Welcome to Stellimare!
11/05/2011
Stellimare is no longer in the computer repair business (but we'll still help
if you ask for repair services).
We will still offer custom programming and web development service, as well
as new/transitioning and existing user Linux support. Our business model has
shifted to education and software development where it should have been all
along.
8/07/2010
Yowzers it's been a long time since I've made an update. Yes, we're
still alive and ticking. Drupal didn't happen, obviously. After looking
at different solutions, I didn't like any of them. So, eventually
I'll write our own, though that's pretty low down the priority list
at the moment now that our company model has shifted a bit.
This was a very exciting week! We opened up an account with a new supplier, and now have access to thousands of notebooks, a large array of Linux compatible MFC/mutli-functions printers, NAS/SAN storage solutions, tape libraries/backup solutions, and much more.
It's also a sad week as well. It looks like the the world of custom/barebones notebooks has died out. Our older suppliers either dropped entirely their notebook lines, or are now only offering low end netbook style systems. While our new supplier has over two thousand notebooks from a number of different manufacturers (Asus, Dell-- yes we beat their non-enterprise web prices, Acer, HP, Lenovo, MSI, and others), they do not carry the whitebox/barbones systems that are used when building custom notebooks.
It is now impossible to get a notebook without an operating system installed. The only Linux notebooks we were able to find were two atom-based systems (Acer and Asus), and one overpriced Wyse thin client running Suse on a C7-M ULV CPU for roughly twice as much as an atom-based notebook. Of course, you can always remove Windoze and install Linux, or leave it on to play games.
Notebooks have always been monolithic highly integrated devices. There was some effort to make these devices upgradeable, but beyond swapping out the standard 2.5" hard drive and PCMCIA (and now USB) devices, there hasn't been much success in that area. Back in 2006 it was possible to get notebooks that had upgradeable video modules-- problem was, it was very difficult to find those video modules, so the line died out rather quickly. Unfortunately, it didn't help much that the preconfigured notebook lines almost always came with better hardware than the custom lines which also happened to cost 20% more.
The custom PC desktop market isn't going away, and never will. The beauty of PCs is how customizable they are (a concept that was lost on Apple with their consumer Mac lines). That is one of the reasons why they became so popular in the first place. People will always want powerful gaming systems, or powerful number crunchers for design work. Then there is the need for database and file servers. and PC hardware adapts well to those needs.
Nothing will ever be as customizable or as powerful as a desktop PC style hardware. That is why PC hardware dominates the server rooms and gamer systems of today. Custom PC's will never go away. they've gotten smaller (and bigger) over the years, but haven't disappeared.
Even Apple has adopted PC style hardware, inadvertently making the hackintosh possible. We won't tell you how to make your own Hackintosh because that would make Steve mad.
So while the custom notebook market may have evaporated in the economic downturn (depression) that hit in 2007, the custom PC market hasn't shaken. We're still seeing plenty of new devices coming in off the boats making Asia richer.
7/31/09
We are currently looking at the Drupal CMS, though we will still
develop our own custom CMS for our clients who rather would not use
a MySQL database.
5/14/09
Our service rates have been adjusted.
4/25/09
Check out the web's most powerful whois/dns lookup (and reverse lookup)
tool:
http://www.stellimare.com/whois/
It is the most powerful freely available tool on the Internet at this time,
and automates many command line searches done when conducting
research.
The layout on that page is a bit different than the rest of the site. It is the template we will probably move over to later (minus the ads, except on high traffic informational pages). Now off to redesigning the rest of the site.
In case you're wondering about the captcha, each picture is unique, unlike many other systems which use a stored database of images. The captcha is there to prevent abuse by automated programs which use whois information for spamming network and site owners— some network owners get thousands of spam emails per hour (thank goodness for Thunderbird email filters!).
4/21/09 Windows 7 Beta Download has ended
The download period for Windows 7, the successor to Vista, had ended.
This typically means the OS will be ready for release sometime next year.
2/24/2009 (corrections 4/11/09) Windows 7 Available for free Beta download -- Microsoft Vista has gone the way of Windows Me of years past. Due to extreme resistance (for good cause) to adopt the system by businesses (6% use vista) and government institutions, Microsoft has begun development on Windows 7. A beta public beta is available for download. For more information visit http://badvista.fsf.org/. The public beta of Windows 7 can be found at: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/beta-download.aspx
This site will be redesigned in the coming months, but, like all good hackers, we spend more time coding than working on our websites ;). We're also taking our business into a new direction, and so our site will need to reflect this new focus.
As such, please ignore any prices you see on this site. They are no longer valid. contact us for pricing and custom system requests.
This redesign will be completed after development of our non-SQL based CMS system is developed. We're currently using a bit of thrown together one using Bourne shell scripts and a wacky file structure that relies heavily on the file system. But we can do better... and this system is getting a bit annoying as the site grows.
We also like the idea of having static pages, a simple HTML/CSS template system, and being able to backup the entire site using scp/rsync, so Wordpress and others are out of the question (Wordpress also lacks true HTML input, which is extremely annoying adding line breaks without them being explicitly specified by the page writer). We plan to make the software available here as well as on sourceforge when completed.
It'll be designed for php rather than the originally planned Perl, since some Linux hosting companies (i.e. GoDaddy's) insist on not allowing for Perl scripts without paying extra. So, to make our CMS work for the vast majority of our clients, it'll be developed for PHP. PHP scripts also will work on WAMP (windows) servers. So PHP it is...
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Stellimare is a computer service and sales company located in Southern California (Los Angeles County). We primarily offer custom computer systems (notebooks, servers, micro PCs, and desktop machines), and services for Linux servers, and Windows desktop support.
Our online store lists common items, along with specialized components (ITX motherboards for micro PCs or industrial operations). For desktop and notebook computers, it is better to contact us beforehand so we can find a system to meet your needs and offer you the best value in a volatile market.