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User: Grog6

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  1. The 5.25" 360k Full height Single sided drives that were in the OG IBM XT computers could put twice as much on a Double Sided Disk, if you cut the notch on the opposite side of the case.

    As was said, you couldn't write to the other side of the disk without cutting a notch out of the case. :)

    The capacity of the drives went to 1.2MB, Still single sided, then 720k and 2.44MB, just before the conversion of pretty much everything to 3.5" disks.

    One thing I've noticed; 30 years in, some of my old 5.25 disks read just fine, few of the newer 3.5 disk set worked. :)

  2. Re:Recycle, Recycle, Recycle. on Ask Slashdot: How Do You Build Your Own Vacuum Tubes? · · Score: 1

    Mercury is a bummer, but if you want bright colors, you want some mercury vapor in there as a charge carrier.

    The fun gas is Helium; it's a beautiful orange color.

    It's used as a cooling gas; one of the rules I learned was "If you see your equipment glowing bright orange, Don't open the door to the lab!" :)

  3. Recycle, Recycle, Recycle. on Ask Slashdot: How Do You Build Your Own Vacuum Tubes? · · Score: 1

    Every light bulb or dead tube has multiple glass/Kovar bonded seals.

    You can carefully break or melt them out and reuse them; large bulbs are good sources of large connections.

    BTW, Neon electrodes are different; they are designed to hold mercury.

  4. Duh!! on Should We Kill All The Mosquitoes? (bbc.com) · · Score: 1

    Elephants don't fly, Stupid!!

    Lol.

    Just channeling my inner Trump. Sorry. :)

  5. It's being hushed up by the Trump-Alien-Russian-Clinton Conspiracy''s Tight grasp on the Media's Scrotum(s).

    Their collective polygrip is just too strong.

    Inform your congresscritter, go door to door if you have to; this evil conspiracy must be exposed!!!

    I'm voting the safe vote; Opus and Bill. No, not the blue dress bill.

  6. If you really want to see how bad it was... on There's A 50% Chance of Another Chernobyl Before 2050, Say Safety Specialists (technologyreview.com) · · Score: 3, Informative

    Read the IAEA report on the Chernobyl disaster.

    It reads like bad comedy; operators trying to follow a test program while the reactor was in a completely unstable state.

    The REAL kicker: The SCRAM command to shut down the reactor made it go "Prompt Critical" and explode.

    No shit.

    "As can be seen from the foregoing, the event which initiated the accident was the pressing of the EPS-5 button (SCRAM Button) when the RBMK-1000 reactor was operating at low power with a greater than permissible number of manual control rods withdrawn from the reactor. " pp67

    http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/p...

    Scariest thing I've read this decade. :)

  7. Re:Not everyone should be a PC Gamer. on PC Gaming Is Still Way Too Hard (vice.com) · · Score: 1

    Nice to see there are still a few of us.

    The 'everyone gets a trophy' mentality means no one tries hard anymore.

    None of my younger coworkers have anything is the way of problem solving abilities; even the highly educated ones can't think their way thru a problem.

    If you highly educate an idiot, you get a highly educated idiot.

    My last pc cost ~2k, but it was so over the top I'm still using it 4 years later, playing with all the eyecandy turned on. :)

  8. Not everyone should be a PC Gamer. on PC Gaming Is Still Way Too Hard (vice.com) · · Score: 0, Troll

    The dick in the above referenced article is a good example of a millennial geek.

    A Complete pussy; like all the modern 'geeks' I see who, if something is hard, buy a prepackaged piece of shit to do most of it for them; like an Xbone or Playscool box with auto aim so they can hit something.

    "Why write code, if I can download it off the internet?" - nameless intern, last fall.

    People don't do things because they're hard to do anymore, because it's hard to do, lol.

    Even the new DOOM game on PC is watered down with "hack modules" because otherwise combat is too hard.

    All the new PC games are complete crap, ported over from the Xbone.

    IMHO, The last Good PC FPS was Crysis Wars, and we can still run our own private servers, so no cheats. :)

    Quake 2 & 3 runs on almost anything; We play those in the PMT lab on raspberry Pi's, and yes, I do use a keyboard. :)

  9. The Rape and Pillage of the middle Class was later on Using a Bomb Robot to Kill a Suspect Is an Unprecedented Shift in Policing (vice.com) · · Score: 1

    That has happened Since the Clinton Administration; things were in pretty good shape when he left office.

    The biggest Fuck we got was the "Fight Two Wars completely without funding them" that drove the economy into a tailspin.

    How long can you just print money to support your government?

    Apparently from 2001 to 2008... :(

    The only thing Congress has done since then is try to repeal Obamacare and outlaw abortion; both complete wastes of time and energy.

  10. Reagan declared the War on Drugs... on Using a Bomb Robot to Kill a Suspect Is an Unprecedented Shift in Policing (vice.com) · · Score: 1

    Just as the CIA with Ollie North was importing shitloads of cocaine into the us, and teaching inner city drug-dealers to make Crack, with was as destructive as Free Base, but easier on the supply chain.

    I knew several guys who flew planes full of coke back into the us, completely covered by the govt.

    The last two died mysteriously after all that started hitting the papers; one died in a parachuting fail while smuggling a planeload, and the other disappeared after a meeting...

    Smokescreens all...

  11. This is exactly my worry. on Using a Bomb Robot to Kill a Suspect Is an Unprecedented Shift in Policing (vice.com) · · Score: 0

    Racism is alive and well, in all the Red states, pretty much.

    Code words are used "Family Values" and such drivel, but the actions of those in charge are the same.

    Amazingly, few black people here want carry permits; it makes them a target of all the Crackers that wear them openly.

    Trump is a facist for sure; some of his backers are Nazis.

    But ALL of them I know are are Racists.

  12. Re:Who first used a Robot for Murder? on Using a Bomb Robot to Kill a Suspect Is an Unprecedented Shift in Policing (vice.com) · · Score: 1

    So this puts us even with the Nazis... How nice.

  13. Who first used a Robot for Murder? on Using a Bomb Robot to Kill a Suspect Is an Unprecedented Shift in Policing (vice.com) · · Score: 0

    State or Private Actor?

    Who will they blame when they realize what they've done?

    I, for one, welcome our murderous Robot Overlords.

  14. Your post makes me think I'm right. on Security Researcher Gets Threats Over Amazon Review (techcrunch.com) · · Score: 2

    I have friends who were in Tienanmen Square that day.

    Some were tortured; some were not.

  15. The real truth is probably worse than we think. on Security Researcher Gets Threats Over Amazon Review (techcrunch.com) · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The common thread for all these phone home vulnerabilities are all going to servers in China.

    Nothing really happens there without the government's knowledge, and probable support.

    Would our government do any less?
    Hell, Their backdoor traffic probably doesn't even show up in the logs, lol.

    The people talking to the security researcher are probably being threatened by the people who designed the backdoors.

  16. Winamp... on Microsoft Kills Windows 10's Messaging Everywhere Texts, To Bolster Skype (pcworld.com) · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I have a WinNT 4.0 box with Winamp that I use to play music on; it's not networked, runs almost no power, and has almost permanent uptime.

    It's on an old Barton-core 2500MHz athlon that draws ~20 watts, IIRC.

    It's tied into the house A/V system, and runs from the same remote.

    I keep what works, while I look for something better. :)

  17. Re:No. on Slashdot Asks: What's Your View On Speed Reading? · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I agree that speed reading novels is a bummer.

    The Elementary school I went to had a reading class for the kids that could already read well by third grade; I'm sure it was someone's research project. :)

    The used a tachistoscope to allow reading one line at a time, and gave tests over the content.

    I worked up to 470 something wpm, with 98% comprehension; others in my class did better.

    Several kids could max out the machine. :)

    I've read Steven King's "IT" in a weekend, with sleep. Well, some, anyway.

    Books are over way too quick for me.

    Technical stuff is different; reading doesn't make the math any easier, lol.

  18. Only if you have admin privileges, are s superuser, and enter the right password.

    Or say "sudo make me a sandwich".
    It works on geek girls, anyway, from what I hear. :)

  19. The 3d Text screensaver egg. on Slashdot Asks: What's Your Favorite Easter Egg? (slashdot.org) · · Score: 1

    In win95 and 98, using the 3d text screensaver and typing "volcano" in the text field would bring up a rotating list of volcanoes.

    Similarly, "beer" would bring up beers.

    You could make a text file called "secrets.txt", with a certain format, and it would play your lists. :)

    It was changed for win2k and later.

  20. I'm thinking Kobold... on Scientist Claims There's Even More Evidence of Planet Nine's Existence (theverge.com) · · Score: 1

    There's a Pak protector out there with a small sphere of Neutronium, holding a small personal planetoid together with proper gravity. :)

    He told Larry Niven everything while wasted in a bar, and modern SF was born. :)

  21. Re:Tough open book tests on New Smartwatches Allow Students To Cheat On Exams · · Score: 1

    I had some really good Professors over the years; one I remember well.

    The Final exam in Differential Equations. 3 hours.

    We were allowed to bring "anything except someone to take the test for us."

    I brought a laptop with Mathcad, all my previous exams (which he specifically mentioned), my DE book, my Calc book, and my physics book.

    He also said there were no questions allowed to him for the first hour. (!)

    All he wanted were the answers; no work to be shown. :)

    It was 10 word problems, each with about 10 variables.

    There was no way possible to do that test in the time we had available.

    However, every problem simplified to the same Equation as a question on a previous exam; so all I had to do was put in the new numbers or the same numbers in some cases where it mattered, and write down the Answers.

    I was done in 10 minutes, thanked him and left. :)

    Everyone else was working furiously. :rofl:

  22. Re:Robert Heinlein said it best... on The Case Against Algebra · · Score: 1

    I only worry when I end up with infinities or zeros; that's where all the fun happens. :)

    Most of the equations I deal with is of the form:

    It this is happening, what would these things have to be?

    Said another way:
    The answer is 42; but what exactly is the question?

  23. Re:Robert Heinlein said it best... on The Case Against Algebra · · Score: 3, Funny

    If you can't set up a differential equation in 3d, you wasted the math classes you did take.

    Everything else is prep for that.

    Everything can be described as a differential equation, even if you don't know all the terms.

  24. BUT... on Google, Yahoo Cry About Ad-Blocking (cnbc.com) · · Score: 0

    Those advertisers are selling cheap knockoff parts that will wear out or break within a year, where the ones lower in the results are real.

    This is my experience: The crap they push the hardest, is the crap you want the least.

  25. Adding Endorphin receptors... on Study Finds You Can Grow Brain Cells Through Exercise · · Score: 1

    Jocks are Junkies too, lol.