I refer you back to this post.
It took longer than I expected, but today the Logitech Squeezebox Radio in the kitchen displayed the error message.
Category: Tech
What Now, Logitech Media Server??
Earlier today I saw this message on the Logitech Squeezebox Touch, now it’s on the radio in my bedroom. I sent the diagnostic information to clear the messages. Can the kitchen radio be far behind?
Follow-up:
Code in the Node
My first hands-on experience with networked, time-sharing computers was an introduction to BASIC programming in a math class I took in my freshman year of college. The programming was interesting but, I admit, it didn’t grab me the way the hardware setup did — teletype terminals connected to a remote data center over leased telephone lines.
Technology Review explains the background on how this educational initiative began, exposing students to the future that we live in today, and the directions the program took later.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/04/20/1071291/learn-to-code-legacy-new-projects-education/
By April 1971, the network encompassed 30 high schools and 20 colleges in New England, New York, and New Jersey. All an individual school needed to connect were a terminal and a telephone line linking the terminal with the mainframe on Dartmouth’s campus (often the greatest expense of participating in the network, at a time when long-distance phone calls were quite costly).
Netflix Cuts the DISCord
It’s official. As of September 29, Netflix will be a 100% streaming service, no longer renting discs by mail. This leaves what’s left of the physical media rental market to the Redbox kiosks.
The DVD division has shrunk over the years (it had $146 million in revenue in 2022, and $183 million in revenue in 2021, down from $239 million in 2020, and in Q1 of this year it took in $32 million, suggesting a further fall).
There was a local video rental business in a neighboring town that I used after moving here. The owner was a smart guy, and an excellent manager. Having no interest in video games himself, he made them a large part of his business nonetheless, and we rented more video games than DVD’s. The owner saw what was coming with Netflix and he sold the business in 2003.
The new owner was a “film person.” He wasn’t interested in video games either, but unlike the original owner he didn’t rent them. Then he removed the convenient drop-off box in the center of my town. This made late fees more likely, and after that stupid move he raised the late fees to a punitive level. The last straw for me was that the kids he hired to work behind the counter were obnoxious jerks. So I gave up, signing up for Netflix in early 2004.
When Blu-ray came along, I was surprised by how frequently they arrived from Netflix with damage that caused playback errors. Some of them were unplayable with scratches that would have had no effect on playback if they’d been on a DVD. This was surprising to me, after reading about the care that had gone into making the Blu-ray format even more durable than DVD. It certainly wasn’t. It’s been six years since I ended my Netflix disc subscription.
P.S. How’s that for a post title? Combining “cut the cord” with Discord, the video gamer hangout where that idiot kid leaked top secret government documents. They were made available to him by idiot intelligence officials who apparently learned nothing from the Edward Snowden case.
Tech Faux Nouveau
1897 — Professor Henry A. Rowland with the first iPhone prototype, 100 years before Steve Jobs returned to Apple as CEO.
If This is Sunday, It Must be Denmark
Phono cartridge brands I have known and (mostly) loved, in the order I first experienced each of them: Pickering, Shure, Ortofon, Audio Technica, Stanton, Grado, Micro-Acoustics, and Sony. That’s a very short list, compared to many vinyl other enthusiasts!
The Sony XL-MC1 is my only moving coil cartridge. The electret transducer in my Micro-Acoustics 3002 is perhaps the most advanced technology ever implemented for phono reproduction, with the exception of the ELP laser turntable.
There are numerous other makers of phono cartridges today, especially with high-end models, but from within that list only Ortofon, Audio-Technica, and Grado remain.
My all-around favorite in sound and tracking ability is Ortofon of Denmark, with the Super OM 20 being my best cartridge. Mounted and aligned in my well-maintained Thorens TD-166 MKII turntable, it is certainly the best tracking cartridge I am using. Ortofon continues its video series on what makes quality phono cartridges work the way they do.