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228 lines
9.5 KiB
HTML
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<HTML><HEAD>
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<title>The Foolish Things We Do With Our Computers LG #86</title>
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<BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#0000AF"
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<IMG ALT="" SRC="../gx/navbar/left.jpg" WIDTH="14" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom"><A HREF="ecol2.html"><IMG ALT="[ Prev ]" SRC="../gx/navbar/prev.jpg" WIDTH="16" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom"></A><A HREF="index.html"><IMG ALT="[ Table of Contents ]" SRC="../gx/navbar/toc.jpg" WIDTH="220" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom" ></A><A HREF="../index.html"><IMG ALT="[ Front Page ]" SRC="../gx/navbar/frontpage.jpg" WIDTH="137" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom"></A><A HREF="http://www.linuxgazette.com/cgi-bin/talkback/all.py?site=LG&article=http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue86/foolish.html"><IMG ALT="[ Talkback ]" SRC="../gx/navbar/talkback.jpg" WIDTH="121" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom" ></A><A HREF="../lg_faq.html"><IMG ALT="[ FAQ ]" SRC="./../gx/navbar/faq.jpg"WIDTH="62" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom"></A><A HREF="jenkins.html"><IMG ALT="[ Next ]" SRC="../gx/navbar/next.jpg" WIDTH="15" HEIGHT="45" BORDER="0" ALIGN="bottom" ></A><IMG ALT="" SRC="../gx/navbar/right.jpg" WIDTH="15" HEIGHT="45" ALIGN="bottom">
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<TABLE BORDER><TR><TD WIDTH="200">
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<A HREF="http://www.linuxgazette.com/">
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<IMG ALT="LINUX GAZETTE" SRC="../gx/2002/lglogo_200x41.png"
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WIDTH="200" HEIGHT="41" border="0"></A>
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<BR CLEAR="all">
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<SMALL>...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I></SMALL>
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</TD><TD WIDTH="380">
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<CENTER>
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<BIG><BIG><STRONG><FONT COLOR="maroon">The Foolish Things We Do With Our Computers</FONT></STRONG></BIG></BIG>
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<BR>
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<STRONG>By <A HREF="../authors/orr.html">Mike ("Iron") Orr</A></STRONG>
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<H2>Floppy story</H2>
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By <A HREF="mailto:L.Mongey@Liberty-IT.co.uk">Lorcan Mongey</A>
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<P> Back in the days when we used 5.25" floppies, somebody spilled a mug of
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coffee over their floppy disc. Not unnaturally, it became unreadable. The
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problem here is not that the data has been destroyed, but the fabric lining
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of the floppy envelope becomes saturated and constantly re-applies a thin
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layer of coffee to the disc surface, preventing the data from being read.
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They brought it to me, so I cut open the envelope with scissors, removed the
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actual disc, rinsed it under a tap and dried it with paper towels. Then I
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cut open a spare floppy envelope (removing the unwanted disc), inserted the
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problem disc and put the whole lot in the drive. It worked perfectly, and we
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were able to copy the entire contents to safety before abandoning the
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floppy.
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<HR NOSHADE WIDTH="80%"> <!--*********************** -->
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<H2>More luck than skill</H2>
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By <A HREF="mailto:Morten.Sickel@newmedia.no">Morten Sickel</A>
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<P> There's a Norwegian saying that goes, "Sometimes you may
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have more luck than skill." With a couple of exceptions, that has been my
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experience when doing stupid things with the computers.
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<P> I have studied chemistry, and as I studied, I had for a while a job as a
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kind of sysadmin for the computers the (other) students could use. Most of
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the machines were some great 386s with a whooping 4MB of RAM. At that time,
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we also got the first 486 PCs. In one of those, the floppy ceased working,
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but I knew what to do, as I had a couple of dead 386s in a storage.
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After a bit of
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Frankesteinification, I again had a 486 equipped with a floppy. I turned
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the power
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on and, oops, there went the blue smoke. It turned out that I had put on
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the power connection one pin too far to the left. Later, floppy power
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connectors have been altered so it is virtually impossible to repeat that
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stunt. Obiously, I have not been the only one...
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<P> At about the same time, a friend of mine (yes it is true, it is not me!) got
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hold of a 386sx that should replace his old 286. I was working together with
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him to get it all together, and in the end, it turned out that one of the
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screws had disappeared. We looked for it for a while, gave up, turned on the
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power and found it immediately, just by looking at the spot where the
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motherboard started to burn... After that, I have always been very careful
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collecting all screws and never turning on the power if any are still
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missing. Well, my friend shortly after got hold of a 486 motherboard and
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managed to collect 20MB of RAM from old PC at his job, so I don't think he
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was too unhappy with it at the end. I still remember the thrill of seeing
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that machine counting RAM during boot... At that time, my own 8088 never
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came pass 640k... :-)
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<P> On the other hand, what really has impressed me is the quality of
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IDE connectors. I don't know how many times I have connected them the wrong
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way around, without damaging anything. My last stunt connected two ingenious
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connections of pieces of hardware was just a few weeks ago. I got a few old
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SCSI disks from my friend with the burningly fast 386SX (no he does not have
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any more left now...). On one of them, there was a label on the top telling
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how to set the jumpers for master, slave or CS, so I thought 'OK, then this
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one is really an IDE drive, then I'll put it in another PC'. After a bit of
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fiddling I managed to get it in, but the PC did not recognice it and
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refused to boot from the other (known working) disk. I took it out again,
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and had a closer look at the jumpers, after a while I could see that even
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though the label on the top were mentioning master and slave, the jumpers
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themselves were labeled A0,A1,A2..... Then a closer examination revealed
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that the connector was broader than IDE and that some of the pins were
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slightly bent... I carefully bent the pins back, attached it to a SCSI
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chain, and saw it came up just beautifully. Occationally, luck is better
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than skill.
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<P> Morten Sickel, Dr<44>bak Norway
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<HR NOSHADE WIDTH="80%"> <!--*********************** -->
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<H2>The whirlybird CPU</H2>
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By Raul Marusca
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<P> A decade ago I was working as a technician at a computer store. One day a
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customer bought a 387 mathematical coprocesator for his computer.
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He insisted on installing it himself.
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Two days after he come back and returned the chip (without the protective case),
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saying, "You sold me a broken device".
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<P> I responded,
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"But now is out of the protective cover, How we know it not was affected by
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an electostatic discharge?"
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<P> "I plugged it on the socket in all four possible ways and it was never detected
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by the BIOS nor by the software at all."
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<P> We were shocked. We hadn't imagined it was even possible to plug the copro
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in another way besides to matching the pin 1 mark on the chip with the mark
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on the motherboard!
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<P>
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It took us a long week to explain he that he broke the chip when he plug
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it in the wrong way for the first time, and that's not covered by the warranty.
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<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
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[If you have a story about something foolish or ingenious you
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did to your computer, send it to
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<A HREF="mailto:gazette@ssc.com">gazette@ssc.com</A>. -Iron.]
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</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>
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<!-- *** BEGIN author bio *** -->
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<P>
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<P>
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<!-- *** BEGIN bio *** -->
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<P>
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<IMG ALT="picture" SRC="../../gx/2002/tagbio/iron.jpg" WIDTH="161" HEIGHT="200"
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ALIGN="left" HSPACE="10" VSPACE="10">
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<em>
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Mike is the Editor of <I>Linux Gazette</I>. You can read what he has
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to say on the Back Page of each issue. He has been a Linux enthusiast
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since 1991 and a Debian user since 1995. He is SSC's web technical
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coordinator, which means he gets to write a lot of Python scripts.
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Non-computer interests include Ska and Oi! music and the international
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language Esperanto. The nickname Iron was given to him in college--short for
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Iron Orr, hahaha.
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</em>
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<br CLEAR="all">
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<!-- *** END bio *** -->
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<!-- *** END author bio *** -->
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<!-- *** BEGIN copyright *** -->
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<hr>
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<CENTER><SMALL><STRONG>
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Copyright © 2003, Mike ("Iron") Orr.
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Copying license <A HREF="../copying.html">http://www.linuxgazette.com/copying.html</A><BR>
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Published in Issue 86 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, January 2003
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</STRONG></SMALL></CENTER>
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