So my Craig Spegel grips turned out to be a perfect drop-in fit:

And my photography turned out to be lousy. Heh. The bitch of it is, I’ve taken more than one photography class. I’m just too cheap to buy a proper camera and too impatient to fuck around with lighting. But anyways, the grips are PURDY.

Following up on my earlier post about these mini-PCs, I see that the company has a “buy 3, get one free” special right now. After factoring in shipping costs, that would drop the unit price to $85.52.

Except I don’t need 4 of these things. If any of my local readers want one, we could do a little group-buy and save a bunch of money. Comment or email if you’re interested.

EDIT: Josh had a good idea; I’m willing to re-ship the machines to anyone who wants in. Cost would be $85.52 plus actual shipping to you; I’m not looking to make any money on this.

If you’re interested in having me pre-install an operating system for you, that can probably be arranged… just leave a comment or email.

So, among all the serious computer geeks on my blogroll, I’m sure at least TWO of you want in on this

UPDATE 2: As existingthing pointed out, and as I should have pointed out, these machines can run Linux. They’ll also work with NetBSD and Windows CE. Looking at the specs, I don’t see any reason why you couldn’t run Windows 98 or 2000, but I can’t guarantee that.

Also note that they ship with blank hard drives and no CD or floppy, so you’ll have to get a bit creative when it comes to OS installation. You can install Linux, NetBSD, or (probably) Win2k from a USB flash drive. Alternately, you could remove the hard drive, put it in another PC or an external enclosure, install your OS of choice, and then put it back in the decTOP. I’m going to use a flash drive to install Linux on mine.

A reader tipped me off today that images posted to my blog weren’t showing up in Google Reader, due to my hotlinking protection. Instead of seeing all the pretty pictures, he was just seeing this:

The crack tech support team here at The Unforgiving Minute sprung into action, using their ultra-advanced, sooper-sekrit IT skills to fix the problem. Hopefully.

So if you read me via Google Reader, let me know if the pretty pictures are working now.

Squeaky goes off to buy a Glock 19 and ends up with a Springfield XD.

Then again, she’s both female AND a redhead, so these things are to be expected…

I’m kicking around the idea of buying one of these little guys:

Aww, isn’t that just adorable? It’s a tiny little computer!

Because, of course, I need more computers. There’s actually a good reason for buying one of these things, though; it looks perfect for a 24/7, “always-on” machine.

See, my desktop system is a dual-processor, dual-hard drive Power Mac G5 driving a pair of big CRT monitors. It draws a LOT of power and throws off enough waste heat to keep that room a good 5 degrees warmer than the rest of the house. Even with the monitors turned off, it still draws 140 watts at idle and 600 W at peak. Keeping it running around the clock is just silly and wasteful.

So I’d like to have a tiny, silent, low-power PC that I can leave on all the time without worry. And these little decTOPs only use 8 watts, which is about as much as a night light. I could install Linux, park it next to the router, and use it to download torrents, upload remote backups and share my MP3 library across the LAN. Oh, and they’re only a hundred bucks. Nice!

The fly in the ointment? Shipping for this 3-pound, smaller-than-a-shoebox computer is $40. That’s just fucking absurd. Hopefully the folks at Data Evolution will come to their senses and get some reasonable shipping rates.

Jeri Ryan

… and all, err, lithium-ion batteries.

Since I’m going back to school in two weeks and plan on bringing my laptop with me to classes, I felt it prudent to check out the current condition of my battery:

td@thinkpad:~$ cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/info
present: yes
design capacity: 47520 mWh
last full capacity: 34650 mWh
battery technology: rechargeable
design voltage: 10800 mV
design capacity warning: 1732 mWh
design capacity low: 200 mWh
capacity granularity 1: 1 mWh
capacity granularity 2: 1 mWh
model number: IBM-92P1075
serial number: 8935
battery type: LION
OEM info: SANYO


Ouch. I’ve lost 27% of my battery capacity in the year-and-a-half that I’ve used this machine. Guess I gotta stay close to power outlets.

Along with the external hard drive mentioned in my last post, the Big Brown Truck of Rage-Inducing Disappointment (so named due to UPS’s tendency to inflict great violence on my packages) also brought me some new Hi-Power magazines from CDNN. I decided to try out some Mec-Gar 15-rounders instead of the old standard 13-round mags.

Mec-Gar uses a few tricks to squeeze another pair of cartridges inside a standard-length magazine tube. Here’s a 13-round standard magazine on the left, 15-rounder on the right:

The top 3 coils of the 15-round magazine spring are narrowed to fit inside the hollow base of the follower when the magazine is fully loaded, making room for 2 extra rounds:

I’ll need to wring out the new mags on the range before I trust them alongside my 13-rounders, but I don’t anticipate problems. Mec-Gar is the OEM for Browning and FN, and they enjoy an excellent reputation. The only little tweak I plan to make is a bit of judicious smoothing and polishing of four little spots on each magazine:

The front corners here below the feed lips are sharp and pointy on every Hi-Power mag I’ve ever used, which makes them prone to snagging on (and scratching up) the front edge of the magazine well. A few licks with a file and a couple passes with a ceramic crock stick is enough to break the sharp edges. You don’t want to remove a lot of metal because the corner there is a stress riser where a crack could potentially form.

The back corners of the floorplate need a little gentle smoothing so they won’t poke holes in your clothes and/or hide when riding in a mag pouch. Again, this is common to all Hi-Power mags I’ve seen, and you don’t need to remove a lot of metal.

I’ll post a follow-up after I do some range testing.

Big bonus points to anyone who gets the reference in the title.

Been running around like a madman (as opposed to my usual sitting-around-the-house like a madman) for the past few days, getting college nonsense sorted, running errands, and finishing up various stalled projects. The goal, of course, being to get things in order before classes start.

I *think* I’m all set for school now. I registered, got my student ID, paid my tuition. There’s still a slight snag with my records, but getting it straightened out isn’t time-critical. Which is a good thing, because my patience for bureaucratic SNAFUs is completely exhausted. The HOWTO on running a college admissions department must have been written by Kafka.

Today’s long-stalled project involves helping The One Who Birthed Me get her computers backed up. Her previous backup routine apparently consisted entirely of saying regular prayers to the Hard Drive Gods. I set her up with an external USB hard drive (thanks, Newegg!) and got her to copy all of her personal stuff onto it. I don’t know whether she’ll actually keep her backups up-to-date, but at least she’ll have SOMETHING saved when (not if) one of her hard drives goes tits-up.

And now it’s time to get the dog out for a walk.

Oh yeah, and a big Happy Birthday to my pal Squeaky

Philip Chevron, guitarist and unofficial spokesman for the Pogues, reports that the band’s “Pogues on Broadway” concert DVD, originally slated for an October release, has been indefinitely delayed due to record company asshattery.

I’d been really excited about this DVD, because I’m going to be in it. Maybe. For a couple seconds. Narcissism, anyone?

See, I was there for that concert, standing up against the crowd barrier right between Mr. Chevron and Shane MacGowan. And the film crew kept sweeping the front rows for crowd shots, so I’ll probably make a brief appearance or two on the DVD. I expect I’ll look like quite a jackass, drunk to hell and singing along. But it was a Pogues concert, on St. Patrick’s Day weekend, in New York City. EVERYONE was drunk to hell and singing along; I fit right in.

In any case, I’m STILL looking forward to the DVD, whether I’m in it or not, because the band put on a helluva show and I’d like to relive it.