Toshiba NB200, life and death, and rebirth with the Phoenix crysis disk

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In Greek mythology, a phoenix or phenix (Ancient Greek φοίνιξ phóinīx) is a long-lived bird that is cyclically regenerated or reborn. Associated with the sun, a phoenix obtains new life by arising from the ashes of its predecessor [wikipedia.org]

This was a very exciting Christmas. I was on the job while inadvertendly clicked on the wrong file: the latest (currently should be 2.20) BIOS winflasher for my Toshiba NB200, previously saved for later use.  Panic: I should have press Cancel right away.

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Asrock ALiveNF6G-VSTA sound issue with Ubuntu Precise

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Ubuntu precise is sometime unsettling at best. Audio won’t work with my old ALiveNF6G-VSTA. It used to be the reverse on Linux: old hardware would work, new hardware not always. Ubuntu Precise changed that altogether: old hardware isn’t working, and new hardware isn’t working either.

ALiveNF6G-VSTA(m)
ALiveNF6G-VSTA motherboard. Photo courtesy of Asrock

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Fixing the frontpanel USB ports, One at time

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Today I decided to fix my front panel USB , that were since long gone due an unspecified issue on my Asustek mobo (WYGIWYP, what-you-get-is-what-you-paid). Since the usual remedies wouldn’t work (resetting CMOS, changing front panel, BIOS fiddling) I decided to tackle the problem the hard way, by bypassing the motherboard completely.

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Playing with bluetooth GPS for fun and profit

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I am recently fiddling with an old Bluetooth receiver to use it as a time source for my Arduino chrondot clock. Please note it’s already been done[wyolum.com] and an interesting graph of Chronodot drift is provided. First of all I decided to get a good look at the NMEA stream coming out of the GPS … Leggi tutto

Updating the Atmega8U2 on an Uno with DFU

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My Arduino is quite old, and I had to upgrade the firmware to address  some issues that arose with serial. Basically I used Windows  XP and those resources: http://arduino.cc/en/Hacking/DFUProgramming8U2 but it’s no so verbose, it’s useful as a general introduction. I soldered a 10K resistor like advised, but then  I decided  to rely on this … Leggi tutto