Dear Sir,

To quote Wikipedia, which does a fair job of paraphrasing every other mainstream definition I can locate:

The term off-the-grid (OTG) or off-grid refers to living in a self-sufficient manner without reliance on one or more public utilities.

Off-the-grid homes are autonomous; they do not rely on municipal water supply, sewer, natural gas, electrical power grid, or similar utility services. A true off-grid house is able to operate completely independently of all traditional public utility services.

I personally believe that there is some level of debate available, even within your chosen definition of OTG (which appears to involve complete independence from the fruits of industrialized societies on the planet). However, in addressing your original comment and using the generally accepted definition, I find nothing laughable and everything appropriate in consideration of this technology's potential legitimacy in an OTG environment.

Best regards.

No I didn't expect them to send a car right over with a replacement.
And I never said I was angry. Disappointed would be more accurate.
Actually, your trolling is causing me a stronger emotional reaction. I'm sure I'll get over it -- you're not worth it.

What I expected is that Intel would have a process and statement for their own motherboards. Less CYA, which was all the chat rep was giving until I pushed the issue. More of "we'll take care of this for you, here's how..." -- that's what I expect from a vendor.

Suck it up? No. They should be accountable for customer service.

Here's my experience yesterday with Intel on their support chat. Not happy.

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info: Please wait for a site operator to respond.
info: You are now chatting with 'Diego'
Diego: Hello. Thank you for using the Intel Customer Support chat service. We are glad to be of service. How can I help you today?
_____@yahoo.com: Hi. I've read about your recent chipset issue. I just purchased and received a DP67BA motherboard. Is there a process to have it replaced with a corrected chipset?
Diego: In this situation, each place of purchase will be in charge of either replacing the motherboard.
Diego: Since the issue is very recent, there are no replacement units with the fix. Bear in mind this issue impacts all Intel® 6 Series Express Chipsets and Intel® Xeon® C200 Series chipsets on systems using SATA ports 2-5, if using ports 0-1, customers are not affected. Using ports 2-5 may impact functional issue rates over time, this is not impacted immediately.
_____@yahoo.com: So, I need to contact the sales vendor regarding this issue, even though it's an Intel motherboard?
Diego: The issue is being under investigation by Intel and we are working as fast as possible concerning this
Diego: Please be aware that in some cases, the Serial-ATA (SATA) ports within the chipsets may degrade over time, potentially impacting the performance or functionality of SATA-linked devices such as hard disk drives and DVD-drives. Systems with only SATA ports 0 and 1 enabled are not susceptible to these functional issues.
Diego: It is not a problem that will be present in a short time
_____@yahoo.com: Yes. I understand. This is a part I bought for a personal computer. I don't have a lot of money. I need the part to last properly for a long time.
_____@yahoo.com: Are you telling me that I have to contact the sales vendor regarding this? I bought an Intel brand motherboard because I thought I would receive good support.
Diego: You may check with the place of purchase in case you would like to replace the motherboard in the future when a hardware fix is available on a new revision. We are working together with our chain or Authorized Distributors and resellers to cover this problem
_____@yahoo.com: Okay then. I will forward this conversation to my sales vendor and see what they say about it. Thanks.
Diego: You are welcome
Diego: Is there something else I would be able to assist you with?
_____@yahoo.com: No. Goodbye.

"The map is not the territory" - Alfred Korzybski

Kinda like how the combination of characters in "9/11" suddenly has meaning attributed it. Our limited range of symbol usage will always belie the actual meanings and situations. As usual, Wikipedia is informative as a quick overview (link below).

Wikipedia (English): Swastika

As for the context of Korzybski's quote, see here: Wikipedia (English): General semantics

Sadly, I realize that some folks reading may not know of this meme. Thanks Wikipedia!

Blinkenlights

Wow.

Well, actually, there are growing numbers of individuals who consider themselves "spiritual" but not "religious". They seem to have no issues with differentiating themselves between practicing their theologies, which may or may not be theistic, and practicing a traditional religion. They generally seem interested in personal spiritual growth outside of a formal religion (which has a public or social aspect).

As far as Atheists go, I don't know if I would go so far as claiming they share such concepts as ritual or dogma. I have noticed that they are capable of having the same rigidity of beliefs and intolerance of other people's beliefs as any other dick.

We're buying Dell Optiplex 745 towers coming off corporate leases from a refurb reseller. It should be easy to find XP Pro, 4GB, 80+ GB, Core 2 Duo with 3 year warranties for under $350 shipped. Less if you can buy in quantity. Grab decent Samsung monitors from Costco locally for easy returns in case of bad pixels.

It's just not worth it to roll your own when you can buy a workstation that solid for that price, particularly when you don't have to be responsible for the warranty.

"Tapes are unreliable," DiGioia says. "Disaster recovery was nonexistent. It consisted of backup tapes in a box." ... "Backups are kept on disk for 30 days and then overwritten, and tape is no longer used. Documents are archived on optical disc and microfilm. "

...so, 30 days on a mirrored SAN. No monthlies, yearlies. Long term is on optical (what kind? Consumer media degrades... What's the retention target?) and microfilm (quaint).

So, the quick recovery offered by the mirrored SAN is sexy, with an appropriate price tag. Writing off tape entirely seems very wrong.

For what it's worth, I think they're spot on to something. The next stage of this debate will probably happen when an apparently viable Theory of Everything appears. At that point, enough real work will go into analysis to prove that said Theory isn't valid within all possible valid frames of reference.

The real beauty of this assertion is that nothing of value is lost. It will only mean that some strong egos will have to deal with the philosophical outcome.

Does anyone else find it odd that so much discussion is taking place regarding free speech responsibilities for the ISP, while the church's agenda calls for BURNING BOOKS?

This makes me curious from a desktop administration perspective. Windows, for all its problems, has a great ecosystem of enterprise management tools for things like software installation and inventory, hardware inventory, health monitoring and more. All the stuff you need to effectively manage a large fleet of workstations with a few techs is available.

Most developers I know make poor system administrators, so it's hard to believe they take a completely laissez-faire approach to desktop management. Also, Google Docs seems like a really poor substitute for file shares on an enterprise NOS and directory service -- it's the "cloud" equivalent of a peer-to-peer LAN network when it comes to security structures.

Geological time scale?

My observation, at least here in the US: Once any crisis (or perceived crisis) becomes subdued, it ceases to be a factor of any kind after 6 to 9 months. After that point, the incident may exist historically but no one cares. If the incident is still causing an issue after 6 to 9 months it's most likely to be perceived as a "new" problem rather than a continuity.

Does anyone who has real experience administrating an NComputing environment care to weigh in on the usability and sustainability? Other than horsepower limitations, I've heard that they frequently react poorly to patching the base Windows environment.

We have some resource-restricted K-12 environments looking at this, as well as Microsoft's Windows MultiPoint Server 2010 to save money on workstations and power infrastructure. Fair warning, the Microsoft site seems practically devoid of substantial implementation detail and is more geared toward the kind of fluffy K-12 marketing that makes school administrators spend your tax dollars. I think it's somehow using USB keyboards, mice and monitors -- but I haven't been able to tell.

These technologies seem to be under consideration in place of, say, a "nettop" (atom-based) lab running workstation management for ease of administration, and possibly one of the many teacher-snoop-and-control software applications for managing their use. Given state testing requirements, most of our region uses Windows or Macs for compatibility with their testing software. The Macs are generally too expensive for regular purchase cycles, but it's apparently easier to find grants for them as opposed to PCs.

Can't resist... http://xkcd.com/298/