Subj : Re: USB lock up - poo! To : Barry Martin From : Ky Moffet Date : Mon Feb 14 2022 22:50:00 BARRY MARTIN wrote: > KM> Also that LibreOffice does not like XP64 at all. (OpenOffice runs > KM> fine, tho. So does WordPerfect x6.) > > Would cloning work? I've not done it other than with Raspberry Pi's. Nope, tried that. Also tried x64 and x86 versions and even back to 4.0, all no joy. Either it won't run at all, or as soon as I apply any formatting, BOOM-CRASH. > As for LibreOffice, OpenOffice uses the same format (.odt, etc.) so > sseems should at least mostly work. I do have some old files probably > under LibreOffice and when when opened under OpenOffice the sizing is > sometimes too large: is like its display in 14 font but says is using > 12. Data's all there. ..ODT is an invention of the devil. It's basically identical to .DOCX. It's really a bunch of XML and stylesheets zipped up together. And if the ZIP header gets corrupted, the document is toast; you can't just load it into a text editor and recover it like you can with .DOC or .WPD or any of the uncompressed document formats. I have an editing client who lost a whole finished novel that way (I'm fairly good at extracting stuff from buggered ZIPfiles, and all I could recover was a page background image). The only worse document format is Apple Pages, which double-compresses so even if you can recover the wrapper, the contents are toast. > KM> have some TIX solder here somewhere, or can order... (there's > KM> still new old stock around) very hard but low melting point. Used > KM> to work where it was made. Ideal for electronics or jewelry. > KM> Contains iridium, among other secret ingredients. > > Order it now so when it after you use it you'll put it away and find the > original spool! LOL, yeah, that's how it works! > KM> [Pinephone] > RTFM! But first to FFM! (Find the manual.) As far as not moving the I may have to do that. I did find a couple of PDFs purporting to be manuals. > files, permissions error? On occasion I've given up and done in two > steps: create a temporary directory on the destination device, copy the > files to there, then copy the files from the temporary directory to > their proper home. (These files were too large and/or too many for > Sneakernet.) Shouldn't be the issue. It stalls at about 200k which is why I think is timeout problem. > KM> Keyboard case doohickey: > KM> https://pine64.com/product/pinephone-pinephone-pro-keyboard-case/ > > Nice! The PinePhone must fit in the top for that price: they didn't > didn't explain it as far as I could see. Does come with a USB port for > hacking! You'll like that! Yeah, you pop the back off the phone and pop it into the case. > > KM> This is the phone part: > KM> https://pine64.com/product/pinephone-beta-edition-with-convergence > KM> -package/ > > Looks good! And nice little dongle with the extra ports! Yeah, now to figure out how to make it work... > KM> battery replacement kit, now waiting for the fiddly patience to > KM> do the job. Forgot to order that component. > > Mine's on back order! Is THAT the problem... > > What was pre-installed is probably a combination of lowest cost to > > install and what the person in charged liked. As for browsers, ran > KM> It's Manjaro linux with the KDE/Plasma desktop. So it's more or > KM> less whatever KDE apps have already been compiled for ARM (same > KM> CPU class as the Raspberry Pi -- under the hood this is a Rock > KM> Pi, IIRC). Some run well, others are still iffy. > > Yes, noted today when snooping the first link the ARM processor. > ..Have it talk to a Pi! (Just because same processor or even similar > unit doesn't mean they'll work together.) IIRC it's a RockPi under the hood... rivals, more like... > I think I sent you that information a little while ago but here's the > link: https://raspberrytips.com/best-web-browsers-raspberry-pi/ Ah yes. We have several in the repository, but haven't had brain to mess with it yet. Today it did a big update and pretty much replaced the whole monkey. Apparently it's a rolling distro. > KM> But linux phones are only a couple years old in the retail > KM> market, so a long way to go yet. The most mature is the Librem; > KM> while nice, out of my price range. (However, for $2000 you can > KM> get a Librem phone with NO Chinese parts; worth it if you're > KM> privacy-critical, given that ALL Chinese chips and software are > KM> to some degree compromised.) > > Yes, I think it's kind of 'funny' how all of a sudden the worry about > potential hacking. Heck, one of the first things I thought of when > looking for (monitoring) cameras here at the house was someone capturing > the signal. Other problem was the video data want to some external > site, seemed usually China just because that's where the unit was > manufactured, and then back to me. What happens when the Internet is I too thought that was a rather obvious concern. > out? At the time I had DSL and every so often problem with their copper > lines. No/poor Internet, no video feed! And what happens when Big Brother decides to share the link? > > across an article on browsers for the Raspberry Pi and he liked (best to > > worst) Puffin, Chromium, Vivaldi, Firefox, Midori, > > https://raspberrytips.com/best-web-browsers-raspberry-pi/ , also lists > > pros and cons of each, amount of RAM used, etc. > > (Hey! look what I found! ) It's following you around. > > KM> Midori is reportedly a good choice as a bit less heavy, tho no > KM> idea how well it works. > > I remember trying it a few years ago, so on a Raspberry Pi 3 or 3B -- > seems like it worked but at the time I wasn't impressed with it. For > the Pi's here I generally don't need a broswer so haven't expermented -- > Chromium is good enough. It works well enough, yeah, and has the extensions I need. Probably a bit weighty for an ARM, unless they've really pared it down. > > That's bad! Anything like a hidden .Desktop directory? > KM> Of course, being it's linux. I'm thinkin' the problem is that > KM> it's Desktop View, which will hide icons. (Folder View shows 'em. > KM> Or is it the other way around; I forget.) This is probably not to > KM> mess with. > > When's that stopped you? Just make sure to have a working backup!! Suuuuure, when I figure that part out... > > do is open a blank LibreOffice document, label and date it, then as I > > start wandering the web copy in sites of interest along with the notes. > > At least with them written down you can go back if something starts to > > make sense (so that's what they meant by "sproodle".) > KM> I just save files in one of the ten bazillion Info directories... > KM> in this case somewhere obvious like D:\Info\Phone\Pinephone. > > I think you're using D:\Info like I'm using $HOME/File Cabinet. ...I was > looking to see how many subdirectoris it contained; did it the wrong way > but has 192 GB inside! Or rather D:\ as the File Cabinet... lessee.... root directories.... !!!HollyLisle !!Books !Music !Video Adobe Official Downloads Corel Downloads Drivers Fonts Games Genealogy Graphics HW Images Info Internet KDE Linux Media Microsoft Office MSDN MyFiles Odds&Ends Office PEDIGREE PEDIGREE and Stud Books RECYCLER storage Utility WADs > > BTW, what do you do with all those extra SD to micro-SD adapters?? > KM> Stick idle micro-SD cards in 'em so they don't get lost, being > KM> they're the size of your little fingernail and prone to go > KM> flipping off into the depths of the carpet. > > OK. I had bought something like 50 of the plastic holders a while back > -- stick a single microSD card in (they can hold up to 6). Cut a small > piece of paper to fit inside as a label. When working on a project will > have two or three: clone before the next major step! Will tape a note > to the outside. Mine live in a tin can on the top shelf of the desk. Yours are obviously more upscale! > KM> Or... HEY! I need to use that computer *today*, not next week! > Really. That's somewhat how I got started with two monitors: do an And how I got started with two computers!! > KM> proactive about such things, and it's a rolling distro, so > KM> updates continuously). > > I haven't timed the updates here: seems no more than a minute, then > generally about a minute or two extracting and installing, though some > several minutes, depending on what the update is. Good news is doesn't > clog the connection -- I did sometimes notice a bit of a slowdown with > the old DSL service (7 Mbps). Well, the diff is rolling is always up to date for every package, and there are no system upgrades. Mostly small and often, unless KDE has another point update, then larger. PCLOS is good about sharing the connection. Fedora is not. > Ouch! One would think with vacuuming and probably actually looking for > embedded staples at the beginning all would have been found by now. > Nope! Just like here -- not in the carpeting but outside every so often > find a nail from when the roof was done several years ago. In the desert, nails were the major cash crop. You could find nails literally anywhere. Not another trace of anything ever, but.. nails! > Back in the old-old days I had a small electronics work area set up in > the basement of my parents house. At the time the house had fuses -- I > put in a smaller value fuse to the workbench so (theoretically) if I > screwed up I'd just shut off my area and not a part of the house. Also > wired it so the bench area light was on the other side of my fuse: that > way still had light! You're much fancier than I'll ever be > KM> Oh, the paid ones at Mozilla Foundation are no better. > Maybe the unpaid ones use the paid portion as a base. I sometimes think > the free stuff is really us end-users beta testing for the commercial > use version. Yep, in fact yonder are Fedora and RedHat, proof of concept. > I haven't played with NVMe's yet -- nothing seems to be all that There's a third party driver to make 'em work with XP and Win7. Works fine with XP64. But made Win7 throw up in ways I'd never seen before. Win10 flags them as corrupt if it didn't format them. (That's twice. And why Win10 never touches Silver again.) Anyway.... the speed is impressive. About 5x that of a good SSD. > sluggish to access. "Worst" is the MythTV files: ...largest 21GB, > generally 3-5 GB. Generally a second, sometimes two, to start playing. > Never times, so maybe not as long as it sometimes think it takes. Video playback is not real speed-sensitive. Even an old HDD suffices. It's not reading the whole file at once, only the part it needs to fill the buffer. > > KM> Considered the size of VMs, and thought to myself... Self, > > KM> wouldn't that be a good job for the fastest storage available?? > > Ummm....a 620 TB HDD?!!!!!! > KM> That sounds about right! > > Though apparently try to avoid the shingled version. My hard drive needs reroofing! > KM> Mine do a lot of typing. > > That's probably it, plus could be additional factors like how hard one > hits the keys. Plus the wireless keyboards here are used on 'secondary' > computers; my main computer has always been wired. And yes, I do wear > away the wired keyboards. Wired are better, for sure, but it's just too much crap to trip over here. > KM> A S D N M L E take the beating here. > On this keyboard the 'd' is OK, the 'n' has a noticeable wearing but the > 'm' does not, which seems odd as "M" is in my surname and so typed > fairly frequently. 'L' and 'e' look intact. It makes little sense compared to how much typing, for sure! > At one time I tried using those number strips like I used for > identifying the wireless keyboards to identify the RPi microsSD cards. > Just the right size! Also too thick: had a couple get stuck and needed > to wiggle out using needle-noise pliers (gently, on the sides!), Ooops.... yeah, a good way to mark those has so far escaped me. > Mickey Mouse mouse (!). Worked fine except the layering to make > Mickey's features were uncomfortable and dug a little into my hand. LOL, now I want one, just because :D > This keyboard has a full-sized Backspace! ...Old Aspire- > branded keybaodr I using with the RPi project currently also has a > full-sized BS. Handy thing about that keyboard is has a USB port to > plug the mouse in to. ...Looking at other keyboards up here: all have Handy! > the full-sized Backspace key. ...Did use one keyboard recently and I > couldn't find the Delete key. Really?! Did eventually find it: was a > big honkin' double-sized key, normal positioning in the 'center' keypad, > but LIS double-sized plus was vertical (most larger keys are horizontal- > orientated). That's...weird. > KM> I can't use a touchpad, not without wanting to hurt someone. > > Guy I knew a while back used a trackball. Seemed to be a good option, Can't use those, makes my wrist hurt. > except here if doing mostly typing (so little mousing) I'll shove the > mouse towards the back and move the keyboard over so the main part of > the keyboard is directly in front of me. With a trackball I'd probably > smack the little roller ball out and then go looking for it on the > floor! Except it's a big roller and it lands on your toe, and... > KM> All else being equal, I'd go with MSI as being less influenced by > KM> the endless beta hardware of the gaming market. I've become > KM> convinced that they literally use gamers to beta-test hardware, > KM> so if you want stable hardware, wait til it's old hat to gamers > KM> but standard for business. > > That tends to make sense. Also tends to go along with my old idea a > motherboard made for gamers was going to be great for those of us who > didn't want to wait (fast file retrieval, etc.). Gamers tend to be all bling and quick fix, and a LOT of hardware churn. The bus speed is the same for a given spec regardless. So let them work the bugs out and buy when it becomes a business or workstation board! > > Personally I'm staying away from liquid-cooled: the potential for > > leaking bothers me. > KM> Yeah, those things do not inspire faith. Good heatpipe type > KM> cooler should be fine. > Someone I know out in Nevada did have a liquid-cooled unit break! Vague > on the details but fortunately didn't short out anything, though the > coolant did do something to his wooden desk. I don't know what they're using in 'em. I think I'd be inclined to mount the guts outside the case. > KM> It's called tearing, and can be software issue or inadequate > KM> hardware. > > Thought it was called 'tearing' but wasn't sure. Here the old MythTV > system had it but the new system does not. Not sure what caused the > change: the Frontends have the same hardware but have been updated to > MythTV version 31. The Backend is a completely new system: Enough of an upgrade to fix the issue, anyway! > both in TV mode and HDMI via MythTV. Have one computer which will 'act > up' on occasion; exit to the Desktop and man is the display tiny! Not > tiny as in shrunk with black surrounding, tiny as in small -- instead of > a 1920x1080 it's something like 3840x2160 (4K), though seems like I saw > a 4,000-something when I checked. (TV's not all that high-end a one.) "Suddenly my screen is half a mile away!!" > KM> So will Windows. In fact in the old days of never-enough-RAM but > KM> swap-is-way-too-slow there was a switch to make Windows > KM> preferentially use all RAM before touching swap. I ran with swap > KM> disabled for years. You can disable it on linux too, but modern > KM> hoggy browsers make that ... unwise. > > Yes, I've seen when one could disable Swap but further reading made it > seem like not a good idea to do so. I have more than enough room on the Mine rarely touches it, and then only cuz Chrome Hog. > hard drives (multiple computers) so don't need the extra few GBs. Plus > it seems like the Swap Drive occasionaly holds some 'valuable' data?? Nope. You should even be able to access it. 4GB should be enough, tho. > I've not investigated but sometimes seem the size of whatever is in the > Swap Drive could be something like update stuff ==> run this file next > time a reboot is done??? I've seen times when there's something in the > Swap drive and AFAICT no reason to be because the RAM isn't even half > capacity. ...Just guessing. Dunno. Only time I've ever seen it used is when Chrome is being stupid, and then I had probably better close down and restart. > Actually does make sense: some motherboards have two slots, > others 4. If 50 motherboards have two slots and 50 motherboards have > four then the average is 3 slots. (This is the first time I've seen a > motherboard with eight slots - I'd be checking if 8+8+8+8+8+8+8+8 could > be used to give me 64 -- cheaper to buy 8 8's than 4 16's? (That kind 8GB are about the largest before price per GB starts majorly going up. (I get it used from any of several used-RAM dealers; dunno what new prices are doing but they all went up last year.) > of a system would probably max out with 256 GB, maybe 512, of memory - > I doubt I'd want to spend that amount of money at once -- do a memory > upgrade every so ofetn when need the smaller RAM for another computer.) Silver is maxed out with 64GB. Fireball also has 64GB, but being a workstation type board can max out at 192GB. Both have 8 slots. > KM> Oh, no, the $50 brand new vidcards are now $200 brand new > KM> vidcards. > > Oh - that seems more like taking excuse of the Supply Chain Issue. And the chip shortage. There just isn't anything in the pipeline. > One thing I found with the new monitors is they are sometimes too slow > in auto-switching to capture the computer's VGA signal, or at least on > booting. Was the reason I kept the CRT VGA monitor semi-handy. Might be > just the older computers as I haven't used the VGA monitor in ages. I've found they can be slow to come back from sleep. I have a couple CRTs yet but haven't seen 'em in years! > > Change is good! I can't imagine you listening to Bubble Gum Rock! > KM> Well, I do like the Raveonettes... tho I'm not sure how bubbly > KM> they are... > I selected a semi-random video (something Love Song -- the earlier > listed were their Christmas songs) -- she reminded me of Blondie. Music > wasn't! Yeah, they're like Blondie on bad drugs. "The Last Dance" came on my little MP3 player, or I'd have never heard of 'em. > KM> People like all sorts of crap, or it wouldn't exist. So long as I > KM> don't have to endure it, why do I care?? > > Nope! Actually I like having other music suggested and have discovered > stuff I never knew about. Admittedly I'm not into "screaming rock" nor > fall-asleep classical nor twangy country yet there are selections I do > like. Yeah, you never know. Frex I follow a Japanese violinist... look up Teppei Okada on Youtube. He does all sorts of weird stuff besides the obvious. Including musical standup, funny even tho in Japanese of which I have like two words. > There was something I read a whiule back the way to get the correct > answer was to post an incorrect one. Always works :) > > Go to https://youtu.be/zx8M5DXmH_0, though when I copied that the > KM> It's daaaaaaark!! > > Really? It's nice and bright! ...Then it dawned on me! Is that how it works? My sundial must need recalibrating. > For some reason the OxBlue site I reference is still pointing at the > riverbank/under the bridges -- do know this Spring Bettendorf is > supposed to be installing some sort of elevator so walkers and bikers on > the River Trail can get up onto the I-74 Bridge to cross to the Illinois > side (there's a pedestrian lane built into one of the bridges). I was noticing how much flood space there is under that bridge.... > Pretty! It seems they're showing as much snow as I have here: thought > Montanta was supposed to be colder and snowier than I am in Iowa! A lot drier than Iowa... and we got hardly any snow this year. We've had about 15 inches here, total, and it's long gone. But that's not terribly unusual to get every few years. We made up for it with 106" a couple years back. > > could bluff -- if I knew how to gamble! > KM> "Gimme all your chips and no one gets hurt." > Potato chips, tortilla chips..... I think your cash-out is going to be not so rich! > That one isn't done on Friday nights and Saturdays. > .. Sign of bad a computer: the only chip inside is a Dorito. My PC is crunchy!! þ RNET 2.10U: ILink: Techware BBS þ Hollywood, Ca þ www.techware2k.com --- QScan/PCB v1.20a / 01-0462 * Origin: ILink: CFBBS | cfbbs.no-ip.com | 856-933-7096 (454:1/1) .