MaX C WeeKLy UpDaTeS PaGe

 

End of Term Update

 

What have you done in this course?

I have done many things in this course. From the first week mickey and i had been working hard on our first pentium 3. We downloaded ubuntu and played around on some of the games for the first week. We looked at many of the desktop programs such as gimp and notepad. The next week we worked on the vinly cutter and made 2 stickers each. After we had been working on our computer for a while and there was no more we could do with it we couldeither start on a new one or start working on sidfe projects.ver Christmas break my relatives got many electronic things and I also receivedmany electronic devices. The first thing i did was to help out my grandpa set up his ipod and his ihome. I downloaded limewire on to his computer at home and showed him how to get the songs onto his ipod. He gave me a list of about 150 songs to download and i finished it in about 2 hours. I also wrote out a list just in case he forgot how to use it. I showed him how to transfer songs from limewire to itunes and downloaded the newer version of itunes for him. I made some playlists for him also. Next i helped him but the ihome together and showed him how to use it with and without an ipod plugged into it. The 2nd thing i did was help my grandma set up her nintendo DS and show her how to use it. This took awhile because i had never used one before but after a few trys i was able to show her what to do. I set up the hard drive for her with some of her personal information and then showed her how to use brain age. After a few times of using the DS i was able to give her a whole tutorial on how to use it and play the game. Yesterday i had to help my mom with the computer because it wasnt working. There was a black screen saying flash disk error so i took one of the flash disks out and restarted the computer and it worked. The next problem she had was the internet wasnt working so i reset up our modem and fixed the wireless and it started working. Lastly, over the weekend i wanted to move my xbox from the living room down into the basement. The moving of the xbox was easy and so was the setting up but the ethernet cable wouldnt reach all the way so we had to cut a hole through the floor under the computer and run it to the basement. It took awhile but eventually my dad and i got it to work so i can now play online in the basement. Those were just some of sideprojects i did about 3 others. The next half of the term i had been working on my Imac. I was able to change some of the monitors settings and get into the internet and now i will be takingh my computer home today.

 

What was the biggest challenge for you this semester/year?

The biggest challenge for me was fixing my imac to work. I had to take it apart and put in a new motherborad. Once that was done i had to get some specific parts and put them into the motherborad. After about a week of work on the compouter it finally workedandi wasable to play around with some of the stuff on it.

 

What have you learned that could be useful outside of school?

I have learnedhow to make an ethernet cable and learned how to fix a newtowrk. I have learned what certain parts of a computer do and i know how to make a computer work from scratch.

 

Of the things you have done in this course, what would you like to do more of?

I would liked to have done more with thwe vinly cutter. I really liked using that and wanted to make a more advanced sticker or even a base of stickers around my computer.

 

 

1/10/08

 

1. Right now i have been working on a few side projects and in class i have been working with the options on the hardrive from the mac trying to get onto the internet through i different server.

 

2. I have made my moniter options a different color which now allows me to play kidpix. I had to go into the hard drive and change the moniter options.

 

3. Changing the moniter color to be able to play kidpix.

 

4. I am still unable to get onto the internet through my mac.

 

5. Right now you need to have a productive side project and be working on something.

 

 

12/14/07

Side Projects

 

1) Over Christmas break my relatives got many electronic things and I also receivedmany electronic devices. The first thing i did was to help out my grandpa set up his ipod and his ihome. I downloaded limewire on to his computer at home and showed him how to get the songs onto his ipod. He gave me a list of about 150 songs to download and i finished it in about 2 hours. I also wrote out a list just in case he forgot how to use it. I showed him how to transfer songs from limewire to itunes and downloaded the newer version of itunes for him. I made some playlists for him also. Next i helped him but the ihome together and showed him how to use it with and without an ipod plugged into it.

 

2) The 2nd thing i did was help my grandma set up her nintendo DS and show her how to use it. This took awhile because i had never used one before but after a few trys i was able to show her what to do. I set up the hard drive for her with some of her personal information and then showed her how to use brain age. After a few times of using the DS i was able to give her a whole tutorial on how to use it and play the game.

 

3) Yesterday i had to help my mom with the computer because it wasnt working. There was a black screen saying flash disk error so i took one of the flash disks out and restarted the computer and it worked. The next problem she had was the internet wasnt working so i reset up our modem and fixed the wireless and it started working.

 

4) Lastly, over the weekend i wanted to move my xbox from the living room down into the basement. The moving of the xbox was easy and so was the setting up but the ethernet cable wouldnt reach all the way so we had to cut a hole through the floor under the computer and run it to the basement. It took awhile but eventually my dad and i got it to work so i can now play online in the basement.

 

1.Right now i am working on an old Mac and are playing some of the games on the hardrive.

 

2.I have gotten my mac to work and have put more ram into it with Mac 8.6.

 

3.I havent overcome any problems this week.

 

4.Right now i am unable to turn my mac on.

 

5.You need to be working on a computer and try getting it to work.

 

 

Briefly describe the project:

We are suppose to be upgrading our machine with upgrades and working on our side project at home.

 

What have you accomplished this week?

I have accomplished getting my writing into the folder. Also, for my side project, I have found an old computer a mouse, and some powercords.

 

What problems have you overcome this week?

I learned how to put my writing into the period 7 folder. At first i didnt know how to do this but i asked some class mates and they helped me.

 

What are the most significant problems you face at this time? What will you do to meet these problems?

The problem i have most is that for my side project i need a monitor and a keyboard.

 

What materials or information do you need? How do you plan on getting these materials or information?

You need your computer, a mouse, keyboard, monitor, internet connection, and an idea of what your going to be doing for your side project.

 

 

End of the Term Update

 

What have you done this term?

This term i have worked with my partner mickey on many different things. The first 2 weeks we looked at different parts of the computer and picked a topic that sounded interesting to work on. We had 3 topics to choose from : the graphics card, the mouse, or the monitor. We ended up choosing the graphics card. I learned many new thigns about both the graphics card and what its function to the computer is. We created a poster with the graphics card and had different information on it that we learned about the topic from the internet. This project helped me learn many differnt things about the way a computer works, differnt parts of a computer and there function, and just stuff i didnt know before. After the project we got to choose a computer and set it up to a monitor. We had to mess around with the BIOS and change the way the computer read the CD's and flash drives. The next couple of days we were working on installing ubuntu for our computers hard drive. After that was installed, it took a few days for everyone to get the software downloaded so we were allowed to play some of the games that came with the computer and check out the deiffernt programs it had. The next project was to make a LAN cable enabling you to get onto the internet. We are at that process now still by downloading differnt things from the internet onto our computer whether its limewrire flock or even itunes. Mickey and i have both created a LAN cable and have gotten onto the internet with both of ours. Also there is a side project going on that is creating a sitcker of your initials or somethig you like on the vinyl cutter.

 

What was the biggest challenge for you this term?

The biggest challenge for me this term was getting ubuntu installed onto our computer. We didnt know how to change the order of the BIOS around and when we finally got it we didnt save so we had to do it all over again. The next day we were half way done with installing ubuntu and one of our table mates "John Shane" unplugged our computer turning it off and lossing all of our downloads. So we had basically an unsuccesful 2 days but we finally ended up getting it on the 3rd day.

 

What have you learned that could be useful outside of school?

I have kearned many different parts of the computer and all of their functions which could help me if i wanted to work with computers professionaly when i grwo up. I have used how to learn a vinyl cutter which i thought was a really interesting machine. Lastly, i have learned that there are other types of a software other than windows or macintosh and that is ubuntu which is alomost just as good as the others i think and its completly free.

 

Of the things you have done this term, what would you like to do more of?

I would have liked to maybe have done a bigger project on the vinyl cutter were we could each create our own sticker and put it on something cool. We could have been graded on the creatfdulness of our sticker and the way the logo looked. The vinyl cutter is really cool and i deffianatley would have liked to do something bigger with it.

 

 

10/26/07

 

Briefly describe the project:

The project is to make a LAN wire that will allow us to get onto the internet and help your table members get on also.

 

What have you accomplished this week?

We have made 2 working LAN wires and have made 3 stickers for our computer.

 

What problems have you overcome this week?

We havent had any problems this week.

 

What are the most significant problems you face at this time? What will you do to meet these problems?

We face no problems right now.

 

What materials or information do you need? How do you plan on getting these materials or information?

 

You need a monitor you r computer a keyborad a mouse and a LAN wire that will connect you to the internet.

 

10/18/07

 

Briefly describe the project:

 

This week we are trying to create a LAN with a group of computers at a table. One of the computers will have a internet connection and the others will be connected off of it through the lane wires we made. A side project is the sticker cutter machine. You can write whatever you wanr and sned it to a machine that will cut it out in a sticker for you.

 

What have you accomplished this week?

 

I have made 1 sticker and have created 1 LAN wire.

 

What problems have you overcome this week?

 

We havent had any problems this week.

 

What are the most significant problems you face at this time? What will you do to meet these problems?

 

One problem we face is that our table has no ethernet cord so our LAN wire must be longer than the other ones.

 

What materials or information do you need? How do you plan on getting these materials or information?

 

You need your computer, a monitor, keyboard, mouse, ethernet LAN cable, and 1 computer at your table with an internet connection.

 

 

10/12/07

 

Briefly describe the project:

 

What we had to do this week was get a working computer and load the software ubuntu on the hard drive. Once this was done we could play around with differnt things that came with the hard drive.

 

What have you accomplished this week?

 

We have accomplished getting a working computer and have fully downloaded the ubuntu software to our computer.

 

What problems have you overcome this week?

 

One problem we had this week was that there was a keyobard error on multiple keyboards that we had. To fix this we kept rebooting our computer with our new keyborad until we got it right. Another problem we had was there was a device error. To fix this we plugged in a mouse and rebooted our computer and it worked. Our last problem was setting up the BIOS becasue we forgot to save some of the changes we made so we had to do it all over again.

 

What are the most significant problems you face at this time? What will you do to meet these problems?

 

Right now we face no problems.

 

What materials or information do you need? How do you plan on getting these materials or information?

 

We need a computer, a monitor, a mouse, a keyboard, and the ubuntu disk downloaded onto your hard drive.

 

9/28/07

 

 

Briefly describe the project:

The first project of the week was to finsih up presenting your projects on the parts of the computer. Once that was all done we had to make a poster board with information from our topic. We had to get a good amount of information on our topcs to take up all the space on the poster and we even added some real graphics cards.

 

What have you accomplished this week?

We accomplished creating our poster with a good amount of information and added graphics card pictures and real graphics cards. We had finished presenting our vocal presentation last wekk though.

 

What problems have you overcome this week?

The problem that we overcame was finding out how to get our graphics card on our poster.

 

What are the most significant problems you face at this time? What will you do to meet these problems?

Right now we dont have any problems because we are done with everything.

 

What materials or information do you need? How do you plan on getting these materials or information?

The materials we needed were a computer with an internet connection and a a poster board. All these materials were provided to us in the classroom.