Darkling

Hmmm, by raising taxes on Oil Producers, do they REALLY think they're going to get lower gas prices out of this?!?

Yeah I just installed Ewido in Safe Mode with network support, since on that computer, I can't get on the internet anymore in regular mode and it found a TON of stuff that none of the other spyware programs have found, but I have to wait until I switch it to normal mode to see if it's going to clean it. If this doesn't work, I'm just going to have to re-install, which means resetting all my keys again.. that really sucks. This was the first time that I ran one of my computers without Panda in 3 years, and the Virus / Spyware programs have gotten WAY more sophisticated than they used to be.

Tried Lavasoft, but it got stuck on one "RootKit" and couldn't remove it. The Rootkit would then reinfect the machine over and over again. I would REALLY like to Reinstall Panda, it's the only product I've ever used that gets EVERYTHING out, but I can't figure out what registry settings One Care left behind that won't allow Panda to install again. I'll give Spybot a shot. How is AVG against Spyware and Trojans?

I decided to give Windows One Care, Anti-Virus and Anti-Spyware a try to see if it can compete with Panda, McAfee and Norton, so I ran a full sweep on one of my computers, uninstalled Panda and installed One care on one of my computers. At first everything seemed fine, ran the "tune up wizard" where it went through all the paces and seemed to keep the computer up to date. About a month later, I tried playing UC Gold on that computer (only a 2Ghz, UCAWA not too smooth on it) and man it was SUPER SLOOOOOWWW. Looked at the processes running and recognized some spyware, so I ran the One Care Tune up Wizard again and after a couple of hrs, It reported back that everything was OK and the computer was fully protected, and yet ALL the Spyware processes were still there! I went ahead and uninstalled it and tried to install Panda, but it left a mess in the Registry and Panda thought it was still installed, so Panda would not install. Thought OK, let me Reinstall One Care then Uninstall again, hopefully this time it will do a better job of cleaning itself up... No luck. (in the meantime I'm dealing with a Popup every 5 seconds from all the Spyware and Popup Generators that One Care left behind... Everything LOOKED ok, because it was blocking this stuff, but it didn't prevent the actuall processes from being installed.) Finally, installed McAfee Security Suite, and it cleaned up the vast majority of it. Panda would have done a better job, but oh well. Moral of the story. If you don't want your computers to get HEAVILY infected with Viruses, Trojans, Popup Generators and Spyware.... DO NOT USE ONE CARE!!! Total Spyware removed by McAfee... 52 Total Trojans removed by McAfee... 38 Total Viruses removed by McAfee... 12 All from a computer that just hours ago was "Protected" by One Care!

anyone??

Well, I can't find my UC AWA book right now, but in the UC Book, on page 75, it's all right there.

Already have UCAWA on my other machine, but on this machine I have UCG, I like it better for longer campaigns, since it doesn't seem to slow down quite as much after I capture a few stations. By the way, what's your preference on Video Cards... ATI or Nvidia?

Also, any chance on getting the FMOD Ex audio ported over to UCG (like it was for UCAWA)?

quote:Originally posted by Yurameki Daishun: quote:Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr: quote:Originally posted by Yurameki Daishun: I thought they were supposed to keep most of the AI gained up till the last time they launched?? ...and you read that where? In every forum I found about cloning, and in the original BCM manual which I still have in my basement, or maybe it was the BCMG manual, one or the other. As far as I know by your posts and the writings they incrementally save their info for the next cloning over time. Am I wrong? Do my people become the such everytime they die? It mostly makes me angry that they died for no reason with no hostiles in the system with a perfect plane just while hyperjumping.... You sure he didn't run out of Power? You need to keep an eye on Power reserves, since the Life Support system requires it. Also, you're wrong about the AI thing, they're as fresh as new recruites every time you clone a new one.

My Nephew wants me to buy him a DX9 Video card for his B-day. I noticed on Outpost that they have a Radeon 9550 and a Gforce 6200LE for 50 bucks each. Anyone know which is the better deal?

I was screwing around with Divx Audio Codecs on my machine with UC Gold. Now when I try to play UC Gold, it barely moves and the sound skips like crazy. I had a similar problem with Freelance before and set the Fraunhaser Codec to the #1 position, and that seemed to fix the problem. I'm wondering, what is the optimal codec to have in the #1 position for UC Gold.

quote:Originally posted by Wolferz: Yup, and Shell Oil reported a second quarter profit of 7.62 billion dollars. They must have gotten a much better tax cut than the average taxpayer. Do you think Mr Bush and his buddies hold stock in Shell? 3 Years ago, when you were critisizing Bush for the tax cuts. you complained that he wrote checks to the tune of 7 Billion Bucks, while cutting taxes. A lot of people on that thread figured that the Economic Stimulus Package, amounted to a handout to the Rich and wouldn't help anyone but them. 3 years later, the "economic pie" has grown roughly 20%, unemployment is lower than it's been since the 50's. Debt held by the public amounted to 37 percent of GDP, 10 basis points lower than the average held by "The Great Debt Eliminator", Clinton! Also, the cost of servicing that debt has gone from 3% of GDP during the Clinton years, to half that (1.5%) at the end of 2005. So with all this economic good news, I have one question for you. Are you ready to admit that you were wrong?

Not all of us have access to that article.. a Quote? At any rate, Iran, which is primarily ruled by the Supreme Council (a bunch of Muslim Cleric's), believes that the US is the "Great Satan". Only after the "Great Satan" is destroyed, will Allah send the final Massiah (the 12 Iman or something like that). So if ANYONE has ANY doubt that Iran would not be willing to use a Nuclear Arsenal against us, they're sadly mistaken. If you FERVENTLY believed that by killing your "Evil" neighbor, you would usher in heaven on earth, wouldn't YOU do it? You probably would, well this is what they believe, and they believe it wholeheartedly. To them, WE are the evil neighbor, and if they kill us, if they destroy us, they will usher in heaven on earth, a WorldWide Islamic State that will give them peace and prosperity for 1000 years. If there's even a chance they are close to developing one, we need to move NOW to destroy them, before they destroy us.

He's been spending WAY too much time at MSNBC.

In the 11 quarters since the Bush tax cuts, the US economy has added 2.2 TRILLION Dollars, roughtly the same size as the ENTIRE Chinese economy! So much for the Chinese economy overtaking the US.

quote:Originally posted by Wolferz: Bottom Line. If we don't enforce all of our laws,then we shouldn't enforce any of them. Can you say Anarchy? Many times laws are passed in an emotional moment. Many of the Immigration laws that were passed, were passed because companies were importing people as cheap labor to work in the factories, displacing American Workers. Problem is the US government realized that these "Illigals" play a vital role in the economy, filling Jobs that would otherwise go unfilled and THAT is the reason they turn a blind eye to them. The prudent thing would be to find some way of legalizing this activity, as Bush is trying to do, but you have emotional people weighing in that we should send them all back, we should throw them in jail, yadi, yadi, yadi, and of course we end up with the current impasse.

quote:Originally posted by aramike: quote:Oh and I ALMOST FORGOT, I used to manage a Home Depot, so I still have a lot of friends over there.Dude, is there anything you DON'T do or haven't done? Very Little, My family was VERY poor growing up, and so I had to devise very early on how to make money. When I was 12 I started a Snow Cone business with my Mom's help, but the time I was 15 I was working in Tile Setting and also bought my first computer, A Radio Shack TRS-80, by the time I was 17 I had my own Tile setting business and earning over 40K a year. When I was 18 I was hit by a car and for the next 2 years had to go to Physical Therapy almost every day, while "retraining" my right arm and leg, during this time, I became very interested in computers and built and repaired them as a hobby, however at the time I couldn't really see how I could profit from it, so once I was physically able to, I started working at a Home Depot, within a few yrs, I was an Assistant Dept head, then Dept. Head, then Assistant Manager, then Manager, however, when Bernie Marcus decided to hand over the reigns to Arthur Blank, I didn't like the direction the company was taking, so I took my stock Options and quit, From there I got back into the Computer repair business (which I had always kept as a Hobby) but my timing was all off, since it was the time of the collapse of all things internet related and there were way too many people out of work in this field. I had to do something, so I took a job selling Advertising and within 5 yrs I was running the Company, Since the Owner wanted to leave the state, I offered to buy the company from her and she agreed, After installing Management to run the company for me, I went back to my first love (Computers), but with the Job Market getting tighter and finding employees becoming harder, a Friend of mine convinced me to partner with him in a Head Hunting Venture, leaving me with my current situation. Next year I'll be 40, HOPEFULLY, with a lot of luck, I'll hit my mark of having a Million $ in assets by then.... All of my Education has come from books that I've purchased (I have well over 100 books in my library on computers alone, plus I have more in Advertising, Marketing, Self Help - You should read Anthony Robbins, he's really good... ), so I am self made in every aspect. I'm a Republican but I don't always tow the party line, but I almost never vote Democrat... So there's my "business" life's story in a nutshell. Hehe.

quote:Originally posted by Marvin: quote:I'm also looking for semi-skilled secreterial type positions, Accounting Clerks, Accountants, Computer Techs and Programmers.Darkling, I know of two unemployed computer techs and a third who can probably be coaxed out of retirement. Not to mention my son who will be graduating and looking for work (in the same field) not too far down the time line. All are U.S. citizens. All do quality work ... and expect to be compensated likewise. What can I tell 'em about your organization? Well, first I'm located in South Florida, as for compensation, I've always been very generous in what I pay my employees, that's never been an issue with me. However, I rarely hire Tech's straight out of college or unemployed, because both usually require substantial Training or retraining, and I would prefer to pay more for someone who has the skills that I need, and the experience, than someone who's overly green. However, I am willing to take a chance with someone who is willing to learn AND is very motivated, I've taken some chances before with some of my guys and sometimes it's paid off, and sometimes it was a complete waste of time. If they're in South Florida, PM me with thier info and I'll see what I can do. quote:Originally posted by aramike: Talk about picking and choosing... quote:. On the Labor shortage... Articles like these coming from the federal reserve illustrate the point that I'm making.That article is over a year and 1/2 old. Also, you conveniently didn't comment on paragraphs such as this: The economy and its many labor markets are in constant flux, even in good times, as some employers add jobs while others shed them. Indeed, some cities still genuinely need more jobs, not workers." quote:I have 3 companies. .... Between the 3 companies I have literally hundreds of job openings, .... WHY in the world would companies like Bloomberg pay my company $25000.00 to find them Programmers? And that's just ONE example.I find a lot of that very difficult to believe because, if it were as bad as you say, you wouldn't be in business. Again, where do you operate and I'll show you people who are looking for positions there. Ah yes, a half a year... that was a LIFETIME ago. Whatever.... Actually, the reason I started the staffing business is because I saw how bad the Job situation was. Now, if you want to help me out, I need Programmers and Accountants in NY, Preferably with both Unix & Windows Server and Cisco experience, Flebotomists, Accountants, Secretaries & Unix Programmers in Philadelphia, Pharmacists, Commercial Bankers, Accountants with MAS 90 experience, Secretaries & Cisco Certified Techs in South Florida and for my own organization in South Florida I need Outgoing Cold Call reps, Techs with Cisco, Linux, Windows Server & Unix Experience, a Personal Assistant and an office manager/Accountant with Quickbooks & Mas 90 Experience (Since I'm switching). My office is in Deerfield Beach close to the Palm Beach county line. As for the rest of the stuff, let's just agree to disagree, I just feel that the existing "Quotas" are WAY too low, I can tell you that Unions here in Florida practically don't exist and the average Joe (or Jose) in construction is still pulling down some serious green, it's not about finding cheap labor around here, it's about finding it at all. When my house was under construction, I saw all kinds of guys coming here doing the construction, and when I mentioned something to the supervisors, they said that they simply can't find ANYONE to do the work, and so they have to hire these subrontracters who usually hire illegals, they just simply have no other choice. And this is from DR Horton, "America's Largest Homebuilder" Also, I would say that most of my American Indian Friends would have to disagree with some of your statements, but that's OK, Like I said, we'll just agree to disagree on this. Oh and I ALMOST FORGOT, I used to manage a Home Depot, so I still have a lot of friends over there. If you walk into the average Home Depot these days, you'll find 1 person handling 2 and 3 departments. It's not because they don't want to hire anyone, it's because they CAN'T FIND anyone. Same for Lowes, Same for Walmart, Same for Target. I don't know what store you're "Friend" runs, but I'm talking about stores that normally hire at least 100 to 200 people that are literally running at 50% capacity. An old friend of mine that quit Home Depot to run a Super Walmart here in Coral Springs, told me that he needed to hire 30 Cashiers in addition to another 30 to 50 Staff, and he's pretty much hiring almost anyone who will fill out an application. [ 06-18-2006, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: Darkling ]

1. On the Labor shortage... Articles like these coming from the federal reserve illustrate the point that I'm making. I have 3 companies. A Telemarketing company, that is SEVERELY short Staffed, even though I'm paying about $1000.00 a month in Employment Advertising for jobs for that company. I also have a Computer Services company, that is again very short staffed, both in the back end support services and in the front line techs and installers. In addition, I have a Headhunting service, where we help company's basically "Steal" employees from other companies, because they themselves are short staffed. Between the 3 companies I have literally hundreds of job openings, so when you tell me that there are tons of unemployed people, I just don't see it. Keep in mind that I'm looking for unskilled workers in telelmarketing, which pays about $10.00 an hr to start, but most make about $15-25 an hr. I'm also looking for semi-skilled secreterial type positions, Accounting Clerks, Accountants, Computer Techs and Programmers. Pretty much the full spectrum from low end to high end, and both my company and the companies I work with pay employees TOP dollar, we're not looking for exploitative wages, NEVER have and NEVER will. I believe that an unhappy employee is an unproductive employee and I won't have that in my organizations, nor would I ever promote that. Also, IF THERE WASN'T a labor shortage, then WHY do you go to Home Depot and see HUGE signs that say that they're hiring. Why do you see help wanted signs all over the mall when you go shopping there. Why do you see almost EVERY US based website not only showing what they have, but also a Career section showing the job openings they have? And lastly, WHY in the world would companies like Bloomberg pay my company $25000.00 to find them Programmers? And that's just ONE example. quote:Originally posted by aramike: The thing is, if we lost every single illegal worker in America tomorrow, what would most likely occur is a small rise in inflation (due to undocumented workers being in the agriculture industry)..... Are you insane? The Federal reserve frets over a 1/4 Point increase or decreas in interest rates. They go crazy over a 1% rise or drop in unemployment. Yet you seem to feel that if the US lost 5% of it's workforce, it won't impact us negatively?? Where do you think our food supply comes from? Who do you think is building all those new buildings in your city? Who do you think serves you at many restuarants? If 5% of our workforce, all of a sudden, where not there, it would cause a HUGE disruption in many parts of our economy. quote:Originally posted by aramike: I'll tell you what: tell me you're city of residence and I'll bet I can find several LEGAL candidates for that position, and do so from here. Perhaps you got CHEAP labor, but that, quite frankly, is exploitative. OK, I own a staffing agency, but somehow, you have more resources than I do in finding qualified employees. Maybe I should bring you in as a partner. quote:Originally posted by aramike: The bottom line is that Social Security is FOR AMERICAN CITIZENS. .... ... Simple question: If a bank robber is captured, serves his time, comes out of prison clean, is he ENTITLED to the money he stole? ... First of all, get your facts straight, Social Security isn't only for American Citizens, it's also for Legal Aliens that are here and have paid into the system for at least 10 Yrs. Second, the Robber will get 40K a year allocated to him while in Prison, so why shouldn't the Alien get his Social Security counted towards him, that HE PAID FOR!!!. Third, Slavery was once legal, Discrimination was once legal, Beating your wife was once legal, Child Labor was once legal... Just because something is on the books as a law, doesn't make it right. Simple Question, if a bunch of European Immigrants come over here and stole the land of the people living here, should they and their children be allowed to keep it? Oops, sorry that already happened, and now they're trying to shut the door on anyone else who wants an opportunity, the difference is, they're not coming here to try to steal anything from you, they're coming here to WORK and send money back to their starving families back in their country, but of course, we don't care, We're rich and we DON'T want to share, we want these opporunities all to ourselves right.

quote:Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr: Nostradamus was a complete tit A big round one, or a nice pointy tit with long nips?

quote:Originally posted by $iLk: 50/49 - 11 Republicans and 39 Democrats voted to further endanger Social Security Retirement by offering payouts to people who are not citizens of this country, who have broken our laws... who is the Senate working for? Actually, what the ammendment says is that if they become legal residents, and were paying INTO Social Security BEFORE becoming legal residents, then that money they paid in, would not be forfiet, it would count towards their final calculations. When you think about it, it's actually pretty smart. First of all, we can't deny that there's a HUGE labor shortage in the US. Walk into ANY store in the US and you'll see that they're severely understaffed due to the labor shortage. The ONLY reason we havn't gone into a recession in this country, is because illegal immigrants have been filling in many of the gaps. I'm pretty sure that the guys that come and cut my lawn and take care of my shrubs are probably here illegally, at least I know they can't speak any english, and most of the restaurants that I eat at, well I'm pretty sure they are too. The Nanny I hired to take care of my Wife and son, shortly after he was born was also here illegally, but hey, I COULD NOT find someone to take care of them that was here legally, and I looked for MONTHS! The other thing is that most Illegals normally don't care that they're getting paid under the table, and nothing is going to Social Security, because they feel that they're never going to see that money anyways. This way they will care, or at least the ones that are planning on staying here will care (over half of them go back to where they came from), and if they care, and they have a choice of 2 jobs, one that pays into Social Security and one that doesn't, they're going to go with the one that pays in, and THAT my friends, is good for the country. Quick Factoid. In the early 1900's we were allowing over 1 Million new immigrants to come here to the US, about 1% of our population a year. These days we allow less than 700K, or around 0.26% of our population. So compared to our population, we're now letting in about 1/4th of the number we used to allow to come here. Even if we double those numbers, we're still a long way off from 1% of our population. As for all the Doomsayers who say that we're going to see 100 million new immigrants due to these bills, the only way that would happen is if: A) There were actually 100 Million poeple that wanted to come here (beleive it or not, most people that want to come here already do) and The Emergency provisions would kick in EVERY year over the next 20 years. The emergency provistions basically allows us to triple the number that are allowed in currently, if the country is in a state of super low unemployment, such as it is now. Here in Florida as an example, our unemployment rate in Broward county is UNDER 3% and statewide it's just over 3%. By the time you figure employment drift, graduates and turnover, that figure is less than 2%. How can the economy continue to grow without a labor force? Hell, I've been looking for an assistant for the past 3 months and I still can't find one! I can tell you this much, if I can't find help, I have to cut back on my expansion plans, and if I cut back on my expansion plans, that means that I don't get the bigger office, I don't buy the additional furniture, I don't hire the new contractors, I don't buy the extra computers, and I don't pay the additional taxes on the additional revenure I would have brought in WITH The expansion. There's a HECK of a lot of economic activity that gets shut down if you can't find any help. One of my good friends had to cut back on a restuarant expansion he had planned because he doesn't have enough waiters now, so he figures, what's going to happen when he has all the additional seats, and no one to wait on them? Again, economic expansion coming to a grinding halt.

quote:Originally posted by Voli0: Although you have point in several occasions, your reasoning in some parts is, at least to say, feeble. quote: ...if you take all the wealth in the world and re-distribute it equally between everyone. Within 5 years 95% of that wealth will end up with the people who had it before. If whole world's capital(capital is not just money, it's factories, land and even the information you posses) would be redistributed equally between all people, who can say for certainty that most of it would end up to the same people it belonged originally?..... Who can say for certain? There was a study commissioned by one of the big Brokerage Houses, in conjunction with a large Advertising Agency, I think it was the Lehman Brothers and Adage, but I can't be certain, since I read this about 15 years ago. Basically BOTH of them took a control group of 20 of their Top guys, all earning at least a half million a year, and swapped thier accounts with 20 midlevel guys who where earning close to 80K a year, which at the time was slightly above the average for both brokers and Ad reps. Within less than a year, the 20 Top Guns at each agency was back on top earning half million or more, and within less than 2 years, all but 2 of the 20 midlevel guys were back to earning an average of 80K a year. Wealth has nothing to do with luck. Most people that are wealthy didn't inherit it, most of them made it themselves. Those that did inherit it and have kept it, learned the lessons that their parents have taught them, however, most multi million dollar inheritances don't last more than a generation, because the kids just don't know what to do to continue making more than they're spending. Once a person learns to aquire wealth, they will continue to aquire wealth regardless of their situation. Here's one other interesting factoid. Americans have more disposable income than any other country in the world. Also, Americans have a longer average workweek, than any other industrialized country in the world. Also, the average person in the US earning more than 100K a year, works an average of 70Hrs. a week, compared to 33.8 Hrs. a week for the average employee. What that should tell you is that wealth is directly related to how hard you work. There seems to be a myth floating around that if you're making the big bucks, somehow you're getting off easy. Nothing can be further from the truth.

quote:Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr: quote:Originally posted by Darkling: Damn, and I just had to reactivate my game from switching Hard Drives and upgrading the Memory. A motherboard switch is definitely going to trigger another Activation, and the thing said I had Zero reactivations left. So? Just follow the instructions for requesting a new cd-key. Oh, thought I had to pay for more than 2 activations. Thanks.. I'll contact you after I upgrade, probably be in a couple of months.

I record a lot of TV Shows. Battlestar Galactica, Stargate SG1, All Shows Star Trek and a bunch of stuff for my kids, like Sesame Street, Barney and the like. In addition, my entire movie collection is stored in Divx Format on my hard drives, so the kids don't scratch em all up. So far I have around a half a Terrabyte stored up on 2 networked Hard Drives and it looks like I'm going to have to add a third drive very soon. What's nice is that I can watch any show, any movie in any room in the house - since every room in my house has a computer, except the bathrooms. If I could find a waterproof computer, I'd probably put one there too! Point is, Movies take up A LOT of space, as for Pr0n, my filters and parental controls, take care of all that noise, plus all the kids rooms computers automatically shut down and night and cannot be logged into again until the next morning. When you're a Computer Guru, you can set things up to work the way you want, hehe..

quote:Originally posted by LostInSpace: quote:Originally posted by cutterjohn: I just hope that this doesn't drive AMD out of [the CPU] business or implies that K8L may be earlier than expected and with better performance than I think it will be able to put up from what I've seen of the design direction. AMD is in for a world of hurt. What makes you think this would drive AMD out of the CPU business? I've spoken to a few stock people and they say Intel is the one that's been hurting for some time now not AMD. If anything, this might make a lot of people who wouldn't ordinarily buy an AMD do so. This is the way the freemarket is suppose work when it's done properly. The consumer benefits. The only time stuff like this drives people out of business is when there are way too many players in too small of a space. Like decades ago when over 100 different companies made Refridgerators (Even GM was in that business) and it consolidated down to 3 Major players in the US or like in the computer business, where there used to be THOUSANDS of different companies building computers, which is now down to a handfull of big ones and maybe 100 or less "Boutique" outfits. However, in the processor business, there's only 2 real players, AMD & Intel, so I REALLY doubt that they would slash their own throats in this game.