Serial Ports

Ah, the good old days of serial and parallel ports... I have several tubs of old computer hardware - IDE cables, video and sound cards, old processors (even my favorite of all time - the Celeron 300A*), etc. I went through them over the week-end and have set aside about a third of it to be recycled. I digress...


Alex (PA1SBM) finds no serial ports or PCI on his new PC, but after a false start finds a card that works.


* Does it make me a huge geek for having a favorite CPU? I just remember how much bang for the buck you got with the Celeron 300A as it easily overclocked to 450 MHz.

Morse Code - A Visual Guide

I stumbled across this visual guide for Morse Code. Some of them make sense and might be helpful in remembering, but others are stretch for me.

Zhem's Fighin Words

I'm too old for this:

“You can always politely ask,” she wrote. “’Oh, nice to meet you (insert name). What pronouns should I use?’ is a perfectly fine question to ask.”

Cheap Kindle Books

I've not read of the "50 Shades" books, so I can't comment, but I liked Ready Player One, The Martian, A Game of Thrones (duh), The Kite Runner, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and Gone Girl. My wife loves the Outlander books.

$2 Kindle Books

Windows 10 - Edge

I upgraded my laptop and everything seemed fine - except the new Edge browser. It would not load anything. All the other browsers (IE, Chrome, and Firefox) worked fine. Hitting F12 showed no activity - no page elements, no network requests. Eventually Edge would timeout and display "Hmm, we can’t reach this page."

I ran the System File Checker (sfc /scannow) and rebooted. All was good afterwards. The only other problem I have is that it keeps trying to update my printer driver and fails. Printing works, so I've spent zero time looking it to it.

That's two computers upgraded with only the problems mentioned above. I've got two left.

TYT TH-7800 Mobile

TYT TH-7800 at the 409Shop for $234.00:

Dual Band 136-174/400-480MHz Mobile Transceiver Car Radio

Main Functions:
    V+U Full Duplex Operation  
    Cross-band Repeater Function
    Ultra-size LCD Screen Dual Display    
    800+Memory Channels
    A+B dual band Operation    
    50 CTCSS Tones /1024 DCS Codes
    8 Group;s scrambler option  
    Detachable Front Panel
    50W output power for 144MHz    
    35W output power for 430MHz

Security Theater Theater

Only posting because I wanted to call it Security Theater Theater.

Google OnHub Wireless Router

Interesting...

Google is releasing their own wireless router: OnHub Wireless Router from Google and TP-LINK.

Specs here. Of note, it is 802.15.4 compliant and has Bluetooth. The wireless specs standout as well.

2.4 GHz wireless	802.11b/g/n 3x3 with smart antenna
5 GHz wireless	802.11a/n/ac 3x3 with smart antenna
AUX wireless	802.11a/b/g/n/ac 1x1

AUX wireless?

Google definitely wants to be in your home.

Vero Telecom (VGC) VR-6600PRO

Click here for a review of the VR-6600PRO:

"Executive Summary

• No serious problems or deal breakers.  All problems were “Beta Testing” grade problems.

• Great Factory Support

• Hardware fit and finish is fine.

• On the air operation is fine

• Manual programing is overly complicated.

• Software programing is overly limited.

One Line Review:

• Great radio if you are technically inclined and want some advanced features, not a great radio for those just starting out in Amateur Radio."

Windows 10

I upgraded to Windows 10. It went very smoothly. My very limited testing showed no problems - OneDrive and Dropbox were syncing, the browsers worked, and I could print. I'm waiting for the go ahead to upgrade at work - I spend only a few minutes here and there on my desktop at home - the real test will be my laptop that gets used hours a day.