Methanoid's Technoid Blogoid

Android Tablets

2011-12-06T22:11:00.003Z

I have investigated Android tablets, even though I have an iPad. Why? Well iOS generally doesn’t allow emulators so no Amiga games on your iPad. Android does allow emulation so I can run UAE4Droid or Gameboid and play those classic games I want to. And Android tablets are generally cheaper too. Plus Plex works on Android.

So I looked at the Kindle Fire – a friend went to the states but couldn’t get me one. I also looked at the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet (slightly better spec than Kindle Fire) but the boot loader on that is secured and it isn’t looking like being busted open soon. So less hack possibilities.

Recently I looked at some of the Chinese iPad lookalikes. This one is the favourite so far. Powered by a Rockchip (Chinese clone ARM chip) and offering an 8” capacitive screen (avoid resistive ones!) it has an 800x600 4:3 ratio screen. Ideal for UAE4Droid. I may buy one!

Hackintoshing

2011-12-06T22:10:00.001Z

Recently I splurged a little and upgraded by main PC that has server duties. I didn’t really need to as it ran an i5-760 at 4ghz but those Sandy Bridge CPUs tempted me and I found some well priced components. I now have a Gigabyte Z68XP-UD3 (rev1, BIOS F6) with a Core i7-2600K (4 cores plus hyperthreading) running at 4ghz (until I experiment with proper overclocking).

One of the reasons for these choices were to Hackintosh again. I have an iMac (which is lovely) but remain tempted by a little hack. Tonymacx86.com has some good guides and Gigabyte mobos are well supported, with Intel HD3000 graphics supposedly compatible.

Well not for me! I installed Lion using Unibeast USB stick, upgraded to 10.7.2 and used Multibeast to install the kexts and bootloader. But it likes to hang on boot up. This may be related to my hardware (I have additional HDD controllers) but right now I don’t have it working L

Plex

2011-12-05T08:07:00.001Z

Plex was originally a fork from the XBMC project and for MacOS only but it soon covered all major systems and now as well as iOS, Plex supports Android (which XBMC doesn’t). Plex is easy to set up but I am not now using it. My reasons? The ATV2 client for Plex is a bit too buggy and crashes too often for my liking. The PC server software is very slow and loves to scrape for its own thumbnails etc when Sickbeard has already done that. It also crashed plenty of times when importing my (large) library of films and TV shows. However, the Android client was stable and worked well. I may come back to Plex in future. You can also get Plex on GoogleTV boxes and on some TVs (LG and Samsung Smart TVs).

XBMC

2011-12-01T13:18:00.007Z

I am a fan of this HTPC software, as it runs on many platforms such as Linux, Windows, Mac and fairly recently they added iOS so you can run it on your iPad or v2 Apple TV (ATV2). Installing it is quite easy but requires a jailbroken iPad or ATV2 so if you don’t like that idea, stop reading before you upset yourself!

Why run XBMC? Well it is a good interface, highly customisable and integrates well with other apps. For example you can use Sickbeard to download TV shows and automatically add them to your XBMC library. Everything automatic.

But one requirement we have is to watch TV upstairs and downstairs so having a central library which records which shows you have watched and where you are in playback is a big help. Normally XBMC installations have their own libraries but a shared library is possible. I have my two ATV2s and my iPad all operating on the same shared library. Heaven! Some helpful guidance can be found here

With ATV2 XBMC there are further complications and differences from the standard shared library. Primarily you need to allow XBMC to generate the database and ideally you want your thumbnails stored on server too. A key performance tweak is to edit your MySQL INI file to disable name resolving (without this the system is unusable). There is also another major performance hack called Dirty Regions but I haven’t yet felt the need to try that. Sounds a bit dodgy doesn’t it? ;-)

Not Dead

2011-09-05T21:34:00.002+01:00

Just a quick post to say I have not yet passed away and intend to post something Techie shortly!

10 Greatest Songs - #1

2011-05-12T12:49:00.000+01:00

Ooops I forgot to complete the list with #1. Anyone who knows me will know what #1 is....

Abba - S.O.S.

Why Abba? Come on, surely they are so dated? Nope, if you honestly look at Abba's back catalogue you'd see that Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson wrote some of the best pop music ever. It's catchy as hell. Everyone knows it can sing along (badly in my case, so normally inside my head!) and how many people loved the movie (and show) Mamma Mia? It's not just the boys work though, the girls sing so well together and they actually pronounce the English properly. I'm fed up with slurred English or Ghetto English from American "artists".

Why SOS? Well it's just such a catchy melody underneath the vocals. It resonates. It's just a great piece of music.

So, go BUY it (yes, BUY or LEGALLY download it).

PS: I fancy Frida (the dark haired one)... cos I don't follow the crowd!!

Updates - check out the Replay board

2011-05-12T11:56:00.000+01:00

Well overdue as usual

1) The server I built was tried and cancelled. It worked fine but seemed a bit pointless. After all you have to weigh the costs of the server against electricity costs. In this case it made sense NOT to spend money but to put my other box on as a server. And would you believe it? My Core i5-760 system with 6 hard disks idles around 50-55w. Not bad at all. So far I have resisted temptation to have a Sandy Bridge system and am waiting for the next generation processors, Ivy Bridge.

2) Amithlon, AROS etc. I saw a bargain board (a D945GCLF2 again!) and couldn't resist. So adding a cheap 2Gb DIMM and a case I have the bones for another system. I know its AROS compatible as well as Mac OSX, Windows and Linux but I remember it booted Amithlon and it seems the new kernel4 for Amithlon has drivers that support the onboard sound and network. Expect an update eventually

3) FPGA Replay board. I am very keen to get one of these as its in effect a mini Amiga but running many times faster and it can be reconfigured to be many different classic machines. C64 or Atari ST for example (in time). I'll post when I have one!

Somewhat overdue ?

2011-02-15T11:38:00.002Z

I tried a new server recently, as I really wanted my files on a server with plenty of capacity and able to run web services etc. The HP Proliant Microserver was what I tried. But the AMD 1.3ghz chip was god for power consumption but just too slow for my use. So I'm building an alternative!

I've sourced the following:

E5200 (2.5GHz S775 Core2Duo in effect)
4Gb DDR3 (I bought for Microserver)
Asus G41 mATX motherboard with USB3 & HDMI (nice, onboard VGA needed to be mATX but can take some cards)
Marvell SATA card PCIEx1 (3 SATA RAID and 1 IDE as the mobo only has 4 SATA)
Coolermaster RC334 case (full ATX, got one already and its got tons of 3.5 bays plus four 5.25 bays)
Powercool 450w 80Plus PSU (cheap but 80+ rated)

Server should run SABnzbd, Sickbeard, Couchpotato & uTorrent for all downloading needs. Also should be fine for webserver needs for my son, running Digiguide & Growl (for notifying other machines). Might even get it running my old /X BBS under emulation or perhaps PCExpress under DOS and a little bit of usenet posting. It will also need to run MySQL for my XBMC shared database.

It won't be Linkstation levels of power consumption but what Linkstation has a 12Tb capacity or more? Plus I intend to automate a few of my mundane PC tasks.

Top 10 #2

2010-09-06T09:35:00.003+01:00

The Jam - That's Entertainment

Well, in total contrast to #3, here is #2 and in keeping with being
fair, after a punk rock anthem, here's one from the Mod revival of the
80s and from the Modfather of British Pop, Paul Weller.

The Jam were Weller's first band and like The Clash were very energetic
and Weller's lyrics were rather political, something which didn't always
endear him to the record buying public. That's Entertainment is an
acoustic gem. Still with energy in the playing but different from what
was around at the time. I still find it grabs me and I have to sit and
listen when I hear it. Surely a sign of a great song.

Check it out here

10 Greatest Songs - #3

2010-09-04T21:43:00.001+01:00

The Clash - I Fought the Law

I've liked the Clash since the 70s. My sister (I think) had the London
Calling album and I loved the variety of stuff they did along with the
raw energy of their punk rock sound. It wasn't until a few years ago
that I saw a video of the another cover of this song from the 60s. I had
no idea it was a cover and always assumed it was 100% Clash but it's
not, it's by Sonny Curtis and the Crickets (post Buddy Holly death).
Anyway, The Clash's version is just exploding with aggression and energy
and I love it. You should too!

Check it out here

10 Greatest Songs - #4

2010-08-31T09:54:00.002+01:00

Guns n Roses - Sweet Child O' Mine

Do I really need to explain this one?

Naaah, thought not.

Here and Here

But you might also (for fun) enjoy this cover

10 Greatest Songs - #5

2010-08-27T21:13:00.002+01:00

The Police - Roxanne

I seem to recall my mother (who worked at a Job Centre) telling me that
she'd asked a client if he had a police record (as the job vacancy
needed to know) and was told he had Regatta De Blanc. I also recall many
comedians in the early 80s doing their versions of that joke but I also
remember how exciting The Police were at that time. They were something
new and had their own style - the bleached blonde hair. Roxanne was the
first big hit they had and was unusual for chart sounds at the time in
that it changed in tempo several times in the record. The song is the
story of a prostitute and her boyfriend who wants her to quit. Many of
The Police's songs had stories to tell (but did "De Do Do Do De Da Da
Da"? Probably not.

Watch and listen here.

Only four more to go... and you might be surprised ;)

The Return of the King?

2010-08-12T13:48:00.001+01:00

Aha, a nifty LOTR reference. My attempts to pension off the Linkstation just keep failing.

My "low power server" isn't as low power as I'd like (cos the Linkstation has spoiled me with 10W or so) so I keep coming back to the LS. I've worked out a way to use the Linkstation to send Growl notifications from Digiguide (as reminders of TV shows) and from NZBget when items have been downloaded. So that's another job a PC could do that the LS can now do.

I even looked into some media streamers to replace my Ion boxes. They can do NAS-like things but none have the CPU power of the LS so again its the triumph of the LS's energy efficiency.

I'll report on Linkstation Growling in due course.

(Low) Power to the People !!!!

10 Greatest Songs - #6

2010-08-12T13:45:00.001+01:00

David Bowie - Heroes

I'm not quite sure why this record does the job but it just does. The music is rather background to the lyrics but is still very important. It's also a very uplifting record with lyrics like "We can be heroes, just for one day". I like a lot of Bowie's stuff in the 70s but this is probably my favourite.

Give it a twirl here at YouTube

10 Greatest Songs - #7

2010-08-10T15:22:00.003+01:00

Blondie - Maria

Blondie have always been a favourite of mine since my youth (!) and of course like all red-blooded males I thought that Debbie Harry was hot. We all grow up (sorta) and obviously Debbie is rather older too but this comeback record was brilliant. Her voice has mellowed with age but the band still have that great pop sound and it's still unmistakably Blondie.

Listen and watch here

Linkstation Pensioned Off?

2010-07-26T13:16:00.002+01:00

Finally retired? Well maybe not. I've found a few tasks that the faithful Linkstation cannot do and for which I need a Windows box. So let's look at the box I have chosen to build.

Case - Chyang-Fun

This is a nice mini-ITX case which, unlike the Chenbro ITX server case,
isn't hugely expensive. I got mine at Linitx.com which is a very
well run ITX specialist shop where you can get good advice too. The case
has space for four 3.5" hard disks in hot swap bays plus a single 2.5"
laptop drive (boot drive or in my case a 500gb drive for the always on
parts of the system). Finally the case allows a full height PCI card.

Mobo - Gigabyte D510UD

This is fairly standard D510 (dual core Atom) with NM10 chipset. This is
Intel's current energy efficient setup. The difference on this Gigabyte
board is that it has an additional onboard controller for 2 extra SATA
and one IDE ports. This gives a total of 4 SATA ports and one IDE (for 2
devices) and supports AHCI and hot plug. The board also supports
overclocking (and undervolting) depending on your preferences but an
Atom isn't really about performance is it? I'm plugging an IDE to SATA
adapter into the IDE port to give me a 5th SATA port for the boot drive.
The single PCI slot will be occupied by a Pinnacle dual DVB-T card and
the Ram slots with 2x1Gb of DDR2

Setup

My 500gb laptop drive partitions to 65Gb for OS and 400Gb for Data. The
data partition can keep all the "always on" data accessible on the
lowest power consumption drive and allow the main larger capacity 3.5"
drives to spin down when idle and save power. So, web server, torrents,
downloads, documents, pictures and music can be fitted on this drive.

The additional drive bays will initially have a pair of 2Tb drives in
(with 2 more to come) and could use RAID. However, RAID will mean that
all drives spin up when any file is requested off them. As the files on
these drives are all video (and replaceable) I am inclined to not do
RAID and use Windows 7's libraries to amalgamate the files into a single
video library. Any non-video data on these drives can be backed up to a
2nd physical drive and then drives can be allowed to sleep, minimizing
power consumption, when not needed.

To cover the tasks that the Linkstation can do it will have

Windows 7
WAMP server (for web serving and re-directs for other web servers)
uTorrent (bittorent client with own web interface)
SABnzbd (usenet download client with own web interface)
Sickbeard (media manager which can identify shows you follow and auto
download them)
DVB Web Scheduler (low resource TV recording s/w)
Digiguide (the TV guide service with its own web server)
Growl for Windows (to enable alerts to be sent to other PCs, iPhone,
iPad)
DNLA server (probably Twonky, perhaps Mediatomb, to enable Xbox360 to
read files but might not be needed)
Printer - it will share my USB printer across all the network

The Moth Goes to the Flame Again

2010-03-09T12:55:00.003Z

Yup, it had to happen. After buying and selling and buying and selling and.. well you get the idea... I've been through a fair few Linkstations and I had a review copy of the Linkstation Pro XHL.

Well I couldn't resist or find a better more economical solution so I bought a Linkstation Pro XHL without HDD which will be fitted with 1.5Tb drive and flashed to open firmware and have many goodies added to it.

Can't wait for delivery. Watch this space Linkstation fans! :D

10 Greatest Songs - #8

2010-03-09T12:45:00.003Z

Roxette - It Must Have Been Love

Funnily enough I worked for Barclays Bank some years ago (okay.... many years ago) and I recall one of the managers talking about how one of our account holders had recorded a single. Honestly can't remember if we held the account of Roxette or of the studio but the single was "The Look" from the album "Look Sharp". Ever since hearing that I've found I enjoyed the simple pop that Roxette record. Great vocals from Marie Fredriksson and Per Gessle too.

This particular track, apart form tugging at heartstrings and emotions (which not many records can truly do), was also on the sound track from the hit film Pretty Woman with Richard Gere and Julia Roberts. So many people have heard it there and many have seen the video on MTV.

Well worth a listen, as it the compilation of singles, "Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus".

Wikipedia

YouTube

Amazon preview & buy

10 Greatest Songs - #9

2010-02-26T11:04:00.003Z

Meatloaf - Paradise by the Dashboard Light

Whilst most people will agree that Meatloaf was incredibly successful, a large number of opponents criticise the songs he sang as bland and basic and not radical enough. I don't agree. Meatloaf was the performer that made Jim Steinman's work sound best. For those who don't know, Jim Steinman was the man behind Meatloaf's Bat Out of Hell album, one of the most
successful albums of all time. The two fell out and Jim recorded the follow up himself.

Bad For Good was a great album but not the same. Jim's vocals are not Meatloaf's and the chance to have the same success again was missed. But Bat Out of Hell has its own legacy and history. If you've not heard it then you've neglected your musical education.

So why Paradise by the Dashboard light? Well it's music that makes me smile inside. The imagery of the 17 year olds desperate to "do it" is compelling. I could almost imagine this music being sung live.

Music at Amazon

Video at YouTube

10 Greatest Songs - #10

2010-02-12T21:08:00.004Z

Hawkwind - Uncle Sam's on Mars

OK. This one will probably have 99% of people thinking "WTF" but bear with me. Hawkwind are a very long standing band starting in 1969 and still playing. Known as the band that started a genre of their own, called Space Rock, Hawkwind have never been a chart topping band (well apart from the single Silver Machine in 1972) but are often cited as an influence on other bands. Some small notoriety came when the follow-up single to their #2 single (Silver Machine) was banned by the BBC. The record, Urban Guerilla, was accused of romanticising terrorism, many years before terrorism became the problem it is today.

So, why Uncle Sam's on Mars? Well, while I could say there are many good Hawkwind tracks this has a number of ingredients that make it a worthy entry into my chart.

Firstly, Bob Calvert. Bob Calvert was a poet, singer and visionary. He is creditted with masterminding the Space Ritual experience that Hawkwind brought to stage in 1972. Calvert was a little left field in his views and struggled with mental problems all his adult life. He left Hawkwind and rejoined and eventually was kicked out when the other members found they could no longer cope with his mental aberrations. That's not to say he was bonkers but he is reported to have tried to kill bandmates. But Calvert was a real talent, a wordsmith and a performer. His solo album Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters was themed about the failings of the infamous Widowmaker plane, the Lockheed Starfighter and was very different from the mundane offerings around the time of its release. For me, the Calvert years of Hawkwind, and the partnership with Dave Brock, made of the best albums, like PXR5 and Quark Strangeness and Charm.

Secondly, the vision. This record is a biting criticism of the US spend on the space program but at the same time talks of optimism for the future ("America has left the Moon"). Look at the lyrics where they talk of pollution, global warming, consumerism gone rampant and about US expansionism ("looking for life to stamp out"). This was all ahead of it's time. How many people talked of global warming 30 years ago?

Oh and here's a YouTube video some Hawkfan has put together

Lyrics here

Link to Music via Amazon

Link to Hawkwind.com

10 Greatest Songs Ever

2010-02-12T21:06:00.000Z

Of course... they have to be... and I am choosing so Tough Titties if you don't agree with me... if you don't feel free to argue away!!!

This is my Top 10... and I'll explain each choice.... Probably they'll all come from MP3 tracks on my iPhone but who cares...

First one in a mo....

Shiny

2010-01-05T10:49:00.005Z

OK a prize to the person who gets the "Shiny" reference ;)

I tried Chrome yesterday for the first time. Well not for the first time but I found I could use Chrome for the first time. And it's GOOD.

I have long been a Firefox fan. The customisations offered by Firefox addons are a god send and enable you to do so much more. Internet Explorer is a dinosaur and always playing catch up. Tabbed browsing for example was in Firefox (and Opera) well before IE got it. I hate to see my workplace is still stuck on IE6 (and have recently blocked my
previous "mods" to enable Firefox to be used!!).

For me the critical Firefox addons that made me never want to use any other browser were:

Adblock, Flashblock, XMarks, Download Statusbar, NZBdstatus, Pleasuredome Ratio addon, Greasemonkey scripts

Anyway, recently I saw a Chrome Portable install and thought to revisit Chrome again. I Googled to see what extensions I could use and found a few that looked promising. Only bad thing was that it seems they don't
like to work on the Portable Chrome so I installed Chrome alongside Firefox.

The extensions for Chrome I chose were:

Adblock, eBay, Firebug Lite, GoogleMail checker, IE Classic, RSS Extension, SABconnect, uTorrent

Now I can do almost all I could with Firefox and more, with that slick and quick operation that Chrome has. Bookmarks synchronised automatically.

Downsides? There always are. Some insignificant (like having no extension to monitor my Pleasuredome ratio) and some significant like in the bookmark department. Google Chrome Bookmarks are not the same as Google Bookmarks. This is strange and a mistake IMHO. It's great to auto sync bookmarks but those synced bookmarks cannot be read via the web. Surely some mistake? It would have been so helpful to have been able to
read my home bookmarks at my workplace during those lunchtime browses!

Oooooooops - AROS

2010-01-04T18:14:00.002Z

It's been FAR too long since I've posted..... Sorry!

I've long been interested in the Commodore Amiga and in emulating it.
WinUAE does a great job on Windows machines in emulating an Amiga and
I've tinkered before with Amithlon, which is a Linux kernel that takes
over the machine and basically turns it into an x86 Amiga. Well, there
are other options I've not explored before and the one today is AROS.

AROS is a recursive acronym - it stands for AROS Research Operating
System - a bit like MINT on the Atari ST ("Mint is not TOS"). It's a new
implementation of an Amiga OS and runs on x86 CPUs. It's not an
emulator. It's been around for some years but recently seems to have got
to a very usable state and runs on a large amount of PC hardware. I did
however discover that it didnt like to work on very large HDDs. I only
have 1.5Tb drives and that's too big. Luckily there is a "Nightly" build
of AROS that now can cope with larger HDDs.

I have a motherboard that I think is ideal for this purpose, as well as
for Amithlon, OSX (Mac) and Ubuntu (Linux). Hopefully I'll be quintuple
booting shortly. I've also been on a pre-Xmas splurge to get some
different kit - now I have two mATX boards and one ATX board suitable
for all the above OS. For the record, Gigabyte GA-EP31-DS3L (ATX),
Gigabyte GA-G31M-ES2L (rev1, mATX), MSI G31M-F (1600FSB rev, mATX). The
key things to look for are Realtek gigabit ethernet (RTL8111B/C ideally)
and Realtek audio (ALC662 or ALC888 for example) plus Intel ICH7 (found
in 945GC, P31/G31 and G41 chipsets). I went for the G31 as it overclocks
much better than the G41, according to reports.

Anyway, as a taster for Icaros, have a look at these YouTube videos from
ClusterUK who sells the iMica systems which are designed for Icaros.

Vid1 Vid2

More Musing

2009-06-30T13:58:00.003+01:00

I'm bored waiting for my friend to go and return from the States with my latest toy. I'm getting the new Linkstation LS Pro XHL - it's basically a LS Live v3 (Bittorrent model) with a faster CPU (1.2Ghz Kirkwood ARM processor) so should be ideal for usenet downloads and bittorrent. I already posted how to bootstrap this box on NAS-Central forums so I can add IPKG and Optware. Now some waiting!!

Also built a mini ITX rig. Based on Intel's D945GCLF2 mobo - that has an Atom 330 (dual 1.6Ghz). It's also a good board for Amithlon and for Hackintosh and XP and Linux. Yeah, all done already. Looking at a new ITX rig though so this one will be sold.

Oh and my son has taken my MSI Wind clone off my hands, so all mobile browsing is iPhone only.

I therefore NEED some more toys!

Torrentzip

2009-04-20T12:31:00.003+01:00

I was browsing for sources to find a few files to complete my TOSEC collections of Amiga stuff and came across Torrentzip. It’s all rather clever really. Basically run your collection through CLR Mame Pro’s renaming function to make sure you’re named the same way as the source torrent’s files and then drag the whole folder of files that you want to complete onto Torrentzip. It then zips the files in the same way as the source torrent and when you join the torrent to download it can work out what files you already have and only downloads the missing ones. Simple but so clever. Only took me a few Mb on a 6Gb torrent to complete my sets.

I see no reason why this would not work with the Linkstation torrent client. However I am waiting for my LS-Pro-XHL before I can test this. I should be posting a review here (or somewhere else depending on how things go) a few weeks before the XHL goes on sale in Europe.

Fingers crossed ;)

Eco-Warrior

2009-02-24T10:52:00.003Z

Flashed my "new" eBay Linkstation with Stevie's firmware as it arrived in EM mode (nice!). Noticed on my Kill-a-Watt that it read 12W which is actually a couple of watts less than the previous LS Live's I've used. Only difference is Stevie's firmware (should make no difference) and that this is a LS Live v2. Not unhappy.

Anyway, in quest for more efficiency I popped the HD out (different guide for this as the layout is different) and popped in a 160gb SATA 2.5" laptop drive I had lying around.

Result? 8W when drive in use... that's fricking awesome... Just now moving 500gb of data off my Eeebox to the 500gb SATA the LS came with, then pop the 500gb drive from the Eee (2.5" of course) and have to copy 500gb over again. Still, it will be a nicer quieter and more economical Linkstation.

Then onto the customisations, Optware, NZBget etc.

Lord of the Boxes - The Fellowship of the Linkstation

2009-02-23T09:13:00.003Z

I struggled for a title for this entry which is also rather overdue - I hadn't done any entry this year!!

Should it be Star Wars or Lord of the Rings themed? Blog Wars or Lord of the Boxes? Return of the Linkstation, The Linkstation Strikes Back, A New Linkstation or The Fellowship of the Linkstation, The Two Boxes, Return of the Linkstation. Ah, who cares.

I have a new Linkstation (again) - this must be my fourth Linkstation Live. They are so hackable. I wanted to try the new firmware produced by "StevieWonder". I'm still very pleased with my Eee Box but that can be put to more general PC duties and the Linkstation can return to the server and download duties. I expect the box tomorrow and will be swapping the HD for my 500gb notebook drive (which will be silent and lower power consumption). I'll pop it on the Kill-A-Watt and report the change in usage when done. Then the Stevie Wonder firmware plus NZBget.

Oh and I should be re-visiting Amithlon, OSX and Linux on a Quad Boot machine. That will be fun!

The wife never even noticed it....

2008-12-21T19:46:00.002Z

OK, another new toy.

I have spent many months looking for a reason to buy the Asus EeeBox as it fits my key green criteria - low power consumption. However, the problem has always been justifying the purchase in my mind.

"I need a box to download" - "Damn, that Linkstation does it all"

"NZB, Bittorrent?" - Yup, Linkstation

"I need a box as a central server" - "Yes, Linkstation again"

"I need something that can serve a PS3 or 360" - "yawn, Linkstation"

"I need a web server" - "... need you ask?"

"I need to emulate an Amiga so that I can host my old BBS via telnet" - "aha, that'll do. I need an EeeBox".

So I bought an EeeBox. Plus a 500gb notebook drive a few days later. I was impressed with the EeeBox when it arrived. The packaging is very efficient, like Apple, in not wasting space. It comes with a mouse (small notebook style and not even unpacked as it is too small for my big hands!) and a keyboard (nice Alu keyboard, looks great but has a laptop Function key and the layout doesn't suit me so packed away). The EeeBox is very small and using laptop components and the more efficient 945GSE chipset rather than the power hungry 945GC that the Atom desktop boards use it consumes 20W in total with hard disk. I replaced the hard disk with a bigger 500gb drive and installed XP Pro, using nLite to strip the bloat away and a custom unattended install disk to pre-configure the box the way I want it.

I have installed SABnzbd (usenet downloader, not as efficient as NZBget on Linkstation but still great), uTorrent (for Bittorrent downloads), Twonky media server (same as on Linkstation) and Apache (for web server and some reverse proxy usage) so far. WinUAE to come shortly plus a pile of UAE configuration for the BBS.

It works, it's quiet (it's silent!!), it's efficient (17W) and as it is on 24/7 if I need a PC for browsing or quick usage it's actually easier to use this than to boot my normal desktops which sound so noisy in comparison. And that is a strange feeling as my uber-nerd friend who pops over often comments how quiet my machines are.

Mac Mini or Hackintosh?

2008-11-20T12:01:00.007Z

(Gigabyte GA-E7AUM-DS2H)

Rumours abound on the net about a possible update to the Mac Mini. The suggestions include using the same chipset as used in the updated Mac Book, the 9400M from Nvidia. This is by far the best integrated VGA on a motherboard so is worth getting excited about. It would be probably the final push towards me buying a Mac Mini.

But an alternative is out there lurking away, in the form of Hackintosh. A few mobos have been released using the desktop version of the same chipset (and they are faster) - example the Gigabyte GA-E7AUM-DS2H.

If this can be hacked for OSX then we could pop a quad core CPU in as well. Integrated VGA could always be updated later to something even faster if needed.

I'm torn in two. Three if you count the desire to get one of the new aluminium Mac Books. Apple are making such good looking hardware that I can see how they sell it at the premium they do.

An Apple a day....

2008-11-10T18:49:00.003Z

Having tinkered with Ubuntu and triple booting on the MSI Wind (Advent 4211) I came to the conclusion that it was easier just having one OS on the hard disk of the Wind (my main one) and others on USB sticks. I managed to install OSX onto an 8Gb USB2 stick I have. Write speeds are slower on USB sticks so it took over an hour to install. I booted it up successfully but it took about 3m 40s compared to 1m 30s odd for the hard disk. Not sure if that is anything to do with setting the Owners on the stick but it was enough to kill the idea for me. However, Ubuntu supports USB booting and I only want to use Ubuntu to try Aircrack-ng so I will try Ubuntu on USB later.

Anyway, when in OSX mood I decided to update my OSX install to 10.5.5. I got some advice from a friendly user on MSIWind.net's forums. The procedure is basically

Download the 10.5.5 update from Apple website (or use the Update facility in the OS - I prefer to download as I may do it on other machines
Download the Wind drivers
Download Kext Helper
Download the GMA950 Kexts (revised ones)
Apply update
Apply drivers
Apply GMA950 kext
Fix permissions

I had a problem with my keyboard being killed by the update. This was "fixed" by plugging in a USB Wireless keyboard I had (luckily) and then when the drivers had been applied the keyboard returned. A normal USB keyboard would have done just as well. I also experienced the weird 800x600 screen bug but after about 3 reboots that disappeared.

Now, finally, a 10.5.5 OSX. The current WindOSx86 disk install method is due to be replaced by a method that involves using a proper retail (untouched, unhacked) OSX install DVD and a custom CD. This method is based on the Boot-132 process detailed on InsanelyMac.com and should result in a clean install that will take updates without breaking and needing many re-patches.

I've gone all Twonky!

2008-11-08T12:03:00.001Z

I have a small problem. Every time I want to find an excuse to buy some new kit I am thwarted. This time I had decided I could find a case for a new low power PC, the Asus Eee Box. I've been playing with streaming video to my Wii and Xbox 360 as I need a media player downstairs to be able to watch my Xvids. I suppose (I realise as I type this) I could persevere with using my slim PS2 but it was too flakey and difficult to set up. Anyway, I discovered a great program called TVersity which works with just about anything. But for the Wii it needs to transcode the Xvid into an FLV (Flash Video) file before streaming that as the Wii cannot play Xvid. This needs a PC. I experimented with this by installing TVersity on my MSI Wind clone (Atom 1.6ghz same as the Eee Box) and it just (and I mean just) coped with transcoding. I tried with my Xbox 360 and that doesn't need transcoding.

And that's when it hit me. If the 360 didn't need transcoding then maybe I didn't need a PC. It was then that I came across MediaTomb and the solution I plumped for, Twonky. Twonky isn't free but the demo lasts 30 days before you need to buy. Mediatomb is free. So I'll make a proper decision in 30 days.

But Twonky will run on my Linkstation - and use 13W in total. Oh bloody hell, yet again the Linkstation stops me buying some nice new kit. Again it saves me money. Damn that little box of tricks. It does everything!!

2008-10-29T08:40:00.002Z

I was playing with some systems I am selling and tried to install OSX on them. One system was my old Amithlon box which also happened to be suitable for OSX. This one took a ton of playing with settings and distros. Installing OSX is much harder on AMD based machines. There are different kernels to be used and there are drivers (known as kexts or "kernel extentions") to be installed for many parts of the system.

Anyway, just for anyone googling away here goes

Asus A8N-SLI SE motherboard with Athlon 3500+ and NVidia 7600GT graphics - I had to use Kalyway 10.5.2, with the 9.2 ToH kernel, Nvidia Titan kext, Nvidia SATA and Forcedeth (LAN) kexts, 1052 Kext Test 1. Everything works fine including sound, lan and graphics.

I also installed my Shuttle K45 KPC, again Kalyway 10.5.2 worked best, with default options pretty much (from memory). I tried iAtkos 4i but I think it wasn't so smooth. I got everything again 100% working.

My MSI Wind (Advent 4211) works fine with MSIwindOSx86 distro - I think I have detailed that before. Recently I upgraded the Ram and the WiFi card to a Dell 1490 as that is fully OSX compatible.

Next is to try my main machines (Intel P35 based mobos) - they should be a doddle compared to the other machines. I may try a new procedure based on Boot-132 which boots a retail Apple Leopard install DVD.

Here's THE site for all this sort of thing - OSx86 Project

Bittorrent Power

2008-10-21T10:14:00.003+01:00

More Linkstation hacking. Buffalo have released a new Linkstation Live With Bittorrent and Bittorrent (henceforth known as BT) is the one thing I cannot get reliably running on my Linkstation. Many users have reported it working on fully hacked firmwares but others with stock firmware like mine (or open stock versions) have recurring "segmentation" faults and BT barfing like mad.

Anyway, a bit of hacking with the firmware from the new Linkstation means that you can extract the Bittorrent binaries and web interface from the new Linkstation and put it on the older models.

I can report it is totally stable, reliable and fast (as well as a pretty web interface). The only thing I could add to the mix - well maybe MLDonkey which does BT, HTTP, FTP and ED2K downloads all in one package. Might try that soon.

Back to Linkstations

2008-09-25T08:40:00.001+01:00

I've played for some time with various machines such as the Zonbu (the low cost Linux box), Linkstation (a Linux NAS), Shuttle KPC (a full PC) and with a HTPC (homebuilt based on AMD's 780G chipset). All the while I have been looking for a low cost, low running cost machine to act as a download box and a central server. The Linkstation came close but not quite the whole way there.

Latest purchase is a 2nd Linkstation. I'm going to store Music, Documents and Pictures on a 250gb Linkstation and Video and Download role to be homed on the 1tb Linkstation I already have. The total consumption of two Linkstations being on 24/7 is 26W, still well below almost all PCs (even those new Atom systems) and with two 3.5" SATA hard disks.

Now here are the clever bits.

When "She Who Must Be Obeyed" is using a PC and working on editting photos as she does, she has almost exclusive use of that LS. The other LS might be downloading away and even unarchiving but that won't slow her down. Good thing too!

Overnight, the two Linkstations talk to each other and backup the key files. All the Music, Docs and Pics are echoed to the 1tb LS and the important files (not the huge chunk of video) are backed up in the other direction. So I have data security too. That is something that doesn't need to involve the PCs I normally use for the job and will be all automatic.

One final green twist? I needed a new Gigabit switch as I hadn't enough ports on the router. I bought a DLink one (same dimension as my router which is also DLink) but this one is the new "green" one that powers down the bits not being used. I can leave my two Linkstations plugged into the router (as they will be on and active all the time) and my less active devices can be on the switch which will save a few microwatts of power as they are not on 24/7.

Hackintosh

2008-09-19T09:38:00.001+01:00

My Wind dual boots now into Mac OSX and into Windows XP.

The easy way to do this is to download from your friendly Torrent site a file called WindOSX86.iso and burn it to a DVD. My experience of this wasn't very smooth - I burned the disk 3 times, first at 16x, then 4x and finally to a re-writable disk at 1x (so if it barfed I hadn't wasted another disk). Boot the Wind from an external USB DVD drive and install. The only thing to note was the need to uncheck "Kernel" from one of the install options but otherwise all very easy. Wireless doesn't work as the card that the Wind has as standard isn't compatible but a cheap Dell 1490 card can be bought from eBay and installed at the same time as upgrading the memory. I have the memory sitting waiting for my wireless card now.

Given the difficulty in getting a reliable burn on the install DVD I found a procedure whereby you can transfer your install DVD to a USB stick so since I had a spare 8gb stick I now have my installer on that, plus images of additional Mac software I can install. I have my hard disk split into 15gb for Windows, 15gb for OSX and 45gb for shared data, accessible by both operating systems.

My recommended Mac software for starters

MS Office 2008 (or Open Office which is free!)
Paragon NTFS (which enables read and write to NTFS drives like Windows uses - OSX only reads but won't write without this extra software)
XSlimmer (this removes all non-Intel code from Mac installs - OSX runs on both PPC and Intel processors and there is no point in storing PPC code that will never be run)
Firefox (I love Firefox because it is so configurable - AdBlock, FlashBlock and Foxmarks - via Addons)

If you have a Wind then why not try a bit of hacking yourself. The forums at MSIWind.net are a good source of info, not just about this hack but all sorts of interesting info

http://forums.msiwind.net/mac/

I've got Wind!

2008-09-12T17:25:00.003+01:00

No, not more farting problems!

My eldest sprog just produced some superb GCSE results (10 grade A* and 2 grade A) and my parents rewarded her (like her cousin) with a laptop. I knew what she wanted to use it for (MSN, Facebook, some basic internet browsing and typing documents) and where (school or home) so I suggested to her a netbook would be ideal as it was portable unlike most laptops and not a device that gives away its presence by the carrying of a large laptop bag or a hunched shoulder.

She was having none of it having seen my older Eee and deciding it was too small. She wanted a 15" Dell. I kept silent. Anyway, I took her to see some laptops in the shops and it soon became apparent I was right. Comments like "feel the weight of that" and "isn't it thick" were mentioned regularly! When I showed her the 10" netbook I had in mind she was sold. So we got one on behalf of grandparents.

Apart from a mysterious fault that seemed to indicate a cracked screen (cause unknown) she's been very happy, so much that she hasn't managed to abide by the rules over usage or abusage!! I had to return the faulty one and when getting the replacement my beloved offered me one as an early Xmas present, so I got one too. The make/model is the Advent 4211 (a re-badged version of MSI's Wind netbook). The keyboard and screen sizes are ideal. Small but usable. Only criticism is the persistence with a 3 cell battery which means 2 hours of use when a 6 cell would give a more useful 4 hours. Still, it can be changed later if needed.

First off, remove the PC World "Tech Guys" partition for backup uses and remove their Windows XP Home edition. Replace with a customised nLited (that means no bloaty Windows here) XP SP3 installation. Runs much smoother now. As I built an unattended install DVD I could come back to complete, customised, fully installed machines with Firefox and all my favourite applications pre-installed.

Next is trying Mac OSX. The netbook is ideal for this but I need two small upgrades first - more memory and a new wireless card. More on that later!

Another Boytoy

2008-08-07T09:37:00.001+01:00

I've bought a new low power PC. This one is the el cheapo Shuttle, the KPC K45 where KPC stands for Korporate PC. What a crapola name. Hopefully when I assemble it all it won't be as bad as the name. I should be chucking some spare kit and some bits from other systems into this to make it a "low power" PC for basic server duties. Spec should be Pentium Dual Core E2180 (2ghz but hopefully either BSEL-modded or overclocked to 2.66ghz since it runs at 3ghz at default volts), 2Gb Ram, 2 Samsung terabyte SATA drives and a dual DVB-T Freeview tuner. If it runs quietly and without consuming too much power I will pension off my Linkstation and use this as my web server, download box, PVR, Rom-box and heaviest use PC whilst my more powerful other PCs can be used for games and internet use but not running 24/7. I've considered an Atom based machine but they are rather slow and if unarchiving an 8gb download may take quite a while and slow down for other uses. At least the E2180 is a Core2Duo in disguise and will easily cope with all the tasks. One other thing - this box is ideal as an OSX Hackintosh so I may try dual booting XP and OSX.

I also got myself an Xbox 360 a week or two ago, selling the PS3 I had. Why you ask? Well there are more games for the 360, its cheaper too and I don't need Bluray on my 720P HDTV yet. Maybe the next TV I buy will be 1080P and by that time I'll have need for decent HD sources but not yet. Anyway, the HDMI port I have will do fine for the Xbox Elite which has an HDMI connection too.

iPhone3G - what a fiasco!

2008-07-16T17:34:00.002+01:00

I finally got interested in Apple's iPhone when a work colleague showed me his and let me have a 60 second play on it before it went safely back in its "sock". I was impressed with the ease of use and slick interface as well as the size, weight and the internet integration. I was convinced enought to buy one when I saw the price drop and heard how you didn't actually need that O2 contract as you could buy it, take home and "jailbreak" it away from O2. Unfortunately it was about 2 days after the UK sold out of the original iPhone so I was forced to wait for the new 3G model.

Come 11th July I was ready. I normally get to work early so was due to wander past St James Park branch of Carphonewarehouse at 7:15 when they were opening at 8:02. When I arrived a single nerd (sorry, "creative-type-person") was there already. After pleasantries were exchanged ("This the iPhone queue?" "Yeah" "OK I'm #'2 then") we stood and waited. At 7:30 a CPW staffer arrived, opened the store to let herself in and gave us a scrap of paper with a number on it (highly secure). She also let slip that the stock was 5 iPhones, all 8gb models. I'd read on the CPW website that the sale should take around 20 minutes inc credit checks etc. However, after all systems crashed, and #1 was ordering a 16gb model (and I was unsure which)... at 10:40 I left with the first iPhone 3G sold at that store. What a mess. Of course this is what Apple wanted. No end of free publicity - like Nintendo with the world Wii shortage on launch. There were some fun moments while waiting, such as when I spotted on The Inquirer website that the 3G iPhone had already been jailbroken!!

Anyway, after arriving late for my first meeting of the day in my new job (impressive eh?) I didn't get a chance to unbox until I got home. At home I found no manual (talk about Apple arrogance - we don't need one) so had to find it on Apple web site. The manual says "remove the SIM cover using the special tool we provide".. nope, not in my box. No charger, no screen protector, no dock. Talk about cheapskate Apple for a premium phone. Got the SIM installed eventually and then had to deal with iTunes Store being down - so no registration and no use of iPhone until about 2 hours later.

Now, the sales experience and registration was a shambles. Quite frankly shameful.

The product is great, the web experience etc is really usable, friendly and easy to work out. The battery life somewhat disappointing - I think I need to work out how to tweak the options to maximise it. The worst thing? My MP3 collection is 13gb... the iPhone 8gb model only has 7gb or a little more but not 8gb free. I may be forced to get a 16gb model but none in stock. How can I exchange it when there are none to exchange it with? Might just have to live with it. Still, there are worse things.

I have to wonder though, have I sold my soul to the Apple Devil? Probably.. Do I care? Unlikely!

Atomic Musings

2008-06-20T09:55:00.002+01:00

Intel's Atom processor is currently the talk of the IT world but let's be honest here, it is not god's gift to the CPU world. It's low power but in many ways. Low power usage (great) but also low power in processing power terms (not so great). However, it's good for PCs that are designed for browsing the net and word processing type tasks, just don't expect to encode HD video on it!

Anyway, my interest is in low power consumption - for downloading and for browsing - for a PC to sit next to the lounge TV.

There are many Atom configurations being offered and they differ a lot in their "green credentials"

230 and 945GC/ICH7 $29+$20 (4W+25W) $49 29W TDP

N270 and 945GSE/ICH7-M $44+$36 (2.5W+5.5W) $80 8W TDP

Pity we don't have Poulbo (designation, US15W, a more efficient single chip "chipset" that includes HD decoding) in desktop form as it is very low power. There is also a planned dual core Atom (code 330 perhaps) due later this year. In the real world, Intel's mini-ITX motherboard, D945GCLF draws 24W-27W using an efficient DC-DC power supply, 1gb Ram and 2.5" HD, compared to Apple's Mac Mini (20W-54W) with a much more powerful 2.0ghz Core2Duo processor. For a green PC you'd have to be looking at the 945GSE/ICH7-M and N270 combo.

This happens to be the chipset Asus have in the Eee Box (the many times renamed Ebox) which is due in UK in July.

Moving to the Dark Side?

2008-06-18T12:29:00.003+01:00

I keep getting tempted by people in my office who are clearly Mac fanboys. I'm not tempted by them as people (oh no, I don't swing that way) but I am tempted by the Apple kit they keep harping on about.

iPhone 3G - I am sold on this and have registered for it on CPW and O2 websites for the July release. It looks to be my ideal handheld device.

Phone - I don't like to carry a phone (some of us don't wanna be in 24/7 contact with the world) but my significant other likes me to be in contact so I need a phone like most people.
Internet - I'm an internet junkie - there, I admit it. The iPhone's Safari mobile browser is the best I have seen. Watch anyone doing the pinch and release resizing a web page and you'll see how easy it is to use. With 3G on the new model the internet is there for you all day and night, even on the train!
Games - not perfect as a mobile gaming device but it has some games and there is a joypad hack being worked on by GBAx.com
Music - it's a iPod Touch for crying out loud. It plays music, well!
...and much more

iMac - well this is for another post... I need to work on the significant other to allow me to get one of these.

Mac Mini - HTPC in waiting. Some months away for me I think.

Media PC here we come

2008-05-07T08:55:00.001+01:00

Finally took the plunge and bought the kit to build a Home Theater PC, Media Center PC or whatever you want to call it. In my case, the prime mover was building a low power consumption PC that I could leave on 24/7 and not feel guilty about my CO2 production. I've bought different components to my earlier proposed machine, these with a view to keeping it green and quiet.

So, that's an AMD 780G chipset motherboard, AMD X2 4450e CPU and some Samsung 1Tb drives.

The 780G is a great chipset with the best integrated graphics you can currently get (by some margin). It's equivalent to a Radeon HD3450 onboard and will play games at 1024*768 (hopefully 1366*768 too since that's the resolution of my HDTV). The Gigabyte board is probably the best out there - it's the most feature filled and also overclocks both CPU and graphics if you want (I will want!).

The AMD X4 4450e is a low power usage processor - with a ceiling of 45W which is quite a bit lower than Intel's Core2Duo (65W) and Quad (95W). It also uses Cool n Quiet to downclock when not being used. The combination of chipset and processor is sufficient to play Blu-ray and HD-DVD (if I fit an optical drive!).

Samsung 1Tb drives are amongst the lowest power consumption drives as well as quick and quiet. Two terabytes should be plenty for now and with a gigabit ethernet connection to my other machines it should act as a decent server too.

Software? Based on XP with Service Pack 3, SABnzbd & Azureus (as uTorrent web interface didn’t work for me) for remote web-controllable downloads,and Media Portal for recording and playback (it's better than MS's MediaCenter and more expandable). I've got some TV capture cards sorted too so this will be a Freeview and Freesat PVR as well. Yummy!

I bought an Antec NSK1300 case but the PSU was faulty and in any case I found it too cramped with the hard disk fouling on the TV card. So, case is not yet sorted.

Graphics Cards

2008-04-18T07:34:00.002+01:00

It's easy to spend £200 on a graphics card for a PC these days but I would suggest it isn't smart or clever (especially if you are married!!). But what does the money get you? Well, you can play the latest games at the highest resolutions and have bragging rights over your mates but that's about it. How many of us have the large monitors that need the highest resolutions?

I'm keen to reduce my carbon footprint (or as some would say, keen to save money and reduce my electricity bill). What most people are not aware of is that there are large variations in power consumption amongst graphics cards (as well as microprocessors and amongst the consoles - I seem to recall mentioning the Wii's power consumption being about 1/8 or so of the Xbox360 and PS3).

Here is some irony. There are two players in the PC graphics market (the others are insignificant)) - Nvidia and ATI (now owned by AMD). Nvidia are known as the Green camp as their logos etc are all green and ATI as the Red camp (same reasoning). The irony? Well, ATI's cards use a lot less power when idle and when loaded than the Nvidia equivalents. ATI invested in some clever technologies - they call it PowerPlay - where the graphics card is effectively "underclocked" (the graphics processor runs a lot slower when it isn't needed to work hard) when you are browsing the net and only uses full power when you want to run the most demanding 2D or 3D games.

The benefits of a lower power consumption graphics card are clear - lower power bills and less heat (meaning less vigorous cooling fans and therefore less noise).

In two months time (or so) AMD/ATI are due to launch their next generation of graphics cards. They are more powerful but again lower power usage. I would have waited for these but there are some great deals to be had on the current cards now. I have now ordered two Radeon HD3850 cards (for both home PCs) for £69 each. This will triple the frame rates on games for us but not the noise levels. Win - win as they say!

PSP vs DS Lite

2008-04-14T21:14:00.001+01:00

I used to own a PSP (and to be honest am considering getting a PSP Slim and Lite - what a crap name!!) and my son owns a DS Lite. There is no doubt the DS outsells the PSP and I bet that surprised Sony. It surprised me at the initial launch as the PSP is a much more powerful handheld than the DS by a huge factor. PSP has better graphics, faster processor, more memory, TV output (with the Slim) and plays video and music. Surely it should have whupped the DS by now?

What does the DS have that made it win? In my opinion 3 things and it's not having two screens or being touch screen!!

Battery Life

PSP lasts about 3 hours but a DS lasts 50% longer. Although PSP is supposed to last 3 hours my experience was that it struggled to make that. Also the PSP battery loses charge all the time - come back to a PSP after 3 days and it is often flat. The DS is always there with charge. This helps make a convenient pick up and play device.

Portability

The DS is smaller and lighter. It's pick up and go and stuff into a pocket. You need generous pockets to stuff a PSP into!

Games

PSP games are PS2 titles (or comparable). They are great but they are not really the thing for a 5 minute game. DS games are all about fun and very innovative. Have a look at Trauma Center or Nintendogs or Brain Training. Sure, the PSP has some great games and even has Grand Theft Auto but the DS has the fun factor.

So, there you have it.. why I think the DS has won the handheld war (for this generation). It's a similar story to the Wii - PS3 - 360 battle.

Having said all that, yes, we have a Wii and a DS, we also have a PS3 now. If only Sony allowed or hackers provided homebrew on the PS3.

Home Theatre

2008-03-05T09:43:00.003Z

I've decided that my lounge may well be served by a Home Theatre PC. Having given the matter some thought I have also arranged it so that I can buy the initial parts, build the system and then add other features as parts and funds allow.

Initially I need a case, motherboard with most devices built in (saves cost), CPU and memory. Hard disk and DVD can be "recycled" from elsewhere and I also have a dual tuner DVB-T PCI card doing nothing. My choices come under a £200 budget (£186):

Antec NSK1300 - £56 - this is a small case but also a quiet one with plastic and metal sandwiching providing sound deadening plus a single 120mm fan exhausting all hot air (not just from the PSU). Reviewed here

Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H - £46 - this is based on Nvidia's Nforce 630i chipset and the ideal board because it has all the bits I need - HDMI connector for HDTV, gigabit LAN, built in graphics that can cope (just) with HDTV resolutions, HD capable audio.

Intel "Pentium Dual Core" E2180 - £50 - this CPU is badged as a Pentium Dual Core but it's a Core2Duo with slightly less cache. I have one already and it overclocks easily from 2ghz to 3ghz at default voltage. The mobo above is also overclock friendly. I may also play with Speedstep and a few other power saving features.

Zalman CNPS7000 heatsink - £0 - I had this lying around for some while. It happens to be the best heatsink that also fits into the Antec case and also is nice and quiet.

Corsair PC6400 (2gb) - £33 - DDR2 memory. What else matters?

The extras that can be added later are:

AMD/ATI HD3450 VGA card - £27 - supports HDCP/HDTV and some low end gaming if I can be bothered

Pioneer BDC-202BK Blu-Ray Reader/DVD±DL Writer - £86 - Would allow Blu Ray playback.

500 GB WD5000AACS Caviar "Green" hard disk - £63 - claims to be lower power usage, therefore less heat produced.

Green Computing?

2008-02-27T12:01:00.002Z

So many websites are going on and on about “Green Computing”. Only today I read an article about how to spec yourself a Green Computer (which I am going to call a GPC from now on to save typing).

Today’s article was about choosing more efficient power supplies, more modern and efficient CPUs and graphics cards. It kind of misses an important point that this only applies to buying totally new kit – it is generally uneconomic to replace your kit with new kit to make energy savings. Besides which you are doing nothing to aid the planet as you’ll be selling that inefficient kit to some other person who will use to create more CO2.

For real GPCs, the key elements to look at (in my opinion are)

PSU – always choose and 80+ rated (energy efficient) PSU but don’t over-spec. So many people buy 600W PSUs because they think they need them. Not many systems do. My two PCs are Core2Duo with two DVD drives, hard disk, graphics card (7600/7900) and 2gb memory and run on 460W and 400W PSUs and that is plenty.

Graphics – do you need a dedicated graphics card? What is the last game you played? I’m actually playing Half Life Source and Red Faction right now – the latter is fine on integrated graphics. Have a look at the power consumption of the graphics card you are considering? I really wish NVidia and AMD/ATI would consider making an energy efficient card (about the power level of a 7600GT which runs most games). Quite frankly I couldn’t give a toss about some SLI behemoth with a fan the size of coffee cup. I want to play normal games at normal resolutions in peace and quiet and without wasting electricity!

CPU – very little beats the Core2Duo for the balance between energy efficiency and power. Undervolting can also reduce power consumption (but my damn IP35 boards from Abit won’t allow it!) and ensuring that EIST and Speedstep (or equivalents) are switched on can help. VIA’s C7 CPUs are efficient but quite frankly slow as hell. If you must go low power then undervolt a C2D or try the Celeron in Intel’s D201GLY2 motherboard. Intel’s forthcoming Silverthorn CPU will be a boost in this area and the newest C2D CPUs (Wolfdale E8200-8400-8500) are much more efficient and lower power consumption than the older C2Ds.

My recommendations to look into (in roughly ascending processor power and power consumption)

Zonbu (as mentioned earlier in this blog)
Intel’s D201GLY2 motherboard in an ITX system
Shuttle’s forthcoming KPC
Any Wolfdale Core2Duo based system with 80+ PSU and integrated graphics.

Gaming on the move... Eee Styleee

2008-02-07T08:02:00.000Z

Well, yes, you CAN play games under Linux but let's face it.. 99% of the best games are Windows (or even DOS) games. So, to use your Eee for games you really should install Windows and it needs to be XP as XP has the driver support. So, off to Eeeuser.com's wiki here for a guide to how to install XP on an Eee. I also recommend a large fast SD card as the Eee's 4gb flash drive isn't really big enough for games and you don't want to wear it out as well.

There is a list of games that have been tested at eeeuser.com so I knew Call of Duty would work but my favourite game had not been tested and when it was tested, it was reported as not working due to DirectX errors. The game, Red Faction, is a favourite as it is set on Mars (an interest of mine) and has a good plotline and was a first game where you could affect the landscape around you. No route to where you want to go? Blast one with explosives. No games supported that sort of thing when Red Faction was launched.

Red Faction also launched on PS2 and on Mac and spawned a sequel which I think was dull and uninteresting - no plot and no innovations. Red Faction 2 is on PC, Xbox, PS2 and Gamecube.

Anyway, onto gaming on the Eee. Call of Duty installs fine but requires editting the config.cfg file to use a custom resolution (800*480). It works well but better if you turn down the lighting effects and clock the Eee at 900mhz using Eeectrl.
Red Faction installs fine but barfs at 640*480 resolution with DirectX errors. It runs at 800*600 but isn't very playable as the screen scrolls whenever you need to access the other part that the Eee cannot display. Not good. I had a quick trip to my favourite Red Faction site, Levels4You and, after searching, posted a request for help with custom resolutions. I was pointed to a Res Hack tool which allowed you to select 320*240 and some other exotic screen resolutions but not 800*480. But viewing the executable file in Notepad showed me that it changes the registry to effect these new resolutions so all that was needed was to enter the resolution I wanted.

Note: when using this hack you should launch the game from the Red Faction launcher, not from RF. exe and also do NOT change or select a different resolution. The screen resolution will be shown as blank but leave it alone. The game runs fine in 800*480 at 900mhz but I get occasional pauses when the action gets going. I suspect it is down to my SD card's speed but basically, playable Red Faction heaven. I'm happy, Red Faction with a MS wireless laptop mouse and Call of Duty too

Mods

2008-01-21T13:03:00.000Z

Nope, not those has-beens from the Sixties but Mods for Games.

In recent years it has become all the rage for smart young things (any old Modders out there) to show how clever they are by designing new levels or new graphics for existing games. Some games have even supported this by including level design programs or level editors or by making tools available from official websites. Many games have such mods now.

What is the cool thing about these mods is that many are high quality and most importantly, FREE!

The game that probably most epitomises the mod is Counterstrike. This game sprung from the loins of Valve Software's Half Life and was a freely downloadable online-enabled multiplayer game that you needed the original Half Life to play. Later they even packaged Counterstrike as a separate game and sold it. Counterstrike is arguably the largest online game (because I refuse to acknowledge World of Warcraft as a game as it's pathetic, IMHO!). It's still great some years later and has been remade using Valve's HalfLife 2 engine as "Counterstrike Source".

A good starting place to look for mods for your old and completed game is Moddb.com. A few mods that I think are worth a look are listed below. Feel free to post details of your favourite mods.

Operation MarketGarden mod for Call of Duty
German Front Mod 2 mod for Call of Duty 2
Zombie Stress Mod (single player) for Half-Life 2
Zombie Panic Source mod (multi-player) for Half-Life 2

Firefox

2008-01-15T11:41:00.000Z

Sorry but when Googling Firefox images I spotted this one. It has many things that are dear to me such as cats, Firefox etc... ;-)

OK, Firefox.

I've mentioned this before but last day or two I have had more of a play with it. I was already familiar with AdBlock Plus (a great extension for blocking adverts and also blocking half naked "lady" pics from websites that I would otherwise be happy for my kids to use like Torrentspy.com) but I like Internet Explorer (or rather I am used to it).

Internet Explorer often copies other browsers better features like Tabs from Firefox and Opera and pop-up blockers. Well, recently with IE7 they copied the idea of extensions like AdBlock Plus. I tried the IE version but like most things associated with MS products, it isn't free and it isn't that great! So I came back again to try Firefox.

Here are the extensions I have been trying:

AdBlock Plus - speeds up loading web pages by not downloading all those crappy adverts as well as de-porns some.
Flashblock - blocks all Flash anims unless you click to allow them. Useful for blocking those Flash adverts that AdBlock misses.
PlainOldFavorites - use your old IE favorites as a menu item in Firefox. Useful if you store your Favorites centrally. Check out Foxmarks also.
MyFirefox - make Firefox look like IE7. Ease yourself into being a Firefox user.
Chatzilla - IRC client for Firefox. Online chat.
FireFTP - integrate a proper FTP client into Firefox.

There are many more. Let me know what you like about Firefox and which extensions you use or enjoy.

The 7 Wonders of Wii Homebrew

2007-12-31T10:51:00.000Z

Now that Wii homebrew is finally a possibility http://youtube.com/watch?v=H5YB1Mmx7E4
I’ve been wondering what would make the Seven Wonders of Wii Homebrew and here are my thoughts. Feel free to disagree!

1) Emulators
The Wii is basically a Gamecube on steroids. When you boot a Cube title the Wii downgrades itself to Gamecube specs but what possibilities would we have if we could access the full Wii mode for emulators. You could even play Cube titles in Wii mode, a sort of super Gamecube mode where the framerates could be faster perhaps? Now the extra power of the Wii over the Cube could allow you to emulate more powerful machines like the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST, perhaps the Playstation (PSX).

It’s just a starting point. These wonders are building up.

2) Samba (SMB)

Samba is a network protocol. If the Wii could be Samba compatible one way or another then we could connect it to a PC or Mac network and read files from the network, store files on the network and so on. This is a key building block as the Wii has no hard disk so is limited to SD cards for storage. Add Samba and there is no limit.

3) Kai (link)

Kai enables machines of varying types to play network games. Not quite sure how this would or could work on Wii but it’s a useful bridge and could enable Wii online gaming when the Big N doesn’t take care of our needs.

4) ISO loader

Sometimes burning titles onto DVD is a pain in the butt. Loading ISO images would be handy and allow you to store titles elsewhere on networked storage or on a PC. It would be great to be able to load Gamecube and Wii titles remotely. Obviously only images of titles you actually own ;)

5) Keyboard Support

The Wii has USB already but using a USB keyboard would be a key building block. How else are you gonna do MSN style chats? Enter your Samba config by hand? Again, a key step towards a full homebrew Wii. Let’s have mouse support too!

6) Linux

I never used to be a huge Linux fan until I came across my Linkstation and the size of the Linux software base. And it is free! There is Gamecube Linux but Wii Linux (Wiinux, Wiix or whatever it gets called!) should turn the Wii into a full computer with it’s PowerPC processor. As long as we have Samba access to a remote hard disk then Wii Linux could boot from SD and store on a Samba share. With Linux installed the Wii could run Firefox and many other quality Linux apps.

7) Media Center

Have you seen how good XboxMediaCenter is? XBMC is, for me, the sole reason to own an original Xbox. If the Wii had homebrew like this (yes XBMC is free homebrew, not commercial software) then you could play on your TV all those Xvid TV shows you have downloaded, your MP3 collection and look at those family pics you store on your PC. Heaven.

So when will this get going? Soon I hope!

Xbox Bling

2007-12-21T09:37:00.000Z

Well, yesterday was a fun trip shopping. I bought my Asus Eee for £199, having haggled at PC World where they put the price up overnight. It's very cute but more on that later. Another purchase was an Xbox. Having sold mine about 10 days ago for £100 (the package) I found via MoneySavingExpert.com that Game in the UK were selling off their "pre-owned" stock for £20 each (well £19.98 actually) so I bought one (well two actually, one for a work colleague) and have decided to soft-mod it (or maybe chip it) to allow XboxMediaCenter to be installed. XBMC is a superb media center app that plays every format you could want. At £20 for the Xbox you can't go wrong. But now I've seen some Xbox mods l am being tempted to build a blinged up Xbox like the one in the pic above (more info here http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=615937)

Eee by Gumm

2007-12-19T16:52:00.000Z

OK, well you'd probably have to have been on another planet to not have seen or heard of this year's "must have gadget" the Asus Eee PC.

Not heard of it? Well you have been in the wilds then! So what is it?

It's a laptop - "Big deal" you say. Seen them before.

It's small - "Yup, seen small laptops". There was the Toshiba Libretto (Google it if you haven't heard of that!)

It's light - "Yup, been there"

It's Linux - "errrm so what. You can put Linux on any PC" - yes, but this starts with a custom Linux built for it

It's Flash-based - "what's that then?" you say. It has no hard disk but a flash memory disk. That means no moving parts (no noise, no heat and no worry about it failing because of a small drop onto a surface) but also it uses less power and it loads much faster. Getting interested?

It's very small - it's the size of a hardback book but still has a proper keyboard and screen and an Intel CPU.

It can run Windows (if you want), it's hackable ("Oh yes it is!!"), it's wireless, it's cute.... and there is a growing community at www.eeeuser.com where you can find out the best ways to install Windows, run games that it wasn't really designed to do so, modify the internals to add extra storage and so on.

So, I'm decided now to get one. The problem now is availability. You can get white ones easily enough (well, sorta!) but the black ones are a little scarcer so I will have to wait. The plan is to get an 8gb SDHC card to expand the storage (as it includes a card reader) plus an 8gb USB pendrive to hold those Xvid, Mp3 and other media files. I will be building a customised XP install CD for it (to install a stripped nLite XP, with the frequently modified files stored on the SD card like My Docs, Temp files and the like) and using customised office applications like Thinstalled Office on a totally optimised "flash disk".

And the best thing of all? It's so small I might JUST get away with smuggling the device past "she who must be obeyed"!! :-)

Portable Applications

2007-12-17T09:49:00.000Z

You know the problem, you have some useful application but you cannot run it at work or at college because the nasty system admininistrators have their systems locked down so tightly you cannot install any executable files (or maybe you don't want to as you don't want to leave traces behind). The solution? Portable apps! These will run from a USB pendrive or whatever portable device you have (Apple iPod anyone?). But not just serious applications, games can be portable too.

I've done some looking around and here are some of the handy things I have found:

Portable Firefox - handy if you cannot abide Internet Explorer, also handy as Firefox has extensions to add functionality like FTP, Torrents etc.

Portable Counterstrike - very handy for a quick blast. Haven't the nerve to try it at work though

Portable MS Office inc Frontpage - this was powered by Thinstall, a virtualisation program which effectively allows a PC within a PC to run and is a very powerful tool. I had a play with a friend's copy and we Thinstalled Frontpage but it's not an easy process or particular intuitive to do. The results are superb though. A search of Bittorrent sites can reveal Thinstalled Office suites for download of varying sizes. The downside to Thinstall is the astronomical price $4995 if I understand their pricing structure. Ouch.

MojoPac - this is another way to carry portable apps. Basically you install your PC on a removable storage device (USB pendrive, iPod etc) and when you plug it into another PC you can run all your apps from that device, any reading and writing being to that device and nothing whatsoever is changed on the host PC which just provides the hardware. A clever idea but no good for me as my workplace have USB devices very heavily restricted so we can only write to approved devices (which iPods are not!).

Anyone come across any other portable beauties? Let me know!

Core2Duo Goodness!

2007-12-10T11:09:00.000Z

Just upgraded the #2 PC cheaply by flogging some other components I had spare. The new system is also a G33 based microATX motherboard (this time an Asus P5K-VM) with 2gb of PC6400 memory and a cheapie E2180 Core2Duo processor. Recently Hexus.net did a budget CPU article which confirmed what we all knew - this is a bargain chip. As standard its a 2ghz processor and even at that speed is pretty quick but it also is a good overclocker. All I had to do was raise the FSB up leaving all voltages at standard and it's now a 3ghz CPU. It's plenty quick enough for our needs so I cannot see the point of pushing to the absolute limit. It did boot at around 3.3ghz in a quick test but I think the memory was too pushed to cope. Either way, £50 for a super fast CPU has to be good and the motherboard will be good for the next bargain CPU coming from Intel, the 45nm E8400 which should also clock to 4ghz with ease. That''s next year realistically.

Next Gen - is it worth it?

2007-12-03T10:03:00.000Z

We've got all the last generation of consoles - PS2, Xbox and Gamecube.

We've got the Wii from the current generation but listen to any "serious" gamer and they will tell you that the Wii isn't really "next gen" like the PS3 and some will even say the Xbox 360 isn't "next gen". There is a lot of bull floating around on this topic. There are no rules about what is and isn't "next gen", really there aren't. So PS3 and Xbox360 owners get a grip.

Personally only a few games on the 360 and PS3 have looked vaguely worth playing. Recently I have liked the look of Assassin's Creed and Mass Effect so using that excuse I let slip to the sprogs that I was considering a 360 as those games and perhaps Halo 3 had me tempted.

I conducted a little experiment, I borrowed a 360 from a friend and plugged it in and waited for the reaction. I also borrowed a pile of games with it.

Let the comments begin:

"Crikey, what's that noise." (360 switched on).

"Look at that brick" (360 power supply is a tad chunky)

"All consoles should have wireless controllers" (that was me!)

"Is this what next gen is about then, just some prettier graphics"

"The games are slightly sharper but the games are still much the same"

"Put another title on...... there's nothing I want to play, let's unplug it and plug the Wii back into the tv" (followed by Avatar the Burning Earth and an Eyetoy session on PS2)

So, the jury in our household is firmly against "next gen". I have an acceptable PC so I'm happy to play Gears of War or Lost Planet on that. Assassin's Creed is out on PC next year (it was delayed) and there is a strong rumour that Mass Effect will be on PC next year. Halo and Halo 2 made it to PC and even Microsoft's effort to force Halo 2 gamers to buy Vista (what a joke) was bypassed by hackers so Halo 2 plays on XP machines fine.

No point in Next Gen. Actually decided to sell the Xbox 1 as it's media playing duties have been distgributed elsewhere. The Cube is redundant as the Wiii plays Cube games.

We're quite happy with a Wii, a PS2 and a decent PC for gaming, thank you very much.

Mediagate MG-35 heaven?

2007-11-28T10:34:00.000Z

I bought myself another new toy (!!). This time it's called a Freecom MG-35 but in reality it's a re-badged Mediagate MG-35 from a Korean source. Why did I buy this? Well it's a networked media player which means it can play the media I have stored on my NAS, my Linkstation. So, put simply, I can watch video or listen to MP3s while my PC is saving electricity being switched to standby or off.

There are plenty of networked media players out there (I actually use an Xbox with XboxMediaCenter installed) so why this one? Well I have looked at many in recent days and will advise you if considering one to Google them extensively. Ebay is a source of NMPs but the ones I saw listed almost all seemed to have buggy firmware (according to net reports). The MG35 also has it's bugs but the clincher here (apart from price!!) was that there is an established hacking community on Yahoo Groups. The group have modified firmware to add a few features like AC3 playback (always handy for those Xvid/AC3 dvdrips) and to improve the interface with better looking "skins".

So, I plugged the thing in and it found my network straight away. I set up the interface as I wanted and then navigated to my AVIs and played them without any issues. Superb. Next to upgrade the firmware to a modded one, simply browse the network to the latest stock firmware, select the file and the box knows that it's a firmware file and flashes it for you. Next flash the modded firmware and you are done. There is also a wireless MG-35 for those who like freedom from network cables.

One final comment. The MG35 supports playback from a locally fitted hard disk (IDE) or via network. I am a silence-freak so don't want to listen to whining hard disks. With no hard disk and no fan, the MG-35 is totally silent and therefore ideal for bedroom use. Pity mine is downstairs now!

Wot no Zonbu?

2007-11-26T11:37:00.000Z

I've sold my Zonbu. A bit strange to only have it a few weeks but my needs have changed. I still think the Zonbu is a great PC and a great concept - green computing.

I had considered the Zonbu originally to become my download box, allowing it to download all day to either an external USB drive, an attached 2.5inch drive or to a NAS. Anyway, astute readers (are there any?) might have noticed my success with the Buffalo Linkstation NAS box which is now acting as my download box using Hellanzb for usenet downloads. The only other role the Zonbu could have fulfilled would have been to act as a video player but it's probably expensive to do that so the Zonbu is going. The Linkstation still fulfills my Green computing needs!

What will be the video player? Well, a Freecom MG-35.

That's another entry though when I have updated that with "modded" firmware! What fun - boy toys!

Leaves on the Line

2007-11-16T10:28:00.000Z

I'm wondering if this is just a peculiarly British problem or something the world over? Anyway, in the UK every autumn (that's "fall" for the Yanks) we have the commuting world grind to a halt with the excuse from the train companies of "leaves on the line" or "the wrong kind of leaves on the line". This only came about in the last 10 years or so but now it has suddenly got so bad (if you believe the BS we are fed) that we have "Leaf Fall Timetables" where trains are timetabled to run late. If you ask me this is just another excuse for the crap rail services we have in the country.

Where I live we have a small local railway close by and not only has the Leaf Fall timetable led to earlier starting and later finishing trains (less sleep for the Mrs) but it also means we have a Leaf Cleaning train that runs after the normal trains have finished. This is some mighty behemoth that at night is barely lit and looks a little like a huge steam breathing dragon. It blasts (very noisily) the tracks clean and goes quite slowly once and down the line. We had just about got used to this (which finishes only an hour after the last train) when this week it got worse. The bloody Leaf Cleaner came at 3.30am the night before last and 1:10am last night. How are we expected to get some sleep?

I can picture me either planting some explosive on the Leaf Cleaner or sabotaging the line to prevent any trains running. Bring back British Rail I say because even they could run a better rail service than the shambles we have now.

[The image is a fair likeness of the Dragon of the Rails]

OMG I am a Nintendo Fanboy!

2007-11-15T12:28:00.000Z

Well, this was a shock to admit this to myself. Having spent years scoffing at Ninty fanboys and my son in particular I have slowly come to this moment where I have realised I am a Ninty Fanboy.

I did own a SNES some while back but probably mainly because there were devices like the Wildcard where you could backup games to floppy disk and play them without cartridges. But I soon got bored and sold the SNES and Wildcard - there was just so much Streetfighter 2 you could play.

I easily resisted the N64 although my son had one to play the Pokemon games. His arrived after the console was officially "dead" so wasn't expensive. Sure, Goldeneye was impressive but I easily resisted.

Gamecube? Well, I laughed at that from my Xbox heights. I did relent and get a PS2 for the family to use Eyetoy and Dancemat games mainly. Again, my son got a Cube later than most (just as it was dying) but it didn't grab me. He was still on his Pokemon Colosseum games at this time. I did notice that there were a few of the more mainstream games out on the GC though.

And Wii. Well by now I had to admit that Nintendo had something special out and the social gaming that Wii Sports brings looked rather fun. The most beloved in a moment of pure genius produced one for me at Xmas 06 and we all agreed it was the best surprise present ever. Much fun and several Wii Sports-related injuries later it's still a revolutionary console. Sure, the graphics are not "Next Gen" like the Xbox360 and PS3 but graphics don't make the game, the gameplay does. The Wii also made me look hard at the Cube's back catalogue and generally if the game was good it got a Cube release too, bar the few "exclusives" like Halo and Project Gotham or God of War.

And I haven't even touched on handhelds and how Ninty owns that market. Maybe another time? Feel free to disagree with my views.

Amithlon again

2007-11-14T07:46:00.000Z

Well, after much searching I believe I have found the perfect Amithlon motherboard. It's the Asus KV-81. So why is it perfect? Well, all the devices onboard are supported (which is always good) and it's microATX (which is better, means nice small cases are an option) but it's also just about the only board with gigabit ethernet that is supported by Amithlon (using the VIA Velocity chipset). The downsides for me are that I have a nice PCI-E graphics card and this board only takes AGP cards (so anyone wanna swap for a 7600GT?) and this is a Socket754 board and I have Socket939 chips. I managed to pick up a cheap Sempron 2600+ and have an Athlon 3000+ also cheap that is on the way. Now I have to sell the old S939 kit!

Anyway, a few install experiences. I had some issues with the partitioning of the hard disk. You can only have 4 Primary partitions which basically meant XP, Amithlon Kernel/Boot partition and the "Amiga hard disk" partition. I didn't manage to squeeze a Mac OSX partition in this time. My little advice I can offer is that if you want to have additional NTFS partitions for XP that you create them at the start when installing XP (which you do before Amithlon), make them logical and not primary partitions and use a partition package like Acronis Disk Director to move the partitions to the end of the physical hard disk layout. Then create your Kernel and Amiga partitions using XFDisk in the resulting space in the middle. If not then things look to be confused as XFDisk thinks your Kernel/Amithlon partition is your D or E drive!

One final tip. After configuration, boot from the Amithlon CD, not from HD. Then "install" the Amiga hard disk and WB3.9 from your Amithlon CD and then and ONLY then boot from the "Amiga hard disk".

My Amithlon boots using the old kernels, not the Gary Colville versions. Need to tweak the setup. Anyone care to offer some advice or help?

Saving the Planet

2007-11-09T09:05:00.000Z

The Linkstation hacking is going rather well.

So far I have upgraded the hard disk to a larger one, re-sizing the partitions so that I have extra space to install all the goodies that I am adding to it. Then I opened the firmware up on the box ("hacked it") and installed a few Linux goodies to make life easier. I tweaked the box to enable it to act as a web server for a personal web page which isn't written yet but you can get the empty site at www.strontiumdog.co.uk. I wonder if you know what that website might be about? The last improvement for me is the best. I installed a usenet downloading package that downloads files from the internet, checks and unpacks them, all whilst the PC is switched off. Now if you think that a Linkstation uses 15W power and a PC normally around 175W, the saving in electricity pays for the Linkstation and upgraded hard disk in about a year. I have to do my bit to save the planet don't I.

The thing is so good that I wonder what my Zonbu will do!

A full how-to for installing the usenet downloader is available at the Linkstation wiki at NAS-Central here.

Next is a web interface for remote control of the usenet package and perhaps a Bit torrent client.

X-Amiga

2007-11-07T07:34:00.000Z

What fortuitous timing. There was me ranting about Windows yesterday and saying how Linux and Amiga were cool and along it comes. This is a project I've been tracking for a while, basically an installer for a very small Linux boot system that loads E-UAE (the Linux Amiga emulator). Loads fast and avoids bloating! Sounds like a pro-biotic yoghurt eh?

More info and the downloads can be found here

I Hate MS Windows!

2007-11-06T07:57:00.000Z

Well, sort of.

Windows is one of those necessary evils or so many will tell you. I find it a bloated operating system, it takes too much space, too much memory and therefore is inefficient. It comes with "eye candy" to make it look pretty but that doesn't change what it really is.

So what can we do? Well, there are many alternatives:

1) Linux - this is very much a realistic choice. I really doubt there is much reason for people to use Windows if it wasn't for the fact they had it pre-loaded on their PC or they found it easy to pirate. Try a Linux install like Ubuntu and you get all the Office applications, internet browsers and whatever you could want. My Linkstation is running Linux and can do an awful lot and similarly with the Zonbu! You can even try Linux using "Live CDs" where you keep your existing OS but boot Linux from the CD and can test and play with it before deciding if you want to install it.

2) Mac OSX - well I cannot claim to be taken with this but pretty much the same applies as for Linux. Less users though so less people writing for it. Interestingly if you like to try new stuff, you can install this on your PC to make what is called a Hackintosh (not Macintosh or Mac)

3) Amiga OS - well not really an alternative but you could have Amithlon running a fast non Microsoft system. Amithlon can run with very little else on your system bar a small FAT32 partition. Less software around for it too. Same applies to an AmigaOS clone called MorphOS.

4) Hyperspace - just publicised. This aims to save on the loading times associated with booting a Windows PC. More info here

Amiga

2007-11-02T09:26:00.000Z

I've owned and used a fair few computers in my time from tape based TRS80s at school (and they were cutting edge) to the modern PCs we use today. The one computer that evokes most affection (yes, affection) and nostalgia is the Commodore Amiga. Now if you have just said "what's that?" then you should wash your mouth out with soapy water.

Linkage!

If you were an Amiga user in the late 80s and through the 90s you might be interested in emulations. Finally modern PCs have got sufficiently powerful to run an accurate emulation of the Amiga. Most people will be using a Windows PC and running WinUAE (the Windows Uxxx Amiga Emulator). WinUAE is a fine piece of software and can be configured to emulate most Amigas, even the later AGA chipset models. But for real emulation speed and features, nothing comes close to Amithlon. What Amithlon does is makes all the modern facilities of the PC available to the Amiga emulation - that means fast graphics, better sound, ethernet networking. You really get a powerful modern Amiga.

Unfortunately due to legal shenanigans Amithlon is no longer sold but copies are still traded on places like eBay. To run Amithlon you need compatible hardware - generally AMD and VIA kit works well (more info via the links). I spent quite some time hunting down the "perfect" motherboard, Abit's KV-81, which is fully supported and allows superfast gigabit networking. The Amithlon machine is set to dual boot - you can select your superfast Amithlon-based Amiga or (yuk) Windows XP.

Amithlon info can be found here

Kittens!

2007-11-01T08:00:00.001Z

We have two of them and they are, of course, adorable. These are the latest in a line of Burmese cats I have owned and these two are very different from the others.

Zaphod is a Chocolate boy and very small. I would not expect him to ever look like an adult cat but he's still cute and has a stubby face. He is, at the current time, rather strangely the "top cat" and he is quite aggressive with his brother, growling over possession of the sacred toy, the shaped pipe cleaner which looks, to a kitten, rather like a spider of sorts.

Aslan is a Lilac boy, quite chunky and muscular but is #2 cat. He is by all definitions of a Burmese and by those of The Sun newspaper, "a stunner". He has a lovely colour and shape. He's also very dippy and prone to losing the plot and staring at the ceiling as though he is having hallucinations. We think he is "touched" and a "special needs kitty".

Anyway, I'll post some pics later. Remind me to post some more in three months or so or late December because by then the poor boys will no longer be "whole". I hesitate to use the word "chop" in case they are internet-savvy kittens and read this!

[Update - Still haven't got pix sorted but dug out this one of my kittens' mum, brother and uncle]

Dexter

2007-10-31T08:51:00.000Z

I have to confess Dexter would not be my normal choice of viewing, and FX channel would not be one I normally hop to, but I was intrigued by adverts on the London Tube of a new series about a serial killer. OK, so there are plenty of crime dramas around but this was about the serial killer with him being the star. The ad intrigued me so I watched and was hooked, downloading episodes from the USA and watching the first season quite quickly. Now season 2 has just started in the US.

So, what is it about? Well, Dexter is a disturbed man who as a child witness the brutal murder of his mother. He was saved by a policeman from the bloody scene and adopted by the same policeman but the murder affected him. He now feels strange urges and desires that can only be satisfied by killing. His "father" realises the only way to stop Dexter from being incarcerated is to teach him a code and some control. Dexter's code is that he only kills those who kill others - he has some "ethics" - and he always covers his tracks by leaving no forensic evidence. Oh and did I mention his job? He's a Blood Spatter Analyst for the Miami Police Department.

I would not want to spoil the plot for you but season 1 ends with a bang. Season 2 opens with Dexter's stash of victims bodies being discovered. And look out for Dexter's girlfriend, she is someone that fan's of Buffy may recognise, Drusilla, played by Julie Benz.

One to watch without a doubt. If you liked, or didn't like it, let me know.

Linkstation - More Toys for the Boys?

2007-10-30T07:29:00.001Z

Another toy, ordered last night. This one is called a Network Attached Storage box, branded as a Linkstation. Basically it's a small computer hiding away as a semi-intelligent hard disk. The clever thing is that any PC on your home network (or the internet if you choose) can access this hard disk. Imagine, you store your documents on the NAS box and when you are at school you've forgotten your homework? No problem, log into your NAS and retrieve and print it at school.

The Linkstation Home Server model I bought first of all turned out to have a fault preventing it being upgraded and the hard disk was faulty. Luckily the eBay seller was a decent bloke and didn't cause me grief over the refund. I'm now having to buy a different model, the Linkstation Live but it stil has has a gigabit ethernet connection which means fast transfers between PC and Linkstatiion. This is also quite hackable.

The cheapest Linkstation I could find was a 250gb model at Play.com for £99.99. That is a great price and doing that and bunging my own HD in it to upgrade it to a 500Gb model is cheaper by far than buying a 500gb model as standard. Plus I get a spare 250gb drive. Result.

The plan is to open the firmware somewhat (perhaps even re-flash the device) and to add some software to it to enable me to host a personal website and to turn the Linkstation into my 24/7 download box, replacing any need to leave a PC on all day and night. Depending on how successful I am this could even render my Zonbu partly obsolete and save the planet at the same time!

More info can be found at http://www.nas-central.org/ with info on how to modify Linkstations too!

What the heck is a Zonbu

2007-10-29T07:25:00.000Z

I've just received my latest toy. Yes, I am a sucker for all things electrical (well, not quite all - there are a few battery powered devices I could happily pass on). This is a "green PC" called a Zonbu. http://www.zonbu.com/.

It's a relatively low powered PC which runs a customised Linux operating system but with all the programs you would need already installed. It consumes around 15W - about the same as an Energy Saver lightbulb and additionally the manufacturers have bought carbon offsets to offset it's use. Oh how green can you get? A further major benefit is that it has no hard disk and the processor is a low power one so there are no moving parts and no need for a fan. Yes, it is totally quiet meaning it can be left on even in a bedroom without disturbing "she who must be obeyed". Next job is to replace the operating system with a customised and stripped (lean and mean) version of Windows, without all the Microsoft bloatware and then to integrate it into the home network as my 24/7 server in conjunction with my other low power box, the Buffalo Linkstation (although that has just turned out to be faulty and needs replacement). Stay tuned!

Ninja Warrior

2007-10-24T10:53:00.000+01:00

Also known in Japan as Sasuke.

We've got into this TV show in a big way. It's the one thing on TV (as opposed to downloadable TV shows from USA) that I actually want to watch. It's a mad Japanese gameshow where grown men (and some women too) compete on a fiendish obstacle course that tests their skill and their physical prowess to complete four stages. Some of these stages are timed, all are difficult. If too many people get through, those fiendish Japs make it harder. It's been going for some years now and so far only two people have ever completed the thing. The first guy now has an eyesight problem and although he tries to compete he often cannot see what he is doing (which is potentially rather dangerous). The old and the young compete (we've seen a 14 year old and a 70-odd year old). Some of the regulars are stars in Japan and even some foreigners have competed like US Olympic medal winners who haven't done that well!

Our hero for this is a Japanese fisherman called Makoto Nagano. The man is a class act. He makes the thing look easy when it isn't and he is super-fit. I was very surprised to read he is only 5'3" tall.

Anyway, you are advised to check this show out. It's on in UK on ChallengeTV at 6pm or shown on US television as well. "Go Nagano!!!"

10 Print "Hello World"

2007-10-24T10:50:00.000+01:00

Well, so far I have resisted all the trendy internet uses like Facebook, YouTube, Blogging and the like but no longer. I mean, it comes as a shock to find your non-nerdy wife has a Facebook page you didn't know about. So without further fanfare, here we go. My weblog. I wonder how long I can be bothered? My prediction is "under six months". First proper entry later today.