Turns out doing that makes the machine unstable when you push the CPU to its limit. You get BSOD’s or applications crash or whatever. I eventually figured out that taking the CPU back to it’s default clock settings made life much much more stable. Once I did the overclock properly (increase multiplier and voltage) things worked better, but were much, much hotter.

Fast forward to today. My new Xigmatek HDT S1284 arrived and I was ready to strap it on. This new heatsink/fan combo is very highly rated, and quiet. It’s also very tall. You can see the difference in the pictures below.

The new cooler is a beast, but the results are impressive.

Stock system: 2.5GHz; 50°C idle → 71°C fully busy (Prime95)
OC’d system: 3.0GHz; 39°C idle → 54°C fully busy (Prime95)

The new system is 20% faster and 22-24% cooler. That’s a win in my book!

UPDATE: Real world testing (encoding 5th Element from Blu-Ray to mkv) is 15% faster! (4h 29m 54s versus 3h 49m 24s)

Those of you not in California may not know about Proposition 8. It’s a proposed amendment to the California Constitution that would only recognize marriages between a man and woman in the state. It’s something I simply can’t support for two major reasons:

1. I can’t support ammending the constitution to discriminate against people based on anything they were born with: skin color, hair curliness, gender, sexual orientation, etc.
2. I need to know that my children will be able to marry, with the same rights and responsibilities their parents enjoy, whomever they fall in love with.

I’m also quite discouraged by the Yes on 8 campaign’s reasoning behind their proposal:

California voters passed Proposition 22 in 2000 by more than 61%, saying that a marriage in California is between a man and a woman. Earlier this year, four activist judges based in San Francisco wrongly overturned the people’s vote, legalizing same-sex marriage.

I’m not sure how kind of thinking comes up:

1. These judges were never considered “activist” until they did something the campaign disagreed with.
2. The judge’s job is to uphold the state constitution, which they’ve done the best they know how.
3. There is precedent (the 1948 Perez v. Sharp case) that “marriage is a fundamental right and that laws restricting that right must not be based solely on prejudice”. That’s why prop 22 failed, not because they want to overturn the people’s vote, but because the people voted yes on a law that is illegal.

The Supreme Court’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage did not just overturn the will of California voters; it also redefined marriage for the rest of society, without ever asking the people themselves to accept this decision.

In fact that is not what happened. Prop 22 is what was redefining marriage; overturning prop 22 returned it’s definition to what it’s been for decades in the state of California.

For example, because public schools are already required to teach the role of marriage in society as part of the curriculum, schools will now be required to teach students that gay marriage is the same as traditional marriage, starting with kindergarteners.

Indeed. [Begin sarcasm] I am shocked, shocked, to think that schools will be required to teach what is legal and what is not in the state of California [End sarcasm]. Further; being a product of public education in California I cannot remember a time when marriage was discussed in any great detail. Further, if you fiercely oppose anything taught in school (sex education comes to mind) you can have your child pulled during the material you find offensive. California law has guaranteed that right for years.

By saying that a marriage is between “any two persons” rather than between a man and a woman, the Court decision has opened the door to any kind of “marriage.”

If by “any kind” of marriage you mean one of the three possible combinations: man-man, man-woman, woman-woman.

This undermines the value of marriage altogether at a time when we should be restoring marriage, not undermining it.

This final line irritates me the most. It has to be the most base form of thinking in the entire analysis. There are precisely two people that can undermine the value of any marriage: the couple. Nobody else has that power. Only the couple can make a marriage work. Only the couple can break it. Only the couple can make it stronger and beautiful and something to marvel at. I am simply disgusted to think that the Yes on 8 campaign belives it has any influence what so ever into the strength or value of my marriage. Their audacity is beyond compare.

Vote YES on Proposition 8 to overturn the outrageous Supreme Court decision and restore the definition of marriage that was approved by over 61% of voters.

I can’t argue with this; that’s exactly what Prop 8 will do. It will also tie the hands of the court in a way that cannot be challenged without another proposition to overturn this amendment (think of ending prohibition).

Gays have a right to their private lives, but not to change the definition of marriage for everyone else.

In California, Yes on 8 is changing the definition of marriage for everyone else. That is the very essense of Prop 8.

Available at /wallpaper

Available at /wallpaper

Monday night, around 10pm while we were watching TV in the living room, somebody opened a window into one of the bedrooms, came in, and took both of our laptops. WHILE WE WERE HOME. We filed a police report and immediately cancelled/changed all our financial information. We reset all our passwords: email, wifi, work, etc. etc.

It’s been a major PITA, the police are doing what they can but obviously they have higher priorities. I think we’ll be able to put this behind us pretty shortly with some home security improvements, but it still sucks. If either of us have been a bit wonky/spacy this week, now you know why.

Available over at /wallpaper

Available over at /wallpaper

I joined in the fun and downloaded the Mac version.

Since there were spots for more creature parts, I went shopping on EA’s website and found that if I pre-registered for Spore, I could download the full creature creator right-then. Sweet! I pre-registered, gave them credit card info, and got all set to download only to find that they don’t have downloads for the Mac.

“Weak,” I thought, “I’ll just download the full version later.” With that all thoughts of Spore left my head.

On August 28th, I received two email from EA that I hadn’t expected!

Thank you for your recent pre-order purchase of Spore from EA Store.
As you are probably aware, Spore is due to be released on September 7th. However, we’ve just made it easier for you to get in the game faster by making Spore available to pre-load from the 28th August!

Followed by another one:

Thank you for ordering on EA Store (US). The product that you pre-ordered is now available for either preload or release. The EA Download Manager indicates the release date and time of your purchase. The preload is a convenience to get you into the game faster when the release date arrives.

Order ID: xxxxxxxxxx
Product ID: xxxxxxxx
Product Name: Spore™>

“Yay!” I thought, “Spore will soon be mine!”

But that was not to be the case. I searched the EA site high and low, but couldn’t figure out where I could download Spore. Giving up, I decided to ask the Customer Service people for some help. This was my first mistake. Their contact form simply doesn’t work. I couldn’t get the combination of “Macintosh”, “Spore”, and “Install” to work because their JavaScript menus kept eliminating options when I would change one of those fields. Eventually I settled for saying it was “Battlefield 2142″ I needed help with, and letting the text of my message do the talking.

My message wasn’t the kindest so I’ll get to the meat of it:

How the heck do I download Spore for the Mac? The email I got today about pre-downloading isn’t very clear. This is very frustrating.

Two days later (August 30th) I got a reply from “EARep Seanna” (Sonika Singh):

Thank you for contacting us.

For more information on the SPORE Creature Creator full download for the Mac, please keep updated on the Game Tree Online website.

http://www.gametreeonline.com/ea/sporeIf you have any questions about this material or have any additional questions about your issue, please let us know.

Thinking I’d finally be free, I went to the link and started browsing around. Finding the links for Spore I tried to login using my EA account information.

No dice.

I tried different information from my account.

No dice.

Defeated I updated my request with EA:

That doesn’t really help; my EA login info doesn’t work at gametree.com. That makes it seem like I’d have to buy/pre-register for the game *twice*. I don’t want to pay for this game twice. Please refund or cancel my pre-order; whichever makes more sense. I’ll just pick up a DVD when the game comes out, this is too much of a hassle.

Today (September 3rd) I got a reply from “EARep Anna”:

Greetings,

Thank you for contacting Electronic Arts.

If you have the trial version of the SPORE Creature Creator, and you have purchased the full version of the Creature Creator, you must uninstall the trial version. To do this:

1. Click on the Start button.
2. Click Programs, or All Programs.

[More Windows instructions that don't apply to a Mac in any way shape or form.]

Now I’ll be honest, the first thought that entered my head was “Are you high?” My second thought was “Clearly, they’ve become very confused” and so I replied:

What are you talking about? I don’t have a Start button, this is a Mac!
I downloaded the spore creature creator trial, then tried to buy the full version for the Mac.
Apparently that was too complicated for EA since nobody’s been able to tell me how to download the full version.
SO. Please cancel my preregistration and reverse any charges that have been made. I have not been able to download anything.

I think I’m truly stuck now. I have no way of reaching anybody at EA over the phone and they have my credit card information. Obviously their customer support leaves something to be desired. If I had the option, I’d take a gun to the EA office. Unfortunately they’re all the way up in San Jose.

Available over at /wallpaper

Available over at /wallpaper