[X] My Assistant

I'm resisting against the version update of NoScript.
While they changed it once since they started to mess up the UI still look worst than before, and I really expose myself to it too often to not mind.
Unlike Adblock Plus and uBlock, I don't think there are competitors in this case though, not that it necessarily help.

Unlike Adblock Plus and uBlock, I don't think there are competitors in this case though, not that it necessarily help.

Ever looked at uMatrix?

I appreciate the virtues of a modular power supply, but the premium on them is just too high.

Semi-modular can sometimes make more sense, realistically there are some connectors that we will always have to use on PSU, so having them as modular just takes up more space rather than saving it.

Depends on the quality of the modular cables I guess. Some people like being able to get their own custom cables for better management but those can be pricey.

Semi-modular can sometimes make more sense, realistically there are some connectors that we will always have to use on PSU, so having them as modular just takes up more space rather than saving it.

Depends on the quality of the modular cables I guess. Some people like being able to get their own custom cables for better management but those can be pricey.

mine's not even semi modular. Just a big octopus of cables coming out the side.

Do modular PSU's even use standardized connectors/pinouts?

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Jul 10 2022, 02:46

Do modular PSU's even use standardized connectors/pinouts?

They attempted to standardise but I don't think it worked. The problem is that many cables can connect that can cause issues. Different gauge wiring or maybe still different pin outs?

mine's not even semi modular. Just a big octopus of cables coming out the side.

Do modular PSU's even use standardized connectors/pinouts?

many 'standards', the corsair one I had and slowly became too annoying had atx on the psu side as well, plus some fixed cables like the main board connector and cpu.

in the end the janky 'modular' nature of the powersupply was more an annoyance. content with switching to some cheap non modular psu. its really not that bad having a couple cables bunched up in the case vs being able to pull cables out of the psu and having to wring yourself into weird angles to add more cables when you do need them.

I was looking at a SFX-L 1000 PSU thinking it was impressive technical feat until I realised it was SFX-L which is a weird standard.

Think i need to reflow one of my playstations. Can't figure out where the fault is.

Think i need to reflow one of my playstations. Can't figure out where the fault is.

what type of dead is it? I always question the whole 'just reflow the entire board' tactic. even if it apparently does more good than harm for people

Think i need to reflow one of my playstations. Can't figure out where the fault is.

Isn't it usually an issue with the CD rom drive for playstation 1s?

Isn't it usually an issue with the CD rom drive for playstation 1s?

Yes, but I know for a fact the CD drive is good because I've tried known working drives from four other units.

Also pressing down on the motherboard can sometimes make it work.

I have repaired more playstations (PSX) than any other game console. This is the launch revision one that I'm really fond of, though, so I don't want to let it die. It also has significantly different GPU design and performance in some tasks compared to later SGRAM-based GPU revisions. Also it does gourad shading differently.

I'll probably try hand-reflowing the mechacon chip and then oven it if that doesn't work. (Mechacon is the chip that controls the CD drive and does the initial copy protection check. Right now it's not spinning up to 2x to try the copy protection after I turn it on).

Could also try to actually figure out a schematic and determine what components are involved in telling the drive to spin up to 2x (there is no schematic I can find for the PU-7/PU-8 revision PSX boards like my SCPH-1001 uses; it was made one month after the US launch date and I have a known good drive in it now because the original WAS garbage).

This thing has been a nightmare on and off for years now though. I just refuse to let it die.

what type of dead is it? I always question the whole 'just reflow the entire board' tactic. even if it apparently does more good than harm for people

The main reason is that my iron sucks for surface mount stuff. And I tend to pick up small passive components while I'm trying to reflow them manually with the iron.

I have already reflowed one quadrant of the board by hand (top side only). And replaced the power supply. And replaced the disk drive. And replaced the case top because the original was brittle and breaking apart. This thing has been through hell.

For illustration purposes, here's a photo from the last time I had it 100% working:
[i.imgur.com] (IMG:[i.imgur.com] https://i.imgur.com/t21JyLnm.jpg)

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Jul 12 2022, 07:34

My launch revision PSX was the first to die.

My launch revision PSX was the first to die.

Mine died and has been brought back by necromancy multiple times.

The launch revs all had awful disc drives, though. The one in mine is a donor from a PSOne (the mini system).

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Jul 13 2022, 03:46

Do modular PSU's even use standardized connectors/pinouts?

Doesn't seem to be the case [youtu.be] as mentioned by a Corsair employee on the Gamers Nexus youtube channel. Modular cables from different brands have different wiring schemes so they should not be plugged into power supplies of a different brand. So if you have multiple brands of modular power supplies, you should label each of the unused modular cables with the power supply model that it came from so they don't inadvertently get mixed up in common cable storage. At least there seems to be some standardization coming with the new 600 watt 12VHPWR connector proposed for the high power graphics cards powered by the 1100 and 1250 watt future PSUs with modular connectors.
[www.pcmag.com] https://www.pcmag.com/news/graphics-cards-a...power-connector

Reason why 600 watt connectors is due to nVidia 4000 series GPU cards for 2K(qhd)/4K gaming:
[www.pcgamesn.com] https://www.pcgamesn.com/nvidia/RTX-4000-850W-PSU

Does this mean a bedroom with a 1250W PSU needs to be served by TWO separate 120VAC circuits so that the big screen monitor and other non-PC things in the room can haz power too without blowing the breaker?

This post has been edited by Anime Janai: Jul 13 2022, 05:41

Pretty cool how NoVidia is killing the environment, too.

Mine died and has been brought back by necromancy multiple times.

Hurray for tech necromancy.
That's what saved my Surface Pro that used to be near death, and once in a while it repairs the stylus too (though right now after the last miracle it got broken again (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/dry.gif) )

Surface Pro

I almost suspect they were made to fail, even more so than macbooks.

I almost suspect they were made to fail, even more so than macbooks.

They clearly were. They have explicitly non-replaceable batteries. They are disposable commodity devices with premium price tags.

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Jul 13 2022, 16:09

They clearly were. They have explicitly non-replaceable batteries. They are disposable commodity devices with premium price tags.

Macbooks use chips that are known to fail reliability. I think the issue with the Surface Pros was that they had too many failure modes and were more difficult to repair. For a while many companies adopted them due to aggressive pricing of leases but most companies have banned them now as the IT service costs are not worth it.

Macbooks use chips that are known to fail reliability. I think the issue with the Surface Pros was that they had too many failure modes and were more difficult to repair. For a while many companies adopted them due to aggressive pricing of leases but most companies have banned them now as the IT service costs are not worth it.

Yeah, pretty much.

IT at my company will get surfaces, but only for IT staff members that want them; everyone else gets Dell Latitudes because otherwise the costs would be too great.

Pretty much repeating what you said, but you are far more likely to break a surface when servicing it to replace the battery than you would if you were working on a Macbook, even if you're a professional who does it daily.

Even Apple will actually replace a battery if it fails and you pay their exorbitant fees; Microsoft won't replace surface batteries at any price point. They'd rather sell you a new Surface. I hate to say it, but Apple makes the better computers in this comparison.

DISCLAIMER
I have not worked on an M1 laptop yet. My newest Apple experience was with a macbook air from around 2017. And their keyboards DO suck, but at least it is physically possible to replace them with enough money.

Also the surface line has batteries that swell like balloons; Some even run heat ducting above or below the LiPo battery (along its faces).

Surface devices are designed to fail.

And the consumers love them.

----
BTW, as you probably figured out already, I hate Apple hardware products. I just hate Microsoft hardware products more. Even their nice ones. For nice ones, I can only think of the Microsoft Trackball Explorer, which has been discontinued for over a decade but was ergonomically great. it wore down at a rapid pace and was not designed to be repairable once the bearings got worn flat and the trackball started sticking. Thus, new MTE's are approaching half a thousand dollars now, when they retailed for $20.

Their natural keyboard line had a good layout for the first iteration, but felt like shit to type on, and all future revisions regressed from the great initial design/form factor/layout while not improving on anything else except adding USB versions.

The Microsoft Intellimouse with the wheel was a good invention; it was so long ago now that the Obama's inauguration was closer to it than present day. Ditto for the natural keyboard, only Obama's inauguration is equally close to it as present day.

Notice how none of those "good" hardware products were made after Bill Gates left. Their hardware declined alongside the rise of their shitty modern software development practices. And even those had some major problems compromising their potential.

----
Thought: It's great that I don't have to write a goddamn systemd daemon in order to run hdparm at boot on my machine (SysV init; written in /etc/rc.local to disable HDD spindown on all rotating disks).

CODE

for hddnode in /dev/sd[a-z]; do
  DRIVE=`echo "$hddnode" |sed 's!.*/!!'`
  DRIVETEST='/sys/block/'"$DRIVE"'/queue/rotational'
  if [ -e $DRIVETEST ]; then
    ROTATIONAL=`cat "$DRIVETEST"`
    if [ $ROTATIONAL -eq 1 ]; then
      # -q: suppress '-S' output text unless errors occur
      /sbin/hdparm -q -S 0 "$hddnode"
    fi
  fi
done || /bin/true

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Jul 14 2022, 02:10