Feminism/Marriage and Relationships/Sex

Reply to Denise Ngo about “good guys”

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Let’s play a game called “how many women can I piss off with this article?” Prompting this latest match is the article on Yahoo! Style called “11 Things a Good Guy Will Never Ask You to Do” by Denise Ngo. I may skip over sections with which I hold agreement for the sake of brevity — especially since on the other sections I’m bound to not be brief. Let’s begin.

1. His Laundry

Pairing your socks isn’t exactly our idea of a stay-at-home date, nor does living with you make us a 1950s housewife. A good compromise is for one partner to sort and start the laundry and the other to fold and put it away. Plus, studies show that helping around the house increases a man’s chances of getting laid. So, how ‘bout that pile of dishes? If you clean up the sink while we tackle the living room, we’ll get to the bedroom twice as fast.

Compromise is whatever you and your husband or significant other make it out to be. Compromise is a necessary part of any relationship, and dividing chores is part of that compromise. Part of that compromise means that the regular laundry may fall to one person just as other regular chores may fall to the other. As such, a “good guy” may negotiate the chores arrangement such that you will be doing his laundry along with yours. As laundry can, at times, be an arduous task, make sure to negotiate for him to pick up two or three other smaller chores in exchange for that one.

At the same time, though, do not use sex as a motivational part of that negotiation. Once you start successfully doing that, you will likely find that you could use sex to get what you want. And once he becomes aware or suspicious that you’re doing that, he’ll be more likely to stray.

Compromise is a good thing, but sex should never be part of that compromise.

2. Buy gifts and cards for other people on his behalf.

We’ll help when we’re out with you, but no, we won’t make a pit stop at Hallmark and Laura Ashley while we’re shopping with the girls. Just because we’re women doesn’t mean we’re automatically adept at figuring out your Aunt Martha’s dress size.

This item has so many exceptions it’s ridiculous.

If he already knows what to buy for a family member and where to get it, and you happen to be going there or will be in the area, don’t be offended if he asks you to pick it up for him. It’ll save him the trip — and the time and gas that goes with it — and he might think of some way to thank you for it.

Obviously we’re not going to expect you to know what our family members will like, or what clothing sizes they take — and any guy who expects you to just magically know or just intuitively select the perfect gift for one of his family members should be kicked to the curb, but again there are exceptions. If you’ve spent a decent amount of time conversing and visiting with his family members, don’t be surprised if he asks your opinion on a gift, or, Lord forbid, even asks you to select something. But, should that occur, it should be given as a gift from both of you instead of just from him.

But then if you two are a couple, any gift you give to others will be assumed, if not expected, to be from the two of you.

3. Plan an entire vacation without his help.

When we ask you whether you’d rather spend our anniversary in Cabo or Vermont, we want you to express an actual preference, not to say, “Whatever, I’m happy with what makes you happy.” The same goes for the hotel, the airline, and the restaurant reservations. Letting us take the reins isn’t considerate, it’s just lazy and boring. Instead, make sure to divvy up the planning. We pick the location and hotel; you plan the activities.

Letting you take the reins in planning the vacation is quite different from asking you to plan the entire thing. But here’s the thing: he genuinely may not care about where you go. I really hope that doesn’t seem like a foreign concept.

One thing that drives my wife up a wall at times is when we’re going out to eat and she’ll ask my opinion on where to go. Typically my response is “whatever is good for you”, mainly because I genuinely do not care. And I’ve said that to her numerous times. I don’t do that to be lazy. We’ve been together long enough that she’s learned to instead ask if my preference is to sit-in or grab and go, but that I don’t really care where we go to eat, as unless I’m in the mood for something particular, I’ll be able to find something on the menu that’ll do just fine.

Now that’s just eating out, not an entire vacation. At the same time, it still applies.

Don’t be offended if it seems like you’re doing the majority of the planning, or think we’re somehow not a “good guy” because we’re not chipping in our opinion as often as you’d like, because we may not actually have an opinion on the matter. We may genuinely not really care about the specifics of a vacation.

In the last real vacation my wife and I took together, which was almost 8 years ago, I did most of the planning — in part because the expenses were going to be coming out of my bank account (we weren’t actually married yet). Sure we both selected the destination as we wanted to go to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, VA, and spend a few days out there. Aside from that, the specifics on where we stayed, what vehicle we rented to get out there, and the like, were entirely on me because my wife didn’t really care about those specifics — and your significant other may not care either.

But then, if you’re engaged or married, you should already know that.

And if you’re still dating but not quite heading to the alter, this is a good opportunity to see how compatible you two really are. True that he should at least help you decide the destination and should contribute an opinion every now and then. But if the vacation is your idea, don’t be surprised or offended if you end up selecting most of the specifics. Also at the same time, again, he may not care about the specifics, something that can work quite well to your advantage when planning things.

Yes I know I’ve repeated that phrase several times, but then it seems like something some women just don’t actually get. They expect men to think like women, to care about things the same way they do, to have opinions on matters they care about, when we just genuinely may not give a shit. And if your guy is actually telling you “whatever makes you happy”, it likely means he truly doesn’t care and will go along with whatever you plan — within reason of course.

Want to snap him into actually helping you with the planning? Plan something unreasonable. But then that could end up backfiring, as doing something like that could also erode his trust in your ability to make sound, reasonable decisions.

4. Make him a sandwich.

Oh this old canard has rooted it’s ugly head again:

The refrigerator is 10 feet away and your game control has a pause button, so get up, stretch, and slap that ham and lettuce together by yourself. We don’t care if you’re “in the zone,” because apparently, you were out of it long enough to articulate your immediate need for a nibble. Maybe we’ll consider it if you agree to break from the game for 20 minutes, put on some coffee, and enjoy your afternoon snack with us.

Question: do you feel any qualms about asking him to make you a sandwich? If no, then shut up!

The only way this point is valid is if he’s rarely making his own snacks. But asking the other to do something, even something as innocuous as making a sandwich, is part of living together. It doesn’t matter if you think we could just hit the pause button and get up and do it. It’s about the same as in point 2 where you may be asked to do something simply because you happen to be in the area.

Now if you don’t want to do it, say so! A “good guy” won’t hold that against you. He’ll just wait till he reaches a good stopping point and do it himself.

And saying that you’ll “consider it if you agree to break from the game for 20 minutes” isn’t what’s being asked. He is asking you so that he doesn’t have to break from the game. And if you’re going to get offended at being asked to do something, even something as innocuous as preparing a snack, perhaps you need to reevaluate your perspective.

After all, have you ever asked him to make you a snack or fetch you a drink so you wouldn’t have to break from reading your book? If you’re going to ask it of him, expect him to ask it of you. At the same time, if he asks it of you, feel free to ask it of him as well.

5. Change your relationship status on Facebook.

We believe our life outside of the Internet should speak for itself. On the off-chance that we break up, wouldn’t you rather tell your close friends in person, rather than have that ever-present broken heart appear on 500 people’s newsfeeds? Well, we would, so don’t even ask us to include our relationship status on Facebook in the first place.

Yet at the same time, many women get offended when their guy doesn’t change their relationship status on Facebook to show that they’re “taken”. I’ve even seen it on lists of how to tell if your guy is “committed”. Just Google the phrase (without quotes) “he won’t change his relationship status on Facebook” to see the hypocrisy behind this notion.

Ladies, if you expect us to do it, don’t get offended if we want you to do it as well.

And one other thing: do you actually know 500 people? Clean out your Facebook friends list. This goes for both of you!

Good God, the only people that should be on your friends list are people you’ve actually known at some point. Not people you merely interacted with, or someone you’ve heard of because they’re friends or family of people you do know, but people you genuinely know. Before accepting or making a friend request, you should be able to answer, without much hesitation (hey, even at 34 my memory is sometimes a little slow) how you know that person. If you can’t answer that question, you shouldn’t link up with that person on Facebook.

Which means if you have enough people on your Facebook friends list to occupy the small town where I went to college, you have way, way too many. I can say to a reasonable degree of certainty that you do not know all the people on your Facebook friends list if you have that many. So clean it out!

6. Be his wake-up call.

If we wanted a newborn, we’d just pierce the condom. Kidding! But really, buy an alarm clock. Remembering a man’s nap and wakeup schedule should be an occasional favor, not an everyday obligation.

Let’s go back to point 4 about being asked to make a sandwich as what I said there applies here as well. It’s basically the same thing: both should be an occasional favor and shouldn’t seem like a burden or obligation. At the same time, the inclusion of this item in the list makes it sound like asking it even once or twice is reason to not consider him to be a “good guy” since the title of the article does say this is something a “good guy” will never ask you to do.

7. Take care of his drunk friends.

We’ll help them hail cabs or drive them home, but our couch really shouldn’t be a post-happy-hour crash pad.

Remember, this goes both ways. Don’t expect us to harbor your friends when they get wasted. But at the same time, understand why they may be staying overnight.

Back in college, my roommate and I had a group of mutual friends. They took him out for his 21st birthday — I hung out with my girlfriend — and he came back a little sloshed. I said to one of our mutual friends to keep him the next time it happens because of the racket he made coming in late. Thankfully there wasn’t a need for that to occur as he never went out drinking to that extent again during that academic year.

Going to skip 8 and 9 since I don’t have anything to add to them. The only thing to say is to just remember that those items also go both ways, much like most of the previous points.

10. Lose weight.

Time to tread lightly…

We’ll tone up for health purposes and for ourselves, but if you’re really concerned about the 5 lbs we gained over the holidays, don’t flat-out complain that we’re getting flabby. Instead, invite us to go biking with you or to take a yoga class together. Treat exercise as a fun activity we can do together instead of something we should do just for you.

Let me first point to two other articles I’ve written about this: “Divorcing over weight gain” and “Reply to Ragen Chastain“. Needless to say, there are exceptions to this — major exceptions to this.

My wife is overweight — obese, actually, by medical definitions. She’s gotten the “you need to lose weight” statements from her nurse sister, nutritionist mother, and also from doctors. We now know that there are underlying health concerns that contribute to her weight, and they are being addressed.

That said, the “if you’re really concerned about the 5 lbs we gained over the holidays” remark is situation specific.

If it comes during a string of weight gain, we have every reason to be concerned. If you went from 120 lbs when we first started dating and that extra 5 lbs is on top of an additional 40 lbs of weight you’ve gained in the interim, we not only have every right to be concerned, but every right to point it out.

Now this is provided you weren’t rail thin at 120 lbs. If we could see outlines of bones against your skin and now we can’t, yeah we shouldn’t complain about an extra 5 lbs, provided, again, that extra 5 lbs isn’t on top of an already unhealthy weight.

If you went from rail thin or a healthy weight to overweight, and added 5 lbs to that, that is reason to complain or be concerned. If we have reason to believe it to be a symptom of an unhealthy trend, we have reason to complain. If we invite you to fitness classes or biking trips and you refuse to join us, then we have even more reason to complain.

But, as I said in “Divorcing over weight gain”, that only holds true if he has kept his weight in check.

11. Keep our hair long.

Trust us, short hair is cute, fun, and just as feminine as back-length hair. Just look at Halle Berry, Audrey Tautou and Keira Knightley, circa 2005. It’s not as if we’re going to shave it off or sport one of Rihanna’s hairstyles, but even if we did, we hope you’d find us just as attractive.

If you want to keep your hair short, there’s really only one thing you need to discuss: maintenance. Shorter hair is much easier and less expensive to maintain, requiring less shampoo and conditioner along with less time in the shower. Now in the cost aspect we’re not talking about significant savings — perhaps a couple dollars a month depending on what shampoo and conditioner you use.

But on time the savings can be significant, especially if you have a finicky water heater or one that’s not really all that large and can be drained quickly. This means he may not have to wait nearly as long to jump in the shower, or if he’s typically quick anyway, it’s a better chance he’d have more than enough hot water available if he does. And if you shower together on the weekends, it can mean more time to just sit under the hot water together (depending on shower layout, of course).

The weight of longer hair can also contribute to headaches or exacerbate any scalp concerns.

Let’s directly address this notion: “It’s not as if we’re going to shave it off or sport one of Rihanna’s hairstyles, but even if we did, we hope you’d find us just as attractive.” You can hope all you want, but it may not happen. And if you expect that he’ll still find you attractive despite what could be a drastic change in appearance, hopefully you’ll do the same if he drastically changes his — provided you don’t first jump to the conclusion he’s cheating because of his drastic change in appearance (yes, I read those articles, too).

Again, much like the rest of this article, what you expect from your guy you’d better be open to him expecting of you.

How your hair is kept is more important than the length. As such, Audrey Tautou isn’t really a good example of a woman who looks attractive with short hair, in my opinion. All of the pictures I’ve seen of her with short hair don’t shine well on her simply because her hair is naturally wavy, and naturally wavy hair always looks better longer — I’ve yet to see an example of that not holding true, and the wavier the hair, the worst it looks when kept short unless it’s styled. Which brings me to Halle Berry. Her hair has a wave or curl to it, but she has typically had her hair styled, and keeping hair styled can get costly quickly. And she’s also almost always had short hair — anyone know of a time when that wasn’t true?

Keira Knightly‘s hair is also typically straight or pretty close to it, making it easier for her to keep it short or long and still look great, and she’s worn it both straight and long over the years as well. Jena Malone‘s hair is similar as well because it is straight.

Rihanna‘s styles over the years have been touch and go, I’ll admit. She’s had some nice hair styles, and some that were… questionable. So if you wanted to sport one of her styles, I think you’d have to be specific on which style you wanted to wear.

But getting back to the original point, a “good guy” may ask you to keep your hair longer. Longer hair is considered more attractive. My wife used to keep her hair really long. And I didn’t chide her for wanting to cut it short back in 2006 and keep it that way. She had very good reason for wanting to take her hair down a couple feet —  yes it was long enough they were able to take off 27″ for donation and still keep it what we both felt was a reasonable length. She didn’t want to go super short, and I didn’t want her to take it that short either.

What would make him not a “good guy” is if he obligates you to keep your hair long.

And that’s kind of the thing about the title of the article. A “good guy” may ask or request numerous things of you, even things you may not want to do. What he will never do is force you to do them or obligate you in some other way. Plus whatever you request of him you’d better be ready for him to request of you.

Rack mount HDD enclosure

Rack mount HDD enclosure, part 6: Follow up with Protocase

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 1 Comment
Build Log:

After writing such high praise on the Protocase Designer software — which Protocase shared via their Facebook page and Twitter — I was torn on writing this next segment, but I must in order to be completely honest about my experience building this project.

Plus if I’ve had a questionable experience with a company, I’ve made it a point to write about it: CaseLabs (here), Performance PCs (here, here, and here), FrozenCPU (here), Amazon (here), FedEx (here and here), AquaTuning/AlphaCool and their insurance company… I believe in being honest about my experiences — and where I’ve previously talked about a problem I’ve had, I’ve not only said what the problem was, but how it was resolved.

So too it is now with Protocase.

The quote

The original quote I provided in part 5 of this build log was erroneous. For reference, this was that quote:

Rack quote

Before continuing, I need to fill in some other side details. While trying to figure out what I’m going to do for an enclosure, I’ve since got a proof of concept together for the internal components: I have 4x1TB WD Blue hard drives connected to the Addonics port multiplier and connected to my computer via eSATA, powered by a FlexATX power supply. The hard drives are configured for RAID 10 as I’d planned — I’ll elaborate more on how I got that set up later (hint: it didn’t involve the SIIG RAID card I’d been using).

DSC_0230

What prompted me to make that move a little sooner than expected was some hard drive corruption that unfortunately caused me to lose the original file I’d sent in to receive that quote. So I decided to build the proof of concept, partly as a test to make sure everything was going to work. After getting the RAID setup and everything re-installed, I re-downloaded Protocase Designer and rebuilt the file. Allow me to shine a bit more praise on the Protocase Designer: it only took me about 20 minutes to build out the new file from scratch to what I originally had, mostly thanks to the cutout library.

When I queried for an online quote, with the intent of actually placing an order, I received a bit of a shock:

hdd quote

That’s a bit of a disparity!

I wondered what I had done differently to get the drastically different quote, so I tried changing the enclosure’s materials and other options. I even built out a new file from scratch again and tried getting another quote. The numbers were about the same, so I wrote in to the sales team with the new file. After a few e-mails back and forth, they agreed to honor the original quote — the one for which I actually had the screenshot (lucky me in taking it) (emphasis mine):

The design team took a look and at the present time we don’t see any major concerns, this is not to say there wasn’t some type of error when you recreated your file. We did have a minor concern which was addressed immediately. You may have created your design when this was happening. We do apologize for this. The second price is a more accurate price.

If the design is needed I can work with you on the price. We can honour the price for you this time . If you would like to call I would be more than happy to talk to about this.

During the course of the conversation, I had made a couple additions to the design — the original design didn’t have any way out the back to exhaust the air, so I added a few 60mm fan mounts. In having made the changes, I proposed a new offer: 175 USD for the work and setup, plus shipping — which would bring it to shy of 200 USD. Basically I was taking advantage of the fact they were willing to honor the original quote, but since I’d made modifications, I proposed something a little higher.

After I sent the e-mail back to them with the proposal and new file, I went digging through my IE search history after noticing it appeared to have been preserved. One of the benefits of having your Windows 8.1 local account linked up to your Live profile is IE will automatically save off your history. And the original quote was still in my history. When I visited the page again, it showed that my original quote was indeed caused by a flaw on their end:

38273 recalculated

Quote No. 38273, quoted at 299.92 USD plus setup with free shipping. Contrast that with the original quote of 79.38 USD plus setup and another 18 USD for shipping. Yeah there was definitely something not right when I got the original quote.

RAID setup

Let’s briefly segue into the RAID 10 setup. In a parenthetical above, I noted that the RAID is not going through the SIIG card I had installed. One thing not mentioned in the manual or anywhere is that it will not allow you to create a RAID including drives on a port multiplier. So I have it going through my mainboard’s BIOS. I had to turn off the RAID’s caching options as well to keep it stable — with caching turned on, it would periodically crash and eventually got to a point where the RAID controller kept telling me 3 drives were offline.

There is a slight performance penalty turning off caching, but it’s not anything serious. I created a backup image of the new installation using Macrium Reflect, which showed read throughput of over 2.5 Gb/s — note that’s nearly a 70% improvement over the specified sustained read rate for the WD Blue. Still slower than an SSD, but I think SSDs are overrated anyway. And if anyone wants to challenge me on that, feel free, as I can tell you my experience with using an SSD heavily on a software engineering computer for the last 3, approaching 4 years. It’ll probably change your perspective on how good they actually are.

After the weekend

The following Monday after sending the e-mail, I received a reply back from the Protocase representative. I didn’t hear back till mid-afternoon, and, until I received it, I wondered if my e-mail was filtered out for having an attachment like the e-mail I initially tried to send to CaseLabs (see link above). After first apologizing for also not responding nearly as quickly, the representative informed me that she wanted to put my proposal in front of her boss — which I expected — and then reiterated that the erroneous quote was likely caused by an issue on their end: “Since this was our mistake I know it won’t be a problem to work with you based on your proposal.”

Unfortunately her boss was expected to be out of office till Friday, so I inquired if there was someone else to whom she could forward the proposal to be reviewed. I wasn’t on a time crunch for this, and the proof of concept was holding stable, but if things could get turned around sooner, then I’d go for sooner — especially since they have a 2 to 3 day lead time once the design goes into production. She also stated in her e-mail that the design would also need to be forwarded to the design team for review, which is part of their procedure.

The next morning, the representative decided to not wait and instead gave the necessary authorizations while making sure to document why she was selling me a custom enclosure for what amounts to a 40% discount. The order was pushed through with a total of 193 USD — 175 USD plus 18 USD for shipping. The order has gone through all necessary approval steps and should now be going into production.

I’ll update the series when I have the enclosure in hand, which will probably be toward the end of the week. Production should take two to three days and be shipped by 2-day shipping.

Concealed carry/Due process

Concealed carry without a permit

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 1 Comment

Also known as “constitutional carry”, a number of States do not have a permit procedure to carry a firearm concealed. More States are now considering such allowances. The Washington Post recently reported on it, and said this:

The American public has recently been tilting toward gun rights; a Pew poll last month showed guns rights supporters pulling ahead of gun control supporters 52 to 46.

But Americans also want background checks, which permitless concealed-carry laws could do away with. A Quinnipac poll last year also showed that an overwhelming majority of voters, both Democrat and Republican, support background checks for all gun purchases. A similar majority would also bar people suffering from mental illness from purchasing guns.

“Permitless concealed carry” laws would not do away with background checks, since Federal law still requires an NICS check for every firearms purchase through a Federally-licensed (FFL) firearms dealer.

More States are pushing for “constitutional carry” simply to eliminate the ability for law enforcement to deny permits on faulty grounds. For example, after Illinois was basically forced by a Federal Court to allow concealed carry, the Illinois State Police just started denying permits without reason — and it appeared to be doing so to predominantly black applicants, even those without any criminal record or history of any kind. Part of that is due to Illinois being a “may issue” State, not a “shall issue” state like Missouri.

Speaking of Illinois, being arrested too many times — regardless of whether charges are actually pursued — can also disqualify you for a concealed weapons permit. And they can also deny a permit if they have “determined by a preponderance of the evidence that you pose a danger to yourself or others/are a threat to public safety“.

But beyond that, background checks for concealed carry permits tend to pull up things that don’t bar a person from actually possessing a gun. A person convicted of a felony as a juvenile who has had that record expunged may be able to obtain a firearm once they reach appropriate legal age (18 for long guns, 21 for pistols), but that previous record could come back to bite them when they apply for a concealed carry permit.

For example, one person wrote on the Expert Law forum detailing his experience in which a juvenile misdemeanor offense was used against him to deny him a permit:

My question involves criminal records for the state of: California

When I was 14yrs old I was arrested for fighting at school. I took a plea bargain as a infraction was fined 35.00 and given 2 day of work detail. I had my record sealed when I was 18 and have not been in trouble ever since. I have TS clearance in the military last done 2009. I am now 41 years old and have been denied my concealed weapons permit in the state of Georgia for a battery charge in a city (that doesn’t exist on the same date that I got into the fight in 1987. I called the county juvenile department and was told the records do not exist and would not have followed me as it was a infraction. I spoke to the probate court in Georgia they said they never seen anything quite like this before due to the fact that it only had a date and charge and had to deny the permit as a open case against me on file.

On the forum The High Road, a corrections officer in the State of Georgia found himself denied a permit due to clerical errors with the Court:

my so called terroristic threat charge from when I was sixteen (which was simply a cruel rumor started by classmates which is why it held no legal grounds) is still listed as a charge on my record. The probate judge who handles CCW’s did not have any info other than the actual charge on hand…..he had no information on what happened to the charge after it was filed almost 10 years ago. So I had to explain what happened and show him a peice of paper from the DA’s office that stated that the charge was dismissed almost as soon as it was written.

He was also charged with being a minor in possession of alcohol, which is a simple misdemeanor.

And YouTube user MrAk47master posted a video on March 4, 2011, showing the letter in which he was denied a concealed weapons permit by the prosecuting attorney’s office for Houghton County, Michigan, for a juvenile record in California that, under Michigan law, would’ve been a felonies if they were adjudicated in an adult court. The juvenile record does not prevent him from purchasing firearms.

So this is a person who was never convicted of a felony and so is not barred by Federal law from purchasing a firearm. His juvenile record does show he has misdemeanor convictions in the State of California. If he were an adult and those charges adjudicated in criminal court, as opposed to juvenile court, then they would’ve been felony-level charges under Michigan law (who knows what they would’ve been under California law), and Michigan used that to deny him a concealed weapons permit.

Now while a lot of people might say that such records should be disqualify someone from getting a concealed weapons permit, I must vehemently disagree.

You see in the United States we have this thing called “due process”. And under due process, you cannot refer to someone as a felon unless they have actually been convicted of a felony! The due process clause states, quite plainly, that you may not take away a person’s rights without due process of law. And before a person can be deprived under Federal law of their Second Amendment rights, they must be a felon, which, again, requires they be actually convicted on felony charges. And if the Court determines that a person’s juvenile record should be sealed, then that means it should not be used against them later in life — not as an impediment to obtaining a firearm, and not as an impediment to carrying that firearm.

But to gain the ability to legally carry a firearm concealed in public, we have to file application for what should be readily recognized as a right given the Second Amendment. And that application process operates on a “guilty unless a search comes back empty” premise. I’m sorry, but that’s not how it works.

And at the same time, a person who has not been convicted of a felony should not be denied a concealed carry permit simply because the charges on which a person was actually convicted would have been felony charges if the circumstances were a little different.

That is what “constitutional carry” laws prevent. A person who is legally able to purchase a pistol should be legally able to carry that pistol, concealed or open, without first having to apply to the government for permission to do so.

Absinthe

Absinthe – Part XX

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment
Build Log:

Okay so for Valentine’s Day I bought my wife an R9 290X to replace her GTX 660 pair.

Previously I’d talked about going with a GTX 970, mainly because they are a little better than the R9 290X on performance while consuming a lot less power — as in one R9 290X uses about the same power as a pair of GTX 970s. So why did I not go that route? The 3.5GB memory limitation on what is advertised as a 4GB card.

While for most that memory limitation won’t make a difference, I know how my wife runs her system. For most people 8GB of RAM is more than enough. For my wife, it was barely breaking even, so she got bumped to 16GB, and so far she’s running smooth. It’s also why I water cooled her system: when I first built out the computer that would become Absinthe, I saw her taking massive advantage of the new power her system had, and the temperatures were getting me a little worried. In a way that shows that AMD makes good processors and ASRock and ASUS make good mainboards — she runs her computer pretty damn hard.

We’ve done Radeon’s in the past, and it was in Q4 2013 with a GT 620 that I bought the first “team green” nVidia card for my wife’s computer, which was originally built out in 2007 (AMD Athlon X2 with 4GB RAM). That would eventually get upgraded to the water cooled GTX 660 pair.

And now it’s a single R9 290X. Will it become a pair as well? We’ll see. But yes, #RAMgate is the reason I avoided the GTX 970. I did not want to chance that becoming an issue with how my wife can run her system. I don’t know if my wife is aware the GTX 970’s limitation. If she is, then she’d probably opt for the R9 290X as well and not chance the GTX 970.

So specifically the R9 290X I bought is the XFX “Double-D” model. Initially the card was installed into her system on Valentine’s Day while she was at work. It required modifying her loop in a couple important ways.

For one, an R9 290X is a full-length PCB, but the cooler on the XFX model extends beyond that by another inch or close to it. Contrast that with the relatively short PCB of the GTX 660, which is comparable to the GTX 970 — one of the other reasons I was considering that card. The longer card meant I needed to push her pump and reservoir over beyond the edge of the UN Z2 bracket to which it was mounted.

I also didn’t have a water block for it immediately. Even if I did, I wanted my wife stressing the card for a couple weeks before mounting the block. So to get the card in her system without throwing everything back on air, I just bypassed the graphics card and ran a piece of soft tubing from the bottom radiator to the top — this put her CPU on 7x120mm of radiator capacity. For the coolant, it was just distilled water.

So that’s how she ran the system for two weeks. In the mean time, I looked around at blocks to decide which direction to go. In the end, going on an in-depth analysis I read online, I went with the AquaComputer KryoGraphics block with the backplate. The analysis showed the card to be the best overall block for the R9 290X. It tested to within 1C of the top performing block for GPU temperatures, which was Swiftech’s Komodo block, but the cooling of the VRMs with the backplate topped the list by a significant margin.

I ordered the block through Performance-PCs — with the recent FrozenCPU hiatus, they were the only stateside distributor. And they had one backplate and two of the blocks in stock when I ordered. The only other option would’ve been ordering directly from the manufacturer. It would’ve been a similar price, but would’ve included a nearly 2-week wait time before shipping. FrozenCPU had the block, but not the passive backplate.

The one thing I found rather intriguing is how the block is shipped vacuum packed:

Unfortunately due to the washout from the flash, the full beauty of this block can’t really be made out, and I forgot to take pictures of the card with the block installed. The promotional picture on Aquacomputer’s site does it more justice anyway (see below). It’s a great looking block, and it was a relative breeze to install — but then I’ve had a bit of practice doing that. It’s also the only block I know of that has you use thermal compound on the memory chips instead of thermal pads. The backplate was also easy to install.

Yes, that’s the Hawaii islands cut into the copper cold plate. It’s manufacturing detail that’s mostly wasted as well given that, in most builds, that face of the block will be toward the bottom of the case and not in ready sight.

Anyway, once I got the card installed, it was a matter of doing the rest of the loop.

This wasn’t as easy as it sounds, merely because I kept overthinking some things.

First, in noticing how the pump and reservoir were barely held down with how I had them mounted, I thought the better idea would be to have it straddle two UN Z2 brackets in the middle of both of the 120mm fans on the bottom radiator. Only problem is having the Z2 bracket on the fan closest — actually directly underneath the front radiator — interfered with the front radiator and meant I couldn’t mount the front radiator. So scratch that idea.

So I thought I needed to separate the pump and reservoir and started exploring that idea. That introduced quite a few complications into the equation, and it wasn’t until my back was screaming at me from working on this all day that I realized something I should have hours earlier: removing the stock cooler shortened the graphics card by up to an inch. This meant that I could keep the pump and reservoir mounted to the bracket and held a bit more securely to it.

So I tried that idea — and it worked! — and went to bed, after having my wife try to get as many kinks out of my back as possible. I saved finishing the tubing and getting it filled for a leak test till the next day.

Looking at that picture, you can probably see how it’s mounted at the edge of the bracket. It’s very similar to how I had it mounted in the initial Absinthe build, only on the opposite side of the bracket. It’s sturdy, held in place by two M4 bolts from underneath, and the tubing running from the CPU back to the top of the reservoir also helps keep it in place.

You can see off to the left of the pump the new run from the bottom radiator to the graphics card — just one giant 90-degree bent piece of copper tubing. And I went with another 45-degree bend to go from the graphics card to the top radiator.

The windowed lid on the block makes it very easy to tell when there are large bubbles still trapped in the block. I was tilting the case to all kinds of different extremes to get the largest bubbles out of the block as I wanted those gone before I powered on the system.

And initial performance numbers from the block are certainly quite pleasing — ambient temperature was about 20C:

It topped out at 45C after running three cycles through Unigine Heaven. The stock cooler would top out in the lower 70s. On cold boot, it idled in the lower 30s — not unexpected given the hotter profile for the card. I expect temperatures may improve as the last of the air works its way out of the blocks and radiators, but it won’t be a significant improvement.

Technology

On or off?

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 2 Comments

It’s a reasonable question to be asking: should you leave your computer on or turn it off every night? Recently Simon Hill of Digital Trends tackled this question, bringing in Steven Leslie from Geek Squad to assist.

The biggest argument for leaving your computer on constantly is that it is less damaging to your components in the long run. This is only partly true, and it’s based on what I’d considered a somewhat flawed observation. The time when a computer part is most likely to fail is when it is being powered on, not while it is running — don’t read that to mean a part won’t fail while it is running, because it most certainly can, it’s just not as likely to do so, just as your car is more likely to fail to start than die while running or idling.

All computer components have a rating called MTBF, or mean time between failure. “Mean time” means average. If a part is rated at 50,000 hours MTBF (typical for a computer hard drive), then that means the manufacturer has determined that the average lifespan for a component would be 50,000 hours of constant running — or it should be able to run continuously powered for over 2083 days, or about 5 years and 8 to 9 months. Now given this is the average rating, your part could die in a year run continuously, or it could die in 10 years.

So the idea goes that powering off your computer every day should extend the lifespan of your computer components because the MTBF is rated on constant use. The slight “surge” in powering on your components isn’t going to cause any significant stress to your components unless you’ve got bad wiring in your home or you’re connected to a substandard power grid. But if that were the case, and you’re not using an uninterruptible power supply (UPS, and I’m not talking about the courier), surge suppressor or power conditioner, you’re already causing damage to your computer whenever it’s powered on.

Modern desktop power supplies can more robustly handle substandard power delivery coming from the wall, but there are still limits beyond which that is not true, and that is in part still determined by what your computer requires to operate — i.e. if your computer is trying to draw 500W from the wall, but is having a difficult time getting it due to the power delivery in your home, you’re going to have stability issues. To find out the quality of the power delivery on your grid, you’ll need to talk to your power company. If the grid is fine, you may need to upgrade the wiring in your home — this will have significant benefits beyond your computer, as it could increase the lifespan of everything in your home, including major appliances, and possibly improve energy efficiency while also decreasing the possibility of a fire due to faulty electrical lines in your home.

Now this doesn’t change the fact that a component is still most likely to die when powering on. That’s just the nature of any electrical component.

In his article, Hill writes this: “A traditional hard disk drive, for example, has moving parts, whereas a solid state drive doesn’t and is far more robust as a result.” Okay let’s tackle this idea.

An SSD, or solid state drive, does not have moving parts. As such it consumes much less power and will run cooler and quieter, and is much less prone to shock damage (as in from a striking blow, not electrical shock). But they are significantly more expensive than traditional platter hard drives (HDDs). But whether they are more robust depends on how you use them.

Here’s the caveat: you don’t want to use them in systems where there will be very frequent changes to the data stored on it. Content creators, software developers, and the like really should not use an SSD as primary storage. Using it to store the operating system and software is one thing, to ensure that programs load quickly, and it’s information that is unlikely to change frequently.

But use a traditional HDD for storing work files and the like.

This is because SSD performance degrades over time, and will degrade faster if you don’t keep much free space on it while using it as a primary drive, or are making frequent writes, deletes, or rewrites to the data on the drive. You can keep this from occurring nearly as much by having multiple SSDs configured in a RAID 0 configuration (beyond the scope of this article), thereby spreading writes and rewrites across multiple drives. But you’d likely still be better off having a platter drive, especially since platter drives are much less expensive, and capacity is going to be more important than speed — doesn’t matter how fast your data is saved and loaded if you can’t store it.

The laptops issued by my employer have SSDs in them, and my upcoming device upgrade will also have an SSD. I’m actually considering talking to device support about moving over to a platter HDD, even if I have to pay for the drive out of my own pocket. This is in part due to capacity — see my previous paragraph. The drive I currently have is only 120GB, and the drive in the new laptop is 256GB, and as a software engineer, I prefer capacity over speed, so I’ll be discussing putting a larger platter hard drive in the device in its place. Word has it I may be able to have an HDD alongside the SSD, so I may explore that option as well.

SSDs are faster, but, again, their performance will degrade over time, and the SSD in my laptop is currently not much faster than a traditional platter drive. This is in part because my SSD — like those of my colleagues — has about 75% of its capacity currently used. That will cause an SSD’s performance to degrade faster because the algorithms the SSD’s firmware uses to prevent that performance degradation from occurring cannot work nearly as well.

Several of my colleagues have had to replace their SSDs over the last couple years due to the drive failing. The fact we also use full-drive encryption at work I think plays into that.

Whether you will encounter those limitations depends on what you do with your system, but do not ignore the fact that any drive, HDD or SSD, can fail on you at any time, so keep regular backups of important data. And the power delivery to and inside the system is what is most likely to cause a component to fail.

Hill provided a couple lists of reasons to leave your computer on or turn it off. The first reason to leave it on is if you’re using the system as a server, which most aren’t doing that, so it’s a moot point. The other two reasons are perfectly applicable:

  • There are background updates, virus scans, or other activities you’d like to occur while you’re away.
  • You never want to wait for it to start up.

It’s always best to have scans and updates occur during downtime, especially if the updates require a reboot — which means even if you’re not shutting down every night, at least have the system in a state where a reboot can automatically occur if it must. Speaking of which, even if you don’t shut down every night, a nightly reboot can still be beneficial.

Now let’s talk about the reasons to turn it off:

  • Leaving it on wastes electricity and can slightly increase your power bill.
  • You don’t want to be disturbed by notifications or fan noise.
  • Computer performance generally benefits from an occasional reboot.

Of these, the last is kind of nonsensical as you can manually reboot your computer. You can do a reboot in the morning while making coffee, or at night before going to bed. If you don’t want to be disturbed by fan noise or notifications, then put your system in another room so it’s not going to disturb you. And if the fans in your system are loud, replacing them is always an option, as there are plenty of options available for quiet fans that still push a good amount of air.

Leaving your system on will obviously mean it’s using power. Your system does not draw a continuous level of power from the wall and will only draw what it needs up to the rated power of the power supply. So if  you’re leaving your system idling overnight, it’s increasing your power bill by only a few dollars a month, so shutting it down every night is probably not going to make a huge difference on your power bill, especially if the amount if time it’s off will always be less than the amount of time it’s on.

How little power it draws when idling depends on the processor, mainboard and other components. For example Western Digital has the WD Green drive which is designed to spin down when not in use — this makes the drive undesirable for anything other than backup storage. Modern processors are actually fairly power efficient today, with technologies built in that allow them to sip power when idling. The efficiency of the computer’s power supply will also determine how much power the system uses while idling.

Then there’s the question of sleep or hibernate. Just like powering off, hibernate will only be of significant benefit if the computer is going to be off more than it will be on.

Putting your computer into a sleep state is also a beneficial option, but with one caveat: make sure your system is configured so the mouse cannot wake it up. If you have a wireless mouse, turn it off before putting your computer into sleep. A lot of optical mice on the market have very high resolution tracking on them, meaning the slightest shift on the mouse could wake your computer unexpectedly, negating the benefit of putting it into a sleep state. Hard drives spin down when the system is put to sleep, so unexpected wake-ups caused by a jolt that causes the mouse to report it’s moved will spin it back up sooner, and potentially more frequently.

Abortion/Marriage and Relationships/Second Amendment

Firearms to the left is like abortion and gay marriage to the right

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

It is at times interesting noting parallels of liberals discussing abortion and marriage laws, and conservatives discussing gun laws. The recent example here is Michaelangelo Signorile, Editor-at-large for Huffington Post’s Gay Voices section, and his article “Has the Anti-Gay Right Found Its Gay ‘Partial-Birth Abortion’?”

In the article, Signorile talks about how the pro-life right will not stop trying to chip away at abortion in the United States simply because of Roe v. Wade, and how that will become a model for what would happen should the Supreme Court of the United States issue a blanket decision overturning all gay marriage bans in the United States. Basically, they will be a bit more sneaky about it, using the cryptology of legalese to mask what they intend.

Yet if you look at the observations Signorile makes in his article, I cannot help but notice the parallels with what the left is trying to do with firearms rights in the United States. This paragraph in particular is key:

On abortion, they chipped away slowly at women’s freedom of choice, making abortion difficult to obtain and passing laws to restrict women’s rights even if some were and are later overturned. Some laws would stick, helping to limit abortion (often affecting poor women). And even when they ultimately lose, the right temporarily shuts down clinics or restricts access, creating a constant state of instability and keeping its agenda — and the often hateful rhetoric — in the national spotlight.

Let’s massage this paragraph a little bit:

On firearms, they chipped away slowly at gun rights, making firearms difficult to obtain and passing laws that restrict gun rights even if some were and are later overturned. Some laws would stick, helping to restrict guns (often affecting the poor). And even when they ultimately lose, the left temporarily cuts off or restricts access, creating a constant state of instability and keeping its agenda — and the often hateful rhetoric — in the national spotlight.

Doesn’t that summarize the gun control — excuse me, “gun safety” agenda in a heartbeat? Here’s another observation:

Test something out, see what works, and move on to something else if it doesn’t work.

Again, this is exactly what the left is trying to do with regard to firearms. The left will talk about needing to restrict guns to save lives, and the right will talk about needing to restrict abortion to save the unborn. And the sad thing is both sides are so clouded by their own ideologies they won’t see the hypocrisy, even when blatantly pointed out to them.

Even Signorile’s observation about how the gay rights movement has become somewhat complacent due to a lot of victories in recent years also applies to the gun rights advocates — or at least how we were ahead of Sandy Hook and Aurora:

It’s perplexing, but this seems to be part of a cocky strategy to act like winners and not give credence or attention to the haters. But when a state successfully passes an abhorrent, dangerous bill like the one in Arkansas, the only response is a loud, public condemnation, and demands that all your allies, including your business and political allies, speak out and condemn it. No matter if you lose, you must always show the opposition you will put up a nasty fight.

Again, let’s massage the language:

But when a state successfully passes an abhorrent, dangerous bill like the one in [Colorado, or other gun control state], the only response is a loud, public condemnation, and demands that your allies, including your business and political allies, speak out and condemn it. No matter if you lose, you must always show the opposition you will put up a nasty fight.

I don’t know Signorile’s stance on guns, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if he were in favor of severe restrictions and bans on firearms. Yet even if I were to show him my observations herein, I wouldn’t change his mind in the least if that were the case, and he’d probably use predictable arguments to back up his assertions.

Rack mount HDD enclosure

Rack mount HDD enclosure, part 5

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 1 Comment
Build Log:

Let me start off with a simple question: why has Protocase never come up in my search results before? With their Protocase Designer software, I could create a CAD design of a 2Ux12″ enclosure with 4 cutouts in the front for 80mm fans plus a cutout for a 16mm vandal-resistant switch. Plus in the back of the case, I had a cutout for a FlexATX power supply (it’s actually just a square hole for the AC plug and holes for a 40mm fan, but close enough) and a cutout for the port multiplier.

And the software is the easiest I’d ever used for something like this. I’m not kidding. It is extremely intuitive. It comes with a pre-loaded library of cutouts for various things, and you can create your own cutouts if you know what you’re doing. Only downside is everything is in inches, and I’d love to see a metric option, so Protocase, if you happen across this, consider that an enhancement request.

And I was able to get an instant quote as well from the software:

Rack quoteFor a custom cut 2Ux12″ rack enclosure made from 18 gauge steel into which I’d just have to add what I’m going to be mounting up, with plenty of room for cabling and cable management… I’d say 138 USD is a pretty good overall price.

Their service promises turnaround of a few days, but I’m not going to place the order just yet. I’ll probably wait till later in the week if not till next payday.

In the mean time I’m going to be playing around with their software a bit more. I’ve got a couple other ideas in mind, and I’d like to see what kind of quotes I could get. Ordering multiple things at once could save on shipping.

Rack mount HDD enclosure

Rack mount HDD enclosure, part 4

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment
Build Log:

Time to admit defeat. Well, sort of.

Over the last couple weeks I’ve tried several options for mounting hard drives inside the rack mount enclosure I had purchased. And so far none of the options had really worked well. First, let’s look at the layout of the enclosure.

Recall that I was trying to work in the Bud Industries PRM-14462 enclosure, which is a 2Ux8″ plastic enclosure — there is a 1U and 3U option as well. If you look at the technical drawing for the enclosure, you’ll see that there are 4 posts in the middle of the enclosure with about 8½” between them. 3½” HDDs are 4″ wide.

I could have the HDDs mounted fairly close together, but the trouble was figuring out how. I bought acrylic sheet from my local Home Depot with the intent of trying to make HDD mounts from scratch, but trying to drill all of that by hand without a drill press (one of the downsides of living in an apartment) only proved frustrating. So I ultimately gave up on that mark.

By the way, if you’re wanting to drill holes through acrylic, get a glass-cutting bit. It works like a charm.

Another material I considered, and which probably would’ve worked well, was aluminum angle bar. But after trying to use acrylic to get want I wanted, I didn’t want to custom build something if it could be avoided.

With that in mind, I found a product from Agestar that intrigued me. I first saw it listed on ModDIY, but as out of stock, then found it listed on NewEgg as in stock. Thinking it would work like a charm, I ordered 4 sets, one for each HDD that’d be going into this. Things didn’t work out the way I’d hoped though as they wouldn’t fit within the vertical posts in the enclosure.

There was another problem with the enclosure that ultimately led me to believe what I had planned would not work.

3½” HDDs are not only 4″ wide, they’re 5¾” long. Subtract out about 1″ for the fans I’d be having in the front to draw in air, and that leaves only 1¼” of space for figuring out how to neatly route cables. The lack of SATA power connectors on the drives means I need to use splitters, which would take up a significant chunk of that leftover space, meaning cable management would be interesting, to say the least. Plus I’d need to run cables to the port multiplier and fans, along with the other cables coming off the power supply… it’d get messy quickly.

So what I need ultimately is just a deeper enclosure, preferably at 11″ or 12″. It still needs to be 2U depth, since everything else I’ve bought is for that configuration. The deeper enclosure, preferably one without vertical posts, should allow for a much better configuration of everything. The only trouble is finding one for a reasonable price, as most of the ones I’ve found are either too expensive or available only from an overseas supplier.

One company I am considering, though, is Protocase since they are here in the United States, namely New York, and I’m using their designer software to make an enclosure that will support 4x80mm fans in the front plus a 22mm anti-vandal switch. For the back, I’m not sure what I’m going to do there. I may stick to my original plans to leave it open with the exception of thin mesh, or I’ll see how much I’m quoted to have a proper back panel on it with ventilation holes.

Absinthe

Absinthe – Part XIX: Valentine’s Day

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment
Build Log:

The title almost makes this sound like some horrible romance/horror movie… Anyone know Neve Campbell’s phone number? I think she’d be perfect for the lead role… Anyway…

So here’s a question: what do you get a PC gamer girl for Valentine’s Day? In previous posts I talked about upgrading her graphics system, and I was originally thinking R9 290 or GTX 970. Then I saw a pretty good deal on NewEgg for an R9 290X “Double-D” from XFX:

20131220105936_R9-290X-EDF_1.jpg

Stay tuned.

Debt

More crap about debt collectors

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I wonder how many of those who write articles about debt collectors and collections have actually been through it. I have. It’s been about three years since I paid off and wrote off the last debt collector, so I know the territory. I’m pretty sure Ben DeMeter of Investopedia does not. He wrote an article back in 2012 (only just saw it recently) called “6 Ways to Keep Debt Collectors at Bay“, and it reads as if he’s discovered Superman’s secret weakness.

And one of his opening statements tells me he’s likely never been through collections: “Anyone who’s ever been in that position will tell you it’s somewhere they never want to be again in their lives.”

He’s right that it’s not someplace I want to be again. I’ve been through collections. I’ve been to Court. Of course in the future I’ll do whatever I can to avoid that. Unfortunately you may, like me, end up going through it out of circumstances not of your own making.

You have rights as an American citizen – rights that debt collection agencies cannot infringe upon no matter how much money you owe.

Yes you do have rights, but so does the debt collector. Here’s the thing: debt collectors are not government agents. They are out to collect what they are owed. But the rights you do have with regard to debt collections, the specific few there are under Federal law (and any applicable State laws) have a time limitation to them.

The other rights that come with debt collections aren’t rights exclusive to it. If you are being harassed, you have the right to tell them to stop, and seek redress through the Court or law enforcement if they refuse.

A debt collector can’t legally pursue you unless he or she gives you a written statement outlining your debt within five days of contacting you. You don’t have to say anything to him or her over the phone until that letter arrives. If the letter doesn’t arrive within five days, you could have grounds to sue him or her for harassment.

None of the collections agencies with whom I’ve had the wonderful experience of interacting ever called me. So there may never be an initial phone call, and not all debt collectors will attempt to call you. Instead what they’ll probably do is send you an initial notice in the mail, which can go out at any time, then try to call you if they don’t hear from you within a certain time frame after sending the notice.

Given how many collections accounts the agencies are likely managing today, initial contact attempts by phone are likely very uncommon.

And they are not obligated to attempt contact by phone first. Their initial contact may be by mail only, especially since they’ll likely include a settlement offer with it with a payment coupon to take immediate advantage of it. You’re not obligated to accept that offer and can negotiate, but, again, they are not obligated to call you first before sending notice by mail.

And to keep clocks from ticking against them, many likely will not, unless the account is for a small balance (i.e. $100 or less), for which payment may be arranged over the phone without any additional communication being necessary.

Third party collectors who buy your debt from your credit issuer are not. They’ll try to keep their identities a secret, because they know that the Fair Debt Collection Act gives you the power to demand, in writing, that they stop calling you.

Debt collections has kind of gained a reputation as being a shady, underground enterprise of assholes who do nothing but sit on the phone screaming at old ladies trying to shake them down for an unpaid hospital or doctor bill. While some collections agents and agencies may be like this, to paint the entire industry with such a wide brush is fallacious in the kindest terms.

Seriously there are so many sob stories about debt collections that I’m not sure what is believable and what isn’t. I’ve seen a range of them from the story of someone being taken through collections over $8.97, to widows and widowers being “harassed” over a debt account they didn’t realize their deceased spouse had, to threats of arrest and prosecution, and seizures of houses and cars.

By the way, the very latter is actually a legal maneuver a debt collector can take, though there are quite a few steps involved in doing so.

And the trend definitely reflects that the more you owe, the more aggressive debt collectors are likely to be, and they may end up crossing the line without really realizing it.

But yes you do have the power to tell them to stop calling you. So go ahead and send that cease and desist letter if you so desire, thinking that you’ve just given the debt collector the proverbial finger and that you won’t have to deal with them again.

Because what the author failed to mention is the potential consequence of sending that cease and desist letter. You may receive a knock at your door by a Court process server.

Don’t accept any of their payment plan offers when they call. Instead, offer to pay 10% to 15% of what you owe. Tell them you can’t afford any more, and stand firm if they don’t accept.

Again this guy seems completely unaware of the fact that a debt collector can and will sue you.

If you think you can offer to pay only 10% or 15% of what you owe, you’re borderline insane as I don’t know of any debt collector that will accept such an offer. Instead what they will likely do is consider any potential negotiations to be fruitless and take you to Court, in which case your argument about what you can afford is absolutely worthless.

Lawsuits open up a lot of different avenues for collections for the debt collector. But lawsuits also mean delays in getting any kind of money, but if what you’re offering could be considered certifiably insane, or if you refuse to work with them at all, you’ll find yourself on the business end of one.

As soon as your debt collector starts calling, record everything he or she says. When he or she calls, inform him or her that he or she is being monitored and start taping. When you make an agreement with him or her, get it in writing and keep the letter on file. Think of it as gathering evidence. If the collection agency ever crosses the line, you’ll have a strong enough case to take the agency to court. Sometimes, even a small clerical error is enough to get your debt completely erased. You can only win the battle if you’ve got enough bullets.

And DeMeter is definitely certifiably insane.

While you should record everything with regard to the debt — namely because the debt collector is likely doing the same — that’s about the only part of this paragraph that is accurate.

Small clerical errors are not going to get your debt completely erased, and if you try to bank on such an idea, you’ll find out how expensive it will be. Small errors are likely to be overlooked by the Court unless there is evidence of willful or intentional misconduct. The Court won’t erase the debt or bar enforcement of it because of a small clerical error. Yet it would not surprise me if there are a ton of people who think such.

If the collection agency ever crosses the line, yes you may have evidence for a suit or counter-suit. But that is only if you can demonstrate that they have acted in violation of the law. Small clerical errors don’t count. It needs to be something a bit bigger on the legal scale.

If a collection agency refuses to stop overstepping its bounds to contact you, then you should strongly consider contacting an attorney. If you’ve been recording evidence of after-hours calls and verbal harassment, you could be able to file a lawsuit. Who knows, you might even be able to clear your debts through a settlement.

Again, I wouldn’t bank on this.

Certainly if you think a debt collector is overstepping what is allowable by law, then you should contact an attorney. A settlement, though, is unlikely to clear out what you owe to them. In a lot of cases, what’ll probably happen is the debt collector will just cease collection attempts, but that does not mean the debt goes away as it’ll likely be placed with another collection agency, and the whole process starts anew.

* * * * *

Okay let’s get into the reality of debt collections and what your rights actually are.

First, if a debt collector contacts you by phone, they must identify themselves as a debt collector and must inform you they are calling with the purpose of collecting a debt. If you are contacted by phone by a debt collector, say this and hang up: “Put the details in writing and send it in the mail.”

From that initial phone call, the debt collector must send the details of the debt to you through the mail, and it must be postmarked on or before 5 days after that initial phone call.

After you receive that initial letter, you have a right called debt validation, but you have only 30 days to exercise it for its exercise to be legally binding. Validation means just what it says: the debt collector must verify the validity of the debt they are attempting to collect, and must provide evidence of that validity to you by mail. They do not have a time limit by which to do this, but they cannot continue to collect on the account until they have done so. For older accounts, this will likely end any collection attempts.

Provided all of these requirements are met, the debt collector is free to use whatever tools are at their disposal, within the bounds of applicable State and Federal laws, to collect the debt.

One of those tools DeMeter never mentions: they can sue you to collect the debt. That is a tool that is always at their disposal. If you tell them to stop contacting you, they will likely turn around and send you a letter saying, in short, “Okay we’ll stop contacting you. Instead we’ve filed a lawsuit.” Nothing in any applicable statute says they cannot. They will place the account with an attorney in your area and you will be served with papers.

And your options become limited once they initiate a lawsuit. And if you think you can just offer to settle for 10% or 15% of what you owe, you’d better read up on what options come available to the debt collector once they have a legally-binding judgment against you.

If you have evidence of misconduct on the part of the debt collector, you must counter-sue as that evidence has nothing to do with the validity of the debt itself, only the collector’s ability to enforce it. And unless your State has laws on its books mirroring the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, your lawsuit may have to be taken to the United States District Court that has jurisdiction. If the collection agency is in a different State, you may have file your lawsuit in that State.