I just switched ISPs, and for some reason, I’m not getting any posts from the sci.space.* hierarchy on the new provider’s (Bellsouth) news server. I’m using Agent as my news client. Does anyone know what the problem might be?

Sigh…

My wireless router has stopped talking to my desktop.

But here’s the weird thing. The wireless is fine–I can still access the internet and router through my laptop on that connection, but the desktop is plugged directly into the router via cable, and the router is refusing the connection. When I do an ipconfig, it shows no connection and no assigned IP address. When I unplug the cable, it knows it’s unplugged, and when I plug it back in, all is well again, except it won’t talk to the router.

I’ve tried rebooting the thing several times, with no luck. It just started happening, and I didn’t do anything unusual that might have caused it.

Next thing to try is rebooting the desktop, I guess, which I hate to do because I have a loot of browser windows open that I’ll lose.

[Update a few minutes later]

Well, that did it. The ways of Microsoft passeth understanding.

It was, as I suspected, a bad power supply (and it had probably been going bad for a long time, which is why I had the previous mobo problems).

All better now.

We had an intermittent power failure last night.

I woke up this morning and wandered into the kitchen, and saw that, in place of the time, the LED on the microwave was displaying a “PF.” Most of the clocks have battery backups, but the one in our antique (sixties era) electric stove was about an hour behind.

Computers had to be restarted, natch.

After doing so, I was using my desktop (my primary work machine) for about a half an hour (the one in which I’d recently replaced the motherboard), when it decided to reboot itself, seemingly spontaneously.

Then, after the reboot, right after login, and the desktop coming up, it did so again.

After repeating this two or three times, it bluescreened. This was similar to the symptoms before I replaced the mobo the last time. Except that this time, after finishing writing whatever cryptic diagnostics it was sending to that future, in which the technology might exist to revive it, it didn’t reboot–it just shut down.

And wouldn’t restart. Poking the power button was availless.

So, now I’ve got to figure out what’s wrong with the thing now. I may have a power supply problem, but I may also just need to upgrade to a better board.

Anyway, I’ll be working on the laptop for the nonce.

[Late afternoon update]

Dang.

I was hoping that it was the power supply, but I just tried another one, with the same result. The power switch is fine, based on a test with an ohm-meter, and shorting the terminals on the motherboard doesn’t give any action, either.

I still need to verify that the supply I swapped is good, but it looks like there’s a problem with the mobo. I just bought it about a month ago, and it’s probably on warranty, but I only paid thirty-some bucks for it, so it may be best to simply upgrade and get a more modern one.

Oh, as for the suggestion in comments to unplug everything from the board except the video card? That’s already my configuration. Everything else (sound, ethernet, etc.) is built into the board.

I was hit by over four hundred of these nasty things last night, and for some reason MT Blacklist is deleting them, but not rebuilding the pages. I had to do it manually for about a hundred this past weekend, but I just don’t have the time, which means that I have to rebuild the entire site. Does anyone have any idea what the problem is?

Sort of. I’ve got the DSL back up, but I’ve got to drive up to the Cape tomorrow, so blogging will be light/nonexistent until Tuesday, other than a post or two from there.

In case anyone was wondering, I lost DSL on Thursday, with no knowledge of when I’ll get it back. I’ve got a hardware modem in my firewall, but it died back in California. I’ve just diagnosed it as having a dead CPU resulting from a dead fan. I found an old K6/2 and fan at a computer place, so I hope I’ll get the firewall back up, and be able to at least use dialup sometime this weekend.

I’m posting this from Patricia’s office.

See you later.

Technorati says that I’ve already gotten 126 links to the Global Test. It seems to have struck a blogospheric chord.

We were very lucky. I lost DSL about seven last night, and as we were watching the DVD of “Hidalgo” (not my selection) the power went out just as Viggo the Idiotarian crossed the finish line.

After that, as Bulwer-Lytton would write, it was a dark and stormy night. I think that once again, just like Frances, we were in the southern eye wall. No flooding, and by morning, the wind was down to a dull roar, and we could go out to survey damage, of which there was little. We heard on the radio that a million people were without power in Florida, and that eighty percent (of which we were a part) of Palm Beach County was in that state. We didn’t expect to get power for a few days, under the circumstances, so I was (almost literally) shocked when it came back on about half an hour ago. So we didn’t even lose it for twenty-four hours.

Considering what the folks up north have been through, we feel very, very lucky. We’ve taken down plywood and shutters, and perhaps we can finally get back to normal. Though, since I’ve only been here a month or so, this (watching for storms, preparing for storms, going through storms) is starting to feel normal to me. Perhaps now we can get to something much better than normal.

I don’t know how long I’ll be able to continue to post.

Everything is fine here, but we’ve had several power dropouts, most of them momentary, causing reboots of computers, but one of them was long enought to knock down my laptop. I also lost DSL for a while, but it’s come back, so I thought I’d attempt one more post tonight before we’re down for good. Or at least for a few hours or days.

The wind continues to pick up. We have a stagnation region just outside the front door, because the winds are coming from the northwest, so it’s fun to stand out on the porch and watch the wind and rain across the street. I think it will get worse than this, but not a lot worse, based on the track we’re seeing on the television. I’m not done with the post yet, but it seems like a good idea to put it up, in case I lose the connection. Think of it as a “save” that everyone can see.

The DSL connection is hokey, so I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to post. In any event, power or not, we’ll be good. I wish that I could say the same for those folks farther north.