Category Archives: Personal

Dollar Accounts and Barclays Bank

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Just had a webchat with Barclays Bank, and it must be them embracing different ways to chat to customers that browse their website.  So thought I would ask about dollar accounts and why not after all it popped up and they asked me.

So here goes the conversation

Customer: ok can you give me current exchange rates on dollar accounts that you offer please
Customer: ??
Sarah A: I am sorry, Paul, we don’t have that information.
Customer: what ??? you dont have the information and your the bank !!!! never mind I will look around thanks for your help good afternoon
Sarah A: You’re welcome, Paul. Thank you for using Barclays Webchat Service.

Well again a corker from Barclays Bank – they are the bank and they cant even tell me what dollar rates they have !!!

Reminded me of the time I went into a branch and asked how much it would be to pay off an existing loan with them.  The girl behind the desk said well i’m not really sure its approximately ….  cant write a cheque for approximately …. eventually a supervisor came over and told me the exact amount.

Gosh they do make me laugh.

Got my Suzuki GSXR750 K7

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Last weekend took delivery of my Suzuki GSXR750 K7 it is very nice. Bit frightened have to be honest of it at first but after 2 bends I was smiling very big wide smiles its excellent. Unfortunately it broke down 2 days after getting it, the regulator went on it but Portman Motorcycles are fixing it. But until that time I didn’t get above 3rd gear and was doing about just under a ton.

Suzuki GSX-R 750

Suzuki GSX-R 750

Getting Rsyncd, Vista and Backuppc to work

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Recently upgraded to vista and for the life of me couldnt get the vista to work with rsyncd running from cygwin.  Would always stop with a code 12 error and not alot else.  I just run rsyncd or rsync with the daemon option as I dont belive the cwrsync works as a service yet on vista. 

Now in the backuppc config options for rsyncd and rsync there is a hard link option I just removed that and it seems to work not sure why vista cant deal with that option but if you remove it, everything works as it did before on windows 2000 / XP.

Broadband Slamming – www.broadbandchecker.co.uk

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Well just when I was thinking of moving my broadband thought I would have a look around and tried a site called broadband checker on www.broadbandchecker.co.uk, only used that site and about a week later I got an email from my existing provider saying that I had been slammed.  Basically there had been a manual cease put on the line from what seemed to be from Tiscali, now my existing provider eclipse internet said they couldnt do anything which really worried me.  After contacting Tiscali they said that a 3rd party reseller had initiated it but wouldnt tell me who. 

Talked to Ofcom and they said that there had been quite a lot of this happening lately.  So after getting them invovled BT wholesale agreed not to cancel the line and luckily its back on now although it keeps training the line now.

It all seemed too much of a coincidence that this happened when I had tried out the broadband site so I would urge everyone use the site as it is a good one lots of info but what ever you do dont put your phone number for the search only use the postcoe option.

Hopefully moving to bonded adsl with www.upstreaminter.net  so will blog about my experience of that soon….

Vista, Palm Treo 750v and Windows Mobile Center 6.1

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Since upgrading to Vista have had a few problems syncing my Palm Treo 750v with the mobile center.  Read lots of places that upgrading to Mobile Center 6.1 helped well I dont think thats really the problem, the problem seems to be that the (or at least mine) Treo seems to have a mind of its own and gets stuck doing things ie. the bluetooth sometimes doesnt connect as the mobile is busy this seems to be the same with the syncing one minute it syncs the other it doesnt.

I normally find that once I have soft rebooted (taken battery out) the mobile it works fine whether it be mobile sync center 6.1 or 6.0

I run Vista 64 bit here as well for the record, just waiting for Birdie Sync to be compatible with vista 64bit then all will be good as I tend to run a mixture of windows and linux, prefer not to use outlook and use thunderbird instead as it has better support for IMAP.

Napster Media Center Plugin on Vista

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Since upgrading from xp windows media center to vista home premium I have been unable to get Napster to work using its media center plugin the one that allows you to download and listen to music through the media center with the tv remote.  The normal napster application works fine but not the plugin.  It was provided free with windows xp media center edition but it doesnt appear to be there in vista meda center.

Looking on the internet it looks like this is the case that microsoft are not providing it free with media center probably because they have their own music download site now.

So thought I would ring Napster to see what thay had to say about it, hoping they were going tell me not to worry as they would be releasing it soon.  I hoped this because I believe it was rather good and used it rather a lot.

Ringing Napster you are prompted with an automated message about which OS do you run press 1 for XP press 2 for Vista etc etc.  So pressed the appropriate number for vista and the phone got answered by a nice chap with an american accent guess he was in america – lol.  I explain my predicament and he is unsure what I am on about as he has no experience of XP media center, when I pressed him about a similar version for Vista he admitted to me that he hadnt even seen vista now what the hell is he doing on the end of a line where you have to press buttons to appropriate support staff when they havent even seen the basics like operating system. 

Ah well, I immediately cancelled my subscription.  If any one has any news about the media center plugin for vista I would be grateful not to mention restarting my subscription to Napster as I really did like it.

Mini Adventure to Berlin – May 2007

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Well it all started about two months ago, when my mate Chris reckoned to go to Berlin for a weekend.  As soon as he said that I thought “YES” but instead of flying I would suggest driving, I thought it would be a blast and due to my last excursion in Brittany France was well up for it.

We left on Thursday 24th May 2007 and caught the tunnel train at around 10pm.  Just as we got on the train a couple of lads from Epsom parked behind us with their Aston Martin DB9 now me being me and Ken being Ken !! thought we would chat to them and get a sit in the DB9.  But before I could say anything Ken was demonstrating how to use their TomTom.  They were on their way to Marbella for the week and were unsure how many miles it was.

Ken giving a lesson on how to use TomTomsneeked a sit in the DB9
And while Ken explained how to program in the complete opposite of how to get to Marbella I sneaked a ride in the DB9.
Ready To GoOn Our Way

It was soon time to get back in the cars ready to get out on the french roads, Ken had a bit of business to attend to in the back of the mini and was heard ranting Buy, Sell etc etc ….

Then once off the train trundled along to the formula one hotel in Calais to stay the night so we would be refreshed for the journey to Berlin in the morning. Once near to the hotel ran into (not literally) the DB9 going around and around, Ken had obviously done the business on the TomTom ho ho … !!! Dumped our stuff and got off to the only place left open in Calais, a disco. Which in the end was actually quite good and we got a few beers in before heading back to the hotel about 3am.

While driving into the locked hotel complex via a coded gate a van decides to follow us in.  Its a bloke driving and he appears to pick a lady up and then realises he cant get out of the gated complex.  He then jumps out and starts banging on the door, its at this point that Ken and Chris decide to wind him up as they knew they were safe on the inside of the locked door.  Eventually after much banging from this guy Chris goes and lets him out.

We finally get to sleep about 3.30 / 4 am after Chris and Ken have sampled the delights of the vending machine.  We all go to sleep, Chris and Ken sharing a double bed – oooolala.  Then next I remember is that I was woken around 6am by a couple of growling tigers, was very frightened until I realised it was just Ken and Chris snoring their heads off.

To be Continued….

Quick Plug For FEL Communications and Nick Roast

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Right was after some 3.5 mm socket savers for my media center and found FEL Communications in Sunbury.   Think they are about the only people that do them as couldnt find anything like it else where on the net.  Very nice chap and collected them personally from his house which incidently was down the same road my friend from Brooklands Technical College used to live – Adrian Turner.

Right so the website is http://www.felmicamps.co.uk.

Thanks again Nick

Scruffy Died

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Well for all those fans of Scruffy, unfortunately he died back in February.  He was breathing deeply one day and turned out he had a tumor in his lungs so had to have him put down.  Very sad day indeed as he was my mate.

Here is a nice picture to remember him by…