Category Archives: tech
shiny new hardware
I got myself new toys (finally!) :)
I got a “compensation payment” from my previous employer, unexpected, that is. And such money needs to be spend immediately :P
The Nokia N800 “Internet tablet” – basically a 800×480 touchscreen that runs linux ;)
Well, it’s a bit more than that. The screen is just amazing, featuring 220 DPI (!) displaying virtually any PDF or website without having to zoom.
WPA2 WLAN encryption, (unfortunately, there is no VPN client, yet.. but as the OS is Debian-based, it can be only a matter of time till someone ports vpnc to it’s developer platform, Maemo).
(I am waiting for Skype (with video) and a good PIM, then this device is perfect!!!)
If there is no WLAN access, it connects through my mobile phone, using bluetooth.
I can listen to AAC+ music streams (like SomaFM) on it, read my email, well… it does almost anything I want ;)
Once I have trained the handwriting recognition, I can also skip the iPhone-style on-screen thumb-keyboard (basically a neat idea, but so slooow…)
Also: I got myself a Nokia E60 “business” cellphone, which has no camera but amazing PIM and document/internet functions and VoIP over WLAN capabilities! So whenever I am at home it switches from “cell phone” to VoIP, how cool is that? ;)
And finally… Now I can sync with my iCal and address book again..
I like its “retro” look a lot, now that people buy phones by colour and ringtone-variety, I buy a phone that looks old but at a close look has fantastic functions.
A N95 or N73 would also have been interesting but I realized that VoIP and long battery life is way more important than having a multimedia computer with you. (besides, that’s what I have the n800 for) :P
One device that does everything somehow.. well.. I tried that with the C500 “smartphone” (which is understatement, it runs windows mobile) :P and I decided I don’t want a smartphone anymore. I will wait till voice recogniton is better and people have PADDs everywhere.
Hey, wait! There is a “PADD” skin, look here
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back to the roots
I thought I had been spared.. I thought I was lucky as usual.
But it seems I wasn’t this time. My MacBook has RSS :(
(Random Shutdown Syndrome)
It is sent now away to get a new Mainboard and a new heatsink… 8 working days. Apple apparently expects a _LOT_ of units being replaced the next months.
At least they don’t make a fuzz about it and just take it in for replacement.
Now that I had the Mac OS X Experience for more than 2 months and all of a sudden am back with Ubuntu Linux on my old 400Mhz VAIO I know that once the warranty of the macbook is over I will run ubuntu on it ;)
building a “killstick”
bootable USBdrive + DBAN + loadlin/GRUB = a killstick ;)
http://dban.sourceforge.net/faq/
just boot with the parameter “autonuke” :D
Ubuntu and suspend2
I am using Ubuntu “Dapper Drake” for a while now and I am truly impressed how far the Linux community has pushed this. It’s nearly perfect.
Of course, some work is needed and one will actually have to read at least one website to get mp3 working (did I mention that patents and copyrights suck badly?)
But everything is usually resolved quickly after looking into the forums once.
What Ubuntu lacks at the moment is good hibernation support.
Software Suspend 2 is a project that gives Linux the ability to hibernate the PC just like in Windows XP. Problem is, you have to patch the kernel for it to work with Ubuntu. Beginners don’t like that. :P
Here’s a nice person that has written a nice howto and has provided custom (experimental) kernels to use with software suspend 2:
http://dagobah.ucc.asn.au/dapper-kernels/
Thank you very much!!!
P.S.: And to speed up the whole thing there is a neat script: faster-dapper
alarm clock for the “difficult cases”
for all those that sleep long and always find ways to switch off the alarm clock before waking up there is help: *grins at Anna*
This alarm clock ejects pieces of a puzzle when buzzing and won’t switch off before you have found all pieces of the puzzle (which are scattered around your room).
It’s cruel.. but highly effective ;)
seen at OhGizmo.com, to be purchased at bimbambanana.com – all great gadget sites.
To name a few more: there is gizmodo.com, iwantoneofthose.com, shinyshiny.tv and of course thinkgeek.com for the extreme geeks ;)
Death and rebirth
My Mainboard did not survive the moving to Aachen, it seems.. 2 weeks after moving in a capacitor blew on my ASUS A7M266-D, rendering this beautiful dual-cpu board unusable :'(
As it is a quite exotic server/workstation board, spare parts are expensive as hell and a replacement cost ~750 Dollars (no joke) because ASUS recently declared it “end of life” making it a “most wanted” board for those that can’t afford changing hardware.
Suckers :P
Now, having good friends *hugs Sir Cubbi* I was given a replacement board. And I did what usually never works, I just plugged it in, connected my hardware and booted windows. After 30 minutes of hardware detection, a lot of restarting and a new activation of Windows XP I was able to use my system again. I’m running Cubbi’s 800Mhz “Thunderbird” processor now but I don’t really see much difference in performance from my 2x1500Mhz that I had before. That should teach me a lesson not to go for speed anymore in the future…
Ok.. this saves me from painful reinstallation of Windows. *grin*
(at least till I get a decent replacement.. dual core athlon or whatever)
And by the way: Fedora Core 5 will be released March 15th…
Please, please keep me away from the Install CDs till I finish my exams :D
It’s still 5 days to go till the Biochemistry exam. I must not fail this one!
read mail…
Learning Linux – part 2
yesterday I learned how to read mail – really fast in Linux/Unix
the command for this is rm -rf * (isn’t it obvious?)
Thanks, Cubbi, for giving me this most valuable tip :P
a whole new world
With everybody talking about Ajax and the “new internet” I feel kinda silly these days.
It feels as if a group of openSource developers and some Microsoft officials (plus some sponsors, of course) had accidentially agreed on something common and all of a sudden hell broke loose.
This is not “hyping” or “bloating” anymore, this is induced mass hysteria!
It will be better, nicer, prettier, easier, fuller, more colorful, more useful, more.. more more more… *bangs his head against the wall in happiness* – Reminds me of early Microsoft advertisement campains – Steve Ballmer shouting “WINDOWS! WINDOWS! WINDOWS!” like a madman.
I just hope it will happen fast and that the “old and non-pretty internet” that will remain will become the silent and intelligent place again that I got to know 12 years ago when I got my first modem :D
long range wireless lan
Sometimes when I find the time, I play with wireless lan components, trying to find out how to enhance the reach of my wireless network using self-made antennas, professional antennas,
tweaking wlan-cards or modifying a router (link) to get a couple of meters more out of the network or to be able to transmit from the basement go the attic.
Using 2 modified Linksys-Routers and 2 of the cAntennas, I was able to get a wireless link over more than 1km.
But the guys at Defcon seriously overdid it this time, breaking their own world record from last year, where they achieved a 55 mile wireless link.
More than 200 km of wireless connection without amplification!
The final result was a full 11 Mbps data transfer rate over a distance of 125 miles, a new world record for an unamplified wireless networking connection.
I just love extreme technology :D
See the details at wifi-shootout and for details go to the blog of the team at http://pasadena.net/shootout05/