Brian's thingie on the web

Looks like this might be the best specs for a Mega Storage brick v2. although it’s not much better than the smaller 6 drive configuration.  Probably would buy 6-10 drives to start with and build out from there in phases.

For reference here is the cost breakdown… (updated with the parts I found today)

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=12190592

Storage Brick v2

Qty.
Image
Product Description
Unit Price
Savings
Total Price

3

HighPoint RocketRAID 2320 PCI Express x4 SATA II RAID Card - Retail

Model #:RocketRAID 2320

Item #:N82E16816115026

Return Policy:Standard Return Policy

In Stock

1

G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ - Retail

Model #:F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ

Item #:N82E16820231122

Return Policy:Memory Standard Return Policy

In Stock

1

NORCO RPC-4020 4U Rackmount Server Case - Retail

Model #:RPC-4020

Item #:N82E16811219021

Return Policy:Standard Return Policy

In Stock

1

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80570E8400 - Retail

Model #:BX80570E8400

Item #:N82E16819115037

Return Policy:CPU Replacement Only Return Policy

In Stock

1

MSI X58 Pro-E LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

Model #:X58 Pro-E

Item #:N82E16813130226

Return Policy:Limited Replacement Only Return Policy

In Stock

20

Seagate Barracuda LP ST32000542AS 2TB 5900 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Model #:ST32000542AS

Item #:N82E16822148413

Return Policy:Standard Return Policy

In Stock

Subtotal:
$5,112.73

(I just realized i need a video card so add $50 for a video card)

Alright, it’s been a long while since I have upgraded my storage bricks so it’s time to look at what’s out there and see if I should upgrade.  One of my bricks is made with 300GB drives and another one is built with 500GB drives so they are relatively old. 

Below is a table I built to understand the best size of drive to by to optimize my $/GB cost.  Knowing that the larger drives are more expensive always pushed me to the cheaper drives, the typical sweet spot for drives is around $120.  Anything more expensive than that it gets pricey to build out a brick, anything less than that is over paying.  But what I have found is that the largest drive on the market is generally the best price because I get more storage in the same brick because I have to buy and power fewer CPUs.

You can see from this chart I am currently paying about $1.20 over 3 years for 1GB of storage in my 300Gb brick while I would pay about $0.24/GB over 3 years for a brick with 2TB drives and even better would be the 20 drive bay brick at $0.18.  It would seem an upgrade is an order.  However the capital outlay for the 2TB brick with 20 bays is $4.6k.  The capital outlay is too large so I will have to stick to the smaller bricks.  I also wouldn’t want to have one machine with 20 drives.  I like the idea of having multiple machines for redundancy.  As an example I just had to replace the video card in my 500GB brick yesterday so machine level redundancy is nice.

While I say I wouldn’t get the 20 drive brick, that’s not completely true.  I am still on the fence sort of.  I am thinking about using it a different way.  One issue I have with my bricks right now is that upgrading drives is a big ordeal.  I have to find a place for all the data on the system while I remove all the drives and put new ones in.  One way I could fix this is to buy the 20-bay brick and only put 6 drives in it and sometime later add 6 more drives that have a higher capacity.  I could so 6 2TB drives now, 6 3TB drives later, and even later than that do 6 4TB drives.  Partially filling it and upgrading regularly means I will be on a nice rotation and will never have to worry about finding some place to put all my data so long as I have enough space to move the data to when upgrading.  Not sure that’s the best solution though.

Well yeah, until they discovered a data corruption issue for which they don't have a fix.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/946676

TECHNICAL REVISIONS

The following table lists significant technical revisions to this article.

Date
Revisions

April 3, 2007
Original publication date

December 28, 2007
Updated the article to document more information about the scenario in which this issue occurs

January 9, 2008
Updated the article to indicate that Microsoft can reproduce the issue and is currently working on a fix

The third-party products that this article discusses are manufactured by companies that are independent of Microsoft. Microsoft makes no warranty, implied or otherwise, about the performance or reliability of these products.

SYMPTOMS

When you use certain programs to edit files on a home computer that uses Windows Home Server, the files may become corrupted when you save them to the home server. This issue occurs if the following conditions are true:

•
You edit files that are located in a shared folder on the home server.

•
You use one of the following programs to edit the files or to save the files to the home server:

•
Windows Vista Photo Gallery

•
Windows Live Photo Gallery

•
Microsoft Office OneNote 2007

•
Microsoft Office OneNote 2003

•
Microsoft Office Outlook 2007

•
Microsoft Money 2007

•
SyncToy 2.0 Beta

Note You may also experience this issue when you use other programs.

Note This issue affects only Windows Home Server. This issue does not affect any other versions of Windows Server or of Windows Small Business Server.

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CAUSE

This issue may occur because of a recently discovered problem with Windows Home Server shared folders and with certain programs.

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STATUS

Microsoft is researching this problem and will post more information in this article when the information becomes available. This issue can now be reproduced by using an automated test harness. This process will help Microsoft develop a fix.
Until an update for Windows Home Server is available, we recommend that you do not use the programs that are listed in the "Symptoms" section to save or to edit program-specific files that are stored on a Windows Home Server-based system.

Back to the top

MORE INFORMATION

Before you store files on a system that is running Windows Home Server, make sure that you have a backup copy of any important program files. You can still use the Windows Home Server home computer backup process to back up and to restore files on your home computers.

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---

APPLIES TO

•
Windows Home Server

Back to the top

Keywords:

kbexpertisebeginner kbtshoot kbprb KB946676

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This is a classic example of introducing complexity can bit you.  I have hear people rave about how great it is to add drives and WHS server just adds that capacity to it's existing disk array and balances out utilized capacity.  But I have also hear how this is done internally is extremely complex.  Well, I guess it is since they have a data corruption issue with no known fix.

I am a strong believer in keeping it simple when it comes to my data.  I store all my data on Windows Server 2003 using the built-in RAID5 functionality.  While it does make me a little nervous to use Win2k3 server for doing RAID it has been around for a long time and it's impressed me a few times with how well it works.  Now if I could only find a way to buy 50TB of drives without breaking the bank.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0801/08010806panasonic32gbsdhc.asp

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0801/08010804pretec48gb.asp

Wow, this thing is thin!

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0801/08010707casioexs10.asp

not sure if I would ever get Casio…are their cameras good?

Someone tattooed this on their arm?  Is that a Halo Half-life tattoo??

http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2007/11/09/447492.aspx

Nasa has been looking to get a dog for a long time but tonight it just went past serious.  We got one.  Today at lunch a friend of ours told us about someone that was selling a litter of Golden Retrievers.  we asked her to find out if they had any puppies left and she promptly found out (wow, was she on the ball).  She also found out they had a male and female remaining so we called right away.  Well, we ended up going over there and found one dog that was just all over the place (not our type) and one that was really docile.  We quickly warmed up to the docile one, he also happened to have a really really soft coat, really nice coat and he is really red.  So we brought him home!

Now the fun part, our house is not doggie proof and we don't have any doggie stuff.  So we ran by Fred Meyer on the way home to cover us for the night with dog food, tomorrow we'll hit Petco (Nasa likes to shop there) and get the rest of the doggie stuff.

About 1/2 way home and after the both of us trying to come up with a name, Nasa said, "What should we name him?" (mind you, we had throw this question around a few times already), I immediately came back with "Jake", Jake popped into her head at the same time I said it.  So, our dog is named Jake.  I like the simple name, one syllable, not that common (not to me, anyway), and masculine.

Maybe he is tired but Jake is just laying around being a great dog.  He is whimpering a little which I am guessing is from being away from his sister and mom.  I hope he gets over that quickly, maybe I will spend a lot of time with him over the next few days to help acclimate him to our house.

What dog food should we get?  What toys are good?  What treats are good?

Yeah, that's right, I used to be a huge, I mean huge fan of HTC because their devices are so cool!  But Pantech has just out done them with the Pantech Duo.  In December of 2005 I went from a Motorola flip smartphone to the HTC PPC-6700.  I really liked this phone, it had a QWERTY keyboard, touch screen, lots of memory, miniSD slot, wireless.  I was an all around good phone.  Well, over the last 2 years I have grown to dislike it's size.  It's quite large as you can see

Since that time I have seen several phones that I would like to get but being held hostage by the 2-yr contact I signed meant I'd have to wait.  Finally I am coming up on my 2yr and started looking for a new phone.  Wow have things changed.  They are many more choices and the all the the phones are much better!

Over the last two years I have learned my preferences (in order of priority):

• ActiveSync - gotta have my home exchange account sync'ing on the phone.
• Small - I can't handle a larger phone, the 6700 is just too big. I need something a little shorter, narrower, and thinner.  After carrying this thing around for 2 years it's started to bother me a little.
• Web browsing - I browse the web daily while waiting for various things.
• GSM - I am tired of going international and having issues with CDMA availability.
• Weight - I need something little lighter.  I would like something about 1-2ounces lighter than the 6700.
• Keyboard - I must have a QWERTY keyboard.  I really only use it about once every two weeks but it's at that time when I really appreciate it.
• Large screen - I want a larger screen but could compromise to get the high priority features.

When the HTC TyTN II was released and I had to re-evaluate my priorities because it had so man great features like GPS, HSDPA, tilt, wifi, GSM.

But unfortunately it was the same size as my 6700 and just a hair heavier.  So I couldn't go for it.

Then I saw the HTC S730.  This was a little smaller but it was heavy and not that much smaller.  Still not that happy about this one but it was a front runner.

Earlier this week Nasa and I made a run to the Redmond REI and decided to swing by the ATT store to see what they had, I didn't expect to find anything new since I had looked at all their phones on the web.  Turns out I missed a key phone, the Pantech Duo.  Since they didn't have one in the store I had to go back Thursday when they got a new shipment.  So I went home and researched the phone, it looked very promising.  It was significantly smaller and lighter than the above phones.  The really nice part is that it's a slider, so many times I have let someone else use my phone only to learn they couldn't figure out how to dial since there isn't a numeric keypad.  Since then a priority 2 feature was a numeric keypad.  Not having a numeric keypad never really bothered me since all the phone numbers I use are already contacts in my phone.

Key features that sold me:

• Smaller - It's 30% smaller in volume than my 6700.  It's shorter by almost 1/2 inch.  Narrower and thinner.
• Lighter - It's 36% lighter than my 6700.
• GSM - Quad band and 3G.  Data is fast!
• WM6 - great to see I can play my Vonage voicemail on it now.  For an unknown reason I couldn't play the wav files from Vonage on the 6700 all the while it could play other wav files.
• Price - I didn't have to pay $500 for the HTC S730, the Pantech is <$199.

I have had the phone for about 24hrs now and am still in awe.  It's so small and light.  The QWERTY keyboard is a little small since the phone is so small but works just fine for me so far.  I still don't know if the battery life is good enough but I am thinking about getting an extended battery but only if necessary.

Live search application - It rocks.  The voice recognition is GREAT, is able to understand my voice 9+ times out of 10.  Traffic.  Found movies on it really fast.  I will spend a lot of time using this application.

I think an issue I had with my old phone might be resolved in this phone.  I always have the phone on vibrate so I was unable to tell if I got an email, SMS, or phone call.  So I would just wait for it to ring twice letting me know it's a phone call then I would scramble to answer it, missing calls because I took to long.  Last night in the movie I got an email message and the phone did 3 short vibrations.  I am hoping phone calls are longer vibrations.  If so I'd be a happy camper.

I can't wait to see if I get Pantech or HTC 1yr from now when I upgrade.

Needless to say, I was devastated.  Monday afternoon I heard from Nasa that Bryan had been on a plane that crashed, she pointed me to the below article:

http://www.komotv.com/news/local/10316012.html

YAKIMA, Wash. -- Ground searchers following the smell of fuel Monday night found the wreckage of a plane carrying nine skydivers and a pilot that crashed in the rugged central Washington Cascades.
The plane was found around 7 p.m. Monday near Scatter Creek at the 4,600 foot level in the White Pass area, said Dan Cypher with the Yakima County Sheriff's Department.
Seven of the 10 on board "have been found deceased," Yakima County Sheriff Ken Irwin said in a statement released late Monday night by Yakima Valley Emergency Management. Recovery efforts were suspended for the night but were to resume Tuesday.
"I'm told it was a horrific sight and the airplane crashed at a fairly high speed," said Jim Hall, director of Yakima Valley Emergency Management. "It appears that no one survived that crash."
The families of those aboard had been notified, said Hall, who had not been to the crash scene but spoke from a ground search command post near White Pass. The passengers and pilot were not immediately identified.
A National Transportation Safety Board investigation was expected to begin Tuesday, Hall said.
The area where the wreckage was found is only accessible by ground, but search and rescue crews stayed with the downed aircraft through the night to continue to search for any possible survivors.
The Cessna 208 Grand Caravan left Star, Idaho, near Boise, around 7 p.m. Sunday en route to Shelton, Wash., northwest of Olympia, but did not arrive as scheduled. The plane was past due at midnight, and authorities organized a search for it at about 2 a.m. Monday.
The plane was returning from a skydiving meet in Idaho when it disappeared from radar, and about 50 people spent the day searching on the ground with help from other aircraft.
Elaine Harvey, co-owner of the skydiving company Skydive Snohomish, said that nine of the 10 aboard were either employers of her business or else licensed skydivers who considered Snohomish their "home drop zone." Skydive Snohomish operates a training school and offers skydiving flights at Harvey Field in Snohomish County, about 20 miles north of Seattle.
The other person on board was from Idaho, officials in Boise said.
Harvey said Skydive Snohomish had nothing to do with the flight to Idaho or the event held there.
"These people were beloved friends," she told the Yakima Herald-Republic. "It is a very close knit community here ... and until we find out more information about what happened we're just trying to hang in there for their families."
The plane was owned by Kapowsin Air Sports, based in Shelton. Geoff Farrington, co-owner of Kapowsin, said the family-owned company, more than 60 years old, has never lost a plane.
"We've been around a long time," an emotional Farrington said, describing the people on board as acquaintances. "(Skydiving) is a small community."
Family members told KOMO News one of the members on board the plane was 30-year-old Casey Craig. His uncle said Casey is an experienced skydiver.
The rest of the names of those on board were not released.
Members of Tacoma Mountain Rescue were among about 25 volunteers still searching after dark Monday in the area where the plane was believed to have gone down.
Based on radar transmissions and a hunter's report of seeing a plane flying low Sunday evening and then hearing a crash, the search was focused on a steep, densely forested area near White Pass, about 45 miles west of Yakima.
Search crews concentrated on a relatively small area of 5-10 square miles along the north fork of the Tieton River.
Six fixed-wing aircraft, the Air Force helicopter and a King County helicopter had searched all day Monday, said Tom Peterson, aviation and emergency services coordinator for the state Department of Transportation. The Air Force chopper flew for a while Monday evening but then was required to land because of a 12-hour duty limit for its crew members, he said.
The tail section was separated from the rest of the plane and has not been located, Wilson said.
The single-engine plane was built in 1994, according to FAA records.

Nasa soon called Kapowsin and confirmed he was on the plane.  The next day we met Byran's parents at the airport and head out the the crash site where we learn more details about what happened.  It was not a good day for all of us, the news was really bad and there weren't many answers.

Here is one of the better articles:

Crash victims "were all family," their loved ones say

By Seattle Times staff

Philip Kibler, 46, Troy, NY

Philip Kibler was making his last flight of the season before heading home to the East Coast to be with family.

The 10-year veteran pilot had agreed to take a group of friends to a weekend skydiving event in Boise before slowly traveling to New York on a cross-country fly-fishing trip.

While family members often quipped with Kibler about the dangers of flying, they knew the reality of working with small planes.

"But we also knew his desire to fly was a life-affirming event," said younger brother Bill Kibler. "Flying was Phil's thing."

For the 46-year-old, there'd always been that desire to fly, but it was perhaps a non-traditional path that eventually led to the cockpit. With a doctorate in microbiology and an undergraduate degree in oceanography, Kibler took a job with a pharmaceutical company in Montreal, where he worked before tiring of the industry.

What he really wanted was to learn how to fly and participate in scientific research. He earned both opportunities, working on his pilot license and then eventually flying scientists over the Atlantic Ocean to study whale migration patterns.

But the lure of the Northwest eventually drew him away from his home on the East Coast, and flying became his sole occupation. It was here that he first came across the skydiving community.

"He was a very good pilot and operated an aircraft safely," said Fred Sand, owner of Skydive Lost Prairie near Kalispell, Mont., where Kibler worked during the summer of 2006. "Everyone liked him, and you felt comfortable when he was flying."

Kibler made his way to Washington, where he spent this past summer working for Skydive Snohomish, piloting skydiving flights at Harvey Field. The local skydivers there became acquainted with Kibler during after-hours forays into Snohomish taverns, said Ryan Shipley, a Lake Stevens skydiver who often flew with Kibler. They grew to trust him as a pilot.

As the summer came to an end, Kibler had mused about his next career step, tossing around ideas such as applying for a job with Federal Express.

Bill Kibler said he exchanged e-mails with his brother just days before the weekend flight.

"He mentioned this was the last flight for the season and was heading home," Bill Kibler said. "At the time, I didn't think much about it."

But despite Kibler's death, Bill Kibler said his older brother led a very lucky life.

"My brother was able to do what he absolutely loved doing," Bill Kibler said. "He was able to pursue his passion and get paid to do it. Not a lot of people get that opportunity."

— Christopher Schwarzen

Andy Smith, 20, Lake Stevens

Andy Smith was the kind of kid who could take an engine apart and put it back together — without the help of a manual.

The 20-year-old Lake Stevens man, who for the last couple years interned at Seattle's Victoria Clipper with the goal of becoming a marine mechanic, recently built his own motorscooter that could go 40 mph. He and a friend were getting ready to test-drive another invention, a go-kart fitted with a turbine engine Smith built himself.

"He's a big grease monkey," said Smith's girlfriend, Julianne Hezlep, a Lake Stevens native who is now a freshman at Northwest Nazarene University in Nampa, Idaho.

Smith also loved the "natural high" that came with skydiving and planned on getting his pilot's license next summer, said Hezlep, who returned to her parents' home Monday night after learning that Smith and nine others had perished in a plane crash near White Pass.

"He is fearless. He embraces adrenaline and embraces natural highs, and loves to live life on the edge. He loves that edge, loves tickling that edge," Hezlep, 18, said tearfully.

Hezlep spent the weekend with Smith and his fellow skydivers and watched their Cessna 208 take off from an Idaho airfield at 6 p.m. Sunday. Their pilot had delayed takeoff for four hours because of a storm in the Cascades, and Hezlep said she begged her boyfriend to stay an extra day.

"I didn't want Andy to get on that plane — I just had a feeling the plane wasn't going to make it, wasn't going to land," she said. But Smith said he needed to get back for work, promising to call when he touched down.

"I probably left a thousand messages and I never got that phone call he promised me," Hezlep said.

Smith is survived by his parents, an older sister and his identical twin brother, Alex, she said.

His family could not be reached.

"He's an extrovert times three. He loves to talk and tell stories ... and his head was so packed full of knowledge," Hezlep said of Smith, who was a senior when she was a freshman at Lake Stevens High School.

The two became friends but didn't start dating until last year. They were talking about marriage, and Smith had started saving up for a down-payment on a house, Hezlep said.

"I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him, I wanted to grow old with him, I loved him that much," she said.

Darrell Bryan, the vice president and general manager at Victoria Clipper, said Smith's death has impacted everyone who works for the small company.

"Andy was dearly loved by everyone he worked with... There wasn't a person he encountered who didn't love him around here. He was full of life," Bryan said.

— Sara Jean Green

Casey Craig, 30, Bothell

Casey Craig, a veteran of more than 600 jumps, hosted regular parties for fellow jumpers and "lived life out loud," his friends and family said.

"I want to make sure people know he didn't die skydiving — it was a plane crash," said his mother, Wanda Craig. "There are people who think they could have jumped while the plane was going down. That's just not possible."

She said her son was introduced to the sport by his older brother, Kelly. Kelly Craig, 34, told KING-TV he'd wanted to go to Idaho to jump with his brother and other friends, but had had to work. Of the skydiving group, he said, "they were all family."

Like his mother, Kelly Craig emphasized his brother wasn't killed skydiving. He called the sport "an educated risk."

"It's not as safe as staying in bed," he told KING-TV, "but it's not what you think it is until you go and try it."

On his Web page on Myspace.com, Casey Craig, 30, described himself as "a self-employed carpet installer that loves to skydive if I can ever find time and if it's ever sunny in Seattle." He listed his interests as "skydiving, snowboarding, construction of any kind — I LOVE TO BUILD."

He said he was a 1995 graduate of Inglemoor High in Kenmore, where he was on the wrestling and track teams.

Posts from friends to Craig's MySpace page started as concerned and hopeful early Monday night but turned mournful and reflective after the plane wreckage was found.

"I want you to come back safe," one friend wrote Monday afternoon.

"I miss you already," another wrote two hours later. "Blue skies forever."

At the rescue scene today, Craig's roommate, who did not want to give her name, said, "He lived life loud. He did things his own way.

"I lost 10 friends today," the roommate said. "All of those people on the plane, they were my family. They all lived life to the fullest and took care of each other."

— Eric Pryne and Craig Welch

Hollie Rasberry, 24, Bellingham

If there was fun to be had, Hollie Rasberry was never far behind.

An intrepid adventurer at the tender age of 24, Rasberry could turn a Friday night bowling session into a laugh riot, or a bull session after work into a memorable evening, her friends recalled.

Today, as her co-workers at Billy McHale's Restaurant in Bellingham pored through a shoe box filled with pictures of Rasberry, they noticed that there was not a single one in which she wasn't smiling or making a goofy face.

"She was always really positive. Always out for fun," said McHale's owner, Kristy Knopp, who hired Rasberry 4 ½ years ago when the young woman moved from Wenatchee to Bellingham for a change of pace.

"I do remember the first time I met her," Knopp said. "She introduced herself and said, 'Rasberry — without the 'p.'"

Passionate about the outdoors, Rasberry fell in love with skydiving last year when she and her boyfriend took their first jump on the Fourth of July in Las Vegas.

Not even a chute malfunction on her second dive — she was forced to use the backup — dissuaded her from free-falling every chance she got, typically once every week to 10 days, Knopp said. "Honestly, skydiving is all she talked about."

Rasberry grew up the middle child of three girls in Wenatchee.

At a news conference at the rescue site today, broadcast by Northwest NewsChannel 8, her older sister sobbed as she displayed a photo of Hollie. "She was wonderful."

Last spring, Rasberry began taking classes at Whatcom Community College, and was on track for an associate of arts and sciences degree, according to the college's admissions office.

When Knopp last saw her, Rasberry was preparing for the trip. "She was so ridiculously giddy to go."

— Susan Kelleher

Michelle Barker, 22, Kirkland

Michelle Barker took her first dive on her 18th birthday, said her stepfather, Rich Williams of Boise.

"We didn't know how much it would take over her life," he said from the rescue scene Tuesday. "After skydiving, we never saw her; she was either in the air or on the jump zone.

"Michelle was her own person, she wasn't doing what her mother taught her, not what her dad taught her, just what she wanted to do," he said.

Michelle's mother and grandmother were expecting to pay her a visit this week. She told her mother, "Relax mom, I'm going to see you on Friday."

Kendall Shew, 27, met her several years ago, when they were working at the same record and video store in Boise. They became fast friends. Barker had this silly streak he loved; she would carry on entire conversations in the character of an imaginary sloth with a lisp.

"I think I've laughed more times than I've cried, thinking about her," said Shew.

Barker tried a range of jobs in the time Shew knew her, working at a hospital, and a wood products manufacturer. At one point, in 2003, she spent a semester at Boise State University. Then she found skydiving.

Barker always liked sports, but the adrenaline rush of skydiving was something else altogether. She began working at Star Skydiving Center, Shew said, and found a strong community there. She moved to the Seattle area last spring, he said, to be with some of her skydiving friends.

"It was her discovery time of life," Shew said.

On her MySpace page, below a photograph of her smiling, standing beside a plane, Barker attached a quote:

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, wine in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO what a ride!"

— Cara Solomon and Craig Welch

Landon Atkin, 20, Maltby

At the home where Landon Atkin, 20, grew up, about two miles south of his job at Harvey Airfield, family, friends and neighbors came and went throughout the day today, sobbing, embracing and sharing stories.

The Atkin family moved to the Maltby area about 20 years ago, said Landon's sister, Taisha Atkin, 23, when her father, Calvin Atkin, transferred to the area, where he now works for Boeing.

Landon Atkin grew up there, in a close community on a dead-end street, where everyone knew everyone else.

In later years, Landon threw himself into life with gusto, his sister continued, starting a rock band named Rumor Has It. Neighbors recalled how Landon had dutifully approached them, asking everyone if they minded if the band practiced in the family garage.

"He was passionate about his music. He did shows and everything. He really loved it," said Taisha Atkin.

Yet he had a fearless side. The family enjoys cliff-diving, she explained.

After graduation, Landon began attending community colleges, and most recently had been at Cascadia Community College in Bothell.

But a transforming moment in his life came little more than a year ago, Taisha Atkin said, when he made his first parachute jump, on a whim.

"He and his best friend, they just got it in their heads one day," his sister said. "I went up there to watch it. I was scared out of my mind."

But Landon loved it.

He started working at a Harvey Field skydiving business, packing parachutes, and by last weekend, he'd made over 100 jumps and changed his college studies to move toward a career as a pilot.

Taisha said she last talked to her brother over the weekend, when he called home from his Idaho trip.

"He called me when he was over there, he said he was having an amazing time," she said.

"He was definitely doing something with his life. It wasn't his time to go," said Ryan Johnson, who moved from California six months ago to skydive in Snohomish. He met Landon there.

After a day of skydiving, Johnson said, everyone in the group would go to a Snohomish restaurant to share the events of the day and their love of the sport.

"They're phenomenal people," he said. "It's been a dream of mine since I was a kid. I'm like them. We're all thrill-seekers.

"Being a mile or two up there brings a whole new view. All the chaos and calamity down here, you don't see it up there," he said.

That feeling of a sense of loss deeply affecting the community was echoed by Elaine Harvey, operator of Harvey Field, where the skydivers were based.

"It's incomprehensible, the loss," she said. "We're still in shock. I'm feeling the pain and hurt. This has struck the core of the community. We're going to pull together and get through it."

— Peyton Whitely

Cecil Elsner, 20, Lake Stevens

Cecil Elsner lived for skiing and skydiving.

The Western Washington University student came from a sports-loving, tight-knit family.

"We're all devastated," said his aunt, Francine Long, whose family owns a ski school at Stevens Pass.

Friends of Elsner, 20, mourned his loss by posting comments to his Facebook and MySpace web pages. Their messages offered a glimpse of a fun-loving athlete:

"I was looking forward to having you with me on the plane as a fellow tandem instructor," wrote one friend. "This world needs more people like you. You'll be in my heart forever."

And another: "... you helped me fly, your views on life impacted mine, fooseball wont be the same, you became one of my best friends and I will miss you."

For his MySpace web page, Elsner used a skydiving photo as the backdrop. He didn't care for television, but was well read, listing more than a dozen books he liked, from "East of Eden" to "Upside Down" and "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."

On his blog, he mourned the selfish behaviors of modern society and lamented that the United States had become hated by people around the world.

"How you act and interact in this world can either give life or death to what you are a part of," he wrote.

— Sanjay Bhatt

Jeff Ross, 28, Snohomish

Ross had begun skydiving a little over a year ago. He took to it with a passion — so much so that he was pursuing his dream of one day becoming a licensed skydiving instructor.

His uncle, Doug Brewer, said Ross "regarded his friends at the drop zone as his family, and would do anything for both friends and family."

At Skydive Snohomish, Ross, 28, was among those who packed parachutes.

It's a skill to pack a parachute just right, so it will inflate slowly for a smooth, soft sensation, said Ryan Shipley, a Lake Stevens skydiver.

"Something that sends chills, my rig is packed right now and it was packed by Jeff," Shipley said. "So whenever that rig opens, I'll know it was packed by Jeff."

— Janet I. Tu and Diane Brooks

Ralph Abdo, 27, Issaquah

A program manager at Microsoft, Ralph Abdo took up skydiving just this past summer, said Darrin Hatakeda, Abdo's Microsoft colleague and former boss.

Windsurfing in the Columbia River Gorge was a passion. Tina Brake, Abdo's Issaquah neighbor, said he broke his foot earlier this year and was crestfallen when the injury kept him off the river. "He was very outdoorsy, very active — always doing something interesting," Brake said.

Abdo and his girlfriend had moved into the Klahanie neighborhood just about a year ago, Brake added.

Abdo's profile on the LinkedIn business-networking Web site says he attended McGill University in Montreal, and began working for Microsoft in 2002. He worked in the Office unit there, and is listed as an inventor on several company patents or patent applications.

— Eric Pryne

Bryan Jones, 34

Within the area's small fraternity of skydivers, Bryan Jones was in an even smaller club of canopy pilots — "swoopers" with small parachutes who hurtle through obstacle courses at high speeds close to the ground.

The 34-year-old systems engineer at Microsoft traveled the region with fellow canopy pilots putting on swooping competitions — an activity that's gained recent popularity among skydivers.

"Brian was a good guy; I've jumped with him," said Charlie Markin, treasurer of Seattle Skydivers. "He was quiet, the kind of guy you listened to when he spoke, because you knew it was something worth hearing."

Jones, last year's president of Seattle Skydivers, was a month shy of celebrating his 7-year anniversary at Microsoft.

I attended his memorial on Sunday.  There were probably over 150 people there, it was great to hear so many stories about bring and the cross-section of people he touched.  I miss you Bryan.

Last weekend I finally investigated why one of my servers was failing to stay up for more than 30min.  The interesting part about this failure that I have never seen before is that it would turn off.  No event log, no kernel dump, nothing.

First step was to turn on the computer.  When it comes time to start booting the OS I get the fatal message "ntoskrnl.exe missing or corrupt".

Have you ever used the ultimate boot CD?  It's a  must have for anyone with a PC.  Bold statement to make but it has some invaluable tools.  Save time diagnosing any problems from motherboard, memory, CPU, HDD very simple.  Although one complaint I have is the Seagate HDD tool only allows me to run at test on one HDD at a time.  I really would like to select the drives for the test and walk away since they take about 3hrs each to run (the long version).

Back to the computer problem.  I pop in the UBCD and select the Seagate HDD diagnostic tool.  The UBCD begins expanding the tool into memory and fails.  Hmmmm, interesting.  Ok, let's run the memory test.  Sure enough, loads of errors.  Memory failed because of the temperature?  No doubt in my mind.

I build this computer about 4-5 years ago ask my desktop.  That was when Rambus was hot and cheap.  Well, it's not so cheap now at $99 for 256MB or $200 for 512MB.  So I am the unlucky one that get's to buy a new CPU, MB, and Memory.  Luckily I don't need a new Case, Mobo, DVD, Video card.

Ok, I gotta take a break here and explain a habit of mine.  When I get started on fixing a computer problem I can't stop working on it otherwise it will take me weeks to get back to finish.  So I rarely order stuff online because I want to have the computer working that day or within two days.  I consider this somehwhat of a bad habit because computer parts are not cheap locally but Frys has changed that lately.

So I head on down to Frys to see how cheap I can get my replacement parts.  here is what I ended up with

Wow, not bad!  Dual core, 2GB server for $145.  I'll take it!  Now on the drive home I am thinking, what a deal but it's not a complete system.  What would a complete system cost?  So let's add the following:

The way I have my servers setup is on a switch box that allow me to share the keyboard, trackball, monitor, and DVD drive.  So I really don't want to include the DVD drive since it's shared between all my machines.  I also can usually fund a boot drive by using a really small drive I find around the house or get one used cheap so my total would be $183.

Even though I already have this server packed with 8 300GB drives, let's see what it would cost to build this bad boy out with drives today.

I only buy Seagate drives.  This is because they offer a 5 year warranty and because I have seen about 5 drive failures in the last year a long lasting warranty is really important to me.  Running in Win2k3 software RAID5 means you have no redundancy when one drive fails so I always keep a few drives ready to go.  I typically will use N-1 drives where N is the number of drives in the server so when  drive fails I can immediately start rebuilding the RAID.  Also the process for returning a drive to Seagate is easy and timely.  They will even ship the drive to you for an $20 so you don't have to wait.  But I don't do this since the $20 is costly compare to a new drive.

I always wait for a super deal or just after a price cut to buy drives.  Also when deciding what to buy I already look at the $/GB/server.  It's not always most cost effective to buy the cheapest drive since each 8 drives I have to spend $261 it's sometimes cheaper to step up to the next level of capacity.  You will see below that power pushes us to the next level of capacity for drives since we are leaving this servers on 24x7x365

If you would like to make your own modifications or look at the calculations I posted it to WL SkyDrive - http://cid-0a55203737b76aeb.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/Storage%20Brick/storage%20brick%20cost.xls

Some interesting notes on the above data:

1. Raw HDD $/GB is not really interesting.  What's interesting is including all the additional costs like power, computer, etc.
2. Power drives decisions - Power does change the sweet spot.
3. Redundancy - You can see that I have allocated two drives for RAID5 (for the 1TB drive server it has 1.5TB of parity!  Wow).  This is because I create two RAID5 volumes for ease of management for moving data around.  It's also to create more redundancy, now I can lose a drive in each volume before the volume is offline.
4. Manageability is important - We can't forget about this one.  I need some way of easily managing the data on the volumes when they fail, moving data around, etc.  Also I want a little extra redundancy so I don't have to monitor the server for failures daily or worry about the server failing when I am away on vacation

You can see that buying the largest capacity drive pays off in the end.  However I can't justify forking over $3k in drives and it's nice to have two servers for server level redundancy so I would stick to 500GB drives and get 2 servers.

So the total server cost for 500GB storage brick is $1,800 but I highly recommend getting 2 extra drives for spares, ready to pop in anytime you have a failure.  The majority of my failures are early in the life-cycle, the first 6-12 months.

Final tally is $1451 = $1190 (HDDs) + $261 (server)

Back to the original subject - I installed the new components and got the server back up and running with little issues.

I sure wish I could install the latest Windows live suite....  

---------------------------
Installer - Windows Live
---------------------------
Windows Live programs can’t be installed on this operating system.
---------------------------
OK  
---------------------------

I am running Windows Vista 64-bit.

This is cool!  I commute on this trail almost every day and it's really busy no matter when I come or go (early in the morning it's not too bad).  I am really glad they are waiting until 9am, it means I will not be affected (unless I am late  :-)).

http://dnr.metrokc.gov/dnrp/press/2007/0731SammamishRiverTrailRestrictions.htm

Widening, repaving work lead to brief restrictions along Sammamish River Trail south of Redmond

Joggers, cyclists, walkers and others who use King County’s Sammamish River Trail between Redmond and Woodinville will have a safer, smoother trail once an upcoming widening and resurfacing project is completed.

Beginning Aug. 20, a half-mile stretch of trail from its intersection with Northeast 124th Street south to its intersection with Northeast 116th Street will receive a fresh topcoat of asphalt and will be widened from 10 feet to 12 feet. All bicyclists must dismount while moving through the active construction zones.

The work is being done by the King County Roads Services Division and is expected to take about three weeks to complete. The expected date of completion is Sept. 7.

“A wider trail provides users with more room to pass others and improves overall trail safety,” said KK Soi, project manager for King County Parks.

Soi said that rather than a standard 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. work shift, repair crews will be working on the trail between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., so that cyclists who use the trail as a commuting corridor are not affected by the work. No trail work will be done on weekends.

Trail work alert signs have been installed at several locations along the trail from Bothell to Redmond. Trail users may use the trail’s shoulder or the equestrian track around most of the construction work.

The Sammamish River Trail is a 10-mile portion of the 27-mile-long Burke-Gilman Trail. The Burke-Gilman begins in Ballard and follows an old railroad right-of-way along the Ship Canal and north along Lake Washington. At Blyth Park in Bothell, the trail becomes the Sammamish River Trail and continues for 10 miles to King County’s Marymoor Park in Redmond.

King County's regional trail system features more than 175 miles of trails. The long-term plan calls for bringing that total up to more than 300 miles of trails that link together communities throughout King County.

King County Parks - Your Big Backyard - offers more than 25,000 acres of parks and natural lands, including such regional treasures as Marymoor Park and Cougar Mountain Regional Wildland Park, 175 miles of regional trails, plus pools and a world-class aquatic center. By cultivating strong relationships with non-profit, corporate and community partners, King County Parks enhances park amenities while reducing costs. Learn more at www.metrokc.gov/parks/.

Jeff Atwood also mentioned UltraMon.  This seems like a winner too but unfortunately it's not free but I am more than happy to support folks making great software, if I am still using it at the end of the trial period I will definitely buy.

I have installed it and turned on the "Smart Taskbar".  Seems like a great idea as I am always referring back to one monitor when looking to switch windows.

We'll see if i am using it in a month.

On a regular basis I  find myself trying to figure out where all my disk space is going, either to clean it up or understand what data is chewing up my hard drive.  Until now I had no idea how to do this so I often would resort to doing a "dir /s" inside the folder I wanted to know it's size including subfolders.

Today I happened to catch TreeSize Fee v2.1 on Jeff Atwood's blog, it's does exactly what I want!  This might turn out to be my favorite software for 2007.

As a side note - my favorite software in 2006 was the remote desktop client (Terminal services client 6.0) that allows one to use a terminal server gateway.  with the Gateway I can TS into my machine at work directly from home - unbelievably cool.  Even more cool for my employer which gets a lot more work from me at home.  I probably work 5-20hrs more a week because of that feature.

Oh and if you bought content you will get a $2 coupon for Google checkout.  Wow the hype around this was huge and now it's out.

http://newteevee.com/2007/08/10/google-shutting-down-paid-video/

In Korea!

Broadband is available in four out of five Seoul households and costs just $40 a month for speeds up to 100Mbps.

It pays to live close to each other.

"A battle between a pride of lions, a herd of buffalo, and 2 crocodiles at a watering hole in South Africa's Kruger National Park while on safari"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU8DDYz68kM

Damn it. The worst part is that my old house has FiOS.

http://policyblog.verizon.com/policyblog/blogs/policyblog/ericrabe9/316/one-millionth-fios-customer-video.aspx

From engadget.com

You won't be seeing one of these sensors in your fashioncam any time soon. Canon has built a 50 megapixel CMOS monstrosity, which is reportedly almost twice the resolution of its nearest competition, and is prepping it as a sort of large format surveillance camera for monitoring large, busy areas such as parking lots and theme parks, along with detailed work like factory part inspections. Despite the sensor's clear industrial-end aims, Canon has managed to build its prototype at 19 x 28mm in size, the same dimensions of the sensors in its DSLR cameras, so who knows where this tech could end up in the long run. So far Canon hasn't even announced release plans for this current incarnation, so we aren't going to go hawking our existing shooter just yet.

http://www.cafepress.com/codinghorror.117167199#

Well, yeah.  I am engaged.  I have a fiancé.  I couldn't be more happy.

It starts off with a trip to Hawaii.  My brother's girlfriend had 5-day free accomodation in Kauai so off we go.  The first few days all of us spend time hiking and seeing the sites, with a few not so fun SCUBA diving in there.

Then one evening (the 24th :-)) Nasa and I headed off to the north beach of Kauai.  OH wait...roll back for a second.

I knew I wanted to ask Nasa to marry me before we went on the trip.  So I was packing up my laptop back in my office while talking with Nasa but I had to put the rings (my grandmother's rings my mom gave me a couple of weeks prior).  I wasn't very sneaky about it, I just grabbed the ring case off my desk (Nasa had seen the rings) and put them in my laptop case.  The problem is that she JUST happen to turn around and look at me at that very moment and then looked down at my hand that was putting my rings in the backpack.  Great, now she knows.  There goes the surprise.  Now let's fast forward to the 24th.

Before we headed out the beach again, need to transfer the rings from the laptop back to the hydration pack (yes, we came prepared for some good hiking).  Well, it just so happens that I was moving the ring from one pack to another when she gives me this, "what are you doing look from the restroom".  Ugh, great, she has a spidey sense for the ring movement.  There goes the surprise.

We are aiming to be at the beach at sunset, we just make it when the sun is setting.  We walk over the rocky beach to a secluded place and watch the sunset.  We begin to head back, putting our head lamps and I pass her a note, that says "will you marry me", with a really big checkbox for "yes" and a really small one for "no".  Just kidding!  I tell her I love her and a few other things and ask her to marry me.

Well, she said "yes".

Ever since then we have been talking about the wedding.  When, where, who, how, etc.

I'd like to say I will keep you posted that would be a lie given my track record on this thing.  So I guess maybe there will be blog post after happens at the very least?  :-)

And it's happening right now.  Check out http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/traffic/seattle/ 

I am so glad I don't have to get out in that traffic, it looks miserable.  I am gonna make a run to Redmond in a few minutes but I doubt the traffic is too bad that direction otherwise I could wait until tomorrow.

That is a very nice Zune you have there FOR ME TO POOP ON!  (from Triumph the insult comic dog on the Conan O'Brien show).  Check out this posting on InsideMicrosoft:

Amazon User Poops On Zune

Someone trying to be funny (and, lets be honest, succeeding), submitted a “customer image” of Microsoft’s Zune. Now, normally these images are supposed to help Amazon have extra pictures of its products, in order to assist shoppers, but I think this fella’s image was never going to convince anyone to buy Microsoft’s MP3 player. The image was taken down by Amazon eventually, but here’s a screenshot and a closeup:

Well, at least 17 of 27 people found it useful.
(via Digg)

A windstorm hit the Pacific Northwest last Thursday night/Friday morning that took major parts of the power distribution and transmission system in the Pugest sound area leaving >1 million people without power.  By Saturday I think that number dropped to 350,000.  We lost power around 1AM on Friday morning (Thursday night) just as I was reading in bed so that wasn't a big deal.  Nasa was really looking forward to the power outage so earlier in the night she and I took a bet, I would make her a McNasa if the power went out (I knew this was a losing proposition but fixing her a McNasa meant I got one too :-)), I made her McNasa Saturday morning when the power was back.

Friday, like a real trooper, I attempted to work but all the buildings were on emergency power.  Friday we were suppose to have a lunch for a co-worker moving to another team but I couldn't get to mail to let everyone know it was off.  I doubt anyone could get to mail either though so no worries there.  Oh, Typhoon, where we were going to have lunch, still didn't have power last night.  So I drove home and slept for about 4-5hrs,  then Nasa and I met Erica at the Alderwood mall at around 4 for some grub and shopping.  I wasn't interested in shopping but what else am I going to do?  so we shopped until around 8 when we grabed a movie, "The Pursuit of Happyness", it was good, I recommend it.  then home at midnight and didn't make it out of bed before the power came back on.  Oh, on the way home we saw the crew working on the power repair, the lady said they would be working until New Years so it sounds like some people will be out of power on Christmas.  That makes me sad, I wish I could do something to help those people.

So we got power back on Saturday at noon which was nice but the house only dropped to 60-65F the entire time so it wasn't too bad.  However I really didn't like Comcast support.  I called on Saturday to report that the internet was still not up, they knew about the problem but didn't have an ETA, the tech was hoping it would be back up in the afternoon or evening.  I called again on Saturday and no dice so went down to watch Nasa play some XBox.  Well, it wasn't 5min later and the xbox started downloading trial games, logging into xbox live, etc.  Ugh, frustrating.  That really makes me want to communicate to our customers at work regularly if we ever have an outtage, it's frustrating to not know what to expect.

Then last night I went to workout at the Probclub but they are mostly out of power.  This is on their homepage right now.

Power Outage Update!

UPDATE, 9:30 a.m., Monday, December 18th
Bellevue Location - Now open with limited facilities!
Power has been restored to much of the Bellevue PRO Sports Club location.

The following areas remain closed:

* Cardio Theatre, Free Weights, Discovery Bay, Basketball/Pavilion, Aquatics, Squash Courts and the South Fitness Center.
* We are sorry, but we are also not able to conduct Group Fitness Classes.
* The Squash Tournament which was scheduled through this Tuesday, has been moved to the Seattle Athletic Club (206-443-1111).
* Please disregard our other postings regarding events scheduled in these areas located elsewhere on this site.

The following facilities are open:

* Auto Detail, Locker Rooms (NOTE: Family Locker Rooms remain CLOSED), Medical Offices (20/20, Podiatry, Physical Therapy), Racquetball Courts, Spa, Tennis Courts
* Fitness equipment is available only in the North Fitness Center. However, due to limited equipment during peak hours, there is a limit of 20 minutes on cardio (especially 7-8 a.m. and 5-8 p.m.) until full power is restored. There will likely be a wait for equipment at those times. Thank you in advance for any adjustments you can make to your workout schedule.

Seattle Location - Open with no limitations!

Ha!  the only thing you can do is cardio in one of their rooms and raquetball.  20min limit on Cardio?????  please.  I understand it but is it worth the effort, it will take me 20min to get there.  I am going outside of the limited times maybe I can get more time, if not I will be one frustrated person.