Few things that I can really count as strange happen to me.
I would have ignored the fact that my PSP inexplicably died on me, only to have it suddenly return to life, then intermittently work, and finally start working again. I would have relegated it to the perversity of the inanimate.
So it only served to raise the event to even higher levels of mystery when the same thing happened to someone else, at around the same time, and stranger still, to someone sharing my first name.
I'm just glad that my PSP is back and better (except for that piece of tape holding the LCD backlight flex cable to the connector)
Showing posts with label hardware. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hardware. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Woe is me
Yesterday my girlfriend was towing me around while looking for a new pair of shoes, and while we were in one store, I plopped down on a sofa and whipped out my almost 1-year old PSP.
I was playing N+, and all of a sudden the unit just... died.
I thought, ok, it's just the battery, but I just charged it, so maybe its that RemoteJoyLite plugin -- it's always crashing --, I'll just do cold boot.
So I tried pulling the power switch up for ten seconds. The power LED turns green for a few seconds, then dies. I try it again. The same thing. I have never seen a bricked PSP before, but I hope that that is all it is - a corrupt firmware.
When I got home I try to plug in the AC adapter, to no avail. I went as far as disassembling my PSP. I got as far as removing the LCD frame, but it was almost morning and my girlfriend has work early, so after a few tries I finally got the PSP back together.
Right now I have my PSP with me, at the office. I was hoping to borrow somebody's PSP and make a Pandora battery.
I already have the magic memstick, so unbricking is my last course of action before having the unit fixed (which will cost me the half price of second-hand PSP phat, at least, that's what replacing the motherboard will cost me)
But in my rush not to get to work late, it seems I left the magic memstick at home, bugger that.
The thing is, I haved dropped my PSP (from about 1 foot), and it did fall a bit hard -- hard enough to somehow get the battery cover lock out, but still leave the whole PSP and battery cover lock mechanism intact.
I really wouldn't want to lose my PSP. It's almost a part of me, and 1 year isn't good enough for me to say goodbye to it yet. If I ever resurrect it I promise never to drop it, ever again.
I feel guilty for shelling out some money to fix it after my girlfriend has repeatedly told me how badly I treat it, I almost feel like I don't deserve to have it fixed.
But leaving it broken just doesn't feel right... and if it could never be fixed, I would at least like to scrap the LCD and build a driver for it, turn it into a digital frame or a mini monitor. Good luck with that though - Alexan doesn't even stock up on PICs, much less FPGAs.
If anyone has a phat compatible motherboard to sell (for cheap), let me know?
I was playing N+, and all of a sudden the unit just... died.
I thought, ok, it's just the battery, but I just charged it, so maybe its that RemoteJoyLite plugin -- it's always crashing --, I'll just do cold boot.
So I tried pulling the power switch up for ten seconds. The power LED turns green for a few seconds, then dies. I try it again. The same thing. I have never seen a bricked PSP before, but I hope that that is all it is - a corrupt firmware.
When I got home I try to plug in the AC adapter, to no avail. I went as far as disassembling my PSP. I got as far as removing the LCD frame, but it was almost morning and my girlfriend has work early, so after a few tries I finally got the PSP back together.
Right now I have my PSP with me, at the office. I was hoping to borrow somebody's PSP and make a Pandora battery.
I already have the magic memstick, so unbricking is my last course of action before having the unit fixed (which will cost me the half price of second-hand PSP phat, at least, that's what replacing the motherboard will cost me)
But in my rush not to get to work late, it seems I left the magic memstick at home, bugger that.
The thing is, I haved dropped my PSP (from about 1 foot), and it did fall a bit hard -- hard enough to somehow get the battery cover lock out, but still leave the whole PSP and battery cover lock mechanism intact.
I really wouldn't want to lose my PSP. It's almost a part of me, and 1 year isn't good enough for me to say goodbye to it yet. If I ever resurrect it I promise never to drop it, ever again.
I feel guilty for shelling out some money to fix it after my girlfriend has repeatedly told me how badly I treat it, I almost feel like I don't deserve to have it fixed.
But leaving it broken just doesn't feel right... and if it could never be fixed, I would at least like to scrap the LCD and build a driver for it, turn it into a digital frame or a mini monitor. Good luck with that though - Alexan doesn't even stock up on PICs, much less FPGAs.
If anyone has a phat compatible motherboard to sell (for cheap), let me know?
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
My new toy
My girlfriend got me an early gift for my birthday.
Yeah. No. Not a Wii, just the Wiimote.
I've been pining for one for the past few months, comparing everything to the price of a Wiimote, and she finally caved in and decided to get me one.
She probably didn't see the point in getting a Wiimote without the console, but I've been watching those videos and drooling with envy at the all geeky things you can do with a Wiimote and a PC with a Bluetooth adapter.
Installing the damn thing
My Bluetooth adapter is the cheapo Billionton BT-dongle that seems to do the job well enough.
It comes with IVT BlueSoleil drivers. My first try with this set of drivers kept me awake for most of the morning. The Wiimote was being detected, but GlovePIE and Wiinmote refused to detect it.
I got a copy of the BlueSoleil drivers v1.6.2.1, and these worked fine, but since my dongle was detected as an unlicensed device, I was only limited to 5MB data transfer before needing to restart BlueTooth.
GlovePIE and Wiinmote worked perfectly here, and before long I was playing TrackMania Sunrise with the Wiimote as a steering wheel,
and Portal with some difficulty.
Before long I exceeded the 5MB limit and my game of Portal was abruptly halted due to lack of control. This wouldn't do.
I finally tried going back to a newly downloaded copy of v1.6.1.4, and now BlueSoleil is not complaining about about an unlicensed device, while GlovePIE continue to work happily.
To get everything working you will need:
I'll not post complete instuctions on how to set things up here. Google can help you find that.
Yeah. No. Not a Wii, just the Wiimote.
I've been pining for one for the past few months, comparing everything to the price of a Wiimote, and she finally caved in and decided to get me one.
She probably didn't see the point in getting a Wiimote without the console, but I've been watching those videos and drooling with envy at the all geeky things you can do with a Wiimote and a PC with a Bluetooth adapter.
Installing the damn thing
My Bluetooth adapter is the cheapo Billionton BT-dongle that seems to do the job well enough.
It comes with IVT BlueSoleil drivers. My first try with this set of drivers kept me awake for most of the morning. The Wiimote was being detected, but GlovePIE and Wiinmote refused to detect it.
I got a copy of the BlueSoleil drivers v1.6.2.1, and these worked fine, but since my dongle was detected as an unlicensed device, I was only limited to 5MB data transfer before needing to restart BlueTooth.
GlovePIE and Wiinmote worked perfectly here, and before long I was playing TrackMania Sunrise with the Wiimote as a steering wheel,
and Portal with some difficulty.
Before long I exceeded the 5MB limit and my game of Portal was abruptly halted due to lack of control. This wouldn't do.
I finally tried going back to a newly downloaded copy of v1.6.1.4, and now BlueSoleil is not complaining about about an unlicensed device, while GlovePIE continue to work happily.
To get everything working you will need:
- A BlueTooth dongle (BillionTon was used here)
- Bluetooth drivers (BlueSoleil v1.6.1.4 was used here)
- GlovePIE v???
- PPPJoy
- Some patience
I'll not post complete instuctions on how to set things up here. Google can help you find that.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
LCD Monitor Troubles
Remember my 19" Hanspree LCD monitor I got last Christmas?
Just today I noticed that it was developing horizontal streaks across the screen towards the right especially during sharp brightness level changes.
I was at work when Frans told me it was getting really bad, so I Googled and found an article that said frame rates above 60Hz weren't good for LCDs, so I had her reset it from 75 to 60. It seemed to fix it a little bit, but the streaks were still there.
In desperation I asked her to secure the monitor cable at the back of the LCD and the PC. She did so for the back of the LCD, and the problem went away.
Or so I thought...
UPDATE:
The source of the problem was a loose AC power cord. Some arcing was probably messing up the timing circuits and causing the streaks. After securing the power cord, the screen was back to normal.
Phew
Just today I noticed that it was developing horizontal streaks across the screen towards the right especially during sharp brightness level changes.
I was at work when Frans told me it was getting really bad, so I Googled and found an article that said frame rates above 60Hz weren't good for LCDs, so I had her reset it from 75 to 60. It seemed to fix it a little bit, but the streaks were still there.
In desperation I asked her to secure the monitor cable at the back of the LCD and the PC. She did so for the back of the LCD, and the problem went away.
Or so I thought...
UPDATE:
The source of the problem was a loose AC power cord. Some arcing was probably messing up the timing circuits and causing the streaks. After securing the power cord, the screen was back to normal.
Phew
Friday, January 4, 2008
New-Computer Woes
I've had my new PC for almost a month now, and for the most part, it's not had any problems. I say for the most part, because there were some issues I had with it.
The motherboard, an ASUS P5B-MX WiFI Solo AP sports 4 SATA ports and 1 IDE port. As I was upgrading everything besides the drives, this proved to be an almost fatal mistake. I had a 80GB, a 160GB and a DVD-ROM that were all IDE. One of these drives would be left out.
My first thought was to go USB and buy an enclosure, but I didn't really think that the transfer speeds would be up to par, and another plug on my power strip and wires running to my PC wasn't going to make that corner of my room any prettier.
Instead of buying a new SATA drive and saving myself a headache I stubbornly decided to try the roundabout, unorthodox, alternative way, using a SATA-to-IDE converter.
I knew my chances of finding one were slim as these devices weren't exactly regularly-used items, but I was loath to buy a new hard disk.
After asking around several computer stores in the Megamall area with no luck, I asked my uncle who happened to know someone who sold the very device I was looking for. Hindsight, I should have taken his advice and sold him the 160GB so my losses in buying a new SATA drive would be minimized but I still thought I could save more money with the converter.
The first unit I recieved was a dud. It failed to detect any of the drives. I had it replaced and the new one finally worked.
It wasn't without fault, it failed to detect either the 160GB or the DVD-ROM. There were no instructions with the device. It only detected my 80GB (single partition, jumpers set to Master) which was fine with me, as I could now use all my drives at the same time. My 80GB hosted my OS, but it posed no problem as the BIOS allowed booting from any drive.
Just to satiate my curiosity, I ran Nero's Disc Speed test to see if the SATA-IDE converter made things worse. Although I didn't have a proper control for the results, it was just as fast as the 160GB on the IDE.
With the IDE connected to the 160GB and the DVD-ROM, and my PC booting from the SATA-IDE connection, I mopped my brow of sweat and thought - problem solved!
No such luck.
This time, the problem came from the DVD-ROM. Up until I got the SATA-IDE converter, I was forced to switch between the DVD-ROM and the hard disk manually, shutting down every time I needed a file from one or the other media.
I recall having used the DVD-ROM to install most of the software on my PC with no problems. Now it was acting up and refusing to read most of my backup DVDs! CDs seemed to work fine, as did pirated DVDs such as containing the entire fourth season of the series 24.
Just my backup DVDs that contained my PC installers, PSP games and girl-on-girl porn collection was unreadable! I kept getting an error: "incorrect function" when trying to read my backups. I managed to get it working sometimes, but only if I did the following:
Windows then detects the DVD-R and can read it in explorer. However, opening and closing the tray caused the problem to re-appear.
I tried a System Restore and a new install of Windows XP but neither was able to get my drive working the way it used to.
Strangely enough, when I boot into DOS via UBCD, it can read the DVD backups just fine. The only problem is the DVD is flaky when it comes to booting. So booting into UBCD is a hit-and-miss affair. It has been this way since I got it, so maybe the DVD hardware really does have a problem.
Maybe I should just get a new SATA DVD-ROM save myself a headache.
The motherboard, an ASUS P5B-MX WiFI Solo AP sports 4 SATA ports and 1 IDE port. As I was upgrading everything besides the drives, this proved to be an almost fatal mistake. I had a 80GB, a 160GB and a DVD-ROM that were all IDE. One of these drives would be left out.
My first thought was to go USB and buy an enclosure, but I didn't really think that the transfer speeds would be up to par, and another plug on my power strip and wires running to my PC wasn't going to make that corner of my room any prettier.
Instead of buying a new SATA drive and saving myself a headache I stubbornly decided to try the roundabout, unorthodox, alternative way, using a SATA-to-IDE converter.
I knew my chances of finding one were slim as these devices weren't exactly regularly-used items, but I was loath to buy a new hard disk.
After asking around several computer stores in the Megamall area with no luck, I asked my uncle who happened to know someone who sold the very device I was looking for. Hindsight, I should have taken his advice and sold him the 160GB so my losses in buying a new SATA drive would be minimized but I still thought I could save more money with the converter.
The first unit I recieved was a dud. It failed to detect any of the drives. I had it replaced and the new one finally worked.
It wasn't without fault, it failed to detect either the 160GB or the DVD-ROM. There were no instructions with the device. It only detected my 80GB (single partition, jumpers set to Master) which was fine with me, as I could now use all my drives at the same time. My 80GB hosted my OS, but it posed no problem as the BIOS allowed booting from any drive.
Just to satiate my curiosity, I ran Nero's Disc Speed test to see if the SATA-IDE converter made things worse. Although I didn't have a proper control for the results, it was just as fast as the 160GB on the IDE.
With the IDE connected to the 160GB and the DVD-ROM, and my PC booting from the SATA-IDE connection, I mopped my brow of sweat and thought - problem solved!
No such luck.
This time, the problem came from the DVD-ROM. Up until I got the SATA-IDE converter, I was forced to switch between the DVD-ROM and the hard disk manually, shutting down every time I needed a file from one or the other media.
I recall having used the DVD-ROM to install most of the software on my PC with no problems. Now it was acting up and refusing to read most of my backup DVDs! CDs seemed to work fine, as did pirated DVDs such as containing the entire fourth season of the series 24.
Just my backup DVDs that contained my PC installers, PSP games and girl-on-girl porn collection was unreadable! I kept getting an error: "incorrect function" when trying to read my backups. I managed to get it working sometimes, but only if I did the following:
- Remove the hard disk from the IDE. DVD is the only device on it.
- Boot into Windows. Run Doug Knox's XP CD fix. This removes filters that CD-burning software may have installed and left when uninstalled.
- Reboot. Make sure desired DVD-R is already inside the DVD-ROM.
Windows then detects the DVD-R and can read it in explorer. However, opening and closing the tray caused the problem to re-appear.
I tried a System Restore and a new install of Windows XP but neither was able to get my drive working the way it used to.
Strangely enough, when I boot into DOS via UBCD, it can read the DVD backups just fine. The only problem is the DVD is flaky when it comes to booting. So booting into UBCD is a hit-and-miss affair. It has been this way since I got it, so maybe the DVD hardware really does have a problem.
Maybe I should just get a new SATA DVD-ROM save myself a headache.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Upgrade Complete!
My Cousin Marie called to offer me a modelling stint. As I'm 50 pounds over 200, it obviously didn't have anything to do with a runway, flashy lights, half-naked women...
I need to flesh out 6 characters in 3D for an advert for some industrial insectiside called "Chix".
It vaguely occured to me that my 2.1Ghz Celeron 512MB with 8MB shared video memory just wasn't gonna slice the pie, so to speak, and I was planning an upgrade anyway so Franz and I went out to Gilmore to pick up our brand new PC. Here are the things I bought:
Intel E4500 Core 2 Duo @ 2.2Ghz
1GB Kingston DDR2
ASUS P5B-MX WiFi AP
Inno3D GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2
Epson Stylus C90
19" HannSpree LCD display HDMI (1440 x 900 native resolution)
The CPU and Memory
I haven't actually had time to push this thing to breaking point. Yesterday Firefox was acting all weird and hogging memory and the computer was doing bullet time, so there must have been some bottleneck somewhere. It was really annoying to see a Core 2 Duo getting stuck up like that. You'd expect threading to save the day. Even the mouse pointer was freezing, so it had to be somewhere low level.
The MotherBoard
The annoying thing about this board is that it only has one IDE (PATA) slot. While I understand the need to replace it with SATA, it doesn't make sense to alienate your customers with ony one PATA slot when there are still many PATA drives lying about. Now I need to find an IDE to SATA converter, or else settle for USB.
I should have gone over the specs more and read up on the latest chipsets, so I don't really know what's going on under the hood of this one. I had to upgrade the BIOS in order for it to recognize my CPU.
It's saving grace is the built-in WiFi card that can act as a Station and as an Access Point - all literally at the click of a button. I was able to connect my PSP while in AP mode all without configuring anything.
Granted, surfing the web on my PSP while Franz is chatting away on a 19" LCD screen isn't exactly fun, but if you happen to have a wifi laptop lying around and you don't have a wifi router yet, this is really neat.
The Video Card
I was more of an ATI person, since my brother's 5500 FX broke 3 times, but since all the nice games love NVidia, I decided to follow the higher path as well. I always considered Inno3D being the cheaper, thus inferior brand, but the 8600 GT for Php 2,600 is a bargain.
I don't see why it's DDR3 version is 3 times the price, and I don't really think that DDR3 will provide a large performance boost.
The Display
You can find out what this looks like over here. Personally, Franz didn't like the design. Strongly disagreed. Hated. Like she hates vegetables. I thought it was okay. The guys over at Gilmore couldn't stop flouting it, I should have smelled a sales pitch. They said that the Hannspree was a new entry into the market that they's sold several over the past few months with no returnees.
It's HDMI, which means absolutely nothing unless you have Blu-Ray or a PS3. As that's unlikely to happen within the next 2 years, it's nice to know I'm at least prepared for the possibility. The 1440 x 900 resolution is crisp and clear, and of course you'll need a newer video card that supports the resolution.
What this looks really good with is a see though case and/or a acrylic glass table top.
The #@$!*% Printer
The damn thing refused to work even once. I'm returning it tomorrow. I think the ink cartridges have "expired".
UPDATE: Franz called Gilmore to report the problem. They said they'd replace it... IF we bought new cartridges and found that it still didn't work! Rubbish! A new set of ink cartridges costs almost as much as the printer!
The Tests
ePSXe - the PlayStation emulator
This actually used to be my benchmark for PCs. Prolly cause I read about how it was a good test of performance due to emulation and vdeo card requirements. I just ran the BIOS, with Pete's OpenGL2 plugin set to "Nice". As expected, all went smoothly.
Tomb Raider: Legends
This is actually the only decent game I had on hand, so I whipped it out right away. I turned on all the display options: New Generation Content, Full Screen Effects, Depth of Field, Reflections and all.
Having only played this before on an GeCube X550, seeing it in all its glory blew me away. Widescreen support is a nice touch.
When I enabled Anti Aliasing the game slowed noticeably with each level of AA.
PCSX2
Emulation? I could have just bought a PS2. Instead I need a dual core CPU, a kickass video card, and hope that your game works.
But...
...you can't surf porn sites on a PS2.
With my first few settings I got it running, but rather slowly. After a few more settings I got the BIOS up to speed running at almost 60 fps.
The only game I had on hand was Shadow of the Colossus. It booted (yay!) and then immediately crawled to 0.9 fps. Thankfully, I found out that SotC isn't one of those games that plays well on PCSX2. I'm just going to have to wait until I get a copy of FFX.
Same thing with Anti Aliasing, rendering slowed noticeably with each level of AA.
I find it hard to believe there was that much of a slowdown with AA turned on.
3D Studio Max
I haven't got an installer yet, so the jury's still out on how fast my rig can render a scene. What I want to know is if there are GPGPU plugins that can help boost rendering time.
I need to flesh out 6 characters in 3D for an advert for some industrial insectiside called "Chix".
It vaguely occured to me that my 2.1Ghz Celeron 512MB with 8MB shared video memory just wasn't gonna slice the pie, so to speak, and I was planning an upgrade anyway so Franz and I went out to Gilmore to pick up our brand new PC. Here are the things I bought:
Intel E4500 Core 2 Duo @ 2.2Ghz
1GB Kingston DDR2
ASUS P5B-MX WiFi AP
Inno3D GeForce 8600 GT 512MB DDR2
Epson Stylus C90
19" HannSpree LCD display HDMI (1440 x 900 native resolution)
The CPU and Memory
I haven't actually had time to push this thing to breaking point. Yesterday Firefox was acting all weird and hogging memory and the computer was doing bullet time, so there must have been some bottleneck somewhere. It was really annoying to see a Core 2 Duo getting stuck up like that. You'd expect threading to save the day. Even the mouse pointer was freezing, so it had to be somewhere low level.
The MotherBoard
The annoying thing about this board is that it only has one IDE (PATA) slot. While I understand the need to replace it with SATA, it doesn't make sense to alienate your customers with ony one PATA slot when there are still many PATA drives lying about. Now I need to find an IDE to SATA converter, or else settle for USB.
I should have gone over the specs more and read up on the latest chipsets, so I don't really know what's going on under the hood of this one. I had to upgrade the BIOS in order for it to recognize my CPU.
It's saving grace is the built-in WiFi card that can act as a Station and as an Access Point - all literally at the click of a button. I was able to connect my PSP while in AP mode all without configuring anything.
Granted, surfing the web on my PSP while Franz is chatting away on a 19" LCD screen isn't exactly fun, but if you happen to have a wifi laptop lying around and you don't have a wifi router yet, this is really neat.
The Video Card
I was more of an ATI person, since my brother's 5500 FX broke 3 times, but since all the nice games love NVidia, I decided to follow the higher path as well. I always considered Inno3D being the cheaper, thus inferior brand, but the 8600 GT for Php 2,600 is a bargain.
I don't see why it's DDR3 version is 3 times the price, and I don't really think that DDR3 will provide a large performance boost.
The Display
You can find out what this looks like over here. Personally, Franz didn't like the design. Strongly disagreed. Hated. Like she hates vegetables. I thought it was okay. The guys over at Gilmore couldn't stop flouting it, I should have smelled a sales pitch. They said that the Hannspree was a new entry into the market that they's sold several over the past few months with no returnees.
It's HDMI, which means absolutely nothing unless you have Blu-Ray or a PS3. As that's unlikely to happen within the next 2 years, it's nice to know I'm at least prepared for the possibility. The 1440 x 900 resolution is crisp and clear, and of course you'll need a newer video card that supports the resolution.
What this looks really good with is a see though case and/or a acrylic glass table top.
The #@$!*% Printer
The damn thing refused to work even once. I'm returning it tomorrow. I think the ink cartridges have "expired".
UPDATE: Franz called Gilmore to report the problem. They said they'd replace it... IF we bought new cartridges and found that it still didn't work! Rubbish! A new set of ink cartridges costs almost as much as the printer!
The Tests
ePSXe - the PlayStation emulator
This actually used to be my benchmark for PCs. Prolly cause I read about how it was a good test of performance due to emulation and vdeo card requirements. I just ran the BIOS, with Pete's OpenGL2 plugin set to "Nice". As expected, all went smoothly.
Tomb Raider: Legends
This is actually the only decent game I had on hand, so I whipped it out right away. I turned on all the display options: New Generation Content, Full Screen Effects, Depth of Field, Reflections and all.
Having only played this before on an GeCube X550, seeing it in all its glory blew me away. Widescreen support is a nice touch.
When I enabled Anti Aliasing the game slowed noticeably with each level of AA.
PCSX2
Emulation? I could have just bought a PS2. Instead I need a dual core CPU, a kickass video card, and hope that your game works.
But...
...you can't surf porn sites on a PS2.
With my first few settings I got it running, but rather slowly. After a few more settings I got the BIOS up to speed running at almost 60 fps.
The only game I had on hand was Shadow of the Colossus. It booted (yay!) and then immediately crawled to 0.9 fps. Thankfully, I found out that SotC isn't one of those games that plays well on PCSX2. I'm just going to have to wait until I get a copy of FFX.
Same thing with Anti Aliasing, rendering slowed noticeably with each level of AA.
I find it hard to believe there was that much of a slowdown with AA turned on.
3D Studio Max
I haven't got an installer yet, so the jury's still out on how fast my rig can render a scene. What I want to know is if there are GPGPU plugins that can help boost rendering time.
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