This is a tip sheet for the proper way to drive.
The key to driving is knowing ONE IMPORTANT FACT: YOU are not the only person on the road.
Turn Signals: Use them. The turn signal lets people know you will be slowing down, and also WHY you are slowing down. It lets the people around you plan their actions based on your own. It also lets others know if you are about to do something stupid, such as merge when a vehicle is in your blind spot.
If the LAPD wants to make more money to pay officers, they should start pulling over everyone who doesn't use their turn signals - easy money.
Lanes: There is a proper way to use lanes. Assuming there is a 4 lane road, such as "the" 101 (why the hell do we call it "the" 101 instead of "Highway 101" or "US 101" or "CA 101"?), each lane has a purpose.
The rightmost lane is for exiting or entering the highway. That is ALL it should be used for. If you get your slow ass out of the right lane, people will be able to merge onto the highway faster, and there will be less slowdown for all.
The next lane over is for driving. No matter your speed, if you are simply driving, you should be in this lane.
The next lane(s) are for passing. Get in the left lanes, pass the person or people you are moving faster than, then MOVE back over so that others may pass you. As always, use your turn signals to let people know what you are doing.
The acceleration lane is for ACCELERATING. Especially if the meter is off, you should use this lane to enter the highway at or near the posted speed limit.
If you are on Malibu Canyon/Las Virgenes, and do not feel like traveling at the posted speed limit, USE THE TURN-OFFS!!! They were designed for you to move the fuck out of the way of people who like traveling 45 in a 45.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Monday, July 13, 2009
New Computer
Built a new computer today with parts from the Intel Retail Edge's Big Deal program.
From the top down, outside in:
Antec 900 Case, with Dynex case fan for the side panel.
HP 22x DVD-RW drive. Cheapest SATA drive we have.
Intel DX58SO "Smackover" motherboard.
Intel Core i7 920 processor (stock speed of 2.66 Ghz)
6GB of OCZ 12800 (1600Mhz speed) DDR3 RAM
BFG Geforce 260 GTX OC Maxcore video card (I love BFG graphics cards and the lifetime warranty)
Seagate 7200.12 500GB SATA hard drive. The newer Seagates have speeds approaching the Velociraptors, with more space and less than half the price.
And, a 750W Corsair power supply.
Stock CPU fan currently, although I might replace that once I get my mail-in-rebates :( from Newegg for the RAM and PSU.
Motherboard is slow to post, takes 5 seconds or so for my monitor to go from power saving to showing video... worried me a little on the first boot. Once it's running, it's crazy fast. Only thing I'm having issues with so far is slow internet, and that's likely due to installing updates.
Windows Ultimate 64-bit, to be upgraded (for free) to Windows 7 come October 22nd.
Everything has gone great so far. Flashed the new BIOS, then used it to increase the memory voltage to 1.62, QPI to 1.35 and timings to 7-7-7/20 in able to get the desired 1600Mhz speed. Running great so far. I'm debating using the Intel "Auto-Tune" function for the processor overclock, or simply changing the settings myself.
From the top down, outside in:
Antec 900 Case, with Dynex case fan for the side panel.
HP 22x DVD-RW drive. Cheapest SATA drive we have.
Intel DX58SO "Smackover" motherboard.
Intel Core i7 920 processor (stock speed of 2.66 Ghz)
6GB of OCZ 12800 (1600Mhz speed) DDR3 RAM
BFG Geforce 260 GTX OC Maxcore video card (I love BFG graphics cards and the lifetime warranty)
Seagate 7200.12 500GB SATA hard drive. The newer Seagates have speeds approaching the Velociraptors, with more space and less than half the price.
And, a 750W Corsair power supply.
Stock CPU fan currently, although I might replace that once I get my mail-in-rebates :( from Newegg for the RAM and PSU.
Motherboard is slow to post, takes 5 seconds or so for my monitor to go from power saving to showing video... worried me a little on the first boot. Once it's running, it's crazy fast. Only thing I'm having issues with so far is slow internet, and that's likely due to installing updates.
Windows Ultimate 64-bit, to be upgraded (for free) to Windows 7 come October 22nd.
Everything has gone great so far. Flashed the new BIOS, then used it to increase the memory voltage to 1.62, QPI to 1.35 and timings to 7-7-7/20 in able to get the desired 1600Mhz speed. Running great so far. I'm debating using the Intel "Auto-Tune" function for the processor overclock, or simply changing the settings myself.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Work Rant(s)
I work for the GeekSquad in a Best Buy store. I love my job. I hate some of our clients.
1) @consumerist, gizmodo, engadget, etc... Best Buy is a chain with over 700 stores. If ONE store screws up and does some "cowboy" signage, it is a screw up, POSSIBLY a rip-off attempt, of that store, not Best Buy as a whole or the other individual parts. (Recent episodes coming to mind are the HD, Porn in DVD player (added bonus feature??!!) and the Calibrated/Non-Calibrated signs put in our "HD / Non-HD" display.
It is not in Best Buy's interest to rip off our customers. We are in it for the long run. Associates are trained on Building Relationships, not on "Rip-Off the customer to make the biggest sale TODAY!"
Our Brand Promises and Interaction guides (Changing from CARE+ to TRUST) embody this idea.
2) "Your serivces are expensive!" The company says they are competively priced, either way, I agree that they are expensive. So is a 50" TV, so are IMAX movie tickets (or regular movie tickets for that matter). Are they WORTH it? That's a question for individuals to answer. Sure, a calibration is something that can technically done by anyone (I calibrated my TV and my best friend's using an Episode 1 DVD). But, not everyone is capable of doing it. For them, it is worth it.
3) "OMG!!! This is my work computer! I'm losing $xxxx every day!" I'm sorry you are having computer problems, we'll get it fixed as soon as we can, while ensuring we get properly reimbursed for the fix. I offer a solution "Buy a backup computer." Response "I don't have the money" In my head "You're losing over $1k a day, yet you can't buy a $600 computer?? Does not compute!"
Do the math. Even if you buy a laptop and return it within 2 weeks, you pay 15% and are able to make money. Does it make business sense? Then DO IT!
4) "My computer died 3 months ago. You transferred the data from it to my new computer. Now my new computer died. Backup my data again, or transfer me to the person who handle lawsuits."
My first question - "Did you backup your information?" I know the answer already, "No." Think about this.... computer died, maybe that was a surprise, I understand, some people don't realize the fragileness of computers. However, that puts you on notice that computers can fail. You had to pay us $99.99 or $159.99 (depending on amount of data) to backup your stuff, maybe you should think about doing it yourself in the future. I can say with 90% certainty we recommended a long-term self backup solution so this didn't happen again.
Second thought, and answer to his last statement - 888-BESTBUY handles any mention of lawsuit, and at the store level I can no longer help you. If you are a douchebag, this is an out for me. When you first came up to the desk / called, I wanted to help you, I wanted to do the best thing for you. When you become a douche, I no longer want to, but I will because it's my job. If you say "sue", I'm not ALLOWED to help you any more.
Also, I / Best Buy would win that lawsuit. You paid for a "One Time Data Backup/Transfer." It says so on your receipt, which is a binding contract. One Time. We backed it up properly, you admitted this on the phone to me. We have a 30 day warranty on our work, and had you been in front of me/ not a douche bag, I might have done it for free anyway (which would upset my Services Manager I'm sure).
1) @consumerist, gizmodo, engadget, etc... Best Buy is a chain with over 700 stores. If ONE store screws up and does some "cowboy" signage, it is a screw up, POSSIBLY a rip-off attempt, of that store, not Best Buy as a whole or the other individual parts. (Recent episodes coming to mind are the HD, Porn in DVD player (added bonus feature??!!) and the Calibrated/Non-Calibrated signs put in our "HD / Non-HD" display.
It is not in Best Buy's interest to rip off our customers. We are in it for the long run. Associates are trained on Building Relationships, not on "Rip-Off the customer to make the biggest sale TODAY!"
Our Brand Promises and Interaction guides (Changing from CARE+ to TRUST) embody this idea.
2) "Your serivces are expensive!" The company says they are competively priced, either way, I agree that they are expensive. So is a 50" TV, so are IMAX movie tickets (or regular movie tickets for that matter). Are they WORTH it? That's a question for individuals to answer. Sure, a calibration is something that can technically done by anyone (I calibrated my TV and my best friend's using an Episode 1 DVD). But, not everyone is capable of doing it. For them, it is worth it.
3) "OMG!!! This is my work computer! I'm losing $xxxx every day!" I'm sorry you are having computer problems, we'll get it fixed as soon as we can, while ensuring we get properly reimbursed for the fix. I offer a solution "Buy a backup computer." Response "I don't have the money" In my head "You're losing over $1k a day, yet you can't buy a $600 computer?? Does not compute!"
Do the math. Even if you buy a laptop and return it within 2 weeks, you pay 15% and are able to make money. Does it make business sense? Then DO IT!
4) "My computer died 3 months ago. You transferred the data from it to my new computer. Now my new computer died. Backup my data again, or transfer me to the person who handle lawsuits."
My first question - "Did you backup your information?" I know the answer already, "No." Think about this.... computer died, maybe that was a surprise, I understand, some people don't realize the fragileness of computers. However, that puts you on notice that computers can fail. You had to pay us $99.99 or $159.99 (depending on amount of data) to backup your stuff, maybe you should think about doing it yourself in the future. I can say with 90% certainty we recommended a long-term self backup solution so this didn't happen again.
Second thought, and answer to his last statement - 888-BESTBUY handles any mention of lawsuit, and at the store level I can no longer help you. If you are a douchebag, this is an out for me. When you first came up to the desk / called, I wanted to help you, I wanted to do the best thing for you. When you become a douche, I no longer want to, but I will because it's my job. If you say "sue", I'm not ALLOWED to help you any more.
Also, I / Best Buy would win that lawsuit. You paid for a "One Time Data Backup/Transfer." It says so on your receipt, which is a binding contract. One Time. We backed it up properly, you admitted this on the phone to me. We have a 30 day warranty on our work, and had you been in front of me/ not a douche bag, I might have done it for free anyway (which would upset my Services Manager I'm sure).
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