Personal blog of Peter "Sci" Turpin – Page 4212 – Technology, art and personal faff

Twitter Updates for 12-12-2010

@TinyTeaDragon If I can find a pattern in what turns out to actually be useful, maybe I can get rid of some. Means confronting own ability. in reply to TinyTeaDragon 00:47:06, 2010-12-12
Home from xmas party. Good times. Spent much on drink. Sober already tho. Also feet hurt & frustrated. ;P 00:50:12, 2010-12-12
@angelamelick What time zone's your body clock on now? in reply to angelamelick 00:51:13, 2010-12-12
Not understanding how ebay bidding for USED PS3 webcam can exceed price of NEW buy-it-now PS3 webcam.. 00:52:53, 2010-12-12
@AlbinoKitsune Had a couple of coffee's to stop energy from crashing, prolly didn't help. :P Process it way to fast tho. in reply to AlbinoKitsune 01:01:12, 2010-12-12
Cheapest new price currently ~£17. Just seems wrong to hack a new unused thing tho.. 01:03:18, 2010-12-12
HTTPS-Everywhere is making FireFox search US-only Google. Having to use Chrome for shopping searches. :P 01:05:39, 2010-12-12
Is it wrong to think tiny servo motors are adorable? They're only 1.5g each! 01:16:50, 2010-12-12
@tajasel Oooh, that sounds NICE! Like a mattress-cover under regular sheets for softness, or fleece all over? in reply to tajasel 01:41:49, 2010-12-12
Adorable. Digital cameras in ebays vintage section. 02:41:39, 2010-12-12
Will hit up charity shops in the week to try and find knackered digital cam with focus but NO zoom function. 02:43:47, 2010-12-12
New blog post: More computer faff http://www.sci-fi-fox.com/?p=665 17:12:07, 2010-12-12
@Utlah Try ripping to FLAC. Takes a bit. in reply to Utlah 17:12:43, 2010-12-12
Jesus, Steam's taking up 51Gb of my main disk. D: Deleting time.. 17:26:57, 2010-12-12
Am amazed! Just got friended on YouTube by Jeri Ellsworth! 19:09:54, 2010-12-12
Network's being screwy. 19:35:38, 2010-12-12
@somerandomwolf I feel obligated to upload more videos now. in reply to somerandomwolf 19:41:02, 2010-12-12
@tajasel Wow, sour grapes from someone? :( in reply to tajasel 20:16:36, 2010-12-12
@song_in_heart How badly broken? in reply to song_in_heart 21:00:36, 2010-12-12
@song_in_heart Vintage plastic can get rather brittle. If it's a load-bearing tab, it'll likely need more than glue. in reply to song_in_heart 21:23:37, 2010-12-12
Sold! £120.51! :D 22:06:05, 2010-12-12
@AdriOfTheDead I really want to add afterburners to a bathroom fan. For that real "OMG it's a bad one!" effect. in reply to AdriOfTheDead 22:20:05, 2010-12-12
@retallicka Nooooo, save yourself while you still can! D: in reply to retallicka 22:27:03, 2010-12-12
Bit of a gamble, but mis-advertised PS3 camera for a tenner. Nice. 23:22:06, 2010-12-12

More computer faff

I know the motherboard throttles the CPU fan to keep noise down, so part of me’s wondering if it’s that that’s fouling up. But then when it’s not been running at power-up manually spinning it has got it going, so it sure seems to be the fan itself.

Since it’s the only fan other than the power supply, I’ll hook a case fan to the CPU connector and the CPU fan to the case-fan connector. That should determine it pretty absolutely.

In the meantime I’ve got CPUID Hardware Monitor running on the 2nd monitor showing me the fan speed and CPU temp. The annoying thing is that I already have Rainmeter running, but it requires support-programs to be open as well to add those readouts to it so there’s no point.

It actually makes me want to switch over to Linux again, because I know something like Conky can have any system resource tied to it. Likewise it could also show the UPS status and more, all in a background monitor.

If I do some housekeeping on my boot disk, I may be able to dual-boot again. Hmm.

Twitter Updates for 10-12-2010

New blog post: Tinkering.. http://www.sci-fi-fox.com/?p=656 00:31:50, 2010-12-10
Oh no.. those weird little iris actuators are 4-wire micro stepper motors. D: #research 02:39:22, 2010-12-10
@Houndloaf Arg! Any job prospects for either of you? D: in reply to Houndloaf 03:30:09, 2010-12-10
@Lizardbeth Ummm.. "Yes". in reply to Lizardbeth 04:06:31, 2010-12-10
Zzzzz time. 04:06:58, 2010-12-10
New blog post: Technical issues http://www.sci-fi-fox.com/?p=661 17:52:20, 2010-12-10

Technical issues

Indoors PC has started throwing up “CPU fan error” messages on boot, and an hour ago suddenly powered off, not reset. I’ve had the side of the case off and the fan’s looked like it’s going, so this is either a transient fan problem or something more serious.

I’m hoping it can be resolved by leaving the side off the case and keeping a close eye on the fan. If that’s all it is, I can jury-rig a repair with an old case-fan and some cable-ties. If it’s more than that, I’m in trouble because the parts are outdated enough that it’ll require a subtantially fresh build on failure.

Twitter Updates for 09-12-2010

@JezzKitty D'awww <3 in reply to JezzKitty 02:03:31, 2010-12-09
And now we just wait to see which side the first person to die is on. Nations reality-TV viewers masturbating furiously… #demo2010 17:34:23, 2010-12-09
Hearing reports of student protesters having broken into National Gallery. Or did doors just break open from pressure of the crush? 18:03:11, 2010-12-09
Glad the police got that one. "Protester" in fucking BODY ARMOUR and ski-mask, trying to light fire bomb by broken window. 18:48:05, 2010-12-09
There are innocents on either side of this, but some are being more actively agressive on both sides too. 18:58:16, 2010-12-09
Lot of these old surplus servos I have also have broken teeth. 19:50:01, 2010-12-09
More servos with broken teeth. So many broken teeth on my bench it's starting to look like Parliament Square. 20:06:36, 2010-12-09
Four Hitec HS-101 servos, all failed in the same gear. Can't make a single working one from the lot. 20:34:40, 2010-12-09
Total of 5 mechanically functional servos. If the electrics work too, hurrah. May be able to rig the broken ones onto other gearboxes. 20:50:16, 2010-12-09