tmcd35

For the rare occasions I use big name brands then either Misco, Insight, or Novatech. For most hardware purchases though it's bespoke kit from VeryPC or Novatech with a little Stone or Ergo thrown in for good measure. I stopped buying HP/Dell/etc a long time ago. Companies like VeryPC and Novatech can give me the specs I want at the price I want with reliability and support that HP can't compete with IMHO.

bought! Best of luck to the band!

Wow! I want to put that on my iPod. Is it on iTunes or Amazon?

The cycle won't change until we get a different voting system, which will only happen after successive coalition and minority governments. In Norwich North, were I am, the only party's with a chance are Labour or Tory. In Norwich South the Greens actually have a fighting chance. In Norwich North voting tactically is the only real option (although I did vote LD last time, it will be Labour this time). In Norwich South they have the chance to vote with their conscience (if they like Green policies), and I hope they do. As much as I don't fully agree with the Greens, I do hope they pick up Norwich South, and I hope UKIP get a good half-dozen or so seats, because only then will the voting system have a chance to be changed to something fairer for all.

I thought the same thing. I was disappointed when I read the original Register article and discovered that 'bath salts' was a euphemism for narcotics that look like Epsom Salts

The main problem is the executive is made up of members of that chamber and the parties hold a three line whip over their members. This means the chamber is practically incapable of serving it purpose - which is holding the government to account. If our parliamentary system was properly reformed to remove the executive to a separate elected body, remove the whipping system from both chambers, and actively encouraged independent candidates running, then there would be no need for a 'none of the above' option on the ballot paper. Especially with more equal constituency sizes and AV or STV voting. But all that is pure fantasy. We've more chance of getting 'none of the above' on the ballot paper than proper, meaningful constitutional reform.

Is showing mother nature a good time aggressive behaviour?

For the sake of decency I think we should leaf this subject alone...

But maybe that's the point - a different kind of politics. For all the stick the LD's get, I tend to think they've been a positive influence on this government. I dread to think of some of the Tory policies that may have been enacted if they were given a clear majority.

To be fair to UKIP, I don't think they're racist - their policies are just a little misguided is all. I think they are right to raise the issue of immigration and we shouldn't be afraid to talk about it with out being called out as racist, which tends to be the case in this country at the moment. But then UKIP don't exactly help themselves either. Immigration isn't the answer to every political problem we face in this country at the moment...

Given a Labour minority and larger minority progressive parties (SNP, LD, Green, Plaid Cymru) do you think the minority parties would press Labour into a fresh AV referendum?

At the moment that's a very good thing! Current cannon is actually practically consumable within a sensible time frame (ie, there's not a lot of it). I've just read The Phantom Menace, then re-watched the film. Currently reading Attack of the Clones. With the few official books and the two cartoon TV series along the way, I can easily consume and be fully up to date with current mythology before I go see the new film in December I haven't geeked out on sci-fi properly like this since Voyager was cancelled.

Forest level, the domain can't be raised higher than the current forest level, neither can be raised higher than the oldest Windows version running as a DC currently active in the domain.

My understanding of teaming is - it doesn't quiet work that way. A single stream would only use 1000Mbps. However 4 streams can each transmit at 1000Mbps in parallel to give you the theoretical maximum 4000mbps, rather than transmitting in series as they would on a single 1000Mbps link. I know it's not that simple either - since data is transmitted in much smaller packet sizes, and an element of packet management enters in. But, AFAIK, on bonded links the maximum transmission speed between two devices would still be 1000Mbps not 4000Mbps. Unless I've misunderstood something...

Well, predictions seem to be coming around 270-280 seats each for Labour and Conservatives, 40ish for SNP, 10-15 for Lib Dems and under 5 each for the rest. Which would make only SNP big enough to be king makers and that would never be Tory. Under those circumstances Milliband would be a fool not to guarantee power with the SNP. But it wouldn't surprise me, if given the opportunity, he tries.

It's an interesting game. You start wondering if we'll be back at the polling station before the years out? I'm thinking neither party+LD would make a majority. The predictions I've been getting have had only the SNP able to make a coalition, and Labour didn't seem happy about the idea last night. Labour looks like they may have better chance of surviving in a minority government than the Tories, but 5 years in a minority? But then isn't this type of government alternative voting would have produced anyway had it come to pass? Progressive Alliance FTW

There's a new solar farm being built 5 minutes up the road from here. We get barely 2 days sunshine all year and they build a solar farm !?! Something silly like 10 acres barely powering the first 5 houses in a village a mile away. But it's okay because sheep are going to mill around the panels eating grass !?! We're also the nations Windmill capital at Lowestoft. They're regularly turned off because - "it's too windy". On a plus note, I think they're still building Sizewell C just down the Suffolk Coast from here so all sanity is not lost...yet.

I know North Korea isn't really nuclear capable at the moment, but they are about the only real rogue nation of any concern that is actively developing and would actually deploy. The rest that we might have concerns about are largely keeping stock pile because of MAD - China, Russia, Pakistan, maybe Iran. The threat in this world going forward is gorilla warfare not nuclear. International terror organisations not rogue nuclear states. MAD is a fallacy. I think my comments more point to the fallacy than back up the idea of MAD. Seriously for MAD to work there has to a circumstance when the button would be pushed. Since the end of the cold war I don't think that circumstance exists and won't exist again. Hell there's not even enough nuclear nations for it to be worth our money as a defence strategy. If US, Russia, and China want to face each other off with empty threats, great but why should we feel the need to waste money on an empty threat to be a member of that club? The money is better spent else where.

@CAM, I agree with you 100% with everything except Trident. The acid test for nuclear weapons should be - "name the circumstances under which you will actually deploy them". Since Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and to a lesser extent Chernobyl, I don't think there are any circumstances when anyone other than a rogue nation like North Korea would actually press the button. Even if North Korea launched I don't think a rational world leader would use nuclear in retaliation. It's an empty threat, the bad guys know it, and as such it cost too much to maintain. The money is better spent on troops and intelligence to prevent rather than deter. IMHO. After last nights opposition leaders debate I think I want to move to Scotland just so I can vote SNP.

Personally I think the Thatcher era created a strange stigma around rented accommodation that's done as much to harm our society as the miss-implementation of the right to buy scheme. The subsidy is/was a head nod to the fact that people had been renting their homes for decades. As far as I am aware the amount of subsidy is very much dependent on how long you had been renting for prior to opting your right to buy. There's a minimum rental period (my head wants to say 5-years) before right to buy kicks in, and a maximum discount. Correctly run both right to buy and social housing are far from 'tax payer subsidised'. They are paid for through the rent of the hard working people who live in those homes. I have a mortgage, I'd sooner have the opportunity to rent decent social housing and have a rented home with a secure tenancy I can rely on for life. The only thing stopping us being able to provide this is councils don't build nearly enough social housing and haven't since Thatcher. The money from right to buy wasn't allowed to be used to replenish social stock. And now Cameron wants to sell off more council property instead of using them to re-home neady families. Disgraceful!

If I recall correctly, for current versions of Windows (2008/7 and up), so long as the USB drive is NTFS formatted and formatted as a bootable device, you can just drag and drop the iso contents to the USB. I'm sure I did this with Server 2012R2 when I upgraded our storage system over Easter.

This happens when a drive is referenced in the registry and not available to the computer, regardless to whether or not the installer needs to use that drive. The solution should be to either map the drive to a valid location (doesn't matter where) or search the registry for every mention of the drive and delete it from the registry.

Off topic, what the game like? Been thinking of picking up for PS3 for a while...

Like I say, don't PC game so don't have personal evidence, etc. Site like this: The Digital Foundry 2015 budget gaming PC guide • Eurogamer.net suggest theres a performance issue with AMD drivers. How important that is, don't know. Personally I'd go nVidia on that basis - but that's just me. Regardless I'd say 4Gb and DX12 is probably more important right now than nVidia vs AMD or GTX960 vs GTX970, etc.

Disclaimer - not a PC gamer, haven't bought a graphics card since 2002... Reading sites like NeoGaf and comments in Eurogamers Digital Foundry, there seems to be a general consensus around AMD's drivers being...poor. Personally, if I was in the market again, I'd probably look at the nVidia GTX cards. Not au fait with the difference between models (960/70/80) but would probably look for 4Gb GDDR5 regardless for future proofing over chip model. Apparently Windows 10 and DX12 is going to make a big difference to performance as well - A multi-core CPU and DX12 complaint GPU might be worth the investment now.