Neotech : Eye on Technology

Macintosh from a 512MB USB Flash Drive ?

2008-11-05T09:36:00.000-08:00

Did you ever have one of those times when your Windows XP or Vista operating system made those annoying errors or you cannot boot your computer GUI due to some pesky viruses, worms or trojans? Are you the type of person who constantly use public computers or internet cafe's to surf the net or open your email but always get wary of some key loggers and other spyware on those machines? Is your Windows office machine restricted only to some programs and user installation? Do you wish to boot from a 512MBUSB Flash Drive with a sleek Macintosh look without knowing how to install Hackintosh?

If so, this brief tutorial will guide you to a simple solution to the problems mentioned above. I will provide here a simple outline of how to create your own bootable USB Flash Drive with a Macintosh like interface using the Macpup Foxy port of the Puppy Linux operating system. At the end of this tutorial, you should be able to have your own portable Mac-like operating system in your USB Flash Drive that you can use anywhere you go.

Here is a list of what you will need :
1. 1GB or higher capacity USB Flash Drive
2. Macpup Foxy LiveCD (Macintosh look-a-like)

Step I. Making your own Macpup Foxy LiveCD
a. Download Macpup Foxy ISO file here:

Macpup Foxy Size : 220MB Filetype: ISO

b. Burn the ISO file using your favorite CD-burning program like Nero / PowerIso / K3B / Brasero

c. Now you're ready to try out the Macpup Foxy OS.

Step II. Changing the BIOS/CMOS Boot options
a. After you have successfully burned the ISO file, reinsert your newly burned CD and restart the computer.
b. When the boot screen appears, press Del / F1 or F2 keys to open the CMOS Settings window.
c. Look for the option to "Boot from USB Device" and then enable it.
d. In the Boot Options tab, switch the order of the boot device to
1. USB DeviceUSB Hard disk
2. CD/DVD Drive
3. Hard Disk (your hard drive model usually appears here)
e. Now we are ready to boot from our Macpup LiveCD. Make sure you have already reinserted the Macpup LiveCD at this point.
f. Select Exit and Save Changes. This will restart your computer again.

Step III. Boot from the Macpup Foxy Live CD
1. Make sure that you have already reinserted the Macpup LiveCD as i have mentioned earlier.
2. If you did everything right in Step II, your computer will then boot to the LiveCD. It will look something like this when it loads:

Macpup Dingo from prit on Vimeo.

3. The video above is Macpup Dingo, Macpup Foxy should look like this after boot:

Step IV: Creating your Bootable Macpup Foxy USB Drive
You can use this USB to boot from any computer that supports USB Boot device. Most Pentium 4 PC's support this. You can then surf and email Mac-style on those PCs without having to worry about restrictions, viruses or worms.

a. After booting from the Macpup LiveCD, Insert your USB Flash Drive.
Click the blue icon on the leftmost part of the upper taskbar or right click anywhere in your desktop.
Click Setup > Puppy Universal Installer

b. Select USB Flash Drive from the list, click Ok.

c. Select which USB Drive and click Ok to continue.

d. Click on Install Puppy to SDA1. Just select the default options and click OK for the succeeding tabs. It will then format and install into your USB Flash drive in 5-10 minutes. Keep the USB Drive inserted during and after installation.

e. Now we're done! Just click on the Red Power button and choose Restart. Choose Discard Changes and restart your PC. Be sure to remove the Macpup LiveCD before the bootscreen.

f. When the computer restarts, it should boot from the USB Drive automatically if you have done Step II correctly, you should be booting from your USB by now.

Just repeat Step II on public computers or on your office computer so that you can run your own customized operating system. It's amazing how people will ask you why you're running something that looks very different and nice! OMG it's Mac on a PC without the hack? Not quiet, it's just MacPup from Puppy Linux!

I hope this is helpful to everyone :)

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2008-11-04T01:49:00.000-08:00

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iBUYPOWER Paladin 998 : High Performance Gaming Rig

2008-11-01T10:25:00.000-07:00

iBUYPOWER has released its new high performance gaming machine dubbed Paladin 998. Read this short review on this amazing monster.

Full Specs :
CPU: Intel Q9550 2.83ghz 12MB
Case: CoolerMaster Haf Gaming Case
PSU: 800W Power Supply
Main Board: Asus P5Q3 Intel P45 Chipset
Memory: 4GB DDR-3 1333
Video Card: ATI 4870X2 2GB
HDD: 500GB SATA-2 7200 rpm
Optical Drive: Sony 20x DL DVD+/-RW Drive Sony Blu-ray Drive
Audio: Built-in 8 Channel Surround Sound
Network: Integrated Gigabit Ethernet LAN

Software:
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit Edition
MS Office 2007 Trial
FREE Halo 2 Game
KB & Mouse Logitech Keyboard Logitech Mouse
Warranty 3-Yr Limited Warranty + Lifetime Support Service

Price : MSRP $1,999

This awesome piece of machine brags of its fierce processor topped with Intel's Yorkfield 2.83GHz Q9550 Core 2 Quad processor with a huge 12MB Cache for an extremely fast processing power! It has a bus speed of 1333MHz with a CPU speed and L2 Cache speed of 2.83GHz. It supports tomorrow's processing features including Intel's Enhanced Speedstep® Technology, EM64T, Intel® Virtualization Technology, Enhanced Halt State (C1E), Execute Disable Bit and Intel® Thermal Monitor 2. This monster processor is cooled by Intel Certified Liquid CPU Cooling System Kit which comes with the iBuypower base package.

To complement the speedracing processor is 4 GB [2 GB X 2] PC3-10666/DDR3-1333 Memory Module from OCZ. Each module is unbuffered with CL 9-9-9-20 (CAS-TRCD-TRP-TRAS) timing and cooled by a gold layered Z3 XTC heatspreader with a very reliable lifetime warranty.

All the processing power and memory speed are integrated into a feature loaded motherboard, the ASUS P5Q3. This motherboard supports the latest Intel® Core™2 processors in LGA775 package. It can support Intel® Core™2 Extreme/Core™2 Quad/ Core™2 Duo/Pentium® dual-core/Celeron® dual-core /Celeron® Processors. It sports the Intel P45 Chipset with PCIe 2.0 and ATI CrossFireX Technology. The motherboard supports dual channel DDR3 memory that features data transfer rates of 1800(O.C.)/1600/1333/1066 MHz to meet the higher bandwidth requirements of the latest operation system, 3D graphics, multimedia, and Internet applications. The ASUS P5Q3 creates crystal clear sound from its onboard Realtek® ALC1200 8 -Channel High Definition Audio. You can surf the internet with blazing speed through its onboard Realtek® 8111C PCIe Gb LAN controller featuring AI NET2 . It's power saving feature highlights the new ASUS EPU-6 Engine - the world´s first power saving engine, which provides total system power savings by detecting current PC loadings and intelligently moderating power in real-time, as well as the ASUS AI Nap which allows you to instantly snooze your PC without terminating the tasks. It also has the ASUS Express Gate feature which allows you to surf the Internet in 5-second-boot time without entering Windows. Other fancy features of this motherboard includes the ASUS 8-Phase Power Design, ASUS Drive Xpert, ASUS Fan Xpert, ASUS Q-Shield, AI Direct Link, ASUS Q-Connector , CrashFree BIOS 3 , EZ-Flash 2, O.C. Profile, Precision Tweaker 2, and etc.
The icing on this cake is the ATI Radeon™ HD 4870 X2 Graphics Card with a humongous 2 GB of GDDR5 memory, 2.4 teraFLOPS of GPU power,1 600 stream processing units, 2 x 256-bit memory interface, 24x custom filter anti-aliasing (CFAA) and high performance anisotropic filtering, Dynamic geometry acceleration, Game physics processing capability and Dual mode ATI CrossFireX™ multi-GPU support for highly scalable performance. It supports DirectX® 10.1 and PCI Express® 2.0. Lastly it has ATI Avivo™ HD video and display technology as well as Dynamic power management with ATI PowerPlay™ technology.

This awesome jack in a box is neatly packed in a Coolermaster HAF 932 Full-Tower Gaming Case. The Cooler Master HAF 932 Case is overflowing with excellent features. It has three massive 230mm fans which makes it one of the best cases on the market for air circulation. There are plenty of drive bays, cable management holes, tooless design for installing drives in the drive bays and cards in the expansion slots. A large radiator can be installed at the top, reservoir fillport and much more. This case is steel though so it's fairly heavy and it doesn't come with a removable motherboard tray. It's pretty like a rugged humvee themed casing packed with an 800-watt Quad SLI Ready power supply.

Aside from the Paladin 998's extreme hardware, there is plenty of storage room with a 500GB HARD DRIVE (Serial-ATA-II / 3GB / 16MB Cache / 7,200rpm) and two optical drives namely, a LG 20X Dual Format/Double Layer DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW Drive and a Sony Optiarc BR-5100S 2X Blu-Ray High Definition DVD Drive.