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VMware Server 2 – windows 2008 64bit virtual machines stops working after bios upgrade

Just a quick reminder, if you have a virtual machine of windows 2008 R2 64bit which when you start it can be seems to start loading Windows within the console window then suddenly restarts after showing the “loading files” progress bar completes and keeps repeating this cycle for ever but you know the image was working last time you used it.

Double check you haven’t tweaked your BIOS settings and disabled the “Intel virtualization technology” option in your bios by accident.
In my case I had updated the bios on my P8P67 Pro motherboard which reset the value months ago and hadn’t fired up the Windows 2008 image since.

6am Wake up alarm, I swear I never set that!

One of the joys of having a phone that syncs with your calendar is knowing where you need to be without having to find a computer to work out where you’re suppose to be for that meeting you had half forgotten about.
However where there is a UP, there is a DOWN and this one is due to Outlooks’ default reminder period for all day events being 18 hours which is a serious issue if you tend to put your holidays in your calendar as all day(s) events so people don’t try to arrange meetings whilst you are away.
18 hrs before an all-day event is of course 6am which is not a nice time to getting woken up unnecessarily.
Yes you can just disable the reminder, but I never seem to remember to do that so onto a technical solution.

Whilst looking for an fix, I found Pierre Rossel’s  http://blog.prossel.info/30-solution-to-disturbing-default-reminder-for-outlook-all-day-events/  which is a nice and easy solution to my 6am wake up issue.

A simple macro which fires when you save/update an event, that checks if the /reminder will be outside the allowed hours you have set and warns you and also suggest a better hour for the reminder that is a sane hour of the day.
Simple and logical, just also remember to sign the Outlook macro otherwise Outlook (2007 / 2010 etc)  won’t run it  unless you have tweaked the macro security to let anything run which doesn’t seem wise.

FalconCam – Day 24

Today’s video from the Falcon webcam.

The chicks are really growing quickly, they are no roughly 24 days old and their darker feathers are now really starting to show through.

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3 chicks and it is feeding time

Two videos today: I managed to grab some video of the feeding their chicks

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Any day now.. 1st peregrine falcon chicks

The time is nearly here. With the last egg (4th) being laid back on the 29th of March 2011 we should be seeing the 1st of the baby chicks any day now assuming the incubation period is about a month.

FalconCam: 3 Eggs

The 3rd egg was laid yesterday so we may start to see the peregrines start to incubate the or they may try for another egg, only time will tell.
Looks like the 2nd egg was laid around 6am on the 25/03/11.
1st one was laid before 5am on the 23/03/11.

Shortly after the 2nd egg (well an hour or so) the camera caught this footage.

Mr and Mrs Peregrine falcon checking out the nest

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Falcon webcam

The have finally landed :)

I’ve been waiting for the pair of falcons to turn up on the university webcam and at around 17:00 today (22nd) they made their appearance.

All we need now is some good footage of the peregrines snacking on some pigeons and this week will be off to a good start.

Falcon webcam @  Nottingham Trent University -Expect to see some new highlight reels as the weeks go by.

Peregrine Cam now live – article from Nottingham Wildlife Trust

Nest cam launch from BBC East Midlands

Can play.com / PlayTrade still be trusted?

I’ve been buying DVD’s and games from play for over 10 years (Region 1 fight club was my first purchase back in 2000) but recent purchases just haven’t gone right and play’s response has been less than ideal.

I’m now asking myself if can still be or more more precisely can Play’s PlayTrade scheme be ?

For example out of the last 10 purchases, 3 have been delivered, 1 was cancelled by me , 1 was a duplicate somehow, another was declined by the bank which isn’t really Play’s fault but all the rest have gone wrong.

Exhibit 1: 

Tried to purchase a nice Qnap TS-509 Pro NAS as a good price, several sellers at similar price so choose one with lots of positive feedback but not the cheapest.

Listed as: “Brand new UK stock ready for immediate next day dispatch. Dispatched from: UK (estimated delivery 3-4 days) ”

So get the confirmation, all good.

Next day get another email with ”

Reason for Refund       : 6

Seller Note             : We apologise for any inconvenience but it has been necessary to cancel your order. This is generally due to items selling out. A full refund has been processed. Thank you”

So think, fair enough out of stock just bad luck  I’ll just order from someone else so I go back to play to find the same seller still selling the item but they have bumped the price up.

Also find that as the seller has cancelled the sale, there is no way to leave feedback so sellers can do that as much as like and customer cannot leave any feedback.

Exhibit 2:  Bait and cancel

So reordered from the next best playtrade seller for the same Qnap 509 model at before at around the same price.

All goes through as normal, confirmation emails etc.

A few days go by, status remains: still awaiting dispatch every day I check then suddenly I get a refund email which doesn’t honestly surprise me that much, however the reason for refund does.

“Reason for Refund: Buyer cancelled sale”

The excuse given by the seller after I queried just how I had cancelled sale as I actually wanted the items was:  “Due to higher demand than anticipated and the seller is unable to supply you with this item.”

Needless to say, when I looked the seller was still selling the item just at a  higher price.  :)

Exhibit 3:  Appears to just be plain by the seller

Ordered a kinect 360 game back on the 14th of January, got the “Item posted” email the next day, after a week still no item so went to look how long items were suppose to take, 3 to 5 days and how to report missing items and also clicked on the seller to see if they had any feedback.  17 people had left feedback since the time I ordered my game and the general theme was “Item not received, would like refund” not a good sign.

For those who have never had need claim a refund from a playtrade seller, Play force you to contact the seller then wait 3 days before allowing you to file a claim.  So I fired off the required message to the seller and also sent one to play suggesting they look into the seller straight away and don’t release any money which really I would expect they should have systems in place to monitor and prevent release of fund where fraud is detected/suspected anyhow (ie. everyone who bought from the seller recently hasn’t actually received anything and is complaining :) ).

Play replied with 2 emails, one nearly straight away with the standard canned advice “Blah contact seller etc.” which was expected, the 2nd a day later  said the same thing just in longer form “You must first contact the seller” even with the very first line of my message to play saying I had already done that.  So apparently they don’t read the message before firing off the canned responses.

No response from Seller after 3 days up, play’s site finally allows me to file the claim (Extra option appears where you contact seller, should of taken a screenshot) now they expect us all to wait another 10 days for play to contact the seller before they will contact me to discuss a resolution.

Summary:

I expect I’ll get the money back eventually (there is always the chargeback / dispute transaction option) but customers shouldn’t have to put up with this run around when buying via an established internet retailer.

I also now remember how poor plays customer service can seem, should something go wrong.

Will I use play again?, maybe, but not from a playtrade seller unless they have a lot of perfect feedback.

Playtrade con artist it would seem

Playtrade con artist it would seem

Update: 7th Feb

The refund email turned up today so I’m slightly happier. I warned Play.com of the suspected fraud by one of their playtrade sellers on 25th, refund authorised on the 7th so only 13 days to fix the issue assuming the refund turns up (would be surprised if it didn’t).

Refund email:  “We are sorry to hear that the seller in question has not despatched your order. A refund has been processed for you and will appear on your statement within 3-5 days. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused you and thank you for your patience and valued custom. Kind Regards, Customer Support Team PlayTrade

Naruto Ninja Storm 2: (PS3)

OK, got Naruto 2 a few days ago and just like the 1st one, it is beautiful and reasonable true to the anime.
I had been looking forward to game since April when it was announced for and .
I ended up order it for both as I wasn’t sure which version would be the better option, both were 29.99 from Play so price wasn’t the decider.

So what is it like?
The Japanese voices are still there for the choosing so it plays as if you were in the Naruto anime which is a very nice thing, especially if you’re used to watching with subtitles.
If you liked the 1st one, the 2nd is very similar just with more polish and the Shippuden story arc.
It is still a good solid game with lots of moves and skills to discover and master with some amazing to see moves and finishes.

I ended up getting the ps3 version over the xbox 360 version for 2 main reasons.
1) Its good to make use of the ps3 when possible  2) Performance is apparently slight more solid on the ps3 version than the xbox version based on some reports.

The improvements over the 1st one. (Good points)

  • They have done away with 99% of the mini-game style missions such as “speed tree climbing”, “Dog chasing” and of course the annoying “hide and seek” missions.
  • More variation in missions, such as some where you are flying and firing instead of just pure fighting.
  • You don’t have to collect lots of scrolls for abilities.
  • The village is smaller, so you’re not spending ages running from one bit to the other for your next mission.
  • You can now explore outside the village, go visit the sand village, forrest etc.
  • Added online play.  (not tried it yet as I need to get better before embarrassing myself online)

Bad points

  • More an anoyance I suppose, but as with many fighting games you need to unlock characters, abilities throigh either Story or free play which as I tend to play through the story mode isn’t a problem but for someone just wantng to jump in they will initial only find a limited set of characters.


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