Chrysler 300M Thermostat Location

June 8th, 2009

Another weirdness with the Chrysler 300m.  If you Google trying to find the thermostat location on a 300m’s 3.5L, most answers are from people that have never looked under the hood of this strange car.  You will see answers like:  “Knowing Chrysler, it is located at the top of the engine at the end of the upper radiator hose.” This is a logical answer coming from someone that doesn’t have a clue…if you look at the 3.5L HO engine, the fixture that the upper radiator hose is connected to is blocked by the fuel injection system.

If you want to know the location of the thermostat, it is located at the end of the LOWER radiator hose, near the oil filter.  Jack the car up and remove the drivers side front tire for easier access.

Though there is an important item located on the fixture at the end of the upper radiator hose, a bleeder valve to bleed air out of the cooling system.

Doing DaVinci

May 22nd, 2009

When I was a little kid, I was fascinated by Leonardo DaVinci.  Not his paintings, which were mostly done just to make some cash, but his engineering interests.  Mainly the drawings that we’ve all seen, mostly military devices that were centuries ahead of their time.

I always wondered if any of these devices had ever been built.  The technology didn’t exist in his time to build most of them, they were merely drawings of his thoughts, and it is very doubtful that many, if any, of them have been built over the centuries.

A new show on Discovery Channel is “Doing DaVinci”.  On this show, a team of artists, fabricators, builders, etc, build devices that DaVinci drew.  It is in the cable reality show format, in the vein of “American Hot Rod”, “Monster Garage”, “Junk Yard Wars”, and the like.

“Doing DaVinci” airs on Discovery Channel Mondays at 10PM Eastern/Pacific, 9PM Central.

Asus Maximus II Gene Intel P45 mATX Motherboard

May 18th, 2009

To satisfy the desire for enthusiast/gamer mATX motherboards, Asus has created a new series of boards, the ROG Gene series. These mATX form factor motherboards sport the features of Asus’ high-end ROG motherboards. The first of these to be seen was the Rampage II Gene, an mATX i7/X58 board. Our friends at Asus have now released an mATX Socket 775 ROG Gene motherboard, the Maximus II Gene. It looks to be the answer to what I’m looking for, an upper-end mATX board with Intel P45 chipset. Designed with the enthusiast/gamer in mind, it should be the platform for an awesome LAN party rig, which definitely fits my high-performance/high-portability desire. Will the Maximus II Gene do the job? Read on to see!

See it at ThinkComputers.org!

New Stuff!

May 16th, 2009

New hardware reviews coming.  A review at ThinkComputers.org on Asus’ new P45 mATX motherboard, a member of their Republic of  Gamers series, the Maximus II Gene.  An aluminum watercooled full tower from Ikonik.  Also, triple channel kits from Crucial and Super Talent.  Watch for them at ThinkComputers.org!

ASUS ENGTX260 Matrix GeForce GTX 260 896MB Video Card

May 8th, 2009

At ThinkComputers.org!!!

AMD Phenom II X4 940 Black Edition Processor

April 27th, 2009

At ThinkComputers.org!

Tea Parties 2009 - The Dems just don’t get it….or do they?

April 20th, 2009

On April 15, 2009, at rallies across the US, over 300,000 Americans attended rallies, most being called “tea parties”, in honor of the “Boston Tea Party” that took place in Boston Harbor on December 16, 1773.  The people that attended these rallies were from both political parties or neither, most had never before taken part in any kind of political rally.  Most of these rallies were organized at the local level, many by people who also had never taken part in political protests.

Coverage of these rallies by the “mainstream” (read: liberal) media was abysmal.  The so-called journalists scoffed and made fun of the attendees, and did their best to downplay or completely write-off these protests.   Democrat talking heads on all networks gave negative commentary, even President Obama’s friend and senior advisor David Axlerod called these rallies and those attending them “unhealthy”.

All of the Democrat talking heads and politicians appear not to “get it”, that all of these people who “just got a tax-cut” are now protesting paying taxes.  Of course, these people were not protesting paying taxes per se, they were protesting the incredible increase in spending and the horrific government expansion that has taken place over the past few months.  President Bush’s bail-out of Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac, President Bush’s bail-out of the banking industry, the AIG bail-out, President Obama’s ridiculous “stimulus package”, and his current budget, the latter two which spend as much money as all presidents from George Washington to George W. Bush combined.  They were protesting the potential loss of liberties planned by President Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Many were protesting the “change” they voted for…yes they voted for “change”…but not this kind of change.

Yet much less than a year ago, the Democrat party and especially then-candidate Barack Obama spoke of how great it was when people who have never had anything to do with politics suddenly enter the political process.  That it shows how great the American political process is, and how that process is still working.

Which obviously means new people entering the political process are great….as long as they agree with the Dems.

But don’t be fooled by the Democrat politicians, their talking head robots, and their liberal media puppets.  They do get it.  And they are scared to death.  In less than two years are the mid-term elections.  If this grass-roots protest continues to gain momentum, this could ruin their chances in 2010.  Which, IMO, is why they are trying to do so much so fast….they have two years to make this country as socialist as they can.

But there is a down-side to the tea parties.  Movements like this often lead to the formation and promotion of third party candidates.  Though I would love to see an alternative party, I’d rather see the Republican party come back to its conservative roots and values.  What the tea party attendees want is what the Republicans once stood for.  Though the tea parties had little to do with the Republican Party, this is an excellent opportunity for Michael Steele and the GOP to come back down to earth, and bring back the party of Ronald Regan.

Will they?  We’ll be watching.

OCZ Blade Series DDR3-2000 6GB Low Voltage Triple Channel Memory Kit

April 20th, 2009

At ThinkComputers.org!

Cooler Master Aquagate Max Liquid Cooling System

April 16th, 2009

“Today, I will be looking at Cooler Master’s Aquagate Max, an in-case cooling system sporting a large 300mm x 142mm radiator, plenty large enough to accommodate a pair of 120mm fans. It is also nVidia ESA compliant, so we’ll actually be able to read temps and hopefully make some adjustments via the ESA dashboard. Will the Aquagate Max give us some real watercooling goodness? Read on to see!”

At ThinkComputers.org!

SilenX iXtrema IXG-80HA2 VGA Cooler

April 14th, 2009

“Today I will be looking at the SilenX iXtrema IXG-80HA2 VGA cooler. It has five heatpipes directly touching the GPU, a large fin array, and fits most single-GPU video cards built in the last couple of years. Though the cooler can be used passively in total silence, I will be adding SilenX’s optional fan kit, consisting of three quiet 80mm fans. The cooler looks like it should do a great job of cooling down a hot GPU, but will it make the trip? Read on to see!”

At ThinkComputers.org!