Biggs' Zone

A Geek's Cogitations, Conjectures and other Cortical Experiences

Tech Talk: Upgraded to Windows 10

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On August 3, 2015

In Tech Talk, Technology

Windows_logo_-_2012.svg_-755x755Well I decided to upgrade my home PC to Windows 10. I have a desktop (not a fan of laptops) so I should never have to see the hideous start screen again. It’s a pretty bold move for me to upgrade to a new version of Windows so soon after its official release. Normally wouldn’t have done it had I not played around with it in the tech preview. Usually I wait until all the install and upgrade bugs have been worked out but there were so many articles (from trusted sources) that said the upgrade is pretty painless I went for it. I had some trepidation because I was worried about which of my previously installed programs and “apps” would and would not work once the upgrade was complete. I really only ran into one issue.

So here is my big tip for upgrading to Windows 10, especially if you are running Windows 7 and you skipped 8 (which is why everyone should have done). If you have any kind of VPN software installed (ex: Cisco AnyConnect) make sure either A) its up to date and compatible with Windows 10 or B) you uninstall it completely. I had done neither of these things and spent the better part of my weekend trying to figure out why my internet wouldn’t work properly – I could only browse secure (https) websites. It was frakkin’ annoying! Apparently even Windows Update doesn’t use a secure connection. Once I completely uninstalled AnyConnect all my internet problems went away.

The other thing I would recommend is the obvious suggestion – Back-Up Important Files! If something were to go terribly wrong with the upgrade you may have to format and reinstall which means all your data would be lost. Use Dropbox, One Drive, Google Drive, USB thumb drives, whatever you need to make sure you have copies of files you don’t want to lose. This should always be the first thing you do anyway.

I would also heed all the articles out there (here’s one) about what to shut off in Windows 10 to maintain your privacy, especially if you are upgrading a desktop computer. You don’t need to send your personal and location information to Microsoft to “enhance your computer and/or browsing experience”. Also, despite all the brouhaha that Mozilla was causing, there is a way to maintain your default browser while upgrading (not that resetting your default browser is terribly difficult to begin with). Do not select Express when you are setting up Windows 10 (after the upgrade completes). This is what all those articles will tell you to do anyway to toggle the various privacy settings. One of the custom options is to choose default programs and you can uncheck Edge.

Unless you want to use Edge, which is entirely up to you. Personally I think its horrid and plain. It doesn’t feel like a modern browser although it does perform better than Internet Explorer (Encyclopedia Britannica performed better than IE), but I still prefer Chrome or FireFox.

I hope your upgrade/install experience goes well and feel free to ask me questions and I can try to answer and/or help.

/cheers

minion_keboard_smI could get so much more accomplished if I only had minions!

WoW: Thoughts On Warlords of Draenor

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On July 31, 2015

In Gaming, World of Warcraft

warlords_of_draenor_the_warlords

It never really occurred to me that prior to the launch of patch 6.2 that it would be the final patch of this expansion. Usually the final patch has more pomp and circumstance so those of us a little behind have a better idea of how much time we have left in the expansion. For example, I am substantially behind! I haven’t been past the first wing of Blackrock Foundry (in LFR) nor have I even completed any of the quests from the instances for the cores needed for the legendary ring.

In fact I may just kick this off by talking about that ring. Why a ring?? Why did they pick something that you can’t see as a legendary?? I realize that acquiring a legendary greatly improves your stats in a fight but let’s be honest, a majority of us want to be able to see the fruits of our labor (and not as a visualization proc). I mean at least you could see your cloaks (if you had them toggled on) and the visualizations were pretty cool when they would proc but perhaps not necessarily required. I’ve been a little curious as to why they suddenly decided to stop creating legendary weapons when that seemed to be the standard choice for legendary gear since Vanilla. I don’t see the harm in doing a weapon legendary every expansion, especially if they are not going to let us transmog legendary weapons (which goes back to why we like to be able to SEE our legendary pieces). By the way, not being able to transmog legendary weapons is a pet peeve of mine — *hint* *hint* Blizzard.

The story this expansion was ok; time-travel is such a fickle concept to play with. When you have 7+ million players, I guarantee many of us are going to question AMG It's Pepe!!!!how the actions of our characters would affect the present day. I imagine Blizzard will design some kind of coy explanation as to why nothing has been altered in the present day. I mean, we all know the real reason this expansion was created was so Blizzard could create encounters with the heroes of Warcraft’s past. I will admit I was even taken in by this concept, but now I’m not as entranced with it and perhaps this is because I have barely set foot in a raid at all this expansion.

The garrison is my absolute favorite part of this expansion. I love how it has a little customization and gives you a calm place to hearth to at the end of your adventures. I love how it incorporates your professions and the followers are really cool, especially when you can recruit familiar faces (i.e. Admiral Taylor, Millhouse Manastorm, Leeroy Jenkins, etc). My garrison will be something I will miss more than any other component of the game for all the expansion once we move on to the next chapter. I really hope that Blizzard either finds a way to “teleport” our garrison or gives us something that will be better (*cough*player housing*cough*).

I would probably grade this expansion about a “B”, primarily because of the garrison. If they hadn’t added something like garrisons I probably would have graded this one much lower. The expansion feels rushed and poorly assembled. Perhaps that would be the benefit of creating a completely new zone, that is barely associated with any of the lore (like Pandaria). Granted Pandaria seemed a little “fluffy” for a game titled WARcraft, but I feel like Blizzard had to use a lot more imagination to create that world.

I’d like to know your thoughts. Please leave them in the comments.

WoW: The Sixth Expansion

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On July 29, 2015

In Gaming, World of Warcraft

anth_mapSo if you have been paying attention to the gaming news lately, or you have read my recent MMO Times post, you know that Blizzard has confirmed that they will be announcing the sixth expansion for World of Warcraft at Gamescom next week. I was really surprised that they decided to announce it at Gamescom, usually they save that kind of thing for Blizzcon, but maybe they have other plans for Blizzcon (perhaps the release date of said expansion) or perhaps Gamescom paid them an obscene amount of money to do it.

Whatever the case may be, the rumor mills will start churning and all of us will have to stew in anticipation for a whole week. So I want to take this opportunity to contribute to said rumors and discussions. I want to share my thoughts on what might be coming in the next expansion and I would really like folks to share their thoughts and theories in the comments. A couple days ago someone from the MMO Champion forums discovered a PDF that claimed Blizzard registered the azsharatrademark “Council of Glades”, although there have been several follow up posts since then suggesting that it’s a fake or some kind of obfuscation.

I wanted to say that we will finally see an expansion centered around the Emerald Dream, but I think that ship has sailed, sunk and has been swallowed whole by Moby Dick. Perhaps it might be centered around a person (Azshara, perhaps), like Arthas for Wrath of the Lich King? I do hope they pick a good story line that makes sense because I haven’t enjoyed the story since Wrath of the Lich King. I don’t know where else they could take players. We have traveled to Northrend, destroyed “the Destroyer”, fought for Pandaria and traveled back in time. What new continent or zone haven’t we been to (although Pandaria hadn’t existed in lore prior to that expansion, so maybe they will invent a new zone)? This goes back to my whole “Emerald Dream” theory as that would essentially be a different plane; or perhaps an alternate reality??

What about other forms of new content (beyond new zones)? I don’t expect a new basic class since we just had Monks added to the game in the last expansion, or a new race for the same reason.

  • We haven’t had another hero class since Wrath of the Lich King. Will we see demon hunters or high elves?
  • Will there be another profession (Inscription was the last time we had one of those)?
  • I almost want to say that player housing is a must (and the obvious progression from garrisons).

I want to go back and explore this “alternate reality” concept I mentioned. Honestly, that seems like the most natural progression from the current expansion. We have all earned followers whose future, as it was prior to Warlords of Draenor, looked quite grim (ex: Millhouse Manastorm).  Plus there is the whole “time travel ripple effect” where even stepping on a cockroach would have rippling effects through the space-time-continuum (hah! I’ve always wanted to use that phrase!!)

The problem with this “alternate reality” concept is how would you render that in a game?

What kind of coding effort must that require?

It would almost be like World of Warcraft II!

minion_keboard_smI could get so much more accomplished if I only had minions!

The MMO Times: Where Are You, Pepe??

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On July 29, 2015

In Gaming, MMO Times, MMORPG

star_wars_battlefront_headerIssue 124: The next big convention is nearly upon us, Gamescom 2015 in Cologne, Germany starts August 5th. Perhaps Pepe is hiding out in Germany and will be found at Gamescom! Or maybe Pepe has been hiding out in Windows 10 and those of us upgrading this week will finally see him! If you have no clue what I’m talking about, then clearly you either don’t play World of Warcraft or you haven’t been following along at home! Either way … PePepe!pe will be mine because he’s the coolest pet since Pengu!!

Anyway, in all seriousness we do have some pretty interesting headlines in this issue, mostly centered around Gamescom rumor mills. Blizzard, in their typical way, is teasing us all with a “mystery conference” [which isn’t much of a mystery anymore], Square Enix may have some exciting news for FF fans, and more but we probably have to wait until next week to find out. It looks like Gamescom is going to be quite the popular event in the coming week. In non-Gamescom news Microsoft and Valve are pursuing some interesting technology for gamers and I hope Tom Brady doesn’t play Champions Online.  KCGO

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13lb Pork Boston Butt

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On July 27, 2015

In Grill Master Biggs

This past weekend I took on my biggest challenge yet (figuratively and literally). We bought a 13lb pork Boston butt from Sam’s Club. Most grilling websites and pitmasters will tell you that you should allow 1 – 1 1/2 hours per pound to properly smoke pork. So 13lbs pounds means anywhere from 18-19 hours. Friday night I prepared a marinade and injected some of it into the pork butt, then I put the meat in a 2.5 gallon ziploc bag with the rest of the marinade and left it in the refrigerator until it was time to prepare it for the grill. It marinaded for about 24 hours.grilling-penguin

The best way we decided to do this was start late Saturday night, so I started the coals at 9:30pm, prepped the meat and started everything at 10:00pm. I have a temperature probe that will transmit via bluetooth to a receiver and, thankfully, it reached the bedroom. I set an alarm for every three hours to check the temperature. As long as the temperature was higher then it was at the last alarm, I just let it be.

We didn’t reach our first stall until about 6am; but after throwing some more coals on and refilling the water pan, the temperature was going back up. There wasn’t much that needed to be done throughout the day other than stoke the coals or add more to keep the temperature above 165 degrees. Around 4:30ish I took it off the grill, wrapped it in some heavy duty foil with some more brown sugar, butter and agave and let it rest for another hour (this helps the meat finish cooking).

I have to admit, with as much humility as possible, this has to have been my greatest success of smoking pork. It pulled clean off the bone (as you can see from the pictures below), and it just melts in your mouth. I couldn’t stop eating it as I was pulling it apart. Then you add some home made BBQ sauce to it and you start to have funny feelings in your special places. I don’t think I could ever top it, I just hope that I can always replicate it. Granted it is getting pretty late in the season now to have consistent weather for smoking (another month at best); so if this is the last thing I smoke for the year, then I went out on top!

Lessons Learned:

  • Take Your Time – Don’t rush it. Ever. Cook it for the full length and some if you think it needs it (based on temperature of the meat).
  • Know Your Grills Limits – I learned no matter how many coals I added, I couldn’t get the grill hotter so factor that into your cooking time.
  • Plan In Advance – Know what day you want to cook and watch the weather closely. The nicer and calmer it is, the better the cooking environment.

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Geeks and Our Eclectic Hobbies

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On July 27, 2015

In General Cogitation

blizzcon-geek-is

Chris Metzen at Blizzcon 2010 telling us what it means to be a Geek

How many geeks do you know and what hobbies do you assume they have? If you are a geek, you’re not allowed to answer that question. I’m sure when one thinks of the geeks they know they probably assume computers, video games and/or books are their hobbies. You’re probably right, those are likely among their hobbies but most of us are probably ADD or ADHD and often have far more eclectic tastes outside our [presumed] nerdy sphere.

You might actually be surprised to learn that we do have hobbies outside the typical nerdy genres and a lot of them might actually be outdoors (despite our fears of the daystar‘s brimstone). Personally I’m really into grilling (if you couldn’t tell by my frequent posts about my grilling exploits). I have other geek friends that work on their cars or are actually pretty good carpenters. Now these hobbies do come with some of our geeky idiosyncrasies. We can become quite OCD about the details of said hobby and, of course, if there is a gadget, app or any kind of tech which can be incorporated into our hobbies, well “Holy Frak” that’s an Epic Win! I know there are several geeks out there that are really into fitness (i.e. exercise, running, etc) thanks to gadgets like Fitbit. I know I probably make as much of an effort to go for a walk as I would to make time for video games and/or reading.

Most of us don’t have these other hobbies in hopes of earning awards or other accolades, we’re just into it because, in some way, they still engage our analytical mind. It’s the problem solving or puzzle of the activity that intrigues us; or maybe it’s just different from our other everyday activities (especially if we are stuck behind a computer most of the day for our jobs). It’s probably our love for technology that helps us with our hobbies; it allows us to research and adapt our solutions in hopes of perfecting each project.

Now, if you are a geek, what are some of your out-of-the-[computer]-box hobbies?

minion_keboard_smI could get so much more accomplished if I only had minions!

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