Quoted from http://www.neomeme.net/2007/06/26/iphone-review-roundup/:
-
- Published by Ilya Lichtenstein on June 26, 2007 06:26 pm under John Dvorak, N95, iphone, reviews
- There has been so much hype around the iPhone that I, like Dvorak, just want to say Shut Up Already. Regardless of your opinion of the iPhone(I think it’s completely overhyped) there’s no denying that, for the smartphone-starved American market(no US carrier has picked up recent comparable smartphones like the N95 ),the iPhone is something quite different and revolutionary. Attempting to cut through the infinite hype and speculation, here are some reputable actual reviews of the iPhone. Not guesses
or assumptions based on a 10 minute trial- actual reviews from actual journalists who have had time to review the device in detail.
Looking at many actual reviews, perhaps we can see some consistencies that cut through the hype.
- Reviewer: Wall Street Journal
Bottom line: “Despite some flaws and feature omissions, the iPhone is, on balance, a beautiful and breakthrough handheld computer. Its software, especially, sets a new bar for the smart-phone industry, and its clever finger-touch interface, which dispenses with a stylus and most buttons, works well, though it sometimes adds steps to common functions.”
- Reviewer: New York Times
Bottom Line: “The iPhone is revolutionary; it’s flawed. It’s substance; it’s style. It does things no phone has ever done before; it lacks features found even on the most basic phones.”
- Reviewer: Newsweek.
Bottom Line: “Even those who never buy one will benefit from its advances, as competitors have already taken Apple’s achievements as a wake-up call to improve their own products. But for all its virtues, the iPhone is still a risky venture because it’s yet to be proven that, despite the wow factor, millions of people are ready to pay several hundred dollars more than the going rate for phones.”
- Reviewer: USA Today
Bottom Line: “Even a prodigy needs to grow up. I’d love iPhone to deliver my company mail, tap into a faster data network and provide expandable memory, instant messaging and GPS. The price could be lower, too. My wish list aside, iPhone’s splash of a debut is worthy of the attention it is receiving.”
- So, overall, what statements can be made about the iPhone?
Pros: Visual voicemail, fantastic email,dazzling web browser,Google Maps with free traffic reports,beautiful interface
Cons: No memory card, no Java or Flash,no video camera, no 3G, expensive
Quoted from http://www.neomeme.net/2007/02/07/nine-cool-things-you-didnt-know-you-could-do-with-wikipedia%20:
Neomeme » Nine Cool Things You Didn’t Know You Could Do With Wikipedia
Nine Cool Things You Didn’t Know You Could Do With Wikipedia
Published by Ilya Lichtenstein on February 7, 2007 06:49 am under tutorial, Uncategorized
You probably know Wikipedia as the world’s largest encyclopedia, suitable for research on most any topic. You know you can look up terms, but what you may not know is that Wikipedia features a ton of other information that can do a lot more than help you with that research paper. Wikipedia can also be a:
- TV Episode Guide. Just search for “list of ____ episodes” with the name of the show, and you will see every episode catalogued and summarized, often with trivia and other factoids.
- Cliffs Notes Replacement. Don’t want to read that weighty tome for your literature class? Don’t worry, Wikipedia is on your side. Just type in the name of the book, and you will be presented with a plot summary, themes, symbols, and other in-depth analysis.
- Learning Activities. This is from Wikiversity, a Wikipedia sister site. Whether you are a student wanting extra practice for a difficult subject or a teacher looking for homework assignments or handouts for your students, Wikiversity provides tutorials and worksheets on subjects ranging from AJAX programming to Philosophy. Wikiversity is currently woefully incomplete, but many subject have lengthy, well-written tutorials.
- Stock Images Collection. Need royalty-free stock images for your next web design or desktop publishing project? Turn to Wikimedia Commons, where you can browse images by subject, licence, or author. So if you need, for example, a radioactive Diderot for that big presentation to the investors, you’re all set.
- Music Database. Want to discover new music? Wikipedia has extensive cataloguing of music by genre, making it easy to find similar bands to those you already like.
- Time Capsule. Want to know what people thought of a topic years ago? Wikipedia archives all changes, so simply by clicking on the “history” tab on top of the page and then “Earliest” on the very bottom you can see an article as it was written years ago. Aside from demonstrating the fluid and ever-changing nature of Wikipedia, but also offers a glimpse into how people thought years ago. The value of this technique will increase over the years as Wikipedia gets older.
- Future Planner. Just as it can go backward in time, Wikipedia can also go backward forward. Wikipedia has articles stretching far into the next millennium. Want to see what you need to schedule for 2008? How about the World Cup in 2038? And be sure(assuming you’ve reached immortality) to pencil in the unsealing of that time capsule in 8113 AD.
- Trend Tracker. Perhaps even more important than what people are searching for on Google or other search engines is what people are researching. This page show the most popular Wikipedia articles. For example, following the Super Bowl, a lot of people went to research Prince,whose search numbers spiked recently. A list of sexual positions, however, remains an all-time favorite. Which brings us to our next and final topic:
- Teacher of Sex Positions. The list is more comprehensive than most books on the topic, complete with pictures. Hell, you can even use Wikipedia to look for porn.
And there you have it. I’ve only scratched the surface of the myriad uses of Wikipedia. It is truly an incredible resource I turn to time and time again. I conclude with this cartoon from xkcd, which pretty much sums everything up:
Quoted from http://www.geekstudent.com/?p=22#comments:
Geek Warfare | Geek Student
Gadgets
Nerf Guns + Airbrushing = Awesome Looking Toy Guns you could feel proud to pistol whip a terrorist with!
Get yourself a Nerf Dart Launching weapon like this N-Strike Maverick here…
Find all your old Model Paint bottles from your D&D days or leftover paint from your Warhammer miniatures and slap that stuff on one of these….
BAM!
All you need is a helmet and you’re the next Master Chief!
Guns Master Chief Model Paint Nerf Warhammer
Quoted from http://www.linuxtoys.org/multiseat/multiseat.html:
Build a Six-headed, Six-user Linux System
Build a Six-Headed, Six-User Linux System
By Bob Smith
Introduction
A Multi-Seat Linux Box: This tutorial shows how to build a multi-head, multi-user Linux box using a recent distribution of Linux and standard USB keyboards and mice. Xorg calls this arrangement a “multi-seat” system.
Advantages of a Multi-Seat System: The advantages of multi-seat systems in schools, Internet cafe’s, and libraries include more than just saving money. They include much lower noise pollution, much less power consumption, and lowered space requirements. For many applications power and noise budgets are as important as initial cost.
Requirements: To build a multi-seat system you need a video adapter, keyboard, and mouse for each seat. For six seats, you’ll also need a motherboard with an AGP slot and five available PCI slots. In our test system we used USB keyboards and mice exclusively, but you can use a PS/2 keyboard and mouse for one seat if you wish.
Xorg 6.9 or later is required, but this already ships with many of the major distributions. Our test system uses the free version of Mandriva 2006 and we did not rebuild the kernel or install any additional packages.
Overview
We divide the implementation of a multi-seat system into five main steps:
- Select and Install the Hardware
- Install Linux
- Record Hardware Configuration
- Modify xorg.conf
- Modify gdm.conf
After installing the hardware and installing Linux, we read the hardware configuration from the lspci command from from the /proc/bus/input/devices file. Most of the effort in setting up a multi-seat system is in transcribing the hardware information into the xorg.conf file.
Step 1: Select and Install the Hardware
Selecting the Hardware: There are few set rules dictating what hardware to use in your multi-seat system. Of necessity, some of the keyboards and mice need to use USB, but there is no minimum CPU or memory requirements. We suggest building and testing a multi-seat system using a computer that you already have, and use the test results to help scale your hardware requirements. You may be surprised how modest the CPU and memory requirements are for a multi-seat system that is used only for web browsing.
If possible, try to use accelerated video cards, but for increased reliability, avoid video cards with on-board fans. Use recent video cards; older video cards often have a problem sharing the PCI bus. We’ve had good luck with nVidia cards but you can try recent cards from other manufacturers too.
Hardware for our test system: For our system we chose to use video cards based on the nVidia MX4000 chipset. They are accelerated, have no fans, and it was nice having one driver for all six video cards. The downside of nVidia is that the driver is closed source and you need to download and install it. If you use an nVidia card, be sure to check their web site for the recommended BIOS settings for your cards.
We used an ECS 755-A2 motherboard with an AMD64-3200 processor and 1 GB of RAM. Our power supply is a CoolMax 140mm Power Supply and the CPU heat sink is a Thermaltake “Sonic Tower”. During our testing we added a low noise fan to cool the video cards. Airflow is in at the bottom, past the video cards, up past the CPU cooler and out through the power supply. This airflow seemed to work pretty well. At quiescence, the CPU temperature was 31C, rising to only 38C after fifteen minutes of kernel compile. The current from the mains at quiescence was 0.25 amps, and during a kernel compile it was 0.35 amps.
You will probably need some USB hubs to connect all of the keyboards and mice. One problem to think about before permanently installing the hardware is cable management. Seven power cords, six monitor cables, three USB hubs, six keyboard cables, and six mice cables: that is a lot of cabling!
Step 2: Install Linux
Multi-seat capability is provided by Xorg 6.9/7.0 which already ships with most of the major distributions. When you install Linux, you might want to install all of the window managers including fluxbox and twm. If you are going to use the nVidia drivers, be sure to install the kernel source too.
Do the installation with all of the hardware connected and powered up. Mandriva did a great job detecting and configuring all six of our video heads. Select a default run level of 3 so that X does not start automatically after boot. You can check the installation by logging in and running startx. If all has gone well you should be able to move your mouse across all six monitors.
Mandriva makes up to ten entries in the /dev/input directory. We needed twelve since we had six keyboards and mice. We increased the limit to sixteen by changing the line in /etc/udev/ruled.d/50-mdk.rules from:
KERNEL==”event[0-9]*”, NAME=”input/%k”, MODE=”0600″
to:
KERNEL==”event[0-9a-f]*”, NAME=”input/%k”, MODE=”0600″
Step 3: Record Hardware Configuration
All hardware in our computer has a name that distinguishes it from similar hardware in the computer. In this step we record the names for each of our video heads, keyboards, and mice. Let’s start with the video cards.
Video cards are identified by their address on the PCI bus. We can list the hardware on the PCI buses using the lspci command. On our test system, the lspci command gives the following result: lspci | grep VGA 00:09.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) 00:0a.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) 00:0b.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) 00:0c.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) 00:0d.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX 4000 AGP 8x] (rev c1) The bus address is the first field in the lines above. The number before the colon identifies which PCI bus (computers often have more than one), and the second number gives the card address on the bus. You will need to know these addresses to build the xorg.conf configuration file.
The mice are easy to locate. Each mouse has an entry in the /dev/input directory. An ls can identify the mice. ls /dev/input/mouse* /dev/input/mouse0 /dev/input/mouse2 /dev/input/mouse4 /dev/input/mouse1 /dev/input/mouse3 /dev/input/mouse5 The keyboards are identified as a /dev/input/eventN file. Do a more of /proc/bus/input/devices. Each keyboard will have an entry that specifies the event file. The following two entries are for the first two keyboards in our system. more /proc/bus/input/devices I: Bus=0003 Vendor=046e Product=530a Version=0001 N: Name=”BTC Multimedia USB Keyboard” P: Phys=usb-0000:00:03.3-4.2.1/input0 H: Handlers=kbd event6 B: EV=120003 B: KEY=1000000000007 ff87207ac14057ff febeffdfffefffff fffffffffffffffe B: LED=1f I: Bus=0003 Vendor=046e Product=530a Version=0001 N: Name=”BTC Multimedia USB Keyboard” P: Phys=usb-0000:00:03.3-4.4.1/input0 H: Handlers=kbd event7 B: EV=120003 B: KEY=1000000000007 ff87207ac14057ff febeffdfffefffff fffffffffffffffe B: LED=1f
A table is a nice way to view all of the above information.
Seat Video Card Keyboard
(/dev/input/) Mouse
(/dev/input/)
| 0 |
00:09:0 |
event6 |
mouse0 |
| 1 |
00:10:0 |
event7 |
mouse1 |
| 2 |
00:11:0 |
event8 |
mouse2 |
| 3 |
00:12:0 |
event9 |
mouse3 |
| 4 |
00:13:0 |
event10 |
mouse4 |
| 5 |
01:00:0 |
event11 |
mouse5 |
Note the slight change in how the video cards are addressed. Also, you’ll find the numbering of the keyboards and mice easier if you plug each mouse into the same hub as its corresponding keyboard. Don’t worry too much about matching the video head to the keyboard. After setting everything up you can move the monitors or the keyboards around as needed.
Step 4: Build xorg.conf
The xorg.conf file has sections to describe keyboards, mice, video cards, monitors, screens, and seats. Most of the work in setting up a multi-seat system is correctly copying the information in the above table into the appropriate section of the xorg.conf file. Shown below is our configuration for seat 5. You should be able to use this configuration as a prototype for your additional seats. Note the places where the keyboard, mouse, and video card information is located. Since we were borrowing monitors for our test, we forced all of the monitors to be flat panel displays with a 1024 by 768 resolution. # Seat 5 Section “InputDevice” Identifier “Keyboard5″ Driver “evdev” Option “Device” “/dev/input/event11″ Option “XkbModel” “pc105″ Option “XkbLayout” “us” Option “XkbOptions” “compose:rwin” EndSection Section “InputDevice” Identifier “Mouse5″ Driver “mouse” Option “Protocol” “ExplorerPS/2″ Option “Device” “/dev/input/mouse5″ Option “ZAxisMapping” “6 7″ EndSection Section “Device” Identifier “device5″ Driver “nvidia” VendorName “NVIDIA Corp.” BoardName “NVIDIA GeForce4 (generic)” BusID “PCI:0:13:0″ EndSection Section “Monitor” Identifier “monitor5″ ModelName “Flat Panel 1024×768″ HorizSync 31.5 – 48.5 VertRefresh 40.0 – 70.0 ModeLine “768×576″ 50.0 768 832 846 1000 576 590 595 630 ModeLine “768×576″ 63.1 768 800 960 1024 576 578 590 616 EndSection Section “Screen” Identifier “screen5″ Device “device5″ Monitor “monitor5″ DefaultDepth 24 SubSection “Display” Virtual 1024 768 Depth 24 EndSubSection EndSection Section “ServerLayout” Identifier “seat5″ Screen 0 “Screen5″ 0 0 InputDevice “Mouse5″ “CorePointer” InputDevice “Keyboard5″ “CoreKeyboard” EndSection There is a simple trick to help verify that all the numbers in the xorg.conf file are right — pass the file through sort and uniq.
cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf | sort | uniq The output of the above command string will make obvious any errors in numbering the various keyboards and such.
Testing Your Xorg.conf File: It is a good idea to test your configuration and to sort out the keyboards and mice by bringing up the heads one at a time. Login remotely so that you are not using any of the video heads. Enter the following commands for each of the six heads (0 to 5). (The commands below are for head 5.)
X -novtswitch -sharevts -nolisten tcp -layout seat5 :5 & xterm -display :5 & If the above command fails, examine the error messages and check the xorg.conf file. If the command succeeds, use the xterm to help identify which keyboard and mouse go to which head. The keyboards, mice, and video cards are enumerated in the same order on every boot, so you will only have to move things around during the initial set up.
The above commands might be sufficient if you don’t need user logins. For example, a six headed kiosk might need only X and a web browser on each head.
Step 5: Modify gdm.conf
If you want user logins you will need to modify the configuration for your preferred display manager. The directions given here are for gdm but the changes are very similar for kdm, or for the X display manager, xdm.
Modify the [servers] section near the bottom of the /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf file to tell gdm which X servers to start. The lines should be: 0=Standard0 1=Standard1 2=Standard2 3=Standard3 4=Standard4 5=Standard5 You need to tell gdm how to start the X server on each head. The lines to do this are: [server-Standard5] name=Standard server command=/usr/X11R6/bin/X -nolisten tcp -novtswitch -sharevts -layout seat5 flexible=true You’ll need a section like the above for each head. The server name, “Standard5″ in the above example, must match the name given in the [servers] section. Customize the X command line options to meet the requirements of your particular system.
Once everything is configured, you should be able to start graphical logins by switching to runlevel 5. telinit 5 If everything works, make the default runlevel 5 by editing /etc/inittab or by setting it using drakconf.
Test Results, Costs, and Problems
Performance Results: Between resets, we found performance to be excellent for six users doing typical PC tasks, including web browsing, email, word processing, and games. The accelerated graphics cards seemed to do most of the work so that even arcade style games and web-based video did not put much of a load on the CPU. If “3200″ is an accurate assessment of the performance of the AMD64-3200, then a CPU with a performance of “1600″ would have been more than sufficient.
Cost: Not including the monitor, each seat in our system cost about $67. This includes $40 for the MX4000 based video card, $20 for a USB keyboard, $5 for a USB mouse, and $2 for half of a USB hub. Our test system uses expensive keyboards that have a built-in USB hub which we intended for per user flash disks or audio players.
The shared part of our system cost about $520. This includes $180 for the CPU, $50 for the motherboard, $90 for RAM, and $50 for the CPU heat sink. The case, power supply, and disk drive had a combined cost of about $150.
We give these prices just for comparison. You may find lower prices that these and we’d certainly recommend that you replace our $230 CPU and motherboard with an Athlon 2800+ set that costs about $80. We have not included the cost of the monitors since these prices are in free fall and your particular needs and tastes may dictate what you spend.
Problems: Did you catch the phrase “between resets” above? While the system worked very well, it was extremely unstable. In particular, we got a kernel oops fairly often when we logged out. A syslog trace of one such oops is available here. We’ve tried several things to fix this problem including:
- turning APIC off and on
- reducing the number of heads
- trying the ‘nv’ and ‘vesa’ drivers
- using NoInt10
- upgrading to the official X11R6.9 release
- upgrading to the 2.6.15 kernel
- using xdm and fvwm instead of gdm and Gnome
The problem persists. Please let bsmith at linuxtoys dot org know if you have any ideas that might help fix this problem.
A much less severe problem is that some programs assume that there is a single user on the PC. Screen savers can take a lot of CPU power and both KDE and Gnome complain if they don’t have audio output. Any shared resource, such as audio or a CD burner, can be a problem.
Longer term, we will need to address security issues surrounding multi-seat computers. Whether from students or cafe patrons, these systems are going to come under deliberate, malicious attack. Can we trust KDE and Gnome to withstand such attacks?
Summary
A multi-head, multi-user Linux system is now possible using commodity PC hardware and standard Linux distributions. Multi-seat Linux PCs seem inevitable given the potential savings in cost, noise, and power.
Further Reading
Chris Tyler’s page: Chris Tyler provided support at almost every step of the way in this project. His web site has a HOWTO that also describes how to set up a multi-seat system. Chris is something of an expert in X and I’m looking forward to his next book which will contain some of the material presented here. Chris’ web site is at:
http://blog.chris.tylers.info/
Xorg man pages: Xorg provides a full set of manual pages that describe the xorg.conf file and all of the commands used in getting X-Windows to run. The manual page for xorg.conf is at:
http://wiki.x.org/X11R6.9.0/doc/html/xorg.conf.5.html
The manual pages for the X commands are at:
http://wiki.x.org/X11R6.9.0/doc/html/manindex1.html
Quoted from http://thebrowser.blogs.fortune.com/2007/06/29/the-iphone-is-business-medias-paris-hilton/:
The Browser: Analyzing the tech biz The iPhone is business media’s Paris Hilton «
The iPhone is business media’s ParisHilton
The Browser nowunderstands how the folks attelevision news organizations like CNN(part of the CNN/Money family)feel when they privately complain aboutleading the news with stories about Paris Hilton. They know the story is overhyped and lacks the value of other news, but they struggle with the fact thatviewers seem to love it, even demand it.
The iPhone isourParis Hilton.
The news value of the product launch doesn’t merit all the coverage it is getting - but yeteverytimeThe Browser writes about the iPhonewegettons of reader feedback. (Some of it comes from Apple (AAPL)enthusiasts who seem to pore over every sentence looking for hidden or overt anti-Apple bias.) Sowe feed the beast with more iPhone stories and blog posts.
And like Paris Hilton, the iPhone won’t go away.To paraphrase New Yorkmagazine’s Undulating Curve of Shifting Expectations, there will be backlash to the iPhone and then backlash to the backlash. (We’rewell past the overhype stage, so expect the iPhone to be uncool in about 3 days, and so uncool-it’s-coolby mid July.)
Perhaps by the time we hitthe backlash to the backlash to the backlashwecan moveon to blogging about other news of the day. Like Paris Hilton’s latest exploit. Meanwhile, keep reading the Browser for more about, you guessed it, the iPhone.
Quoted from http://www.23degrees.net/tools/archives/56-Making-a-digital-picture-frame.html:
Making a digital picture frame – Morehow Hibimoyo
Recently I was wondering if there is a better way to show my digital photos without buying into a proprietary system. There is a better way. I found some sites describing how to make your own frame from a laptop computer but a lot of experimentation was needed to get my frame to function properly.
This is the core of the computer. Everything is removed except for the CPU mainboard. After labelling the cables I could begin to put things back together.
The trouble was I couldn’t afford anything fancy but I needed something fast enough to play videos. I searched for a long time until it was almost too late. My deadline was approaching when I saw an old CTX laptop. The brand is actually discontinued now but this one had an original drivers CD with it. The hinge was severely broken on both sides. This laptop has a plastic frame so repairing this would require a lot of work – perfect for dismantling. I bought it for CAD$320.
Why Make This System?
Instead of denial I propose to artists to practice acceptance and gratitude for the tools we are able to use in making our art. The tools of art are as much of a subject in art as the stories we tell. Unfortunately modernist ideas have obscured even many postmodern minds with the ideas of “a classless society” that ignores the medium “as long as the message is good.” The postmodern reaction seems to be mostly in the discarding of the ideal of “a better life through progress.” But society has not ceased to change. Artists must be able to see their own work in a larger context, regardless if they work in a gallery setting or in the commercial market. To do less than this is to merely react to trends in the art community without thinking about why and how we are able to make art regardless if its a painting using mass produced pigments or a photographer using commercial digital equipment.
In this way the photograph and more so the film owe their credits not only to the artists who conceptualise the forms they will take but also the people who invent and make the instruments of these mediums. In many ways both are a celebration or critique of industrialised society. Largely it has been musicians that have investigated the connection between art and industry. Groups like Einstürzende Neubauten ( lit. Tearing down new buildings ) have used machinery and bits of raw commodities as their musical instruments. The aura of glamour surrounding film and photography rejects a view of itself on purely mechanical and industrial terms. Without industry the glamour would not exist. It is an integral part of both mediums.
Here I was seeing how all the parts would fit after I turned the screen up-side-down and put it on the other side of the mat board. I used paper to test the placement of everything before using plexi.
The Laptop I Used
When I brought it home I began to test all the components. Things seemed to work ok with the Windows operating system. I didn’t want to run Windows because I wanted the open programmability of a Unix like operating system. This is where the fun began.
I downloaded FreeBSD 4.8 since I’m running an older FreeBSD on this server (back when I wrote this). It would have made things simpler to use the same OS on both computers but I got a kernel panic every time I tried to boot the installer. Eventually I gave up.
I used Debian before. So I downloaded the Debian installer floppies.
Problems encountered:
- The CDROM on this EZbook is not reliable with any form or Linux, there are some workarounds but these were not worth my time.
- The Belkin network card was not in the original pcmcia.config file. The Belkin Linux FAQ lists the data that must be entered into the file. This was an easy fix – see the end of this document for exact details.
- Partitioning a harddrive that is only 2 GB is not easy. I wanted this to be a robust system with very separate home and var directories.
- The CTX laptops have a strange quirk. They need to have a small partition at the beginning of the drive for writing the RAM to disk when it goes to sleep. Linux does not use this function as far as I know. It does’t work on my EZbook, but I had to wipe the drive clean and install this partition before I installed the rest of Debian.
This is the first simple version of the frame. I was using foam-core and mat board because it’s easy to work with but its not a very strong material for a long lasting frame. For the final result I used plexi.
After three installs I had all the quirks figured out. The computer runs almost perfectly. One little problem is that the clock battery is weak. The computer will not boot properly if it has been unplugged for a few days. Then I need to put the hard-drive in a horizontal position to boot it. After this it runs fine on its side. If I leave it plugged in all the time it boots without any trouble.
Some specs on this system:
- EZbook series, 233 Pentium with MMX
- 32 MB RAM
- 2 GB hard-drive swap = 320 MB, / = 160 MB, /usr = 900 MB, /var = 160 MB, /tmp = 45 MB
I need to have 320 MB of swap to run Imagemagick’s animate function. It uses a lot of RAM and will crash if it can’t get enough. I am using Mplayer to run the clips I made. It uses very little resources but it flashes back to the Xserver desktop each time it begins a new loop. I can run it either on top of XF86 running Blackbox or from the console directly to the video card (vo=vesa).
The Screen Test
After I knew everything would work properly I began to transfer all the parts to the clear plastic sheet. Since the protective wrapping is still on the plastic you can’t see it’s transparent but it kept the surface from being scratched during the work.
The first iteration of the laptop frame was made with the whole computer still intact. I wanted to get it all working before I removed any crucial parts. When I was happy the with the network, USB and video performance I dismantled the whole computer. I removed as many parts as I could.
Parts discarded:
- CDROM
- floppy
- battery mounts
- keyboard
- trackpad
The Prototype
This made the motherboard very compact. I put this upside-down onto a piece of mat board. I needed to keep the RAM and other bulky components from touching the paper. I used the plastic screw mounts from an old radio. I used a small power tool with a cut-off wheel to get those parts. I screwed every mount to the motherboard. Then it would be easy to glue the whole thing down to the mat board. Epoxy glue held the mounts to the mat.
The screen was glued to the other side of the mat board. Slots were cut into the mat to allow the connectors to pass through. I had to plug in the connectors with the screen facing backwards from its original placement. I put the computer upside-down as well. I used spacers in between the screen and the board to keep it from overheating.
I was happy with the layout. It worked properly and it ran very cool so the fan never needed to turn on to cool the CPU. I was worried about this since the CPU heat-sink fins faced the bottom of the computer. This is not an efficient way to cool.
The Final Design
I wanted the final look to be minimalistic. My brother began to help me put this together. He suggested I use clear plastic sheets to support the CPU and screen. So the screen and the CPU are attached back to back on the same piece of plastic sheet. The rear sheet is used to hold the assembly to the wall and protect the CPU but it isn’t touching it at all. The two pieces are held in place with dowels drilled from both ends.
The photo gallery for the laptop digital frame is here.
The finished laptop frame displaying a looping five minute time-lapse film I made called “United” in 2004. More Technical Info
I needed to add this to my /etc/pcmcia/config-2.4 for my Belkin PCMCIA ethernet card to work properly before I could do a network install.
- card “Belkin 5020″
- version “Belkin”, “F5D5020-PCMCIA-Network-Card”
- bind “pcnet_cs”
I decided to partition the hard-drive this way to prevent any overlap or full partitions. Maybe I was too paranoid. I also opted for a journaling file system* because I expect this laptop to be be shutdown in nasty ways if it on exhibit, like it already has been a few times it was shown without my presence. The *ext3fs keeps the file system up-to-date so there is little or no corruption when it’s rebooted. The best part of this is that I don’t have to be there to run fsck on the disk and I don’t have to teach anyone to do it for me.
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/hda5 183M 62M 111M 36% /
/dev/hda6 1.3G 826M 421M 67% /usr
/dev/hda7 168M 48M 112M 30% /var
/dev/hda8 38M 4.1M 32M 12% /tmp
I’m using Murasaki instead of Hotplug for my USB devices. It seems to work a lot better for me. I can use an apple keyboard and a Logitech 3-button mouse without drivers anytime I want.
Quoted from http://www.gearlog.com/2007/06/iphone_bluetooth_compatibility.php:
iPhone Bluetooth Compatibility List – Gearlog
As Dan Costa has been editing Tim’s and my iPhone review, I’ve been busy attaching every Bluetooth headset I can find to our iPhone. Want to know what works and what doesn’t?
So far my recommendations – strictly in terms of iPhone compatibility – are the BlueAnt V12 headset and the BlueAnt Supertooth Light in-car speakerphone. The V12 had unusually clear connections and transferred caller ID information to its built in screen accurately. The Supertooth, meanwhile, fixed the iPhone’s problem of having a too-quiet speakerphone by really pumping up the volume.
For full results with headsets and speakerphones, head to the jump.
Garmin Nuvi 660 speakerphone/GPS: Pairing OK. Dialing OK. Speakerphone OK. BUT microphone is AWFUL – call sounded horribly noisy and muffled on other end. Also, Nuvi stalled while trying to transfer 1585 contact phone book.
Motorola H800: OK.
Plantronics Voyager 510: OK.
Plantronics Pulsar 590 (in mono mode): OK.
SoundID SM100: OK, but some background hiss.
Blueant V12: OK, and unusually loud and clear! Number, not name caller ID on headset screen.
Blueant Supertooth Light: OK
Motorola H9: OK, but very staticy
Samsung WEP200: OK, and loud
Have you tested any Bluetooth headsets? Add them here.
Quoted from http://skattertech.com/2007/04/review-shure-se210-earphones/:
Review: Shure SE210 Earphones | Skatter Tech
Skatter Tech got a hold of the Shure SE210, an upgrade to the popular E Series, a few weeks ago and we have been quite pleased with the headset’s performance. The headphones included with most MP3 players, including iPods, are not exactly top notch. Purchasing a high quality set of headphones makes quite a big difference. Although the SE210 is at the bottom of their line of high-end earphones, it is still one of the best ones available on the market. (We reviewed the SE210-K Black)
Shure SE-210 Specs:
- Sound Isolating Earphones
- Hi-Definition Micro Speaker
- Frequency Range: 25Hz – 18.5kHz
- Included: Deluxe Fit Kit & Case
- Available in Black or White
- Price (MSRP):
$179 $150
If you own the previous E2c model, the first thing you’ll notice is that the new SE210 earphones are much smaller and lighter. We felt the material also looked cheaper, but the sound it produced proved us wrong. Shure kept the headset in the Y-shape form factor instead of switching over to other styles such as “behind-the-neck,” which Sony uses in their headsets. Unlike its predecessor, which had a 56-inch cord, the Shure SE210 offers flexibility by including a 36-inch extension cord to go along with the short 18-inch headset. (54 inches total) Finally, Shure has improved the performance of the bass since it could barely be heard in the E2c’s.
Another bonus when you purchase Shure earphones is that they are almost guaranteed to fit (unless you have really weird ears). Shure includes 3 types of headphone sleeves: foam sleeves (S/M/L), rubber flex sleeves (S/M/L), and a triple flange sleeves. In addition to the sleeves, Shure bundles a semi-hard carrying case, the 3-foot extension cord, and a little tool to clean out wax from your earphones.
Overall, the most important factor, sound quality, was superb. Although $50 more expensive than the previous model, the SE210 is quite a good improvement since the earphones are more compact, reach a wider set of frequencies, and have an improved bass. If you one of those audiophiles, who is looking for something even better, you might be interested in their other higher-end models: SE310, SE420, or SE530. However for most people who want a better set of headphones, but want something cheaper than $150, we recommend checking out these: Shure E2c, Bose Tri-Port, or Sony MDR-EX90. And as for the SE210s, they are available in stores now!
Buy Now: SE210 White or Black for $149
Links: Shure.com | SE210 Earphones
Related: Shure HeadPhones Preview
Quoted from http://www.bspcn.com/2007/05/26/top-8-linux-games-of-2007/:
Top 8 Linux Games Of 2007 | The Best Article Every day
Written by rangit.com
Below are 8 addictive 3d games for linux users to fill their time with. These games are really good and some have won awards or have been featured on magazines. Most of it is cross platform and free. You don’t have to use ‘Wine’ to be able to play as they come with Linux installers.
- Battle For Wesnoth
David White who started Wesnoth back in 2003, had a vision of a free open source strategy game that had very simple rules, uses a strong artificial intelligence, challenging and fun. Wesnoth has already passed the 1 million mark for downloads. As of March 2007, the game is available in 35 different languages.
A normal Wesnoth player has
- 200+ unit types
- 16 different races
- 6 major factions
to choose from. Actually, you can even make your own custom units, design your own map, scenarios or even campaigns. It’s all up to your creativity. The most interesting part of any game is the ability to multiplay. You can challenge up to a total of 8 friends in multiplayer fantasy battles.
- Nexuiz
Nexuiz is a free, cross platform, first person shooter distributed under GNU General Public License by Alientrap Software. It started back in May 31 2005 with version 1.0 using DarkPlaces, a significanlty modified quake engine. The current version, 2.2.3, was released on January 26, 2007. Nexuiz’s logo is based on the chinese character “力” which means strength.
Several notable features of the game include
- ability to multiplay up to 64 players
- ability to generate bots for practice sessions
- dynamic lighting system similar to Doom 3
- America’s Army
America’s Army is a tactical, multiplayer, first-person shooter owned by the United States Government and released as a global public relations initiative to help with U.S. Army recruitment. The first version, Recon, was released on 4th July 2002. The current version 2.8.1 was released on 22nd Mar 2007.
It’s the first well known computer game used for political aims. The game is used as a playable recruiting tool and critics have charged the game serves as a propaganda device. A counter on the homepage of the PC version shows over eight million registered accounts as of 2007. GameSpy tracked the game usage and reported an average of 4,500 players at any one time between 2002 and 2005. It is enough for America’s Army to rank in the Top 10 Online Games chart.
- Enemy Territory : Quake Wars
is a first-person shooter follow-up to Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory. It also has the same science fiction universe as Quake 4, with a story serving as a prequel to Quake II. Quake Wars is the second multiplayer-only game in the Quake series after Quake III Arena. The gameplay is almost the same as Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, but with the addition of controllable vehicles and aircraft, asymmetric teams, much larger maps and the option of computer-controlled bots. Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is being developed by Splash Damage for the PC using a modified version of id Software’s Doom 3 engine and MegaTexture rendering technology.
At E3 2006(Electronic Entertainment Expo), the game won the Game Critics Award for Best Online Multiplayer.
- Tremulous
Tremulous is an open source team-based first-person shooter with a game play that is similar to Gloom(a quake 2 mod) and Natural Selection (a Half-Life mod). The game features two teams, humans and aliens, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. The game has been downloaded over 200,000 times and was voted “Player’s Choice Standalone Game of the Year” in Mod Database’s “Mod of the Year” 2006 competition.
- Tux Racer
Tux Racer is a newbie friendly, open source, 3D computer game starring the Linux mascot, Tux the penguin. Like many open-source games, the replay value of Tux Racer is extended by easy modification of the game. New maps can be created by making three raster images to indicate height, surface, and object placement. The last release of Tux Racer was version 0.61, 29th October 2001.
- World Of Padman
WOP is a new and free comic style game that uses the Quake 3 engine. The game was recently featured in 3 German magazine covers; PC Action, ‘BRAVO Screenfun’ and ‘Linux Intern’.
- Vendetta
is a first person twitch based MMORPG. New players get an 8 hour trial which is enough to get anyone hooked to it. After that, you gotta pay $5 a month which is quite worthwhile, especially considering the incredibly communicative development of the game. It has a native linux installer as well as one for Macs and Windows.
Quoted from http://www.jscreenfix.com/:
JScreenFix – Fix stuck pixels and screen burn-in
JScreenFix
JScreenFix is a software solution that can fix stuck pixels, reduce screen burn-in and improve the quality of images displayed on a screen.
What is a stuck pixel?
A stuck pixel is a bright dot of colour most noticeable when the rest of the screen is black. Stuck pixels are fairly common on high resolution LCD screens. Stuck pixels sometimes start working again with time unless they appear black on a white background, these are known as dead pixels.
JScreenFix repairs stuck pixels through rapid, repetitive operation and resonance. Most stuck pixels are repaired within 20 minutes. How do I check for stuck pixels?
What is screen burn-in?
Dark patches on a plasma screen are the result of screen burn-in. Burn-in occurs on plasma screens if an area of the screen does not change for a long period of time. For TV input, channel logos often burn into the screen. This can also occur on LCD screens and is more correctly referred to as image persistence.
JScreenFix can eliminate image persistence on LCD screens and reduce burn-in on plasma screens. How do I check for screen burn-in?
JScreenFix deluxe can prevent noticeable damage by monitoring how a screen is used and equalising burn-in patterns.
How do I fix a screen?
This depends on the type of screen and the device it is connected to. For LCD screens connected to a computer, the JScreenFix applet is the best solution. The JScreenFix applet can also be used to reduce screen burn-in on plasma screens when run in fullscreen mode.
JScreenFix deluxe is the recommended solution for computers connected to plasma screens. This utility monitors how the display is used and can equalise future damage automatically. It also includes support for defining templates to repair previous burn-in and reoccurring stuck pixels.
For PDAs, mobile phones and other portable devices supporting Java, the Java Midlet should be used.
For screens connected to a standalone DVD player, PixelProtector is the best solution.
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