Red Tiger

I've built my new crossover & power supply (properly, this time!) ...
The PSU has a nice star ground that links to the crossover board's star ground, no hum or anything, regulated supplies of -14.9V and +14.9V with less than 1mV of noise all of which is common-mode. Pretty much perfect, in other words. Pre-regulator supplies measure -24V and +24V, and the voltage between those rails is ... 54V.

I'm having a hard time getting my head around this one.

I think I'll choose to ignore this and just use a simple transistor regulator to drop that to about 34V. Then I can chop that in half with a virtual ground to feed the buffer stage Op-Amp in my switch box (which is looking more and more like a pre-amp now).

I feel I should point out this is all coming from a 10VA 15-0-15V transformer which apparently has EPICLY POOR regulation, and produces something more like 19-0-19V under the (almost non-existent) load that three dual Op-Amps provide. I doubt powering another dual Op-Amp and a couple of relays will have much effect on this ... Maybe I should add some useless bells & whistles to give the transformer a proper load?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crfGXmxJ1vM


What THE fuck.

I can lick my elbows.

Can you?

We have a community full of Killians and AnimalAls.

If this doesn't apply to you, I LOVE YOU.

I completely re-wired our house at the age of fourteen, documenting the location of every single wire and junction and going far beyond current safety standards in the process.
I can look at almost any circuit or schematic and understand it instantly.
I can reverse-engineer anything electrical or electronic and improve upon most designs.
I can fault-find to component level in analogue and (much as I hate it) digital systems.
I can usually tell you exactly why the fault occurred in the first place.
I have a basic grasp of assembly and C++ programming which I would happily expand upon.
I have 13 years experience with a soldering iron and was originally taught to work to military standards.
I understand the internal operation of every electronic component* in use, as well as many "obsolete" technologies (eg. thermionics).
Thanks to my own work in audio, I can list the pros and cons of every type of resistor and capacitor, and where in any circuit they would best be put to work.
I have a BTEC National Diploma in Electrical and Electronic Engineering.

Yet...

I'm not allowed to work as an electrician without paying the government a hefty fee every year to "prove" I know what I'm doing and no bugger else wants to employ me anyway because I don't have previous employment history to back up my actual skills.


I spent best part of two years looking for, and applying for, jobs that I am easily qualified for and I've never had a single reply, not even a "no". Why? Because I have no experience in the workplace.

It annoys me greatly that there are guaranteed to be some right clueless fuckwits getting jobs now that I could do, but they've worked in the industry before, so they get preference.

It annoys me even more that no employers want to take a single risk and allow me to prove my skills to them. So I go on waiting, and hoping.

£200/month part-time cleaning will leave me with around £72 a year to call my own after "rent" and running costs of my car, but it's the best job I can get at present (that doesn't stand a high probability of driving me completely insane).


* Meaning I know how they are made and how they function, not the precise operating parameters of every single IC in existence, I'm not a god.

I've got 5 inches here, how much have you got?

Want to know something that pisses me off even more than furs who call babyfurs paedophiles? Well...

You all remember way back when the MTV special came out that portrayed furry as just a sexual fetish, and everyone in the community got so upset about it? How about the CSI episode? Remember that? All that bad press? All that whining because "(bawwww!) it's not (just) a fetish"?

With that in mind, why the fuck are we letting furs go around telling everyone that it is just a fetish?
UKFur seems to be very guilty of this lately, as do several other "furry" websites including (rather unsurprisingly) Fchan and FurAffinity. I'm getting quite sick of references to "our fetish". No, shit-for-brains, you mean YOUR fetish. You don't dictate what everyone who calls themselves a furry gets turned on by, okay? You don't dictate what an entire community feels and believes, okay?

If you're only in it for the porn, fine, I don't give a shit, just stop telling everyone that porn is the sole reason furry exists.
Not everyone who happens to belong to the same subculture as you thinks with the same perverse mind you were born with.

I used to look upon the "burnt furs" and those calling themselves "anthro fans" and refusing to associate with furries as elitists, but you know what... Now, I just think they're sane.

I am a fan and lover of anthropomorphic and real animals.
Never before have I been more ashamed to call myself a "furry".

Is it just me or are the MSN chat servers acting v-e-r-y strangely of late?

People keep signing in with screen names they used back in 2003/2004, then their name immediately updates to what it should be now. On top of that Pidgin keeps telling me peoples names have changed, but the old and new names are the same.

Yahoo has also been getting slow and buggy... Ever since they integrated cross-network support with MSN.

What does that tell you?

It's so very nice to have a laptop with more than six minutes of battery life again, but at an average of four hours on this thing? Well I just feel greedy now... <3

I have a pink vacuum cleaner.

Sort of win?

When I'm a bit sad, I play some BANGIN' TOONZ far too loud, then I don't feel so down any more :3

It's a shame my laptop only puts out about 200mW/ch for headphones. I make it clip so hard :(

Chopped around and updated! All good fun, eh?

***

In unrelated news, my main laptop no longer has an H key, but since it's a triple-layer membrane keyboard, it doesn't matter so much. I'm rather glad this "Genuine Dell" keyboard wasn't genuine! It's much nicer to type on than the original one, too...

One laptop, a repair job abandoned by the owner.
I'm sick of the sight of it: £65

1.5GHz P4m, 512MB RAM, 12GB HDD w/XP Pro VLK installed (laptop does have a legit XP Home OEM key, but I don't have a Home install disc). Onboard SiS graphics, I believe.

The cost may seem steep for a low-spec machine, but this is to cover my time and the parts used in repairing it - the motherboard caught fire after the original owner left the dc lead connected, knowing the socket was faulty.
This machine now has a very unique dc input connector.

Reply here or by IM/email if you're interested. Comes with a laptop bag and a spare battery, but I think both batteries are a bit knackered.

SOLD.

EVP.

If (with no input signal) I turn the volume and treble controls on my Rogers Ravensbourne Stereo amplifier to maximum, then get up close and personal with the right speaker, I can clearly hear the words "It's a prison!" being repeatedly uttered by a worried female voice.

I really need to service this amp.

( SPOILERSPOILERSPOILERSPOI )

"People who are into cub art and vore calling other people freaks of nature for admitting they had fursuit sex. Really now?".

You know, if it wasn't for the community on FurAffinity, including all the good artists who call it home... I'd be DDoS'ing it to hell and back 24/7/365, just because of the fuckwits that are in charge.

Dragoneer in particular just doesn't deserve to be in charge of a site like FA, he and many of the other admins are just power-tripping idiots.

I'll have a hearty LOL if I get banned for saying this.

... It's still not ready for "normal" people's day to day use.

Too many hardware support bugs, system-specific workarounds, confusing application dependencies and complicated configuration files.

It took me three re-installs to get 3D graphics working on this laptop, and after ~6 months I've only just found a solution/workaround for my "suspend" problem.
My gran's laptop can't suspend either, also suffering memory corruption, and can't use video overlays without the desktop background becoming corrupted for the duration the overlaid video is playing.
The main "downstairs" PC boots into XP in <30 seconds, suspends and resumes instantly, etc.. Yet Ubuntu takes >2 minutes to boot, cannot suspend and cannot use 3D graphics without risk of the system freezing. That's on its fourth or fifth reinstall now, owing to completely losing the ability to display graphics after updating. That is, I install, it works perfectly, I update, it no longer boots. I've found some workarounds, but the point is I shouldn't have to.

This is all old hardware with excellent drivers for Windows.

If all you hardcore Linux fans out there want to convert Windows users, stop making excuses and try making an OS that actually works flawlessly for everyone first.

I do hope the government isn't planning on banning these, considering their rated life is considerably longer than the useful life of most CFLs... http://www.bltdirect.com/product.php?pid=10587&cat=1595&nm=GLS+Extended+Life+16000+Hours+100w+Pearl+BC

Also, want:
http://www.lightbulbs-direct.com/product/2057/squirrel-cage-lamp-60w-bc/ &
http://www.bltdirect.com/product.php?pid=1253&cat=84&nm=GLS+240+volt+1000+watt+GES+Clear

Yagfox, click the cut, you might at least get a laugh out of this...

( Teh latest Furry Meme with grammar corrections and formatting. Stolen from Plastiger )

http://www.lightbulbs-direct.com/product/3318/envirolight-led-golfball-2w-bc-matt-warm-white/

This is the future of lighting, people.

Government response to a problem caused by the government and only affecting the general public:
"We don't see this as a problem, there's no need to take action."

Government response to a problem caused by outside influence and only affecting the general public:
"We're looking at ways to tackle this situation, and will choose whichever one works in our favour."

Government response to a problem from any source and affecting the government in any way:
"The best solution, as we see it, is to create a new department to deal with this situation as quickly as possible, then introduce a new stealth tax to cover the cost of running said department. In the process we'll be introducing new legislation to make everyone's life harder except ours. If you don't like it, tough."


( Our policies on Anti-Terror and Climate Change are certainly the worst... )

MY PPMS ARE BOUNCING OFF THE RED AGAIN :O

As some of you may know, my oscilloscope went bang in a very big way a few months ago.
I took the covers off today and had a look at it.
Oh, dear.

I need to replace every single electrolytic capacitor in there, as well as a large resistor which had been rather badly burned... So it's going to live in the loft for a while until I can afford to order all those weird values required. 6.4V 320uF, anyone?

I did discover that it has no fewer than seven supply rails, ranging from 12.6V (for the valve heaters) to 2kV (for the main HT), with all kinds in-between for grid bias and the transistor sections. Speaking of which, I also found 8 SGS Germanium transistors, 8 Brimar ECF82s and 1 Brimar ECF80, making a total of 10 valves. All look original and perfect. The valves are all in the front-end and timing circuits, by the look of things, with the transistors being used as regulators and amplifiers for the CRT drive. Presumably noise, speed and gain were all mutually exclusive among transistors when this was built.
The rectifiers are all solid-state, and the HT rectifiers look like big brown sticks, about 2 1/2" long & 1/4" wide ... Never seen HV diodes this old before.

By the looks of things, it's already had two film caps, one electrolytic and four resistors replaced. I herd a rumor on the Internets that this thing went up in smoke once before, indeed, long before it came into my posession.

Anyone got the schematic for an Advance Instruments OS 25A?
Is it really a 15MHz scope?
Can anyone offer assistance calibrating it again once I've got it running?

Stolen from sirius_moonshdw
May not be taking this seriously. Or maybe I am.

Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these questions. You can't use the band I used. Try not to repeat a song title. It's a lot harder than you think! Repost as "my life according to (band name)"

Pick Your Artist:
Add N to (X)

Are you male or female?
Sir Ape

Describe Yourself:
A Silhouette of a Man and a Wasp

How do you feel:
Machine Is Bored With Love

Describe where you currently live:
Incinerator No. 1

If you could go anywhere, where would you go:
Orgy of Bubastus

Your favourite form of transportation:
Total All Out Water

Your best friend is:
The Black Regent

What is life to you:
A Very Uncomfortable Status

Your fear:
The March of Pure Mathematical Evil That Ends and Results in War

What is the best advice you have to give:
Lick a Battery (Tongues Across the Terminals)

How would you like to die:
Plug Me In

My Motto:
You Must Create

... There, I bet you feel much better after that!

My iAudio 7 is now a functional 8GB external drive.
The main CPU, DSP CPU and output buffer ICs get rather hot, but the memory is fine. I think that's just because they're running from 3.5V, though, rather then 2.9 ... Datasheet says that's fine... *shrug*

I have portable storage, woo!

Also I'm now working on the AU-505 again, putting a few relays in around the place... It'll look a bit mad, but I guarantee it's going to sound awesome. 25W, 30Hz-20kHz +/-0dB, <0.5%THD, both channels driven, continuous. Intentionally smaller output caps to limit low frequency output, it never gets fed anything below 50Hz with any appreciable power anyway. Helps keep it cool too.

*glee*

Obligatory yearly meme, this time stolen from androgynism
( Don't click if you're just going to complain! )

*listening to the current electrical storm on longwave*

Valve radios are awesome.

okay, I do actually have flu :(