Hi All,
I came around believing I'd see a lot of strange nicks and a totally revamped forum....
I guess I haven't been gone as long as I thought.

First off...apologies to all those I left hi & dry (Spencer, Paul esp). The real world decided it was time I got back in the game and that meant giving this place up for a time. Thanks to Hankers for keeping me up to date from time to time.

I have missed this place.

So things have finally started to settle down. I don't have near the time available I used to, but hopefully I can stop in regular.
Anything I should know about what I missed the last few years?

$40 for upgrades from XP and beyond. That's a great way to get people to adopt Windows 8. Even though I'm not impressed by W8, at $40 I'll be picking up a copy.....might not install it but at least I'll be able to when they hit SP1.

I believe I paid $40 for Windows 3.1.....

I drag my desktop & laptop out to the garage about once a month to blast away a bit of dust but this is unreal....I'd be amazed if that computer would stay on for more than 5 minutes.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=diCvsKmDsng#![/video]

I guess we can wave a fond goodbye to Aero. MS confirmed that it's out for the release version of Windows 8. Looks like pastel solids & squared corners will be the new look. I hate pastels.....like the blue of the forum.....been making my eyes burn for a couple years now.

So I guess the good news is Stardock may have a lot to do in the next few months.

RIP Carroll Shelby. You will be missed.

There's a developer (dotnet) on the Rainmeter Forum working on a Plugin for ATI cards that DOES NOT require third party software like Speedfan to run. He needs someone running in crossfire mode to help him with testing out the plugin. He's already done a pretty impressive job. I run 2 ATI video cards in my system (not in crossfire) and it works great.

Rainmeter Forum Thread

The list of measures..........

   Temperature
    Clock
    Voltage
    Activity
    PerformanceLevel
    PCIECurrentBusSpeed
    PCIECurrentBusLanes
    PCIEMaxBusLanes
    MemoryClock
    FanSpeedRPM
    FanSpeedPercent
    MemorySize
    MemoryType
    MemoryBandwidth
    NumberOfAdapters
    AdapterName
    <-NEW->
    AdapterActive
    FanSpeedPercentMin
    FanSpeedPercentMax
    FanSpeedRPMMin
    FanSpeedRPMMax
    BiosDate
    BiosVersion
    BiosPartNumber
    AdapterIdentifier
    NumberOfDisplays
    DisplayConnectorType
    DisplayConnected
    DisplayMapped
    DisplayType
    DisplayOutputType
    DisplayName
    DisplayManufacturer
    DisplayCurrentResolution
    DisplayNativeResolution
    DisplayMinResolution
    DisplayColorBrightnessCurrent
    DisplayColorBrightnessMax
    DisplayColorBrightnessMin
    DisplayColorBrightnessStep
    DisplayColorBrightnessDefault
    DisplayColorContrastCurrent
    DisplayColorContrastMax
    DisplayColorContrastMin
    DisplayColorContrastStep
    DisplayColorContrastDefault
    DisplayColorSaturationCurrent
    DisplayColorSaturationMax
    DisplayColorSaturationMin
    DisplayColorSaturationStep
    DisplayColorSaturationDefault
    DisplayColorHueCurrent
    DisplayColorHueMax
    DisplayColorHueMin
    DisplayColorHueStep
    DisplayColorHueDefault
    DisplayColorTemperatureCurrent
    DisplayColorTemperatureMax
    DisplayColorTemperatureMin
    DisplayColorTemperatureStep
    DisplayColorTemperatureDefault

It also includes bangs to change fan speed and a whole lot more.

I received notice this morning that "this pre-release version of Tiles has expired"

I've kind of grown used to it so I was wondering when the next version would be out.

I just saw this article over at How-To-Geek about an Open Source Taskbar extender for Windows 7.

Looks interesting.....think I'll try it out. Download is from Sourceforge LINK

Cause the Snowman's having a Birthday!

Happy Birthday Morten!

I'm a few hours early to beat the Aussie's to it..... ;)

Altdesk is Virtual Desktop manager made by Astonshell. TODAY it's free over at Giveaway of the day/

LINK