Post 1475 - Another Day Off

So, yesterday, we didn't go anywhere.  We remained at home all day long and did nothing much more than watch a bunch of tv.

We slept in this morning until 10:30 or so.  We finally got up and went out for lunch at a local Swiss Chalet.   After that we got a few groceries and participated in some Boxing Week sales.  Patricia wanted a microphone for her netbook, so we got one, only to discover this afternoon that there was no way we could get the damned microphone to work on her machine.  Turns out that there are serious problems getting mics to work on these acer emachine computers.  Downloading the latest drivers didn't help.  In fact, they made things worse.  I had to restore the computer to what it was before the drivers were installed in the first place.  It was very frustrating!  I have been working with computers for a long time.  I wonder how many average people would just throw in the towel and return the computer rather than struggle to get something that working that should have been working in the first place.

I like netbooks for what they are.  Mine is a good computer for what it is.  I can connect to my work if I have to on it.  The microphone on it works fine, and I can use this computer to call anyone I want to in North America for free.   What I ask it to do, it does well.

Netbooks are fine when they work, but when they don't, their limitations in terms of processor speed and memory and storage become very apparent.  My sister has a netbook she likes a great deal.  It's only got 2 gb of storage.  I would find it very limiting.  My asus has 8gb of storage, which lets me install nearly any os I want to on it, up to and including XP.  No offense, sis.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this.  It's just that it puzzles me why something as fundamental as a microphone is not supported by the operating system that her computer comes with.  It should just work. Maybe ubuntu will work on it, but it's not my computer.  The decision to install ubuntu must come from Patricia.

Back to work tomorrow.  3 more work days in 2010.  Can't wait for this year to be over.

Bevboy