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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Ugh... Now Playing part 2

Well, in my previous post, I mentioned that I had a massive hard drive failure with my external. As it now stands, I got a replacement back from Seagate less than a week ago and guess what happened; IT DIED on Memorial Day! Kind of poetic when you think about it.

Yup, it died when I decided to write data to it, giving me a cyclic redundancy error with the application I was using to download data to the drive. Not thinking too much about it (I initially thought that the drive somehow became over heated. WRONG!) I then fired up the software that came with the drive to see if there were any actual errors with the drive and to see if it could fix any of them. Turns out that it had some sort of fault when it was on part of the night as I attempted to download the data in question (around 250+ megs apparently) and the software couldn't do squat about it and blasted the error message stating that it needed to go back to its mothership for repairs/replacement.

As I sat there, miffed over the entire set of events with this blasted drive, I couldn't help but to wonder why this sort of craziness happened. Turns out on Seagate's own support forums and at this blog dating back as far as August 2007 (just about 1 year before I purchased the drive), there have been multiple problems with these drives and others under the same line of FreeAgent products. So, this made me think of why, why in the hell would the drive be built in such a way as to force it to keelover due to heating and cooling problems when making the case properly in the first place would alleviate most of the problems? And, why would Seagate also use a drive in these units that, according to their own acknowledgement, has faulty firmware that can disable the entire drive?

These sorts of questions and issues bothered me greatly as I made plans to somehow get Seagate on the phone the next day (well, this past Tuesday anyway). I even wondered about the reliability of the next drive that they would send me to replace the replacement!

So, after a lengthy call to their tech support and warranty department, they agreed to have it mailed back for a replacement, free of charge. That last bit made me cautious since their website generally states there is normally a charge for shipping, but thankfully that was free as well. I just need to get a shipment label printed and have UPS pick it up.

Now, this time I just hope that the damned thing will work as advertised and for more than 8 months!




In other news...

Deviant Art still does not work properly for me after nearly 2 months of issues. The DA admins claim my ISP and/or cache memory in my browsers are to blame for my misfortune and T-Mobile states that the site should load up unless the site is a severe bandwidth hog. Technically, T-Mobile is correct in that assessment since DA has all sorts of random ads, flash, images, web code, and etc. that had problems with my connection up until recently. Though, in my defense, I had enough sense to have an ad/flash/script blocker installed on Firefox to taper off some of that; though, it no longer matters since the site refuses to load for me anymore.

To make matters worse, Google Chrome 2.0 and IE 7 have the same issues and they don't have any plugins that block the ads or craptastic scripts DA spams to through my connection. So, I'm thinking they updated or changed some portion of their web coding and it borks my connection (and maybe others) with it's dial-up bandwidth. Just don't tell the DA admins that, since they could give a fly fuck about users in my situation.

So, without further a due, I might as well begin posting my next several project updates here and on my Fur Affinity page as I'm able. Screw DA and their incompetent customer assistance. I'm just glad I'm not paying for additional services at that site, I'd be even more livid!

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Now playing...

Once again, I've managed to neglect my blog... It seems to be a growing habit when I should at least update more than once a month, but I digress.

Anyway, updated the header with a temporary image of one of my favorite characters, Whip from The King of Fighters '99 - XI. It does not seem like much, but I'm attempting to alter my little piece of space to something that fits more of my style and not be so damned awkward looking. Hopefully, I'll have an image of something I'm working on in her place, but until then, Whip will be there to stay.

In other news, Deviant Art has once again become the bane of my existence as it refuses to let me check my messages and view any of the artwork and associated artists I have on my watch list. I don't know what sort of beef they have with T-Mobile and slow connections, but they've somehow managed to keep pissing me off with their antics. So, if I ever get around to finishing any work that may be post worthy, they will all be posted here or on Sticky-Site until further notice. That or my other websites, which also need some updating. Bleh...

And for those that did not already know, my external hard drive, with just about everything I've gathered for the last several years - anime (Soul Eater just finished! T_T), games, music (had a ton of game music) , movies, porn, etc. - took quite a hit this past Monday. I was over my brother's home trying to get some updates and finish some downloads for anime along with playing some games on his high definition tv when his silly dog decided to play dash! through the area my equipment was occupying. Needless to say, the dog managed to snag one of the wires to the external drive and send it crashing to the floor. I attempted to rescusitate the drive (lol, sounds so silly now that I think about it. There was no way in hell I could have done it.) to retrieve my data from it, but it was all for naught. And to make matters worse, Seagate would send me a new drive for free (so they say), but charge over $1,700 to recover any data from it. I assume that figure is based on how much actual data the drive can hold, which in my gloriously messed up case is 500 Gigabtyes, and how much time and effort they can somehow manage to squeeze out of my pockets to do anything. Obviously, being broke and unemployeed, I said fuck it and sent it off for a new one. I just hope I can get another one back in exchange.
Sigh... And the thought of tracking down and downloading everything again makes me feel ill to my stomach whenever I think about it. I'll manage somehow.

I'm also trying to keep my spirits up by not thinking about it... Ugh, and it's not working too well.

Oh... and here's a sneak peek on what else I'm trying to work on. It's really nothing more than screen capture of a character I've fallen head over heels for, but you should get the idea of where I'd like the final product to look like! Enjoy!