Tomato!

I wanted to take a few minutes and post about Tomato Firmware which I’ve installed on my Linksys wireless router. Since my router much like some of the linksys routers uses open source technology these things are able to be hacked with better software, all which is totally legal. Of course this voids any warranty one might have but when you pay £40 for a router I don’t think you’re worrying too much about a warranty. With the Tomato Firmware installed my £40 wireless router turns into a £400 wireless router. It provides things like VPN capability, DDNS, bandwidth monitoring/Usage Graphs, QoS, various wireless and general LAN tools, and enterprise grade wireless security. I’ve also found it to be much more stable than the DD-WRT

firmware most people, myself included, have been putting on their routers.

I’ll touch on a few of the things I like most. Like I said before it’s stable. The DD-WRT firmware just seemed to lock up all the time on me, it also was kicking my parents computer off the network all the time. Since adding the new firmware to the router I’ve to have a complaint from them in that department. The wireless security features are top notch. It allows everything from WEP (why?) to WPA 1 and 2, using Pre-Shared-Keys or a radius server if you really need that kind of security. It also allows for mixed modes, as in allowing WPA clients and WPA 2 clients, with the highest of encryption schemes for you to choose from. My current setup is in WPA/WPA2 Personal mode using TKIP /AES encryption. This way I can connect to the network with WPA 2 using AES encryption and my parents, who’s wireless card is lacking in the security features, to connect with WPA using TKIP encryption. I’ve been outside most of the day and haven’t dropped a connection yet with the router all the way on the other side of the house. Even using the highest encryption doesn’t seem to effect anything. If range was the problem I could always increase the power to the antenna, another feature provided by the Tomato firmware.
One more thing before I go. I wanted to mention the bandwidth monitor/graphs provided by the router. This feature allows one to view current, daily, monthly, yearly graphs and charts of all bandwidth used. The downside to this feature is that if you reboot the router for any reason, power loss, your parents think unplugging and plugging the machine back in will make their Internet work, whatever the reason, you’ll lose all your logs. Word to the wise, backup your current logs via the handy backup feature on the router before changing your logs to be stored on a share. Luckily I thought to do this, because current logs aren’t transferred when changing where they are stored. In addition, there’s a check box under where you select where to store your logs, make sure that is checked to create a new storage file on your share. Once that is done just restore the backup you made previously and you’re good to go.

Well that’s what I’ve been researching this month.

Freeride Mountain Bike Jumps

I've taken a real interest in Mountain-biking over the past few months, not to the extent of these guys though...holy crap!

Capiiiital

This week I've been to visit our glorious capital, for a course with work unfortunately. Although it has been a good course and nearing the end of it I can say that it's an area of development I'd like to pursue.
One thing I noticed when arriving in London was just how extremely chaotic it is, I mean the rush at lunchtime, you'd think we'd had the 4 minute warning and I think I will be having nightmares about the tube for the next 10 years hehe. I can see why people visit though, it's quite a site when you're walking through and looking at the attractions, in my case without looking where I'm going but that's another story.
So much so I will definately be returning to really go over the place with a fine tooth comb, but in the company of the girlfriend, which I have missed like mad being down here on my tod and can't wait until I get back on Friday to give her a hig bug, or something like that :)

Anyhow that's what I've been up too this week.

Pint of blood anyone?

So I went to give blood today for my fourth donation. All was going swimmingly until I had to lay down and actually start giving, as the nurse decided the vein that has been used for the past 3 donations had a pulse, so a different one had to be selected. A little weird I though as I've never had any problems giving from that one before, but I kept schtum and let her continue.
She found one just to the right and started to drain me of my livelyhood...err blood and then the fun started. Firstly the machine was malfunctioning so the blood had to be measured by weight and not by the computer as usual, then my blood didn't want to come out of this new vein so they thought it would be good to jiggle the needle about (ow!) which did bugger all to help and just plain hurt. The problem was two pieces of tight tape that were holding the valve to my arm restricting the flow, which is nice to know...

Needless to say it was an absolute nightmare and I sometimes wonder why I bother to donate, when you get nothing apart from a large bruise :(

I will however continue, as no matter what people say it does make you feel like you've done something that will possibly save a life.

Noah takes a photo of himself every day for 6 years.

Thought this was an amazing video, just goes to show how much you can change, or not in 6 long years. Freaky.

May!

Well it's been a quiet month, I've been putting in a good few hours on the Snowbourn server (LoTR Online) which is still really enjoyable, mostly down to the excellent game community and the fun in gaming with someone (Girlfriend ^_^) . It does do a great job of making time fly too, a whole afternoon can dissapear so quickly, but it is good fun.

Apart from the gaming, not alot has been happening. I will get back to you soon.

7 Days in.

Well I have completed my 7 day free trial of Lord of the Rings Online and I am impressed. I mean if you after a mainlyPvP; 40 man raid focussed MMO then I don't think this one's for you, but if you do enjoy some really nice story driven questing, smooth graphics and an extremely friendly and helpful community then wait no more!
I do enjoy playing the game, and the fact I've got my better half playing too adds to that enjoyment as you're never questing on your tod, which can and will put you to sleep if you do it for too long. However, I do miss the PvP elements of DAoC days, which do make an MMO much more appealing to me atleast and I think it would be nice to have that choice.
I think I shall be giving Age of Conan a try come October '07, with it's PvP orientated style and most definately dabbling with Warhammer Online come '08. In the mean time though I shall continue with LotRO.

So that's what I've been up to the past week.

Biscuit Rap

Two Pints at it best, this is side splittingly funny. Enjoy.

A WoW beater?

OK, so after having a brief (ok 7 months) dabble in the that well known MMO World of Warcraft, finding it to be very monotonous and all in all quite boring, unless of course you have a spare 12 hours a day to create that "perfect" group, and wander through high level dungeons that really does make time seem like an after thought I decided it wasn't for me.
Now I'm reasonably settled in my new abode with my girlfriend, Stacey (she'll love the mention) I though it would be a good time to check out some of the new, appealing to me MMO's that are due for release in the coming weeks/months.
Enter Lord of the Rings Online, which is an RPG based on the amazing Tolkien novels. At first I was a little scepticle as it is being created by Turbine, who put together D&D Online, which has bombed but I kept looking through the reviews, videos and screenshots. It's due for public release the 20th April and I must say I'm rather looking forward to it.
It does not bring any new real innovative features apart from MvP (Monster vs Player combat) where you can take the form of mobs and dish out damage on the good guys (I mean, who wouldn't want to become an Orc and bludgeon a Hobbit, or is that just me ^_^), but it does look stunning and graphically leaves WoW at the start line.
Just from reading a number of promising reviews and looking at all the media that is available I think I will give it a go! At least until Warhammer Online is out.

For more info, videos, screenshots and lots more I'd advise you to visit the official LotR Online site at - clicky

In a house far, far away!

Hey one and all, I thought I better show you I'm still here. Just over 2 and a half weeks have passed now, everything is going brilliantly well and I must say, it's bloody fantastic being a home owner.

The first mortgage payment and a raft of other debits have now left the building....well been debited from our account, but it's horrible seeing all your "hard" earned cash dissapear just like that hehe.

The only downsides I can see sofar is the lack of money you have but then again you do have a house to show and 'they' say you can't get a better investment that a house. Secondly the raft of chores that you have to do to even keep the house in any kind of order, I mean the girlfriend does the majority, and fantastically well I may add, but I try to chip in with what I can - some washing up here and hoovering there. It all helps I guess.

Wahey! We're in.

So I and the girlfriend moved in to our new abode on Friday, although we didn't get the keys until 3:30 that afternoon so we had rather a boring wait. The remainder of Friday evening consisted of going back and forth like yo-yo's transferring belongings from our "old" homes to our "new" home!

Saturday and Sunday were the killers, I'm pretty sure I shifted more furniture and appliances over the weekend to fill 20 houses, but at least I don't need to do it again...thank god.

3 days have now rolled by and we haven't had a single domestic yet, so things are looking promising. We've been eating lots of food that doesn't require refrigeration of any sort, but it's suprising what you can rustle up...role on Friday's fridge delivery I say.

All in all it's been quite surreal and I don't think it has actually sunk in that we actually own an entire house, I guess the penny will drop soon enough though.

Snooker - The highs and lows

So I've been playing a lot of Snooker for the last couple of months; bought a half decent cue, a towel, the whole shabang, and been practising with a friend who's pretty handy. I've had the highs and lows, but gradually been getting better and just last week felt all the practise had been paying off and was moving forward.

It then happened; I woke up this morning, came to work and went for a few games at lunchtime and then the madness began! The most basic of pots seemed impossible and it was like I was cueing with a liquorish stick.

It's times like these when you feel like the game is against you, when even the "easy" pots don't drop and you wonder what's the point in continuing. I was in this mind set this afternoon and after the 43rd ball did not drop I wanted to pack up and go home.

I have decided to put it down to having and "off day" and shall continue to grind away and try to progress myself (well I have spent hard earned cash on the accessorise so have to at least give it a while longer).

I will stick with it and report back how I am getting on, watch this space!

UFC Knockouts

Just for you Mr Berry

MMO's

Well, we have a plethora of MMORPG's either now out or on the horizon, but which one to play - it's a question that has plagued man for, well...about 20 minutes.

On the one hand we have the current titles out at the moment, namely DAoC, WoW which are seasoned pro's in the MMO genre and then there's Vanguard, which has been out about 3 weeks and Warhammer Online that is due in quarter three 2007.

Each have their own pro's and con's, but Vanguard seems to be offering a few unique elements including extremely expansive lands, stunning graphics and a diplomacy profession, but limited RvR (Realm vs Realm). I am however leaning towards Warhammer, which boasts a mass of classes to choose from including my beloved Orc and full scale seige PvP, which sounds immence.

"RvR combat takes place on three fronts where ancient foes wage an unending war – Dwarfs vs. Greenskins, High Elf vs. Dark Elf, and Empire vs. Chaos." - W.A.R official site.

I know I'm going to end up at least giving Vanguard a go as there are many a month ahead before Warhammer Online is released unfortunately. Nonetheless I really can't wait, it is shaping up to be something spectacular.

Home Sweet Home

So me and my girlfriend are moving in to our first house soon, exciting stuff I'm sure you'll agree. There have been a few obstacles during the purchase; mainly due to certain individuals at the top end of the chain not pulling their weight, but lets not dwindle it's nearly complete now.

Honestly though I am really excited, it's a little of "going in to the unknown" and we won't have much spare cash, but I'd much rather look back in 5 years and be in the position where we have payed off a chunk of mortgage and we don't have to answer to anyone (to some extent) than still be living with me folks.

My only concern is how long will it take us to get broadband and Sky TV hooked up ^_^.