Category: Tech

High School Headphones

This will give my son a shock. Here I am when I was exactly the age he is now, about to turn seventeen.

DOuG pRATt in high school

I used rabbit ears for FM reception and, yes, I was seated to give the impression I had antennae coming out of my head. Ah, my first stereo — Pioneer SX-440 receiver, Radio Shack MC-1000 speakers, Garrard 40B turntable, Shure M91ED cartridge, and Pioneer SE-20 headphones.

When I was in high school I listened to the classics — The Who, Jethro Tull, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath. Today, with the departure of Bush and Cheney, I’m reminded of this song.

https://youtu.be/bYgpv5clf3Y

Security Notes

To do a quick security check of websites you can use McAfee’s free Site Advisor. There’s a plug-in for Internet Explorer and one for Firefox, or you can enter an address at this link.

http://www.siteadvisor.com/download/ff.html

In June Microsoft will be ending its Live OneCare security subscription and introducing a free service, called Morro. This could, and should, be your chance to let go of the security software you use now.

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/nov08/11-18NoCostSecurityPR.mspx

A Tale of Two Transfers

Many YouTube videos have such low technical quality as to be barely watchable, so my sister Jean was impressed by an OK copy, despite being a vertically cropped version with the wrong aspect ratio, of the Beatles in A Hard Day’s Night doing “If I Fell.” Here’s how it appears and sounds on YouTube…

… and here’s my own transfer, from LaserDisc, captured on a Pinnacle 500 PCI. Better?

[flv:http://www.dograt.com/Video/2009/JAN/IfIFell.flv 480 360]

Mambo Jambo

Go back to the very funny Men in Coats video I posted and watch the first three minutes. It’s Mambo music from Cuba. The first tune is “Mambo Jambo,” and here’s a recording of it by Prado Perez, from 1959, the year Castro took over.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/JAN/MamboJambo.mp3]

Great stuff! OK, now go back to the K3 New Year video and listen from 0:08 to 0:20. It’s some of the same music used by Men in Coats. See? I said you’d heard it before.

Mambo was big in the late 40’s into the 50’s, and one of its biggest names was this guy, whose studio later gave the green light to Star Trek.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/JAN/ILoveLucy.mp3]

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Ding, dong, the Bush gone… well, almost. Not been posting much. Sorry! We went out to eat two nights in a row, but not tonight, because it snowed today. Still working on Eric’s computer.

To gain control over the failed drive I put it in an external PATA-to-USB case I saved after the 80 GB drive in it failed, not too long after I copied everything on it to a 160 GB USB drive, that has already been replaced with a 500 GB drive. I ran CHKDSK on the drive and it fixed a bunch of index errors. Then booting into safe mode I took ownership of all the folders of interest and I got everything worth getting off it, but I’ll still probably junk the drive, because it’s five years old. I’ll make the 2-year-old 200 GB D: drive the primary and install XP on that.

USB Drives