On Wed, 2 Jun 2010, Zane H. Healy wrote: I had never heard of "Rough Service" bulbs until the 1970s. When I had a large automotive repair business in the 1970s, I bought them by the case. I also saved replaced automobile headlights to use the remaining filament for power supply testing. I still won't use anything but "rough service" in drop lights, portable lights, desk lamps, goose-neck lamps, swing-arm lamps, etc. I have a swing-arm lamp for my bed. Its power is controlled by a small box that also flashes it when the phone rings. What else should I use? About 15 years ago, Harbor Freight stopped carrying rough-service bulbs. But I got a helluva deal at their parking lot sale! It will take me a while to use up a dozen cases of them. "No more than two to a package"??? Don't they realize that tinfoil hats act as antennas? -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com

SOme years ago, I saw a CFL-like thing which consisted of an adaptor that fitted into the noraml (ES or BC) light socket and into which you plugged a Philips PL tube (I think) -- that being a U=-haped fluorescent lamp with a glow starter switch hidden in the base. The adapter contained the (iron core choke) ballast. Why isn't something similar done now. Have an adapter containint eh electronics which lasts for a long time, and just replace the fluorescent tube when it fails? -tony

On Thu, 3 Jun 2010, Chuck Guzis wrote: Remember the shorter the life of the bulb, the more bulbs you can sell. Zane

And people tell me that soiid-state electronics lasts 'for ever' OK, well still have separate tube and electronics, so you can replace just the electronics when it fails (thus reducing the amount of mercury let loose). Or of course provide a scheamtic of the electronics module, so to can be _repaired_ :-) Well, the electrodes will be damaged in time (even if there is no heater) -- things like NE2s do blacken in the end. And the gas will (very slowly) difuse through the glass. Oh, and the phosphor will probably degrade/ -tony

---snip--- ---snip--- Hi I had a few of these. 100% of my failures were the base and not the bulb. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ The New Busy is not the too busy. Combine all your e-mail accounts with Hotmail. http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?tile=multiaccount&ocid=P…

On 04/06/10 00:36, Fred Cisin wrote: No, but I've asked a Maplins employee for a Y-cable to split a 5.25" floppy drive power connector into a 5.25" and a 3.5" connector. "Durrrrh, I don't think they make those, it'd, like, overload your power supply." "They're a standard part, and you list them on your website." "That must be one of our competitors' websites, like, trying to pass themselves off as us and, like, confuse our customers..." I had a walk around and found a Y-cable, and the "Computer Department Sales Expert" was still wittering on about how my PSU was going to blow up... Idiot. I actually wanted to use it as an adapter -- I have a Sharkoon DriveLink, which is a neat little box that lets you hook an ATA (3.5" or 2.5") or SATA drive straight up to a USB port. It came with a nifty little power supply which supplies 5V and 12V.... on a 5.25"-floppy-style Molex connector. That power supply is very handy for powering disc drives for DiscFerret test runs :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 04/06/10 02:45, Chuck Guzis wrote: Maplins had the same sort of 'air' about it. It was about the only place you could go at two o'clock on a Sunday afternoon and get that one resistor or whatever that you needed to finish off your project. "M4K7, quantity five, and M8K1, quantity three please." (M was the part-prefix for a 0.7W "Min Res" metal film resistor, but they were the same size as 0.25W MF / CF resistors) Hmm. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

Sounds a bit like Maplin over here. About 15 years ago Maplin sold just eelctronic components and related things like electronics books, tools, multimeters, etc. Their range wan't great, but they generally had the common transsitors, TTL chips, resistors, capacitors, etc in stock in the shops. When I was working in Bristol I would routinely go to the Maplin shop to pick uip a load of components for my work or hobby. Now they sell mostly poor-grade consumer electronics and a few components. They can be useful for common connectors in a hurry. But forget trying to get anything exotic (likea 10k resistor)... -tony

Philip Pemberton wrote: Never, EVER, **EVER** skimp on power supplies. Peace... Sridhar

Philip Pemberton wrote: No matter how close a friend you are, I won't let you put me in a position where you can blame me for your own screwup. I also wouldn't have paid for the parts lost due to shortsightedness. Peace... Sridhar

On 05/06/10 10:55, Tony Duell wrote: They used to stock the Antex 660TC soldering station. I got one as "discontinued stock" a while ago for a good bit less than the RRP. That thing has had one new soldering iron (was ?2 cheaper to replace the whole thing than just replace the dead heating element), a couple of new bits, and I've had to open the back to tighten up the screws on the power transformer. Other than that, no issues. Solidly built British-made kit. But Farnell still do :) The Multicore stuff is fiercely expensive, but the stuff they stock as "Multicomp" (i.e. "whatever was cheapest at the time") is pretty decent. At one point the Multicomp stuff was badge-engineered Multicore "562" 60/40 SnPb or something very close to it. I suspect a short in the transformer. Whatever it was, it made a loud bang and dumped a lot of Magic Smoke... Hearing the fan (briefly) rev up to WAY beyond full speed pretty much cemented my (correct) opinion that the machine wasn't going to be doing anything useful any time soon. "Dummy load / PSU tester" is right on the top of my "stuff to build" list :) I just have to figure out how to do the "constant power" regulation. I want to go with opamps for the regulation (faster response time to V/I transients) and a D/A to set the current/voltage/power 'setpoint'. Constant-voltage is easy (drain enough current to bring V_in down to the setpoint). Constant-current is just as easy (drain a fixed current). Constant power involves a bit of maths (a multiply and some division if you're doing PID control or some lesser variant thereof). A microcontroller-based implementation would work, but respond slowly to load transients (which is hardly ideal). -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

Philip Pemberton wrote: Might be more complexity and designing than you wish for the task, but JOOI, one way of doing constant-power regulation is with an analog-multiplier IC. I've seen this done (on the supply side) in a HV lab power supply, using an MC1494 4-quadrant multiplier. I can supply the reverse-engineered schematic if of interest. The MC1494 is 70/80's-era chip, I don't know what's current these days.

On 11/06/10 02:23, Brent Hilpert wrote: That would be nice if it's not too much trouble. I seem to recall the MC1494 being a Gilbert-cell multiplier. The SA602 or SA612 might be one option, but ADI do the AD532 which would probably be a much better choice. Unfortunately even the cheapest version of that chip (10-lead TO-100) is about $20 in 100-off. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

I learnt mean years ago that the correct answer to a Maplin (or Radio Shack, back whenwhe had such shops over here) employee asking 'can I help you ' was 'No'. :-) -tony

Zane H. Healy wrote: The ones in malls are terrible. The stand-alone stores are far from terrible. Peace... Sridhar

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: My 2 data points go the other way around: the Radio Shack in downtown College Park has nothing interesting, but the one in Arundel Mills Mall has a bunch of components; I got an insulated mouting kit for a TO-220 there the other day, and that's where I bought my current mutimeter. Alexey

On 06/04/2010 02:46 PM, Dave McGuire wrote: The weirdest Rat Shack experience I've had was when I bought a can of contact cleaner from them, not in pen form, but in spray form. The clerk wanted to see ID for it. I think he was confused, it wasn't spray paint after all. :) I remember when I was a kid, I used to be able to go into RS stores and talk to the guys there and they'd be able to recommend what IC's I could buy to experiment with... stuff like logic gates for example. Now you're lucky if they just have connectors. Oh well, At least they stopped hassling me about wanting to buy a cell phone, I mean, duh, there's one on my belt, what would I need another for?

On 06/05/2010 12:12 PM, Jim Leonard wrote: Yeah, I didn't get too deep into electronics either, but it was fun to play with circuits... mmm, my kid's about 6 now, I think maybe I'll see about helping him make a few simple circuits for fun, something like an LED and batter with a switch, or maybe a motor or two... just to see if there's any interest. If there is, I'll see if those 50-in-1 kits are still available. :) Sure would beat playing with legos.

On 06/05/2010 07:56 AM, Tony Duell wrote: Well, that I don't have. Maybe the 1650 logic analyzer has it, but I'm not going to let him play with that just yet. But that's not a bad idea. Maybe I can find some simple interface to a USB port and build something to interface with a bunch of relays. Maybe an old USB parallel port interface will do the trick. I actually do have one of the early ones of these kits. Someone gave it to me as a gift before the kids were born, but I've not messed with it myself. So that might be the way to go since he's already into legos. I'll dig it out of the back of the closet. Yes, being able to afford all he'd want is going to be interesting. Some of these kits are $300-$450. I'm not sure he would need a 32 bit processor controller when he's already got his own computer. If he gets that interested, I'll hack something up with a PIC or Arduino board and wire it up to relays or motors. Come to think of it, I'm sure I could dig up an old laptop and use the parallel ports on that as a relay controller. Could fire up DOS and write some simple BASIC programs to control relays via the parallel port... yup, sounds like a plan. Would need some sort of platform with motor controlled wheels to mount a laptop on top of... or maybe if I could find a large toy tank and mount the laptop on top, since prebuilt tank treads should be easier to control - would just take 4 bits. left tread fwd/back, right tread fwd/back. Would need some logic to prevent fwd/back from being turned on at the same time, but actually, could use one relay for direction, and a second to turn the motor on or off, so it wouldn't be possible to go fwd and back at the same time. Yeah, that would work nicely... So 4 relays and two motors, and a few batteries. After that we can add sensors, etc.

It gives you a nice "high" :) For them to fill they daily sales quota :)

On 4 Jun 2010 at 11:34, Zane H. Healy wrote: Funny you should mention that--AFAIK, Radio Shack still sells a fairly nice $7 wire wrap tool, with a stripper hidden in the handle. I have one and use it occasionally to manually wrap--it's eaier to use than either my old Vector or OK tools. --Chuck

On 04/06/10 19:55, Chuck Guzis wrote: Is that the little silver one which looks like one of those cheap "precision" screwdrivers you get in those 6-for-$1 kits? Part number 276-1570? I ended up importing one of those -- RS wouldn't sell it to me over the web so I got someone to buy one for me and shove it in an envelope. Great little tool -- and one of the few I won't lend out to ANYONE. The other tool on my "Not For Loan" list is a Paladin Tools 7000 "CrimpAll" ratcheted crimp tool, with the Molex pin-crimping die. Said crimping die was a pig to find -- it was discontinued at the time, and there were only three left, all on a shelf in a surplus electronics place in California. Ended up calling in a few favours, got them shipped to a friend-of-a-friend's girlfriend on the east coast, then had her send them to me (the friend-of-a-friend and my friend wanted one each too). Great fun, but worth it in the end :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

<snip> The good news is I also have a large collection of molex, amp, paladin, et. al. crimpers from surplus sales, etc. The bad news is all the firms which sold them off in the LA area are gone, along with jobs they created, which would not be so bad right about now (or anywhere). They didn't migrate, they just went away. Jim

<snip> I am on a hiatus from doing much hardware, but I have pulled them all out at times. Latest was a lot of 8 pin work for a phone system. One of my customers bought a duplicate of what I could have pulled from stock for $300 recently, before I could stop them. I do mostly serial cables, some single pin crimping when doing wiring. I did manage to snag a bunch of crimpers for the big 25 pair cables from amp, ampex, and really never have had to use them, but I have loaned them a few times. That much cabling has finally gone from me having to have much to do with it in favor of a lot of networking, which I don't really do, just have done. I did do a lot of 1A2 switch work, but my phone system is stashed, since we sold our house in 2004. Our mobile home is now served by vonage, and a collection of wireless, rather than the nice 5 line phones we used to have. We punted the wired phone for cell for a couple of years, then added vonage. If I was not so lazy, I'd figure out how to do the phones w/o vonage, but I doubt it would be worth the money I'd save because the voip world changes so fast. I do have free dialtone a few places, but don't use it. Rarest thing I have are the weird dec MMJ 6 pin serial connectors and crimper, because of wiring a data center full of alphas, as far as on topic for here. Also have an AMP press, and a couple of T&B presses, with a lot of chucks for said. Those can go for scrap metal, then 2 weeks later people want $1000 for a set of press, and a couple of chucks. I hate that, and hopefully won't ever have to buy any at the high end. I understand that all of this begs the obvious need in some settings to have traceable tooling and that this is just for hack jobs. A lot of the stuff people probably get are timed or worn out junk from various manufacturing settings. I try to buy at least at the top of the food chain, unless the crimper is really rare, and looks potentially useful. Jim

I spend far too much time and money looking at second-hand books. I tend to buy just aobut an 'old' book on electrical/electronic subjects (I think the oldest I have is datad 1892...), and anything that looks 'interesting'. A book containg a scehamtic or ROM listing for a commercial product is almost certain to end up on my bookshelf. -tony

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Tony Duell wrote: Actually this brings up an interesting point. At bookstores around here you used to be able to buy Linux distro's even though they wouldn't sell any other software. I've noticed that pretty much every British Linux magazine I've seen seems to include at least one Linux distribution on CD/DVD. BTW, is the UK's chief export periodicals? Also why are they so much more interesting than ones published in the US? Zane

I don;t think I've ever seen a Linux CD-ROM (or whatever) on its own for sale in a bookshop over here. There are plenty of linux books that include a distribution CD-ROM in the back, of course. But there are many other books that come with a CD-ROM of software, nothing to do with linux Eeek!. Considering that I regard most UK magazines are being pretty awful, yous must be downright useless :-( -tony

On 04/06/10 20:19, Tony Duell wrote: Seconded. If UK magazines are good, your benchmark must be pretty damn bad! A few examples... "PC Plus" started out pretty good -- in their heyday, they negotiated a deal with Borland/Inprise to include Delphi 3 on a cover CD with no license restrictions, then did a ton of programming tutorials based around it. Around 2003 it turned to mush -- the programming articles were gone, and the software on the CD was barrel-scrapingly bad stuff. Some of it didn't even install or work... which says a lot about the QA staff at Future Publishing. EPE (Everyday Practical Electronics) -- again, great up until they decided to stop accepting freelance submissions, and bought ALL of their content in from Silicon Chip. Dave Barrington's "Shoptalk" column (basically: "where to get the weird parts used by this project") got the axe quite early on, I think Net Work and Circuit Surgery are still going, but IMHO the magazine is pretty damn crappy. Their ideas for pricing on the back-issue CDs are mad... Elektor was (and still is) quite good. But it's more of a "technology" magazine now than the project-oriented magazine that it (and EPE for that matter) used to be. They have recently released a DVD with all the articles from 1990 to 1999 on, which is a nice step -- not up to the degree of CCi's "here's every issue we ever published" archive, but still better than EPE's "if it's more than 3 years old it doesn't exist" attitude. Circuit Cellar is still going and well worth the money for a digital subscription. But they've just been bought out by Elektor, which is somewhat worrying. One can only wonder what 'the Big E' are going to do to it. Although they have kept Steve Ciarcia on, which is a good first step (as long as they keep him in the 'editorial control loop'). The old "Electronics: The Maplin Magazine", aka "Electronics and Music Maker" and "Electronics and Beyond" was actually pretty good. It always seemed to me it was more of a sideline for Maplin's -- something to push their project kits. Post-1999, it took a rather odd route down the 'pseudo-science' track, with columns from the likes of Uri Geller (anyone remember him? <GRIN>). Apparently this got sold to Kanda in ~2001, and was (quite quickly) run into the ground. Let's see... what else is there... Amateur Photographer.. can't say a bad word about this. The price is right at least, and it gives me something to read at work on my lunch break (AP is published weekly) :) Photography Monthly -- used to be good, until the editor stepped down and someone else took over... and proceeded to revamp the style of the magazine completely. Now it may as well be "how to Photoshop your digital photos like a complete tit". Practical Photography -- the kings of the Twelve Month Rolling Loop. I kid you not, buy a years' worth of that magazine, and you've got just about every article they're going to publish for the following year. Also I'm not a fan of Bauer Media... it took four phone calls and a letter to them and my bank to cancel the bloody Direct Debit... and they're still spamming me with "look, we've got some other great magazines you might want to read!" emails / post. Which goes straight into the bin. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 05/06/10 11:12, Tony Duell wrote: They're going down the path a bit, and I'm debating whether to carry on with my subscription (it's up for renewal in September). If they carry on with the "here's a really cool project... and you have to buy it ready built" bullcrap, they can stick their renewal "reminders" where the sun doesn't shine. Although in a few cases the article makes it fairly easy to figure out what the project needs to do. The 1974 thru ~1986 era is all-transistor-and-TTL (with few exceptions), whereas the 1990-1999 era is mostly microcontroller systems with little TTL. Very odd for them to publish the 1990-1999 PDFs in preference to (say) 1974-1984 -- nearly all the transistors used in those circuits were "TUN" or "TUP"s; that is, Transistor, Universal, NPN or PNP respectively. Diodes similarly were "DUG" or "DUS" -- Diode, Universal, Germanium or Silicon. TTL is similarly easily available, any electronics hobbyist worth his salt will know that 74LS can usually be subbed in for straight-74xx TTL. It's still possible to get a subscription over-the-phone, it just costs a HELL of a lot. Something like $100 for a paper CCi sub last time I checked, most of that being the P&P. It's both amusing and saddening to see them publish an answer to someone's query one week, then publish a retraction-and-correction the following week. Things like suggesting RAID arrays as an alternative to offline backups (CD-R, DVD-R, tape, ...) Little hint -- what happens if there's a power spike? I'd really like to learn how to do some more advanced plastic/metalworking (and get the tools to do it). At high school we had a fair few wood/metalworking tools (most of which were in pretty good nick), a teacher who knew his stuff (IIRC he used to work for a metalworking company, retired, then started working as a teacher). We also had a headteacher who was the sort of person who'd make the kids run around in plastic bubbles for "health and safety" reasons. Design-tech and science got cut almost entirely (the latter had all the experiments and demonstrations cut and was turned into a lecture / question-and-answer / exam session)... At some point I really need to read up on vacuum tube technology.. and maybe re-read the stuff in AoE about BJT and FET operation. I've never been much good with transistors when used as amplifiers (though I know how to rig them up as switches)... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 08/06/10 19:31, Tony Duell wrote: Point taken. But they were the exception rather than the norm. Store a lithium-ion pack fully discharged and you're asking for trouble (if it self-discharges below ~3.5V most chargers won't touch it). Wouldn't be surprised if half the "dead" digicam and phone batteries were just discharged below the "minimum" mark; a 3.8V PSU with a 10mA limit will bring them back into the land of the living in a fairly short span of time. Li-ion and Li-polymer are generally best stored about half charged. Not sure about NiMH or Nicad, it's been a while since I read the spec sheets. AIUI Pb-acid and Pb-gel are best stored charged with a monthly top-off charge. Leave them on all the time and they sulphate -- or is that leaving them discharged? Again, been a while since I skimmed the spec sheets. Let's see what I've got in my kit box... Olympus OM10: Two SR44s, 35mm film. Have used it in some pretty rough conditions. Olympus OM4 w/ Winder II: Same story, two SR44s, but it eats them MUCH faster than the OM10. If I actually cared, I'd replace it with an OM4ti or an OM4 Mk.II (which have a newer, low-power controller board). You can theoretically use an OM4 with a flat battery, but you're limited to 1/60sec shutter speed and lose the metering. I still miss the multi-spot metering on the OM4. That was NICE, and if anyone ever ports CHDK to the EOS 7D, I'm adding it (might have to hack up live-view mode a bit but who cares!) :) Canon EOS 33v w/ battery grip: Two CR123 batteries, 35mm film, all-electronic. TTL metering, motor drive, autofocus (7-spot), and all the bells and whistles you could want. Doesn't balance well with any of the "L" series metal-body lenses. Canon EOS 7D w/ battery grip: Digital. Two lithium batteries in the grip (or one if you remove the grip), 18 megapixel APS-C sensor. 8 fps continuous burst for 19 shots on RAW (with a suitably fast memory card). VERY nice bit of kit, had it since release day (the privileges of working in a camera shop) and it hasn't let me down yet. Have previously owned: Olympus Trip 35. Let my brother borrow this, he rewarded my generosity by smashing the selenium cell. Now the metering is shot to buggery :( Canon EOS 400D w/ grip. Sold when I upgraded to a 40D Canon EOS 40D w/ grip. Sold when I got the 7D. New owner asked if he could have his money back because he "had a bit of an accident" with it... he'd dropped it in a duck pond. Idiot. I'm probably going to start with something like a Proxxon MF70 micro-mill; at the very least it'll be useful for accurately drilling and cutting holes in front panels. I can knock holes into metal and plastic panels, but I can never get the edges straight, they always look a bit bumpy :-/ -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 09/06/10 21:01, Tony Duell wrote: Most of the ones I've used were crap. Exception being the Sanyo Eneloop batteries -- which actually hold a decent charge for a useful amount of time. Energizer over-estimate their charge capacities (I've seen reports of between 10% and 40% depending on testing method), most of the cheap brands are just plain crap (Uniross especially, Gold Peak are sitting on the borderline)... I'm currently using digital camera batteries in a lot of my projects -- basically whatever's cheap at the camera shop (usually Canon NB4L or NB5L packs). 3.6V 700mAh in a package about the size of a matchbox... Care-and-feeding is a bit tricky, though Microchip and Benchmarq (erm.. TI) have released a couple of all-in-one Li-ion charger chips which cost less than ?1 in qty-1 (and about 75p in qty-10) and only need a couple of external capacitors (and an optional LED) to run. The Pen series were beautiful little cameras... I remember ogling one in the second-hand section of a local camera shop many moons ago :) Bingo. Fully working ones go for ~?25 on "that auction site". Ones which need a little attention (usually new light seals) go for a bit less, and the light-seal kits are a few quid. Not a big deal, but I'd rather like to play with other kit first. I'd rather like to try medium format or possibly one of the Leica rangefinder cameras, but the initial cost is a bit steep. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 10/06/10 01:57, Fred Cisin wrote: I've seen it -- the E-P1 and the E-PL1. Wasn't particularly impressed. Also: there are Leica lenses on the Micro-4/3rds mount? -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

Frotunately most of my projects don't have to e portable, I either build in a mains supply, or just run them off my bench supply I find rechargeable batteries to be a pain in gneeral. Unless it's something I'm using all the time, the self-discharge means they're genrally pretty flat when I want to use the device. And then I have to want for a considerable time for them to recharge. For stuff I don't have to carry around I prefer to plug it into the mains. I have a Pen-FT. It needs a little work, but I will do that sometime. They are not hard to work on (one thing I have discovered when it comes to repairing cameras is that the mroe expensive cameeras have more parts, but they are better made and actually easier to work on. I would much rather repair a Leica than a Kodak.). One thing about the Pen F series is that they;re half-frame with a vertically-hinged mirror. The lens mount-to-film distnace is thus a lot thinner than any full-frme SLR. This means you could get adapters to use just about any normal SLR lenses on them (and focus to infinity). I have the M42 screw adapter (I think it cost me more than the camera...), which has expanded the range of lenses I can use enormously. And for a lot less in charity chops. And they really are easy to take apart and rebuild.. I ratehr skipped medium format and went ot large format. It's a lot slower to use of course, but the results are spectacular. A reasonable 5*4 camera and enlarger will cost less than a good digital set-up, and I know which I'd rather use _for the sort of photography I am interested in_. You are going to kill me... Some years ago I bought a jammed Leica III (pre-war, screw mount, of course) in a camera shop for a bargain price. That night, I partially stripped it, extraced the second curtain latch, cleaned it, put one drop of watch oil in the right place, and it's been fine ever sinxe. I need to strip the slow-speed escapement sometime, but it's not urgent -tony

That tread went off the rails (power rails?) weeks ago :-) Hmmm.. The only digital camera [1] I've seen inside seemed to contain a BGA packaged chip, another PQFP chip and some bits for the flash circuit. And the lense/CCD unit, of course. It didn't look very very repairable. [1] Actually that's not true. I have a Datacopy 300 digital camera here. This thing dates fro mteh mid 1980s, and has a linear CCD which is tracked across the image using a leadscrew. Inside are half a dozen small PCBs cotnaining TTL, op-amps, a parallel multiplier chip (to do a gain correction for each pixel in the CCD, there's an EPROM of gain values too) and so on. It connects to a PERQ workstation (yes I have the interface board). Finding either the sterao brackets for the Werra (I several of those interesting cameras) or one of the bewm-splitter type of lenese for one of my 35mm cameras is something I dream of doing one day... Mains stuff, sure (due to stupid regulations), but I've never seen a charity shop that rejects battery-powered devices. And anyway, I wasn't aware that the Olympus Trip used a battery. I have bought a fair number of cameras in charity shops, from better-grade 110 film ones (Kodak Pocket Instamatic 50, which has a focusable lense, Pentax auto 110) through to SLRs. It's worth looking at the books too. I've found several classic-computer books (for subjects like PDP11 assembly language) in charity shops over here The OM1, sure (it's mechancially timed IIRC), but I wouldn't want to have to fix the elctronics in an OM10 or similar. IIRC, the winding clutch in the OM series is a weak point... You have clearly never had to work on Eumig cine cameras. Suffice it to say that the number of operations needed to extract the mechanism from the case is excessive. Give me a Bolex any day... -tony

On 10/06/10 23:06, Eric Smith wrote: In this case the cameras consisted of two PCBs -- the main board with the CMOS sensor and controller chip, and a switch board with the mode switch and power switch. The cameras had been liquid-damaged and sold as a lot. I replaced a couple of connectors, cleaned the PCBs, and managed to make a few good cameras out of a box of bad ones. From the rest, I scavenged the lens assembly and sensor. Those are in my junkbox waiting for a suitable project... I'm thinking of strapping one to a P8079HP image intensifier and building a night-vision camera of some description. The lenses are "semi-fixed" focus -- you can refocus them by loosening a screw and twisting the front of the lens, then replacing the locking screw. If I could get my sticky paws on a Kodak Ektapro high-speed camera assembly (just the sensor head and data cable), it'd be a several-thousand FPS high-speed night-vision camera :) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 11/06/10 21:11, Tony Duell wrote: Yes there was an LCD... soldered onto the main board. These things used OmniVision CMOS sensors -- as I recall, they're a lot easier to deal with than CCDs. Nowhere near as easy to use as, say, a Mitsubishi Artificial Retina (the chip that was used in the Gameboy Camera) but still not bad. Only problem is that OVT have gotten very skittish about giving out datasheets -- they used to have a huge bundle of downloadable datasheets, appnotes and so forth on their website, including (IIRC) sample code. Now everything's under an NDA, and you have to commit to buying several thousand chips per month before they'll even talk to you. The Micron and Kodak image sensors have a nicer interface than the OVT chips (and they'll give out datasheets free for the asking) but I haven't managed to find a UK distributor for them. Digikey stock a few of them, but the really cool $100 high-speed camera chip (something like 500FPS but only at 640x480 or so resolution) seems to have been ditched. Shame really, I'd have bought a couple. I've actually got a lead on a box of ten 640x480 18-bit-colour TFT panels, complete with backlight inverter. 90 Euros for the whole box, including shipping from Spain. Pennies on the pound, literally (they're NEC panels, and the RRP in that quantity is about ?80!). Piss easy to drive with an FPGA or some TTL if you're that way inclined. You basically need a dual port RAM (or a single port with a bus arbiter), one counter that goes up to 320 and another that goes up to 240. Annoyingly the touchscreen panels cost more than the LCDs -- ?15.74 each plus VAT, and they're "last time buy, all sales final" so I'll probably be getting at least one for each TFT and a spare or two... The idea was to have a handheld device running a standard-ish CPU, then give it all the basic I/O you'd need to talk to test equipment. GPIB/HPIB, serial IEC, RS232, SB-bus, ... and a Microchip wireless transceiver (specifically, the one with the built-in Zigbee/MiWi PHY/MAC). Add a Tek 4014 emulator, a digital pattern generator and a logic analyser, and I'm in heaven :) That's pretty much what these were, only without the focus switch. Probably. The macro mode on most decent digicams should do it as well. Canon PowerShot and Ixus (IIRC these are rebranded as "Elph" for the US market) cameras seem to be pretty good -- down to less than 1cm with full AF in most cases. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

Of course. This applies to any camera, digital or not. For many SLR camera systems there are 'extension tubes' which fit between the lens unit and the camera body, for close-up work. YEs. I suspect that with these cheap digital cameras, the loss of sharpness will not be noticeable. that was the reason for my comment. A decent digital caemra has no problem taking a useful picture of a PCB or some other small part of a classic computer. These cheap ones probalby do. But a closeup lense fixed in front of the camera lens would probably help. The other trick, if you can do it is to fit the lens back-to-front. Most camera lenses are designed to work with a larger object than image distance. Byu turning it round you reverse this, which is a help for the short object distances in close-ups. A few cameras (the Rollei SL66 being the obvious one) were designed to work like this. The problem is that you genrally loose all automatic coupling to the lens, which means it's not a lot of use with modern electronically-controlled cmaeras. The Praktica PLC/VLC series had a special pair of afapater rings to maintain full aperture metering even when the lens was fitted backwards, but I've not seen this for anything remotely modern. -tony

Very few of my cameras do either. I think all of them can be used with no lens communication, you may loose full-aperture metering, but that's the only problem I don't know which model of Exakta you've obtained, but most of them have no internal lens couplings at all. Even the auto stop-down is done by a button on the lens that first closes the diaphragm and then hits the shutter release. If you use that sort of lens on extension tubes, bellows, or back-to-front, you just use a double cable release. Indeed... Large format cameras (at least the older ones I can afford) tend to be very 'manual' They do take a lony time to set up correctly to get the result I want, and the extra time in having to stop the lens down by hand is hardly an issue. And rembering to do that is no harder than rememberign to close the shutter before pulling the dark slide. My guess is msotly the latter :-). I suppose there may be a safety issue if you tried to cheage them in the camera (if it has a built-in charger), but I can't think of any issue in discharging them. -tony

I wrote: Tony wrote: "I don't carry cash any more, because it's too complicated... and I haven't got any." -- _TV or Not TV_, Peter Bergman

My experience with digital cameras that operate on AA batteries is that the problem is not so much self-discharge as it is poor design. (This is also true of many other products) They design the cameras to run on AA batteries - marketing says it has to shutdown gracefully when the batteries run out - and they design a low battery threshold based on 1.5v AA alkaline batteries. Then when they realize it hogs so much power it only takes 3 shots on dry cells, they spec. high capacity NiMh cells - which are nominal 1.2v per cell. I have tested: Minolta Dimage 7Hi - recommended to use NiMh cells (set came with it), takes 4 cells (nominal 4.8v), measured low battery threshold is about 5.2v. Two Cannon A520s - recommended to use NiMh cells, takes 2 cells (nominal 2.4v), measured low battery threshold is about 2.6v. Hp M(something or other - it's gone now) - recommended to use NiMh cells, takes 2 cells (nominal 2.4v), measured low battery threshold is about 2.7v. Sony F42 flash - takes 4 cells (nominal 4.8v), measured low battery threshold is about 5.1v. Both the Dimage and the A520 were reviewed to have "excellent battery life" - the reviews say you can charge a set of cells, and then shoot "all day". Which is mostly true. However when you turn it on a morning or two later, after the cells have settled down to their nominal 1.2v level, they shut down saying the batteries need to be replaced. In fact this happens even if you didn't shoot anything - just install freshly charged cells and wait a couple of days. But... I can take the "dead" cells out of the cameras, and put them in my 2m handheld - a fairly high current draw device when transmitting, and they will run it for weeks. I tested once taking the "dead" cells nearly 10 hours - ie: nearly the full capacity of the cells. NiMh calls when freshly charged exhibit 1.3-1.4v/cell, however they settle fairly quickly to 1.2v - even if not being used... then the voltage remains is nearly flat until the cells are depleted, at which point they drop rapidly. Long term shelf life is poor due to self-discharge, however in my experience your camera will reject them long before this should be a factor. Self-discharge takes months, not days. Hybrid cells like eneloop help with self-discharge, and do slow the initial drop which makes them more useable in a camera ... but the fundamental problem remains - the device simply was not designed for 1.2v cells and shuts itself off when it things the "standard batteries" are getting low. When my A520 says to replace the eneloops, they are still just at the top of their discharge curve. Slight relevence to old computers: Most of the photos on my site were taken with the Dimage (it's very good in indoor low-light conditions - I got it free because the original owner "couldn't keep it in batteries")... I struggled for a while charging batteries every session, but since most of my photos are taken at a single location, it was easy to provide a power supply and it hasn't caused me any trouble since. -- dave09 (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Classic Computers: http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/

American mags are pretty dire. I let most of my subscriptions lapse. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Athiest: Someone who doesn't believe in spell checkers. --------------------

On 06/04/2010 03:19 PM, Tony Duell wrote: They are, they're mostly filled with ads and the articles are fluffy at best. A few years back when internet access was on a slower DSL line for me, I used to buy stuff like Linux Format because it came with CD's or DVD's full of Linux distros. While I think the magazine cost $15 or so, it was worth not having to tie up the line for an hour or so to download a distro. I never bothered to subscribe, instead I went to a nice large magazine store that also had a deli as part of it. I'd buy the article and a sandwich, and it would make for a nice way to spend a lunch hour... A few years back I did an experiment, I ripped out every page that was a full page ad on both sides. I left the pages that had articles on the back, or pages that had smaller ads and article text around them. More than half of the pages I removed from the magazine was ads! And of course the remaining had some ads at least on half of the pages. Of the remaining article pages, a lot of the articles were really product reviews, which if you think about it, are really promotions for those products. Sure, a lot of the reviews do provide value - if you're in the market for whatever it is they're reviewing, if you're not, they're just as much noise as ads. It also was fairly obvious that the larger articles jumped around from the start to the back, so you'd have a higher chance of being exposed to the ads as you went from the front towards the back. Once on the back pages, some of the articles were further chopped up, so they'd be continued on pages past a section that was entirely full of little ads - something like two dozen pages, each with a dozen ads per page surface. And within the magazine, about 5-6 fall out subscription cards, designed to fall out in your lap as you flipped through the pages. These I found especially annoying when I've already subscribed! Some of the ad pages were made of cardboard - supposedly to pop out at you to get your attention, some, annoyingly were perfume ads. Yuck! Not only did they bombard us with ads, but also with their stench! Some had fold out pages, that is pages that were 2x the size of a normal page, but were folded, and when opened, guess what, more ads inside. Some were a bit creative, they used shiny plastic or cutouts, or had little wheels inside of them to make the ads more fun, but in the end, they were just ads. I vaguely remember a car ad for some SUV that contained a flattened dried out sponge in the shape of a sponge of all things! I think the only such ad-riddled magazine I still subscribe to is Wired... only because I started out early and have every since since the first. :) It makes for a nice historical record, (if I'd want to find a reason to justify keeping it.) I used to get MacWorld and MacLife, but then, I stopped since a) they're just full of ads, and b) the "articles" are reviews of products mostly and rarely anything useful and c) any "news" they might have, I've already read online two months ago, despite the magazine's date saying it was for next month, and d) the content was so piss poor that I'd be able to read all the articles of interest in less than half an hour (skipping the stuff that wasn't interesting), and then into the recycle bin in went. Dr Dobbs and C Users Digest used to be good stuff, but they're no more... Now, since the new (greater? lesser?) depression, it's gotten better since there are less companies who buy out ads, but why bother? firefox with adblock, noscript, ghostery, and better privacy, is a far better way to read stuff. No ads, no punch the monkey, no continued on page 260, no perfume ads, no annoying cardboard pages, no annoying fall out subscription cards when I'm already subscribed, etc. Yes, I know, the more ads in a magazine, the more articles the publisher can afford to put in an issue. Call me a selfish bastard, but I hate ads, and besides, despite my paying for the magazine, it turns out they make more money from the ads than they ever do from me, so why isn't the magazine free to begin with? I don't even bother watching the news on TV, or reading actual newspapers anymore. The stories from the newspaper's websites, the dashboard weather widget, plus the stock widget get me enough of what I care for. I'll probably mess with an RSS reader to make it easier than having to reload a dozen firefox tabs every morning at some point, but I'm still too lazy at the moment. :) The few annoyances I get on the web is when you have an article that's really a blog entry, that points to another, that points yet to another. Thanks, but I don't need a summary of a summary, Just point me at the original material. (The only time I find this kind of thing useful is when the original material is behind a paywall.) Or worse when they chop up an article into multiple "pages" -as if I can't be bothered to scroll, or if it was paper... Same as magazines' behavior where an article is continued at the end. Yes, I knowm they want me exposed to as many ads as possible (which I filter out anyway) and that's why I always reach for the "Printer view/Single Page" whenever possible, or if not switch to the "Basic" Page Style and get rid of all the fancy extra shit. Another annoyance is this - my machine has a lovely wide screen, why would anyone center their content with a fixed size in a narrow 5" view and put other crap to the left and right? I don't mind scrolling, but my display can handle a lot more text, it's the text I'm after, not their background images or borders... sheesh! I suppose based on my usage behavior, one might guess I'd be the perfect candidate for an iPad, but no thanks. I'm the exact anti-candidate. I already have a good notebook with a full OS and a great browser, why would I want a crippled one that's locked down to a "store", and even worse, its browser won't filter out the ads! Why bother when I can already get everything I'd want for free anyway? As for reading books, the wife did buy me a Kindle for xmas last year. I wound up going back to real books anyway. There's something annoying about it, either it doesn't look as high res as actual paper, or it's too heavy for its form factor with a tiny screen (when compared to a paperback) or maybe I just like real printed books, not sure... Or maybe the idea of some vendor controlling what I can read, or having the ability to remotely delete or invade my privacy is abhorrent. I might consider an iPad when I can get a full OS on it with a properly functional firefox that includes noscript and adblock+, and yes, even then I will jail break it, Steve Jobs be damned! Actually I do have a tablet computer - an old Motion Computing tablet that I installed Linux on, but I rarely use it. Somehow the idea of lounging around on the couch and surfing the web while listening to mp3's, is not as appealing as sitting at my desk infront of my notebook and doing the same whilst having a full keyboard at my disposal. I thought I'd love to have a tablet, but maybe I was wrong. Still, it makes for a very nice kitchen computer, once docked and attached to a keyboard + trackball... We used to get a ton of junkmail too, but that's dwindled to the point where at first we were wondering, did the mailman actually come by today? But then we realized it was just that not many companies could afford to spam us anymore. I guess that's bad for the economy, but good for the environment, and really, it makes my life a lot easier too since I have less junk to have to sort to. (Yes, I know, I could sign up to have the post office not deliver any catalogs, but there are some I do want occasionally.) Worse yet, apparently our mailmen here have been told to stick actual letters inside of catalogs, or those supermarket ads that are printed on the same paper as newspapers... So they make you flip through the pages to get at the actual important mail. Bastards! Any one have that same issue?

On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 7:29 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: It's cheap and cover mounts /significantly/ increase newsstand sales, even when they also increase the cover price. It's a rare mag that doesn't sell more with a "free" cover CD even if it cost a few pounds more. Sad but true. Slightly freer editorial teams? I used to write for some American mags, and one had to check with the manufacturers of kit before running a review to give them chance to explain/excuse away the defects in the product and so on. Utter madness; totally counter-productive. -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884 ? Fax: + 44 870-9151419 AOL/AIM/iChat/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Tony Duell wrote: Yeah. My first printer on TRS80 was a DTC300 (Hytype I daisy wheel). It took a LONG time to work out a printer cable (my first computer cabling attempt). Later, TRS232 came out with a trivial to use serial printer interface that ran off of the cassette port! GPA made a similar one that plugged into the expansion port. Also Cordata/Corona Data Systems, Eiconscript, and Jlaser I used a DC37 switch box. Tall Tree Systems (Jlaser, JRAM, etc.) sold an adapter to connect to SX printer engines! Their pre-LIM EMS was one of the early ones. At 4th? WCCF (West Coast Computer Faire) Henderson? was frantically trying to get people to write software, ANY software, that would need large amounts of RAM. Cordata's software refused to run on 286 or above. Poems font editor supported Cordata fonts, and HP PCL Maybe some year, I'll move the XenoCopy documentation (LOTS of embedded formatting codes) over to something that survived for a while. Eiconscript had Postscript and HP PCL emulation. Eicon's tech "support" was generous, but hilarious. "Here's a new version of the PCL emulator; no idea whether this one works." Should I try to find/dig out any of those boards? Or should they rust in pieces?

On Sat, 5 Jun 2010, Tony Duell wrote: The drivers seemed to work with all TRSDOS derivatives. I never tried to use them with CP/M. A wonderful book. Also their SX book. That is how the Jlaser one installed.

OK, right... I asusme the interface was little more than a level shifter, and that the serial ouptu was bit-banged on the TRS-80. Dos anyone have shcemaitcs and/or the drivers still? I nevver saw the SX one Bob Davis (may he rest in peace :-() very kindly sent me the CX one. But alas _after_ I had rebuilt my first CX (it started off an a Canon LBP8A1, the formatter board failed, so after a lot of probing around, taking things apart, and looking at the logic analyser, I turned it into a CX-VDO, put the approriate chips on my PERQ's OIO card and got it working. No, not first time, I'd missed off a jumper wire on the OIO board, which mean the FIFO output regester didn't reload). It's a great pity I didn't have it earlie. It wou;ld ahve explained the CX-VDO cabling, I could also have ordered some replacement parts that I had to make from scratch, -tony

It is, and I have m,ade use of that excellent website when I needed some spares for my SX printers. It's easy to identify the bits I needed and order them. But the printed book is a lot more use on my workbench :-) -tony

On 04/06/10 01:07, Chuck Guzis wrote: Transformer cores and bobbins are often very handy (as are ferrite toroids). I've been known to use them to wind custom inductors for projects (especially switchmode power supplies). Great for 1-offs. Speaking of which, I could do with a couple of RM-cores, clips and winding bobbins... used my last one a few weeks ago. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

----- Original Message ----- From: "Philip Pemberton" <classiccmp at philpem.me.uk> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Friday, June 04, 2010 12:25 AM Subject: Re: Lightbulb police? (was RE: Anyone off to VCF-UK) fluorescent It's also possible that some idiot (or kids) would plug in the ballast with no tube at all! Maybe even stick some wire or something into it that shouldn't be there. Either way, I'm sure the HSE wouldn't like it here in the UK. As an employee, I am not allowed to change fuses at work or do anything with our machines unless we have been trained by the appropriate engineer first. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk

Philip Pemberton wrote: My response to this sort of scenario would be repeatedly blowing fuses and sitting on my hands waiting for the fuses to be replaced. If asked why my product wasn't getting out the door, I'd point to the fuse holder. I'd probably get fired, but I might just get their attention. In any case, I'd probably go ballistic when faced with this kind of stupidity. Literally. Complete with arm-waving and screaming. Peace... Sridhar

On 06/04/2010 04:54 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote: Why not come in very early one day, or stay late another day and replace the 3A fuse with a proper one when no one is looking? You could always claim ignorance or say "They must have GREEN power supplies" if they ask "wow how did you get 8 machines to run?"

Except that 3A fuses are red (or have red writing on them), 13A fuses are brown. Other ratings (2A, 5A, 7A, 10A) all seem to have black writing.. Personally, I'd fit a 13A fuse when nobody was looking and claim to know nothing about it if questioned :-) The HSE exists to _stop_ people doing their job. -tony

On Sat, 5 Jun 2010, Jules Richardson wrote: "Of COURSE this is a 3A fuse. See the red dot to the left of the '3'?" A MISLABELLED fuse is a lot closer to being a REAL safety hazard.

On 5 Jun 2010 at 23:59, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote: So, why didn't the UK go for a solution where fuses of different ratings were of a different physical size? That would make it impossible to use the wrong-sized fuse. In any case, it's probably safer than a penny under a (Edison-base) fuse... --Chuck

aka "Lincoln-base"

Indeed, I've rewired those many times. Still have plenty of fuse wire too... The fuse carriers are of different sizes (or at least haev different size pins) so you can't swap them round. But of course nothing stops you put the wrong wire in. Just as nothing stops you using a piece of 16mm^2 copper wire. Sometimes people have ot be careful... -tony

Tony Duell wrote: Ahh that's probably why I've only ever seen them supplied with 13A fuses :) Indeed I believe our workshop who service the electrical equipment at work have a fairly large drawer full of them :) Humm Farnell stock 1A fuses to BS1362 : http://uk.farnell.com/bussmann/c180-1/fuse-quick-blow-1a-bs1362/dp/1123029 So I would assume that it is ok to use them. Ahh but that's what regular PAT testing is for, as the case you cite is an imediate fail, at which point the remedial action would be to cut off the molded plug and correctly fit a BS1363 one :) Having live and neutral reversed is a more serious problem however :) Ah but I suspect you and I know how to correctly wire a plug, I have found most people who think they do, in fact don't. Lets put it like this whenever I get some new (to me) electrical equipment the first thing I do is open the plug and check the wireing, and most times re-wire it correctly :). Indeed I have seen plugs like that too, in this case an IEC lead supplied with the PSU for one of those USB->ATA/SATA adapters, in both cases I chucked it and used UK spec one with a 3A fuse :) Cheers. Phill. -- Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric ! "You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.

Tony Duell [ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk] wrote: I did once find my (then) two year old messing with a cut off 13A plug in an unswitched socket (older house). It was as I was pulling it out (with my fingers brushing against the cut end of the cable) that I resolved to dispose of such cut-offs immediately and securely. Ouch :-) Antonio

Phill Harvey-Smith [afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk] wrote: Our resident dunce had previously done the usual tricks (plug bunsen burner into the water tap etc.) and then moved on to electricity. The loud bang was when he (somehow) plugged a 12V dc lamp into the mains (it wasn't malicious as such, he genuinely didn't think it would hurt ...). After that we watched him more closely, so we were able to intercept his attempt to measure the internal resistance of the mains connection by the obvious expedient of switching the multimeter to ohms and plugging it into the mains ... Antonio

Tony Duell wrote: Though I usually cut from the end down, and try to insert my blade in between where the inter cables are, then peel back and cut round with the wire cutters. Indeed Live : shortest, Neutral next, Earth (if it's a 3 wire cable) longest. This was one of the things we where being taught. It was stripped both ends, and raged, I guess as he plugged it in the wires dragged along the bench and shorted and of course when switched on aforementioned flash-bang ! Andf I wasn't joking when I said he was the class brain, constantly came top in class tests, he just I guess did this on auto-pilot, or was distracted and made an ummm error of judgement :) Cheers. Phill. -- Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric ! "You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.

On 07/06/10 21:07, Tony Duell wrote: Me too. We never got taught anything like that in science or physics (or any class for that matter). Though a few of the PTA members and a certain headteacher were very vocal about their dislike of "dangerous" subjects... It's a bitch doing it with co-ax too. I usually end up using a retractable-blade Stanley knife to cut about half-way through the insulation, then bend/twist it around the cut mark and it breaks apart fairly easily. Then bend 180 degrees all four ways to make sure you haven't nicked any of the internal wires. Easiest way to deal with that is to take off about 2.5" to 3" of outer insulation, put the wire on top of the cable clamp, then cut the wires back appropriately. To check if the lengths are correct -- put the wires into the screwpoints but don't tighten the screws. Pull on the wire and see what the "order of detachment" is. "Simples!" -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On 07/06/10 23:21, John Foust wrote: I've got one for Cat5 and one for RG* coax, but not one for UK mains cable. Plus I'm lazy.. and sometimes the Stanley knife does a better job. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

... Particulalry when it came to human reproduction (wy is part of 'The Meaning of Life' going through my mind right now..) More seriously, eliminating practical scince -- interesting practical science, is exactly the part of H&S that I object to. I was fortunate in that I did get to mess around with things that could have been dangerous if misused -- HV power supplies, the mains, evacuated galls vessels, sharp tools, etc and never had a serious injury. Mainly because I thought about what I was doing and took some care. -tony

On 6/8/10 7:12 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: I'm sure doing that will be illegal soon. "Call an electrician". *SPIT* -Dave, wiring his own outlets since age 9 ...with the breakers on -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

On Tue, 8 Jun 2010, Chuck Guzis wrote: Maybe he felt an urgent personal need to alternate polarity? 40 years ago, I thought that requirement of an electrician to wire outlets and switches was silly, and that ANYBODY could wire an outlet or switch right. Some of the stuff that I've encountered in the last 40 years has convinced me otherwise.

On 6/8/10 11:43 PM, Joachim Thiemann wrote: And if that happens, you get what you've got coming. Don't attempt something without learning how to do it properly. The ghost of Darwin is alive and well. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

On Tuesday, June 08, 2010, Dave McGuire wrote: Local laws, unlikely but I guess possible, but not nationally or globally. Still, I really doubt 99.9+% of communities would consider that. I (as a homeowner) can still do my own wiring on my house where I live, legally. I upgraded my service shortly after moving into my house, and had no problem getting the permit, getting it inspected, or dealing with the utility company. I really doubt that'll change any time soon. If you have problems where you are, maybe it's "time to move." :P Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org

At 01:49 AM 6/9/2010, Dave McGuire wrote: Florida, or the southeast USA, in other words. :-) - John

On 08/06/10 18:44, Andrew Burton wrote: Sounds like what we did. except the "human reproduction" bit got cut... the students were instead treated to a lovely argument between the headmistress and the teacher in question: "IT'S FILTHY! You can't teach that in a public school!" "So how would you teach it?" "Don't! They'll learn it from TV, or their parents will teach them." After a bunch of parents intervened (actually made a REALLY big stink and threatened to take it to the city council) she ended up doing an about-face and started the lesson with... "Let it be known that I do not feel this subject is appropriate to be taught to anyone under the age of 21, and is in direct contravention to my beliefs. I'll hand over to your form tutor, but let it be known, you're probably all going to hell. Oh, and anyone laughing, chuckling or giggling during this session will find themselves with a detention." Did I mention she was religious to the point of zealotry? Yeeeah... made for some interesting altercations in RE ("Religious Education"). I posed the question "But how do you know that God exists?" and she answered with "Shut up or you'll be spending your lunch break in detention." Some of the teachers really hated it when I asked questions... others loved it. :) You fear de' meerkat? <http://www.flickr.com/photos/philpem/3412890836/> -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 15:50, Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote: Tongue _firmly_ planted in cheek, I could ask you to measure the average number of peas in a pod! :-) My own feeling is that actually here you missed to learn something in school that is vital. And that is an aspect of human interaction, or rather, interpreting unspoken demands. Clearly, a successful student would know what the teacher wants, and solve the problem in that fashion, rather than taking the literal meaning (and/or possibly more efficient solution) of the problem statement. Since the subject is Physics, I guess the idea would be to measure capacitance using "lower" units of measurements: Capacitance can be found using time, current, and voltage - and volt can be derived (with difficulty) using a standard length, mass and time. So, assume you have a calibrated ammeter, voltmeter, and clock, finding capacitance is easy! Never mind those calibrations were made by doing comparisons earlier. Is is the best or most efficient way to do it? Hell no! But it's what physics teachers want. This skill is very important but especially to an engineer, as anyone can tell having completed a task only to be told "that's not what I wanted!" ("But you asked me to do this!!" "But it's not what I wanted! Do it again!" ... followed later by "You're fired!") I'm sure many of us have been on both sides of this kind or exchange. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem

On 9 Jun 2010 at 18:08, Joachim Thiemann wrote: The object of education is the method rather than the answer, which is generally the converse of what's encountered in the commercial world. I'm reminded of Alexander Calandra's story "Angels on a Pin": http://www.snopes.com/college/info/baromart.htm --Chuck (Would that we now had "Sputnik-panicked classrooms" in America!)

On 10 Jun 2010 at 18:48, Tony Duell wrote: You oversimplify, I think. The object of education (I hope) is to create a depth of understanding. Anybody can use superposition, mesh currents, Thevenin and Norton equivalents and any other of the "bag of tricks" for circuit analysis, but how many can take the same circuit and solve using Maxwell's equations? Who has the deeper understanding? Of course, no one in their right mind would use Maxwell's equations for DC circuit analysis on an everyday basis. Mathematics is usually taught to engineers on a "cookbook" basis for the very good reason that there simply is not enough time to cover a particular topic in depth. A mathematics major in school can spend an entire semester covering the same topic that's taught in two weeks in an engineering math course. The answers obtained when a problem is solved will be identical, but the math major hopefully will have a deeper understanding of the solution and be able to build on it. There's something to be said for the necessity of both approaches. How many people who use a computer actually understand what's going on internally? Very few, I'm sure. Does that mean that all the training that's required is how to work Excel or Word and a browser and that computer science education is a waste of time? --Chuck

On 6/10/10, Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote: "Assume you have a bulldozer of negligible mass" or "I have a solution, but it only works for spherical chickens in a vacuum" etc., etc. -ethan

Tony Duell [ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk] wrote: Air resistance is ignored because otherwise the equations become too complex. In any particular real world example that may or may not lead to unacceptable errors. The constant approximation is far less of a problem. The Earth's radius is what ~6Mm, so even if your height changes by say 60m then that's less than 1%. The point is to teach you the simple case so that you understand it and can move on to the complications later. There won't be a "later" in A-level maths because there isn't enough time (you have to fit in the rest of the course and the remaining A-levels). I don't recall whether I started solving stuff numerically at A-level or at degree-level, I suspect the latter. However, I do recall that the point of A-level maths was to teach the basics of calculus and some of its applications (I didn't cover any of the statistics options in my course). I could complain that there was no coverage of vector calculus at A-level and that I had to (horror!) go and find out what it was all about when I realised that the degree course turned out to be - use vector calculus (Maxwell's equations or some such) [weeks later] - two lectures on vector calculus and what it's all about I could complain that the basic electronics on my engineering science course was pretty rudimentary and that the practicals were (in my view) pretty basic. But there was a lot packed into the course and it provided a foundation for many different areas. I don't think I could be trusted to build a bridge now, but if I'd been that way inclined I would have had enough of a grounding to get my foot in the door somewhere. Antonio

Sure. My standard of measurement is the 'unit' -- that is a set of one object. And I could claim that was 'counting' not measuring. I hate to say this, but my aim was to learn (real) physics. Not some pretend version that the teacher wanted me to learn. Actaully, you need one electrical base unit too. In the SI system, it's the 'ampere' (which I have always thoguth was stupid, I regard the coulomb as being more fundamental, being essentailly the charage on a large number of electronics, not a rate of flow). But anyway... Every book I've looked in gives the bridge circuit (which is of course what I described) as a method of measuring cpaacitance (and resistance, and inducatance for that matter). Fredrick Terman's [1] book 'Measurements in Radio Engineering' starts off with 'MKeasurement of circuit constants at low frequencies' and describes all sorts of bridges. Several other books point out that in general comparison to a standard of the same time as the qunaitity being measured provide the most accurate measurements. [1] I assume every body knows who he was. No?. He was (IIRC) associate professor of electrical engineering at Stanford in the 1930s. He had a student who did an MSc project making a new type of audio oscillator using a Wein bridge (RC) network an an amplifier whose gain was controlled by a filamanet lamp in the feedback path. The name of that student? William Hewlett [2]. [2] And what do you think the HP Mdoel 200 audio oscillator is?. This actually brings up an interesting question to which I don't know the answer. Given the SI standards -- that is a copy of the prototype kilogram, a current balance to determine the ampere, the appropriate atomic clock, and whatever the length standard now is, how do you determine capacitance? Waht I do know is that the method this teacher was expecting is not the answer, That method (based on a vibrating reed contact) has so many systematic errors as to be totally useless. As I said just now, I was there to learn physics. Not play games second-guessing the teacher. -tony

Err, yes. In fact the instructions supplied with just about everymodern electrical device tell you to cut off the plug if it's not compatible with your mains socket, to fit the right plug, and to dispose of the cut-off plug safely as it is a shock hazard if plugged into a live socket. Assuming your sockets are wired correctly, removing the fuse and holder the live pin. And you can put the fuse in you box of spare fuses :-) -tony

Tony Duell wrote: Yes, I agree totally. I was hoping that the smiley was enough to convey sufficient sarcasm, but maybe I should have added a second one :-) (On the other hand, the equipment only exists to protect the fuse, so logically things will last longer if a more robust fuse is fitted*) * ;-) ;-)

Jules Richardson [jules.richardson99 at gmail.com] wrote: People do think that, but it's wrong. The cable is there to protect the fuse in the plug. (I think I'm supposed to put in a smiley, but having had a cable "explode" last year I've decided that it really must be true ...) Antonio

Quoting David Cantrell <david at cantrell.org.uk>: Or more to the point the HSE exist to try and make sure people THINK about safety, even if they want to ignore the issue. Like a lot of things people think it will never happen to them and get one hell of a shock when it does :( Besides a lot of the anicdotal stories about how the HSE supposedly stopped people doing stuff, when you look deaper it's not actually the HSE to blame. Cheers. Phill. ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.

On 05/06/10 13:08, Tony Duell wrote: I don't have a problem with the HSE. I *do* have a problem with people who take health and safety regulations, then apply "reductio ad absurdum" to them, thus turning them into crazy confabulations of utter madness and despair. I do love the memos Head Office send us every now and again. "All photolab staff should be aware that when performing maintenance work which may involve contact with chemicals, PPE kit (gloves, apron and goggles) must be worn." Yeah, like I'm going to dip my bare hands into a full tank of RA4 developer. Little hint: that stuff has rather a lot of NaOH in it, not to mention the other nasty stuff. The fact that you can smell it half-way across the room and onto the shopfloor makes it quite clear that dipping your hands in would not be a great career move. Though someone must have done it, otherwise there wouldn't be a warning label for it... right? -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

Is it me, or is most of the 'green' movement one big con? If you're going to force people to use a particular type of light bulb for environmental reasons, then that bulb should be aa environmentally-friendly as possible. And since the CFL tube contains mercury, it shouldn't be thrown out for no good reason. So the electronics should be separately replaceable/repairable. [...] Oh wuite likely. And IMHO that's the sort of thing that should be banned -- devices that are delibrarately difficult to repair (not supplying service data is a related rant!). I have repaired several laptop power bricks by cracking them open (a metal strip and a light hammer applied around the join), but I don;t think that technique is a good idea on a device which contains a sischarage tube like a CFL. -tony

I think i mentioned those. Lasttime I looked, you could still get the PL tubes easily, the holders and inducive ballasts are still available if you want to make light fittings using them. But I've not seen the BC-cap ballast adaptors for a long time. -tony

I don't know about you guys, I've already hid some away, "dollar tree" here in parts of the us sells a pack of them for $1... On 6/2/10, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote:

Come again? Lst time I looked, fluorescent lamps were hot-cathode mercury vapour lamps. How can you promote fluorescent lamps and ban mercury vapour lamps???? The mount of not-so-much bad science as non-existant science in the 'green' movement is frightening! -tony

Zane H. Healy wrote: I've got no hard figures; I've tried asking over the years, and nobody seems to know for sure. My gut feeling though is that fluorescent are a lot worse when you think of the 'big picture' and include sourcing of the materials, manufacture, shipping*, and eventual safe disposal. * the shipping's perhaps irrelevant because I bet that incandescents are made overseas too - but I suspect that they could be made locally far more easily than fluorescents if the desire was there, reducing shipping impact. I've had plenty of fluorescents that barely outlast incandescents, despite manufacturers' MTBF claims. Plenty more that exhibit weakened output after a few months. All of them seem to have output even when new that's vastly less than the "incandescent equivalent" rating claimed on the packaging. (Waters are even further muddied up here in northern MN where we have electric heating that's on for over half the year, because during those months any energy that bulbs lose as heat is still doing useful work; there's no waste) cheers Jules

I use lights with multiple fixtures and put in a mix. And I've certainly got my incandescent stockpile. That at least gives me the wider spectrum and warmth partially. Meanwhile, the California State Ass'y voted to ban plastic bags, so that we can all either cut down trees and pay a nickel each, or pay the store a couple bucks for cheapo 'reusable' bags that tear at the slightest glance. I'll just be making more frequent trips for smaller shopping lists to avoid using bags at all. Environmental conservation is fun! -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- No matter how cynical I get, I can't keep up. -- Lily Tomlin ---------------

Liam Proven wrote: We get through a lot for use as trash bags; if they vanish, I'm just going to end up buying more proper trash bags. The system's not *quite* in balance, because the majority of US stores insist on packing your purchases for you, and use *far* more bags than they need to; if I were allowed and expected to pack stuff myself here (as I was in the UK), I think I could probably re-use as much as I took home with me. A ban on those darn blister packs would be more useful, I think - I recycle the plastic, but I really don't *need* a packaging footprint the size of a book just to surround some trivial little item. cheers Jules

I often get a funny look from the checker when I respond with, "No bag," and juggle four or five items for the few yards it takes to get to my vehicle. When I see that look, I give them a glare of defiance and say something like, "I am NOT ashamed to buy orange juice!" Some get the joke and smile, others just hope I'll leave quietly. What irks me is when they just start stuffing my items into a plastic bag without asking, and then look put-upon when I tell them to take it back out. What amuses me is when I'm buying only one item, that's in a bag, and they want to put it in... another bag. -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Cameron Kaiser [spectre at floodgap.com] Sent: Friday, June 04, 2010 8:37 AM To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Lightbulb police? (was RE: Anyone off to VCF-UK) +2. I use them both for bagging my own stuff and as liners in the bathroom. Also, I have to repeatedly tell them I don't need my milk gallons in double bags (or bags at all). But as usual the kneejerk reaction of the political class is ban it all, damn the consequences. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- There are few problems that the liberal usage of high explosives can't cure.

Well, my parents and I have got in the habit of keeping the plastic bags we get from shops. We have 2 bags downstairs - one is full normal sized bags and the other tiny bags used by gaming stores etc. We reuse them as much as possible and have done since the 90's. For instance, when buying 2L plastic bottles of drink (or lots of food items) we always use 2 bags as 1 (e.g. 1 plastic bag inside the other) for a stronger bag. It's much less embarassing than walking down the street and having a single plastic bag rip letting the contents onto the pavement and/or road. I suppose 3 bags as 1 would be even better, but 2 have worked for us. We also use the plastic bags as bin bags for our small bin (perhaps 3' high?). Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ian King" <IanK at vulcan.com> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Friday, June 04, 2010 4:58 PM Subject: RE: Lightbulb police? (was RE: Anyone off to VCF-UK) I often get a funny look from the checker when I respond with, "No bag," and juggle four or five items for the few yards it takes to get to my vehicle. When I see that look, I give them a glare of defiance and say something like, "I am NOT ashamed to buy orange juice!" Some get the joke and smile, others just hope I'll leave quietly. What irks me is when they just start stuffing my items into a plastic bag without asking, and then look put-upon when I tell them to take it back out. What amuses me is when I'm buying only one item, that's in a bag, and they want to put it in... another bag. -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Cameron Kaiser [spectre at floodgap.com] Sent: Friday, June 04, 2010 8:37 AM To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Lightbulb police? (was RE: Anyone off to VCF-UK) to insist to; +2. I use them both for bagging my own stuff and as liners in the bathroom. Also, I have to repeatedly tell them I don't need my milk gallons in double bags (or bags at all). But as usual the kneejerk reaction of the political class is ban it all, damn the consequences. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- There are few problems that the liberal usage of high explosives can't cure.

This is a **very** common thing in Brazil. Grocery/supermarket bags are used everywhere, from trash can bags to storing things. And some bags are made from recycled material. You can see it is a lower grade and very different type of plastic. Also, there is a program in Brazil which turn these bags (and bottles) in garden seats and structural components for housing. Very interesting. Nice! I still cannot understand why someone can't use a pair of scissors to open the darn package :oO Ice cream boxes are nice to store parts :) I miss when I bought magazines :) Now I have a **good** notebook with Wi-Fi and 3G internet, I see no why to buy magazines. I can read then on my'book. Which is a nice thing :D

http://www.floodgap.com/iv/572 -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense. --------------

Sridhar Ayengar wrote: I thought that was to make it harder to shop lift. It is the new meat packaging I find harder to open.

On 6/4/10 11:55 AM, Keith M wrote: It's "more convenient" in the same way as Microsoft's "Genuine Advantage" is an advantage...profit maximization for the seller. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Ben wrote: We used to shop at one Safeway store in the area, as they were close, and they have one of the best produce sections in the area. A few years ago they remodeled and took out a sizable chunk of the isles of food, they replaced them with Wine. :-( American's wonder why there is such an obesity problem, they should start looking at what is in all that pre-packaged **** that so many people eat! Zane

Ian King wrote: I tend to buy what is on sale for around $3.50 to $4.50. That must of been hand washed by Virgins, organic spinach for that price. I do find the blister pack lasts longer in my fridge than the plain plastic bag of greens so it is better deal for me. I tend to shop once a week at the supermarket and regular greens go bad after a few days.

Chuck Guzis wrote: If it is the one I am thinking of, it was made for night light use. 5 or 3 watts of power here.

Ben wrote: 'Now' at 105 years... Link : http://www.centennialbulb.org/ John :-#)#

There are a *lot* of bulbs like that, hidden in farmhouse attics. As I said before, 100 year old bulbs are actually quite common, and every so often one can find one that is overbuilt enough due to the sloppy manufacturing tolerances of the era that it is pretty much bulletproof. If you have ever used an old light bulb, your opinion might be wildly different. -- Will

On 5 Jun 2010 at 11:25, Tony Duell wrote: It's surprising how little voltage it takes to get a glow out of a lamp--a 120V incandescent will exhibit a visible glow on as little as 12V. During the early years of WWII, many of the amateur radio publications ran ads from RCA that advised dropping the heater/filament voltage on transmitting tubes by about 10% and derating them somewhat. Apparently this could result in a doubling of useful life. I believe that some early vacuum-tube computers ran heaters somewhat below the "nameplate" ratings simply to improve reliability. --Chuck

Personally seen that lamp... impressive! George On Jun 4, 2010, at 11:02 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote:

On 6/4/10 10:17 AM, Liam Proven wrote: Don't try that here - you'll be talking to the police in very short order. Store management will immediately assume you're shoplifting. Doc

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Fred Cisin wrote: Isn't that why there are rolls of plastic bags in the butcher's department? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

Liam Proven wrote: SOP at *many* stores around here is to check your package against your receipt at the door. I tend to avoid those stores, because I don't want to do business with someone who assumes I'm stealing from him. Peace... Sridhar

On Fri, 4 Jun 2010, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: With CompUSA I've been known in years past to tell them no they can't check them, especially as the idoit just watched me leave the checkout line. At Costco I actaully expect it, and it makes sense. At Fry's it is actually the employee's they don't trust from what I've heard. The only one of the stores I'm aware of that does this that I'll do business with any more is Costco. Powell's Books actually asks you to check your bags when you enter the store. They've done that for about as long as I can remember. With the current trend of not allowing backpacks, I'm glad I'm no longer in the Navy. When I was inport, or stationed in Washington DC, I didn't have a vehicle of my own, so I'd always have a backpack stuffed full of all kinds of stuff, especially in DC. Zane