Newest addition to the laptop stable (a white one!) *PICS*

Message

#1 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 1:15 am

Earlier I wrote:I don't really mind white laptops. In fact I'm trying to win one this week.

So the wife doesn't tell me that I got a call Tuesday afternoon from someone in the Promotions department at KLLC, to arrange pickup of the Macbook until earlier today. I wonder if she is trying to limit the number of laptops in this house....

#2 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 3:23 am

Congratulations, Ray!
What a great (free) way to expand your collection!
Just make sure you remain 'faithful' to your TP2x-religion!

JHEM · #3 Post by **JHEM** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 4:38 am

Good job Ray.

James

#4 Post by **ryengineer** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 5:33 am

Well done, Ray.

Time

Website · #5 Post by **tfflivemb2** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 5:41 am

Congrats Ray!!!

Now that you have a nice new laptop to play with, I hope you don't get drawn away from Thinkpads!

Purcy · #6 Post by **Purcy** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 6:49 am

Wow, good for you Ray. I'm sure your wife just loves all those fillies lounging around the house. Hey, maybe you can start a new room for MACs.

My sister who does computer graphic design consulting prefers to work on a MAC.

dsigma6 · #7 Post by **dsigma6** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 7:27 am

Ray,

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I hate you!

Congrats on owning the system, yet again.

#8 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 10:30 am

Thanks everyone! (Even you Dan

!)

This contest was a little bit different than the usual "be the Nth caller" and you win the prize. For the five systems that they were giving out, you had to watch a "short" video (available here, a 6.5MB Quicktime clip) that they had created with the built-in video camera on the Macbook. That video was posted on their web site just after the end of the morning show (10am). Sometime during the next morning's show, they would ask a question about something you saw in that clip. The first person to correctly answer their question won the laptop. As I had already mentioned in that other thread, one morning I was this close --> = because I got a ringing signal and they had already picked up the phone twice but the people didn't know the answer.

The last day of posting the video was last Friday. I watched the clip, took LOTS of notes and waited for the Monday morning show to roll around. I'll have to say that it is painful for me to listen to the (mostly) inane pattering between the four people. They don't play any music. They stuff they talk about is generally uninteresting (to me at least). That's why I don't normally listen to them. Anyway, I digress...

So, I'm listening, getting bored, answering posts here and then out of the earphone in my right ear I hear the word, "Macbook". I punch both phone's redial buttons. (Contest trick revealed: I have two phone lines coming into the house. On the "second" line I have a cordless phone with a headset on my right side; over the radio's earphone so it gets confusing sometimes. The left ear gets the corded phone on the "first" line. Both phones have already previously dialed the contest number (11 digits since it's in San Francisco, another area code) so all I need to do is press the redial buttons). Both lines are already busy. Hang up and redial again. Three or four times. Then both lines are ringing. I expected that. The reason? The station has about a 15 second delay. What you hear on the radio has already occured 15 seconds beforehand in the studio. They probably clear all eight incoming lines just before they "pull the trigger" for the contest. Phones ring about four or five times, then I hear "Hello, Alice" in the left ear. They ask me my name and if I know the answer to their question, which they announced during the time I was dialing and waiting. I answer correctly

.

The question you ask? Hmm... Watch the clip (only if you have broadband!). Take notes. The answer to the question was visible in the video for all of about 2.5 seconds. I'll come back here in a couple of days and ask the same question. No, sorry, you won't win the Macbook from me

.

Stargate199 · #9 Post by **Stargate199** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 12:35 pm

How about one of your T23s for the right answer then?

#10 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 12:46 pm

LOL, I'll have to give that some thought...

Purcy · #11 Post by **Purcy** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 12:50 pm

rkawakami wrote:LOL, I'll have to give that some thought...

Maybe you should ask your wife what she thinks Ray

#12 Post by **gator** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 7:36 pm

I demand to see some pics of the white sheep

, preferably with the T23(s)

#13 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 8:58 pm

Rebecca (my contact at KLLC promotions) hasn't returned my calls yet. Everytime I call, I get voicemail; I've left two messages. I'm not getting too worried... yet.

How many T23 systems do you want to see? I think I might be able to round up 12 working units (bootable into Windows; I'm running out of disk drives). I could then use Windows Paint and put one large letter on each screen and spell out something like:

Hello gator!

Put together with the 600 series systems (7), I could spell out:

Hello thinkpads.com!

When the white sheep comes home I'll get the flock together for a group picture. (Just need a table big enough to fit them all... or maybe the living room floor...)

Website · #14 Post by **tfflivemb2** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 9:22 pm

Or a pool table?

#15 Post by **gator** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 10:11 pm

Ray, maybe you can arrange 15 of 'em T23s together like this:

Code: Select all

             ■■■
              ■    ■■ ■■■
              ■    ■■ ■■■

and you don't even have to boot them

tfflivemb2, I think you can easily make a pool table using thinkpads

#16 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 11:59 pm

Okay, here's what I could throw together without finding batteries, hard drives, AC adapters: (sorry, only 14)

(99KB)

(118KB)

(81KB)

Six of the systems either did not have batteries or have bad CCFLs (there's two SXGA+ panels with bad backlights). Two other working systems are with my older daughter and I didn't show a system that emitted a burning odor the last time I tried powering it with an AC adapter or one I bought last month as a test case for removing the CCFL (a parts machine).

If you look real close at the first picture, the system in the upper left has this thread open.

#17 Post by **gator** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 12:29 am

Very very nice Ray! I envy your collection

BTW, what are those stickers on top of the T23s? Some sort of a coding scheme to recognize which laptop is which?

NS · #18 Post by NS » Fri Mar 23, 2007 12:48 am

Ray,

I looked at your pic very carefully and all i can see are 3 red crosses... The image is not working.

#19 Post by **rkawakami** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:07 am

gator wrote:BTW, what are those stickers on top of the T23s? Some sort of a coding scheme to recognize which laptop is which?

Exactly that. Each system that comes into my possession is named T23-nn. I'm up to number T23-21 at the moment. I count the systems that arrive as parts machines too. Some extra labels are stuck on describing any problems, features, OS installed, etc.

@NS:
Embedded pictures in the thread are showing up here. Click the image (or X) and you should download a full-size picture off my web site.

Phazer · #20 Post by **Phazer** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:33 am

When I saw "white" in the title, I thought I was gonna read about you winning the white T23 on eBay......

#21 Post by **rkawakami** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:41 am

Phazer wrote:When I saw "white" in the title <snip>......

Naw, wasn't even considering putting a bid in on that one.

Purcy · #22 Post by **Purcy** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 6:24 am

Wow, what a large family you have

, very nice photos Ray. Makes you wonder though if there is any other one person who has as many older Thinkpads as you, aside from IBM.

#23 Post by **AlphaKilo470** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 10:35 am

Well, I'm thinking your collection might be able to put Steve's to shame on grounds of numbers. Diversity might be another factor...

#24 Post by **rkawakami** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:03 pm

Numbers.... yes, I may have Steve beat, although I'm not sure of his total count of working systems. I think I'm at 24, but a couple of them have intermittent turn-on problems, so let's say 21 or 22. They are T2x and 600 systems, so diversity is not in my favor. There's an A31 that needs a few minutes of work and hopefully this weekend I can add that to the collection.

Just got off the phone with the nice lady at KLLC. We've set up an appointment for me to go up to San Francisco (about 40 miles) early next week to pick up the Macbook. I don't know why they just couldn't call the local Apple store (1.5 miles away from my home) and tell them to give me one from their stock. Certainly would be easier on me! If it's like last year, I'll have to fill out some paperwork (IRS forms, ugh!) and have my signature notarized.

#25 Post by **dorronto** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:27 pm

Awesome Ray!

Great collection and appreciation of ALL YOUR ANSWERS TO THE FORUM.

...oh, by the way, Ray.................do your laptops have any green shirts like in your promo pic to us?? That would authenticate the collection.

Ron

Purcy · #26 Post by **Purcy** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:43 pm

rkawakami wrote: I don't know why they just couldn't call the local Apple store (1.5 miles away from my home) and tell them to give me one from their stock. Certainly would be easier on me! If it's like last year, I'll have to fill out some paperwork (IRS forms, ugh!) and have my signature notarized.

Maybe she wants to interview you on air for your win!! Don't tell her how many other laptops you own though, she may think you don't need the MAC

#27 Post by **rkawakami** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 3:51 pm

'Ron, the Skeptical' wrote:....do your laptops have any green shirts like in your promo pic to us?? That would authenticate the collection.

Wow, tough-to-please crowd

!

Next Tuesday afternoon I'm up in SF collecting the Mac. Assuming I make it out of that city in one piece (I'm hoping that it'll be in a plain brown box so I won't get mugged on the way back to the car), I should be able to post pics of the white sheep compared against a T23 that night. In the meantime I'll spend some time rounding up the needed disk drives and batteries (and charging them) and re-shoot the previous picture with my "Irish" shirt. Might even be able to convince my cockatiel to pose on his favorite T23. He enjoys standing on the keyboard while I'm typing and requesting that I scratch his head.

I've been studying the different models of the Macbook at apple.com. I figure that it's going to be a bottom-of-the-line 1.83Ghz 13" Macbook (not a Pro) and white, since the black model costs $400 more! The extra money appears to buy double the memory (512MB more), double the disk drive (120GB) and a dual-layer DVD burner over the CDRW/DVD combo drive. Oh yeah, and some black paint

. Finally I get a laptop with USB 2.0! Never thought it would be from the "other side".

Purcy wrote:Maybe she wants to interview you on air for your win!!

No, she's just the promotions director. I doubt that I'll be interviewed or asked to tape anything. They want me there to fill out the proper forms so they can send me a 1099 next year. When I won, it was live (well, 20 second tape delay) on the air. At the most I might make this page:

http://www.radioalice.com/pages/57576.php

On the right-hand side is a listing of previous contest winners. Or something may appear here:

http://www.radioalice.com/pages/56439.php

That's the morning show's page. They had asked me if I would send them a short video made with the iSight camera. Once I practice using the one on the iMac and figure out where to send the clip, I will do that.

#28 Post by **gator** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 5:33 pm

Now that you have someone from the other side on your side

, dont you dare to pull a Darth Vader

Purcy · #29 Post by **Purcy** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 5:35 pm

That's the ONLY thing I envy the MAC's for, the built in camera on the lid!

#30 Post by **gator** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 5:39 pm

Purcy wrote:That's the ONLY thing I envy the MAC's for, the built in camera on the lid!

cough Z series cough

Newest addition to the laptop stable (a white one!) PICS

Newest addition to the laptop stable (a white one!) PICS

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