Today marks the 22nd year of this blog. As long-time readers will know, because I mention it frequently, my first post was made on 2 November 2002. It was about an ex for whom I still held hard feelings. Those feelings have faded and now I wish them nothing but happiness. Time heals all wounds.
I knew this day was coming but I wasn’t sure how to celebrate it. I am still writing 500+ words a day but not posting as often. I have a post that is almost ready to post but I want to give it a rewrite. But the longer I take to do that, the less timely it is. I might not post it in its current form.
In the meantime, I can tell that there are people out there reading my words. Not a lot of you, but you’re out there. And you browse the archives, if the referrers mean anything. So thank you! Hopefully you’re finding my best stuff.
Today I am working on upgrading my computer, primarily the CPU. Dragon Age The Veilguard came out last week and it turns out my computer struggles to play it. I’ve been eyeing an upgrade, so that convinced me to purchase an AMD Ryzen 7 7800x3D, the best CPU for gaming out there right now. I’m not building a whole new PC from scratch; I’m trying to do this smartly. But new CPU did mean a new motherboard and RAM. And since I’m switching architecture (Intel x86 to AMD) the smart thing to do is a fresh Windows install.
That surprisingly lead me to a new problem. My current PC runs Windows 10. I don’t really want to upgrade to Win11 just yet. But when I created a boot drive to install Win10 from Rufus gave me an error that I’m using an ISO with a revoked bootloader.
What the what?
Many hours of research and testing later, and I found out that the most recent installer for Windows 10, straight from Microsoft, using the Windows Media Creation Tool, is not patched to mitigate against the bootloader virus Black Lotus. Huh. What this means, in short, is that if I use a thumb drive I create with that ISO to install Windows 10, it probably won’t boot with Secure Boot turned on. I spent so much time on this because I really wanted to keep using Win 10 until the absolute last minute. Honestly, though, I should bite the bullet and install Win11. I just don’t have a key for Win11 but I have one for Win10 Pro. Sigh.
The second roadblock to upgrading my computer brain is my own damned fault. To save money I just figured I would use the same CPU cooler I have on my ancient Intel chip. But I forgot that the mounting bracket for AMD sockets (AM5 in this case) is different than Intel chips. My cooler came with both kinds but I tossed the one I didn’t need, which really isn’t like me at all. So now I have to wait for another CPU fan to show up before I begin the operation.
I wrote up a whole step-by-step process for the upgrade last night, just to make sure I have everything to hand and understand the whole thing. This is how my brain works; it helps me to know the trip before I start. It’s why I know I don’t have the right bracket. I do, however, have a stack of thumb drives, full of all the drivers and installers I need, and multiple backups, and logins and passwords. I am more than ready. I’ve even benchmarked my current system so I can compare it to the newly upgraded computer!
That’s what I’ve been doing last night after work and most of today, along with grocery shopping and going for a walk (while waiting for a user profile backup to finish) instead of planning something for my blogiversary. Hopefully you don’t mind, dear reader.
Once the upgrade is done I should post my step-by-step as a technical article. This blog isn’t just about living with my aging dad, after all.