Last night I installed Leopard on my Macs and I gotta say, it’s way easier to install than Windows. I have installed Windows many many times, and it takes a good day to get everything installed and set up like I like it. I did both my Macs in half that time.

I bought my first Mac shortly after Tiger came out, so this was my first OS X install. This was a good time to upgrade my hard drives also, so both installs were on fresh drives. I hooked the old drives up via USB and OS X was able to bring all my data and programs right into the new install. I couldn’t believe how slick it was. I can even boot off the old drives via USB and I am back to Tiger. Just like I never upgraded. Why can’t windows be this easy?

I am really liking Leopard. It is so much better than Vista. People really should look at a Mac when they are buying a new computer. They really aren’t any more expensive considering on what you get with them, and from my experience, you get way less problems too.

I will be out of town and away from the computer all weekend. So, while I am gone, how fast are you? I got 42 in 5 seconds.

Scott Beale over at Laughing Squid blogged about The Sneeze testing out Domino’s new online ordering system. Apparently you can select where you want each topping on your pizza. Either whole, left, right, or none. You can even select no cheese and no sauce. Over at The Sneeze they ordered a “None Pizza with Left Beef”. Totally hilarious. Doesn’t look good at all, but at least you have the option.

If you haven’t heard yet, Gmail is starting to roll out IMAP support. IMAP is awesome. It’s what I use with my email accounts on my server. Most people these days probably use POP mail. With POP mail you log into the server and download the mail. Then you have it on your computer, but it is no longer on the server. With IMAP you log on and view your mail on the server. It stays on the server so you can access that mail from multiple computers. You delete an email and it’s deleted on all the computers. It’s pretty slick. The one thing you have to worry about is sever space though. I like to keep my email boxes on my clients pretty clean. I only keep email I know I am going to need. For this reason I don’t think I am going to use Gmail’s IMAP access.

Yes, I use Gmail also. I don’t think I have ever given out my Gmail address though. I forward a copy of all my mail to my Gmail account. This gives me access to my mail anywhere, and it keeps a nice archive of all my emails. If I deleted something I need, I know it is only a Gmail search away. I use the handy “Send mail as” feature to send my mail as my regular email address. I don’t think anybody can tell if I am sending my mail from Thunderbird, Apple Mail, or Gmail.

I was all excited about IMAP support in gmail, but after further consideration, I think I am going to stick to my current system. I like my email archived in Gmail, but I also like nice clean empty inboxes. IMAP is great. I am sure lots of people will use it, I know I would if I didn’t have it already on my server.

I am not a big fan of roller coasters. My wife loves them, so I usually end up riding all of them. My secret is to close my eyes and sit back and relax. It works pretty good, but there are only a few coaster that I have actually seen what was going on. This site has a bunch of videos of roller coaster rides. I was tempted to close my eyes while I watched them, but I managed to keep my eyes open.

I finally found the time to watch Zeitgeist. It was an interesting movie. I am not sure I believe everything in the movie, but it does make a person think.

So yesterday I talked about using OpenDNS to block unwanted sites. I currently use it to block known phishing sites. Another way to block sites is to add them to your hosts file, and point them to 127.0.0.1, your localhost.

Your hosts file tells your computer the IP address of websites. If you tell them their IP is 127.0.0.1, it will block them because that IP points to your computer.

This is a good way to block spyware, phishing, and any other malicious sites. But where do you find what sites to block? Right here. This site has a HUGE hosts file that block just about everything bad. You just download it, do a search on your computer for a hosts file with no extension, and replace it with the one you downloaded.

The one downside is that it blocks most ads too. Now a lot of people might like that too, but I don’t really like blocking ads because that’s how people make their money. I actually click on ads if I see them on people’s sites that I want to help out. For this reason I only chance the hosts file on my Windows computer. I am not to worried about spyware and viruses on my Macs.

Not much going on around here lately. The last two days I have been working on backing my computers and getting ready for upgrades. The new version of Ubuntu, Gutsy Gibbon was released today. I am in the process of updating my Linux system now. Hopefully their servers aren’t getting hammer too bad. Ubuntu is so nice. Linux has come a long way.

Next Friday Mac OS X Leopard comes out. I will be out of town over the weekend, but I will be upgrading my Macs the following week. I have never installed an Apple OS, but something tells me it’s going to be a hell of a lot easier than installing Windows is.

I found a nice piece of backup software for Windows called Cobain Backup. My Windows machine now gets backed up to my NAS every night. I have been waiting on a Mac solution until I see how Time Machine works in Leopard. I wish Internet speeds in the US weren’t so damn slow. I would love to backup my stuff online also, but it’s not really practical with my slow ass upload speeds.

Another thing I have been playing around with is OpenDNS. It was super simple to set up, and adds a lot of cool features. I now have the ability to block any site from all computers on my network. I am not going to block anything, but it’s cool to be able to do it. This would be a really good solution for a parent. I am just blocking phishing sites currently. Another cool thing about it is that it can correct typos. If I accidentally type cm instead of com it corrects it for me. Pretty slick. I can also set up keywords to websites. I set up g for Google. I just type g and bingo, I am at Google. The best part of it is that it works on every system on my network.

Ok, I guess I have been up to a lot of stuff.

So I am sitting here watching football and heard a big loud boom. The Li-ion battery for my camcorder just exploded. It melted the cary strap on our camera case, put a hole in the curtains, and melted and burt a few spots on our carpet. Something tells me this isn’t normal. Now I am a little scared of Li-ion batteries. No more leaving the cell phones or laptops charging overnight.

Last weekend the video card in my computer fried. I don’t know how it happened. It must have gotten too dusty or something. I have tried it in a few different computers and I get the same garbled mess on the screen. I am currently using a crappy ten-year-old video card I had laying around. The crappy resolution is driving me nuts, so today I went shopping on Newegg. I went a little crazy. I got a video card, more RAM and a bigger hard drive for my MacBook, and a little portable surge protector. My MacBook will be all set for Leopard when it comes out later this month.