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Apple LED Display vector

hezral — Tue, 19 May 2009 09:23:21 +0000

Just a vector i did for fun in illustrator.

Resize VirtualBox .VDI files to bigger size

hezral — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 01:05:46 +0000

A VDI file is an image file used by VirtualBox as the virtual hard disk for guest OS. I was using Windows XP in VirtualBox and then I found out that my disk space inside Windows XP is getting smaller due to software and other stuffs.

What I did to resize it was to clone the disk drive using a software called Acronis True Image Home. You can download a trial. It is still a full working software even though it’s a trial. Here are the steps I did to do it.

Before you start this, please backup the original VDI file. I won’t be responsible if this messes your VDI file.

First we need to create a new hard disk (or vdi file). Open up VirtualBox, and launch the Virtual Disk Manager. Click the New button.
Follow the wizard to create the new hard disk.
After creating the hard disk, we need to assign it to the guest OS. Open the Settings for the guest OS. Go to the Storage tab. Click the add icon to add the new hard disk. Select the new hard disk and set it to IDE Primary Slave.
Next, we need to initialize the new hard disk. Open the Management Console by right clicking on My Computer and select Manage. Now open up Disk Management. The Initialize and Convert Wizard will appear. Follow the wizard to initialize the new hard disk but don’t convert it to a dynamic disk.
Next, install Acronis True Image Home. The trial can be downloaded from here. After install, launch the application. Click on the Utilities tab. There will a Clone Disk menu. Open it. Follow the wizard. The application will reboot Windows and start the operation after that.
After the operation is completed, DO NOT REBOOT the guest OS. Shutdown the OS first. Now open VirtualBox again, and open the Settings for the guest OS. Change the Hard Disk to the new one created. Make sure to change the slot to IDE Primary Master. Click Ok. If everything goes well, the guest OS should boot.
Once boot, you can check in Disk Management, that the hard disk now has the new size. If the guest OS fails to boot, change the guest OS settings to use the old hard disk and boot back to the guest OS. Check the steps again if you’ve missed any.

Thats it! Now whenever your disk space runs out in VirtualBox, you can resize it to a larger size.I’m not sure for Linux or other OS, but I think the concept is the same. For Windows, Acronis took care of all the disk partition including the MBR, so the cloned disk will be able to boot. I’ve tested with other softwares, like DriveImageXML, HDClone, most of them was able to clone the drive but the guest OS couldn’t boot. I guess it didn’t copy the MBR too.

lingon prettyfied

hezral — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 08:44:33 +0000

did a little makeover on lingon (http://lingon.sourceforge.net/) last nite. i used the tango icons. i think it turned out pretty well. lingon uses pdf instead of pngs or tiffs so had to convert the images to pdf.

before prettyfication

after prettyfication

by the way, Lingon is a graphical interface for creating launchd configuration files and controlling them through launchctl for Mac OS X Tiger. It makes configuring launchd really easy. i’m currently planning on using it to setup some automatic trigger system for various stuffs. will post more about that later.

of macbooks

hezral — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 09:07:27 +0000

so finally i’ve come back to the mac world..It’s been 2 years since i sold my titanium powerbook G4 in 2005 and to kick off the new year, on 4th of January 2007 i bought myself a black macbook.There was a New Year Sale in Biccamera, one of the famous electronics/computer store in Japan (i’ll have to tell that story another time..anyway i was in Japan for new year..). The macbook was on sale for 157,800 yens. The retail price in Japan was 178,000 yens.Thats a 20,200 yens discount.Back in my home, Malaysia, the black macbook is priced at RM5999 which is equivalent to 206,845 yens. It was all in good timing. I saved almost RM1400 on the macbook. The price that i paid for it in Malaysian Ringgit was RM4646. Well..im going to go back to tinkering my new blackbook..