. Ctrl+Alt+Backspace does nothing, nor do the F-keys. You know you shouldn’t have installed that bad driver, but you did it anyway. So you reach for the power button. Stop. Mashing in the power button to reboot could cause a problem if your hard drive is still being written to, and usually causes more problems than it solves. The Linux kernel includes a secret method of restarting your PC should it ever stop doing its job.

I’ve shifted!This time, not just physically but on the web as well.First, physically(literally, and I’m using too many rhyming words). As a trainee in 3i-Infotech I’ve shifted from coastal town of Mangalore to the metro, Chennai, which is again a coastal city, just on the the eastern side of India. On the web, I’ve shifted from WordPress hosted blog to my very own domain(yippee!!!) hosted on ExperTrio (thanks, Preshit!). And for the moment, my Linux experimentations have ceased due to lack of a PC/laptop with me.

Dolphin’s fast loading times and clean interface made me consider to have a second look at Dolphin. So here’s a way to make Dolphin the default file manager. If you haven’t installed Dolphin yet, install it via apt-get or Adept. More info about that in my previous post. Then, Click on K Menu -> Run Command and type ‘kcontrol' (without the quotes, of course). Then Click on KDE Components -> File Associations.

While looking at the packages available in Adept, I saw that Dolphin was available. I was a bit surprised, considering that Dolphin is still in beta stage but nonetheless decided to have a look at it For the uninitiated, Dolphin will be the default file manager in KDE4 breaking away from the tradition of Konqueror being the web browser/file manager combo. While Konqueror will still be available in KDE4, it will no longer be the default file manager.

Insert your USB pen drive. Let it get detected and mounted. Open Terminal. Type The Following commands dmesg |tail -> here the ‘|' key is the pipe, ie, the key before the backspace key(the upper one, so press shift) You’ll get something like sathya@shaman:~$ dmesg |tail [ 9921.681164] sda: Write Protect is off [ 9921.681174] sda: Mode Sense: 23 00 00 00 [ 9921.681178] sda: assuming drive cache: write through