4 Weeks Later
Well it has been a while since I have posted and a lot has been going on so I do apologise. Its been just over 4 weeks since I moved to Birmingham and what a great experience it has been. My placement has kicked off to a great start and I quickly got to know the ins and outs of the company and its systems so a big thanks to Talwinder, the current placement student I will be replacing.
Birmingham its self has been awesome. Last Monday I went with my new flatmate and his friends to The Rainbow to see Kid British! What a great band and they played amazing live! I also saw The Anomalies which were also awesome and other band which were very good but I have no idea what they were called… Any who it got me in the mood for V festival which is only a month away!
My placement has been a real learning curve and I think its going to get steeper which is always fun. I’m currently looking at a Windows PBX called 3CX which may be implemented at the office.
This weekend I’ll hopefully get round to having a look at the new update for Windows Home Server. Power Pack 3 has been released under a BETA tag, which means its not quite ready for the public as it might still have bugs in the software. It brings support for Windows 7 enhancements to Windows Media Centre. Check it out here.
On that note I have been checking out a new media centre called Boxee! After leaving the Stafford house the original Xbox running XBMC has been retired as I no longer have a TV (Soon to change) so I started using Boxee as a Windows version had just been released. I was very impressed initially and continue to be bemused by its features. Boxee is based on XBMC but does a much better job at presenting its self. The applications feature is also a great edition allowing UK users to watch BBC iPlayer, although here in Birmingham I am on 2mb broadband so can’t stream the HD content. I was going to set up XBMC on my new TV though a PC rather than an the Xbox but I think now it’ll be running Boxee so watch this space!.. Going to have a to buy a TV first though.. and maybe a new small computer..??
Also a quick GOOD LUCK to Andrew, Michael and Dave who are in Germany finishing their first week on placement!
Rain!
So I have moved to Birmingham ready to start placement on Monday. It was another humid day but towards late afternoon it started to rain with the odd thunder and lighting strikes. I needed to go to Tesco and not knowing where that was I used the sat nav which took me pass this, a sight dip in the road which had gathered a lot of water..
And yes, I did drive though it..
Move In Day
I have now got the keys for my home for the next year or so in Birmingham. I haven’t exactly packed but I should be moving tomorrow and starting placement on Monday!
I seemed to have been corner by my parents to do some IT work for them today so I think I’ll be packing much just the essentials much like friends Andy and Michael who will be traveling to Germany soon for their placement so good luck to them!
A Busy Week
Its been a busy week for me after moving out of Stafford after finishing my second year of uni. I have been busy working for my parents, sorting out computers, moving printers all sorts it seems as well as having fun with Windows SBS 2003 but more on that later… I managed to escape and had a trip to Alton Towers last Tuesday. I had a great time and I managed not to spend an arm and a leg on crazy ride photos with rather funny poses however it did rain. On the up side the queues were short and we managed to get a good day of thrills. We did go on the new pirate ride, Battle Galleons, in which you fire water canons at other pirate ships and incidentally the queue of people waiting to get on.. although they can fire back. I have to admit I didn’t think it would be as enjoyable as it was, but as all good things must end I managed to hurt my neck. I think it was on the Spinball Whizzzer ride and the past few days I’ve been quite a bit of pain with a stiff neck however it only happened at the end of the day.
The biggest thing I suppose is that is was my birthday this week, it appears I have turned 20. I had a good day and a nice meal at Damons in Lincoln, very good food and if it is your birthday your meal is on the house so its all good, they also give you a cake so recommended to all!
With this stiff neck I also started to get a burning sensation in my pocket but I quickly sorted that out with a purchase of an Xbox 360. I did have one at the start of uni but I never really used it and I ended up selling it. This time around I have got myself an Elite console with my collection of games starting at Left 4 Dead. I’ve noticed the dashboard has changed dramatically which is a big improvement..
I haven’t yet hooked it up to the Windows Home Server to stream content to it as it is currently being used elsewhere but hopefully by the end of weekend I’ve have my hands back on it.
Next week I’m hopefully going to get round to checking out Windows 7 what with uni and exams I’ve not had a chance to have a look a the RC I was about to install it on my laptop which has a new screen (I won’t say how I broke it) but I don’t have any blank DVD’s. When I get some I’ll also be checking out Gentoo which is used at my placement.. which I can’t wait to start.. I’ve signed contracts for my accommodation in Birmingham and move in on the 27th! so I’m playing the waiting game…
On that note I’m going to end this rather unusually long post…
Easter Update
The Easter break is quickly coming to an end with the 3rd semester just around the corner. Its been a good break, I have been home for a while building IKEA shelves and decorating the dining room in between finishing my last assignment and seeing friends. However back in Stafford now as I needed to take care of some things before uni was in swing again.
One of those things was finding a house for my placement year in Birmingham. I decided over Easter I didn’t want to commute from Stafford. I used to commute to college in the first year before I learnt to drive although I don’t mind getting up at 6am in the morning I don’t like the idea of spending 40minutes each way on a train everyday. so I started looking for flat in Birmingham. Surprisingly the rent is very similar too what I was expecting if I lived in Stafford including a season train ticket. I e-mailed a few people and arranged house viewings for yesterday (Tuesday) I was quite nervous as I didn’t know what to expect from the houses as it would be like first year in halls, not knowing who you are moving in with etc. However the first house had reasonably sized rooms and the rent was pretty low, however the house was very student like and didn’t feel like a house at all more like halls really, so on I went to the second house which was very nice indeed. It had been well looked after and was more of a house than a student pad. It had a nice living and dining room with a fairly big kitchen and generally felt like a nice house to spend time after a hard days work. One out of the 4 rooms are taken and I’m the process of signing contracts and putting down a deposit to take up the largest room more on this later though.
It appears I have also signed up on Twitter, I signed up a while back as I thought I’d check it out but never did anything with it and now Facebook seems to me as trying to follow twitter (Little joke there??) which is a shame as Facebook had its own thing going on but has seemed to have lost that spark now so I thought I’d check out twitter again. Haven’t got many followers though maybe because I need to update it more…
The car passed its MOT first time which is a first I think although it had to stay the night at the garage as they didn’t fit the new brakes and new front pile in time for it to have its MOT done.
On other note I have reached 200,000 credits on BOINC Stats…
Anyway back to work….
