Bauer-Power- Information is Power!

Converting Tivo to Mpeg

2009-01-06T08:15:00.000-08:00

If you are like me, you love your Tivo. If you are also like me, you decided to get the cheapest Tivo out there. I would have gone for the lowest end model they had, but that one was out of stock so I paid for the next one up. I just got tivo-fied recently. Two Christmas's ago, I finally wore my wife down, and she let me get one. It has literally made my life worth living again.

If you are a Tivo owner, you may or may not know that Tivo gives you free desktop software to install on your computer so that you can transfer shows over to you desktop to save for later. You can also share your music, pictures or certain video formats from your computer to your Tivo. Not bad at all for a free little program. What if you want to burn your show to a DVD though? You either have to buy the more expensive Tivo with the built in DVD burner, or you have to buy their upgrade software to convert the .tivo files to .mpeg. Once you convert them to mpeg, you can burn them to DVD with Nero or some other DVD Authoring program (sorry I haven't found a free one yet).

Not any more though. I once found a little command line program that would convert .tivo to .mpeg on Sourceforge. I couldn't find it today though when I went to write this. So, I decided to upload my copy and the little script I wrote to MediaFire so you can download it. I took all the work out of it for you too! All you need is your Tivo Media access Key to decode and your done. You can download the utility here for 30 days.

Bauer-Power Episode 4

2009-01-05T05:19:00.000-08:00

Go ahead and pinch yourself, because you are not dreaming! Yes I have completed another video episode of Bauer-Power! This time, I did it on my own. Sundance couldn't make it in for the shooting yesterday, so I ended up doing everything solo for this one.

I decided to change things up a bit this time and not do it "diggnation style" for one main reason. I LEARNED HOW TO DO CHROMA KEYING! (aka Green Screening).

In this episode I talk about the top ten most common new years resolutions, and the top ten techy things to help you keep those resolutions! Check it out!

I am so sorry for the audio quality, and I realize that some of the transitions weren't so smooth, but I was working under a time constraint, as I had to get everything done while the wife and kid were out of the house yesterday.

Besides that though, what do you think about the new format? Like? Dislike? Bring back diggnation style? Let me know in the comments.

If you haven't seen one of the other episodes, you can view them all on my Veoh Channel here: (Bauer-Power Veoh Channel)

Ubuntu Certificate of Authenticity

2009-01-03T01:15:00.000-08:00

I decided to bring this one to the top today. You see, I just got a Powered by Ubuntu sticker request in the mail today, and with it the guy asked if there was a sticker to replace the Microsoft Windows License sticker on his computer. That request reminding me of this post I put up a while back. So without further ado, here it is again:

I found the below picture in my internet Stumbles and thought I would repost it. The image is apparently created by some guy on the Ubuntu Forums with the handle of MenZa, who released it with a GPL license, so feel free to re-post, re-distribute or whatever! This should make the transition to Ubuntu for Windows users a little more smooth.

Time To Get Funky

2009-01-01T23:43:00.000-08:00

How many of you use a service like MySpace, Facebook or Twitter? How many of you participate in online forums? What do all of these have in common? If you said avatars, then you just read my mind!

I found a pretty cool website the other day that allows you to take your favorite pictures, and transform them into really kick-ass avatars for free!.

This website is called BeFunky, and it can manipulate your pictures in two ways (From their website):

Cartoonizer:

If you’re a fan of funky-looking cartoons and comics, you're going to be all over this.
Uvatar:

Avatars are boring and generic. Take your online persona further with Uvatar

If you like those, then coming soon you will love their Video Cartoonizer they are comming out with. According to their site, Video Cartoonizer allows you to, "put yourself in the director’s chair and turn your home movie into an animated feature film."

Pretty cool right? Here is one I did of myself:

If you use this tool, I want to see your handy work! Post a link to your image in the comments!

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T07:28:00.000-08:00

Another year has come and gone! For the most part 2008 was a pretty good year (Blogging wise). Thank you all for sticking around to read my articles. Though I do this as a hobby for myself, the only reason I keep doing it is for you guys who drop by each day to see what I have to say!

I hope you all have a wonderful and prosperous 2009! Please keep coming back, as I don't plan on going anywhere any time soon.

We finally broke 200 subscribers this year. Please do me a solid and tell your techy friends about Bauer-Power. I am hoping to break 300 this year (or more if possible!). Your friends can subscribe by clicking here: (Subscribe to Bauer-Power's RSS Feed)

Once again, Happy New Year!

Adventures in Flashing BIOS - HP DC7700

2008-12-31T00:00:00.000-08:00

My company uses HP DC7700 desktop computers for all of the users. These are pretty solid machines if you ask me. I have never really had any problems with them. Some may disagree with me, but I really like HP desktops. We all have our favorites right?

This is the first time I was left rubbing my head wondering to myself, why the hell did they design something this way. I of course am talking about their method for flashing the BIOS.

I downloaded their BIOS update utility that allows users to flash their BIOS directly from Windows XP. I have used their flashing utilities in the past with no problems, but this time after updating the BIOS and rebooting I got the following error at post:

2218-ME Firmware Version should be updated.

ME BIOS Extension module execution has halted. Update BIOS or Management Engine firmware if problem persists.

WTF? After that error, Windows still boots up. I look online and find that prior to updating the BIOS, you also need to run their Management Engine update utility too. Okay, no problem. Their download comes with that. However, before you can run that, you need to install the Intel chipset driver updates!

Can we say convoluted?

So for those of you out there looking for a solution to the error above, here is the order and links to the downloads you need to update your BIOS:

Install Intel Chipset Support for Microsoft Windows (Don't reboot)
Install Intel Host Embedded Controller Interface (HECI) Driver (Reboot)
Download the BIOS update pack here (DC7700 BIOS 3.04 for Intel vPro)
Extract the pack to c:\drivers\BIOS
Browse to c:\drivers\BIOS\ME Flash and copy the 221_1034.bin file to c:\drivers\BIOS\ME Flash\Local-Win
Open a command prompt and change into the c:\drivers\BIOS\ME Flash\Local-Win directory
Run the following: FWUpdtLcl.exe 221_1034.bin -generic
After you get confirmation that the update is complete, browse to c:\drivers\BIOS\HPQFlash and run HPQFlash.exe
Follow the prompts and reboot. You are done.

Now if you did what I did, and ran the HPQFlash.exe utility first, then all you should have to do is install the Intel Chipset drivers, and the HECI drivers mentioned in steps one and two then reboot, and then do the ME Flash mentioned in steps five through seven.

Do you think they could have made this any more complicated? Have a system that is even more of a pain to update the BIOS on? I want to hear your horror stories in the comments!

Perceptions of Roomba

2008-12-30T00:00:00.000-08:00

For Christmas I went out and bought my wife an iRobot Roomba 400 vacuum cleaning robot from Target. I thought it would make her life a little easier. After all she is a stay-at-home mom, and takes care of the household while I slave away all day in server rooms, and on support calls.

I felt that if I got her this robot to do her vacuuming, she could do other things like eat her bon-bons, and catch up on her soaps (Just kidding honey :-P).

The one thing I didn't count on was how deathly afraid my daughter would be of it. She has almost gotten over her fears now, but she is still pretty timid of it.

To kind of give you an example of just how scared she was of the Roomba, I put together this little video.

If you don't have a Roomba, you should certainly go out and get one. I have seen them upwards of $400. I got the cheap model at Target though for under $200 and it does a bang up job!

Do you have a Roomba? How do you like it? Let us know in the comments.

"Cloning" Yourself Using Windows Movie Maker

2008-12-29T00:00:00.000-08:00

I figured out how to clone myself. No, I don't mean by taking a swab of my DNA, and growing another El Di Pablo from a petri dish or anything. No, I am simply talking about trick photography.

I thought this was pretty cool because I use Windows Movie Maker for editing my Bauer-Power video's, and didn't really think it could do anything this cool. I knew I could do basic video editing with it, which generally suits my purposes, but I never imagined that I could install add-in's to make it do just a little bit more.

To clone yourself, just follow these easy steps:

Film yourself on one side of the camera
Film yourself on the other side of the camera
Make sure not to cross the middle, or the will mess it up
Download the Split Video Plugin from Rehanfx.org
It's a self extracting exacutable. Double click on it, and extract it to C:\Program Files\Movie Maker\Shared\AddOnTFX
Open Movie Movie Maker and import your video's from step one and step two.
Drag one video over the other video
Go to Tools > Video Transitions and drag the Split Vertical Soft transition over your clips.
You are done!

I wanted to try it out, so here is the video I made:

Here is the video I watched when I learned how to do this trick:

Now, I did this using Movie Maker on Windows XP Pro. I haven't tried it in Vista yet. I am assuming that it works the same, but I am not sure. If this works in Vista let me know in the comments.

Do you know of any other cool Windows Movie Maker add-ins, tricks or tips? Let me know in the comments!

FREE Powered By Ubuntu Stickers! Get Them While They're HOT!

2008-12-27T00:23:00.000-08:00

Many many moons ago I sent away for some free "Powered By Ubuntu" stickers from some laptop company in Colorado that make laptops with Ubuntu installed on them. They don't do Windows!

It took a while, but I got my stickers, and I was a happy camper. I promptly removed my Windows sticker from my laptop, cleaned off the old adhesive with some rubbing alcohol, and replaced it with my shiny new Ubuntu sticker. I proudly showed the world around me that I didn't answer to multi-million dollar, self absorbed, monopolistic software companies like Microshaft. No, I did things on my own terms using free, as in FREE BEER, software available to anyone savvy enough to download it and install it!

I decided I would extend that same offer to you my readers, and anyone else that comes along that enjoys the freedom that Ubuntu Linux has to offer!

I will print out, and mail you a sheet of six "Powered By Ubuntu" self adhesive stickers free of charge! I am a big proponent of Ubuntu, and I want to spread the Ubuntu love to as many people out there as possible!

The sticker comes from the Free Software Stickers book that I blogged about quite a while ago. Sure, you can download the book yourself, print out the stickers and tape them to your laptop all ghetto style and whatnot. I on the other hand will print them out for you on nice, self adhesive sticker paper for a more professional look that says, "Hey, I'm not a douche bag!"

Here is a photo I snapped using my Blackberry of the one I have on my laptop:

So you want some right? I knew you did. All you have to do is mail me a self addressed stamped envelope to:

Bauer-Power Ubuntu Stickers
www.Bauer-Power.net
1520 Petree Street, Suite 632
El Cajon, CA 92020

When I get your envelope, I will return it with your sheet of FREE "Powered By Ubuntu" stickers!

For you Kubuntu users, I haven't forgot about you either! Just change the address from Bauer-Power Ubuntu Stickers to Bauer-Power Kubuntu Stickers and I will send you stickers reflecting your choice in Linux desktop managers (KDE v.s. Gnome)!

Please tell all your friends!

Secret Santa - Watch Santa PWN This Holiday Weekend!

2008-12-26T00:00:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday while at work I was whiling away the hours counting down until my shift was over so I could leave for the Holiday weekend. Most office folk were on vacation, and that means a slow time for the I.T. professional. So where does one turn to while at the office and bored out of their gourd? Why Youtube of course!

I found this funny little Holiday gem where Santa is our only hope against an evil monster known as "The Warlock" who is threatening to cast the world into a nuclear Winter.

Check out this Holiday spoof:

What did you think about it? Sort of reminds me of, "The Night The Reindeer Died" from Scrooged.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! I want to hear about what Santa brought you in the comments!

The 12 Admin Days of Christmas

2008-12-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

Last year I tried my hand at Christmas parody by writing An Admin's Night Before Christmas. It was all festive and what not, and did spread some Christmas joy, but honestly it wasn't my best work.

This year, I decided a much easier Christmas Carol to parody, The 12 Days of Christmas!

With the help of Mark Sexton, one of my company's Senior Systems Administrators, I have come up with this year's Sysadmin driven Christmas Carol, the 12 Admin Days of Christmas!

Enjoy!

On the first admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

An EMC Clariion SAN

On the second adminChristmas my supervisor gave to me

2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the third admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the fourth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the fifth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the sixth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the seventh admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the eighth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

8 HBA's
7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the ninth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

9 fibre channel cables
8 HBA's
7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the tenth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

10 Thousand RPM Drives
9 fibre channel cables
8 HBA's
7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the eleventh admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

11 LUNs Provisioned
10 Thousand RPM Drives
9 fibre channel cables
8 HBA's
7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

On the twelfth admin Christmas my supervisor gave to me

12 Terabytes
11 LUNs Provisioned
10 Thousand RPM Drives
9 fibre channel cables
8 HBA's
7 storage admins
6 9's of uptime
5 Hard Drive Shelves!
4 Storage processors
3 Phase power
2 Fibre Switches
and an EMC Clariion SAN

We at Bauer-Power wish all of you a very Merry Christmas (Or what ever Holiday you celebrate) and a very happy New Year!

Please forward this to all of your friends and help me spread some Sysadmin Christmas love!

Check Your Internet Speed - Code for Blogger

2008-12-24T00:00:00.000-08:00

I'm sure you have seen them, different sites that measure your internet connection speed. I like, them because they can be good for troubleshooting, and also so you can get an idea on just what your internet connection can handle.

What you may not have seen is friendly code to embed a speed test on your Blogspot blog! Sure, the one below can be downloaded and hosted on your web server if you manage your own web server, but what if your blog, like mine is hosted on Blogger? Then you are SOL!

Not anymore! Now with the help of the mighty iframe, you too can have your own internet speed test courtesy of Bauer-Power and Speedtest.net! Check it out!

Here is your embed code:

Besides Speedtest.net, what is your favorite internet speed test site? Let us know in the comments!

Netflix Movies and TV Shows on your XBOX

2008-12-23T00:00:00.000-08:00

What would you call a the bastard child between Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Netflix? Well I'd call it Nixboxlix. Yeah I know it was pretty lame. Well it looks like Microsoft and Netflix signed up a deal together. You can now watch your Netflix Watch it now Queue on your Xbox. I've tried it out for a while and the quality over a wired connection on Broadband Cable internet is just as good as watching it on my PC.

Now, you can't sort the list or anything. It just shows it in a list by the movie/show cover by order that you added it to your queue. Also it kind of sucks because you have to add items to your Netflix watch it now queue from your pc, then turn around and watch them on the Xbox. So that can get annoying pretty quick, but if there is a show you like just add a good group of those and it's not too bad.

Another thing that is nice about it is that it keeps your place no matter where you watch it at. So say you're at work and you're watching a movie there (durring your break like always, right?) and you stop it to get back to work and then you get home you can pick it up on your Xbox from where you left off at.

Free training for Solaris 10 OS

2008-12-22T00:00:00.000-08:00

Here is a letter I received from Sun about free training. I figured I’d pass the info along to you guys. Especially since Solaris 10 is a free download.

[Edit by El Di Pablo] -This might be good for you Coleman guys that are reading the blog to get you through your Capstone stuff. For those that didn't catch that stuff, I blogged about my futile adventures in Solaris and wireless while doing the Linux/Unix portion of the labs. Lord knows Coleman isn't going to teach you about Solaris, so you better check this out while its free!

Anyway, here is the content of the email:

In this economic climate, it is as important as ever to keep your skills up-to-date. Now you can enhance your Solaris 10 OS skills with free training at the new Sun Open Learning Center. The Sun Open Learning Center allows you to: Get free access to our most popular Solaris 10 OS training Engage in live conversations with Solaris instructors and experts in Second Life virtual world Obtain highly desired system administration skills for the Solaris 10 OSThere are over thirteen million Solaris 10 OS registered licenses. Don't miss your chance to enhance your Solaris 10 skills and meet the growing need for Solaris 10 OS Administrators.

Free Training Here

If you have any questions or feedback, please send a message to openlearning_feedback@sun.com.
Thank you,
Sun Microsystems, Inc.

By Sundance of Free TV Shows Online

Have you seen my new Bauer-Puntu commercial?

2008-12-19T00:00:00.000-08:00

Well, maybe it isn't that new. In fact, this had been milling around Youtube for the last week and a half. The cool news is that it is sort of picking up speed as far as people watching it. I am hoping that it goes viral, and we can finally get Bauer-Puntu into the hands of the people!

Actually, I really just hope people find it kind of humorous, and if they download Bauer-Puntu, then that is just an added bonus.

If you haven't seen it yet, it is a fairly easy set up. I wrote down what I wanted to say, then did a quick Google image search for the key talking points. I of course wanted to do a humorous spin on it, so the funnier the pictures, the better in my opinion.

For those of you who haven't seen it yet, get ready to live!

I want to know what you thought of the commercial. Funny? Stupid? Cheesy? Hilarious? Let me know what you think in the comments!

Checking in with Kip Kay: DIY 007 Laser Gun

2008-12-18T00:00:00.000-08:00

I have reposted Kip Kay's video's in the past. If you haven't heard of Mr. Kay, you can check out his website at www.KipKay.com. I first found his videos on Metacafe. Kip is a real life McGyver and literally turns random stuff into some of the most kick-ass things you wouldn't normally think of.

I haven't been to his site in a while so I decided to stop by and see what Kip was up to. When I saw that he had turned a CO2 Walther PPK into a laser pistol, I had to share that with you! I mean, I am the worlds biggest James Bond fan, so anything 007 peaks my interest. That reminds me, have you seen Quantum of Solace yet? Awesome right?

Anyway, in this video by Kip he shows us how to make our own 007 Laser gun with a CO2 pistol, and parts from an XBox 360!

Now, I realize that the gun really makes no difference in this video. It is really the laser site that he is modding. Still, the fact that he used a Walther PPK is pretty cool.

IE 8 Beta 2, Good and Bad?

2008-12-17T00:00:00.000-08:00

So I've been testing the new IE 8 Beta 2 that Microsoft came out with and I'd have to say I like it. I have been a big Firefox fan for a long time now but I actually like the IE 8 better. It has many features built in to it that I like that I would have to download plugins for in Firefox. As far as security and privacy I've tested it by just randomly clicking through various porn and spyware infested sites and came out clean, got plenty of messages saying they sites were not safe also.

One of the things I like best about it is the inPrivate Browse option. With this it saves no cookies, history or cache and it's all cleared on exit. So when you're doing some browsing and you get a little paranoid or you just don't want your girlfriend or parents to find out what you've been doing it works great.

I also like their Accelerators. These link to things you do online all the time like say you're on a site and you want to blog about it, just highlight some text you want to quote and right click, then click on the Blog With option. You're not restricted to just using the Microsoft stuff also. When you setup IE 8 it asks you what you want to choose, and both MS and Google options are there. Accelerators also link with Email, Define, Find, Map and Translate.

IE 8 also has some nice enhancements to browsing and navigation options. For example they have a nice Compatibility button for sites that come up and look all out of place, (probably due to poor XHTML coding) it'll do a quick clean up and make it look better. Also one of my favorites is Linked Colored Tabs. So if you open a new tab from a link on the page it'll color code all the tabs that belong together and keep them next to each other to make it a little easier to find what you're looking for in the 15 tabs you have open. Oh and their Find on Page feature is a lot better and more like Firefox and not some 1990's popup search.

One thing that may just not really be used yet but so far seems pretty lame are the web slices. I mean really, do we need to have a little cutout page to look at in our favorites. Most likely if we're adding it to our favorites we know what it is or if we wanted to look up something on a page we'd just go to the page. Also the Ebay web slices don't auto update so that's about pointless.

Another thing is that they really haven't worked on their Favorites or History management. Even though they say Improved from previous versions. I can't tell the difference besides it pops out from the side differently.

And the last thing I really don't like about it is the Tab Recovery on load. There's no option, at least as far as I've noticed, to regain all the tabs from your last browser session. Sure you can go up to tools click Reopen Last Browsing Session, but that's one step I don't want to have to take. But it is at least an option this time around so it's just a minor annoyance.

By Sundance of Make Me a Sammich Games

Possible Blogger Security Hole?

2008-12-16T00:00:00.000-08:00

So there I was, a warm winter day sitting in my office here in San Diego, California. I had just signed up for my new more professional email account and was working on migrating my blogger stuff over to that account.

Then I thought to myself, "Self, you don't really want to have your old email account listed for you blogs do you?" Then I thought some more, "Well Self, a sub user that was added to an account typically can't delete the owner." So as sat there I decided to just check anyway.

I hate things being cluttered and having accounts where they don't need to be. I clicked on the Settings tab and then on the Permissions link. "Oh Self, this is stupid, You're not going to be able to remove it, It's the owner and You're just an Administrator." Then sure enough to my surprise there it was. The Remove button. "Wow Self, You really can do this I guess." Sure enough as the Spike Shooters do make you feel like you're on crack, it worked. I was able to remove the Owner/Creator of the blog!

So to sum this story up. Do not add anyone as an Administrator to your blog for one day they may remove you from the blog without your permission and everything you live for and love will be lost and there's nothing you can do about it...

(queue evil music while screen fades to black)

By Sundance now of Make Me A Sammich Games