09:54 – More work on science kits today. We have a couple thousand bottles labeled and ready to fill. I need to make up several of the solutions we need.
I think our cow neighbors are getting used to seeing Colin. This morning, there were about three dozen in the field near our back fence line, including half a dozen small calves. A dozen or so of them turned to watch Colin and me as we walked along the fence, but none of them said anything. Until recently, several of them would have let out a warning moo, and occasionally one would bellow at Colin. I’m sure they recognize a wolf when they see one, but I think they’ve seen him often enough with nothing bad happening that they’ve decided he’s not a threat.
I just cooked two cups of rice to put aside to make fried rice for dinner tonight.
“…they’ve decided he’s not a threat.”
He’s more cunning than I thought.
Fell down an internet rabbit hole yesterday, and here are a couple of resources:
http://www.lockpicking101.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=17326&start=135
The second post has individual files, they are combined further down the thread.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCp1orOGJwZvjLAvckyxC4Nw
BosnianBill- so many videos, so many easy to open locks. The link auto plays his intro as do all links to youtube channel pages.
I will say that everyone on the internet makes it look easier than it is. That said, sometimes it IS easier.
Having the right shaped tools probably helps.
http://www.bumpmylock.com/by-pass-tools.html
just one source of many, not an endorsement.
nick
Oh, what prompted this long detour into work avoidance mode? Well, one of the things I picked up this weekend for $5 was a sentry “safe” with no combo. It’s just the right size to put a security cam DVR inside. Quick trip to youtube showed a variety of options for opening it (the drop method worked). I swapped out the bypass lock for one I had with a key, and we’re good to go. That put me in mind of a better lockpick, which sent me down the rabbit hole………
Not like us:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3584621/Brooklyn-student-athlete-faces-25-years-prison-shooting-crowd-girls-staged-fight-post-social-media.html
“The court heard how the girls had been bickering on Facebook about who won a fight that had been filmed earlier in the day and so decided to meet up for a second brawl.”
“Eight shots were fired wounding King, Monay Langhorne and Quinesha Reeves, said Villalona.”
“Ashby’s attorney [snip] said: ‘You’re going to hear a lot names. These are not young women preparing for college, working or taking the SATs. There were 10 to 12 kids out there fighting, two were adults.
‘A 40-year-old man is there and Rogelio, he’s 26 or 27 years old and dates a teenager.'”
The shooter (a high school football star) was bailed, picked up again with a gun, bailed AGAIN, this time for half mil, of which typically someone has to pledge 1/10th or $50k, and allowed to PLAY.
So much fail here…..
nick
“… which sent me down the rabbit hole………”
Been there, done that, and still doing that. I have a small lockpick set in my wallet and a coupla small books on it but have not had a chance yet to practice with it. You gotta practice, major hands-on, fingers-on deal. I suppose I have time now thanks to back and legs being effed up for any more than ten minutes.
We got the “much fail” here and even more of it over in Yon Perfidious Albion, yon Scepter’d Isle…Mohammedans routinely assaulting and raping teenage girls and getting away with it, gangs of them “grooming” teenage girls for this activity, etc., etc., and the LE and gummint bureaucrats deliberately turned/turn a blind eye. Which, in my opinion, along with episodes like the one Mr. nick linked to above, constitute a situation where the rulers have failed in their duty to protect and defend the citizens, and have thus forfeited any claim to loyalty accordingly.
i.e., stop paying taxes, stop enlisting in the armed forces and cops, and start targeting State prosecutors and judges and high-level bureaucrats, etc. Not that I am advocating any of this stuff but the day will come, as more and more people see the Empire for what it really is and recognize, as was said here earlier, that we’re all just disposable cattle, and the rulers have no more regard for us than the leaves on the trees and the ground beneath their feet.
I am reading “Avenging Home” right now. You know, Gustav recoilless rifles should be available to purchase down at your local gun store. Just saying.
http://www.amazon.com/Avenging-Home-Survivalist-7-American/dp/0996696016/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Gustav_recoilless_rifle
“Don’t Trust the Cloud Alone: Think 3-2-1”
https://www.backblaze.com/blog/dont-trust-itunes-match-alone/
And nuclear aircraft carriers with full complements of aircraft should be available for sale down at the dock.
Yah, I want one of them Gustav “rifles.” So many uses for it. We had a 90mm recoilless rifle in my day, and the blast from the back was almost as deadly as what came out of the front.
My fave weapons during the SEA capers were the Pig and the M79 grenade launcher. I want those back, too. With a warehouse full of ammo.
Beeyooteefull day in the nay-buh-hood here, and trying for the fifth or sixth time to download Tor to the Whonix Workstation, a vm on my Fedora 23 laptop. Fails every time and takes forever to do so. And on the home kitchen appliance front, our electric glass-top stove went on the fritz the other day with error messages and the ovens wouldn’t work. Mrs. OFD hauled it away from the wall earlier while I was at the VA, unplugged it and then fired it up again; yup, a reboot of its computer. Seems to be fine now.
And I am investigating the Qubes OS Project for possible consideration as my biz desktop/server.
Mrs. OFD leaves Saturday AM again for a gig in Colorado, Denver, I think, and then spending another three or four days with son, DIL and grandkids in gorgeous East Bay, CA. (flat, hardly any trees, hot, dusty, with Bay Area smog, and crop-dusting planes overhead, but hey, sonny wanted the big bucks. Now he’s slaving like a navvy on 18-hour days and is exhausted every night when he comes home.)
“And nuclear aircraft carriers with full complements of aircraft should be available for sale down at the dock.”
Agreed, but we have two problems with that here; the bay is too shallow and no one in this area has the dough for something like that. I’d settle for a squadron of modern-day Navy gunboats, but have no idea what they’re like now.
Well, yah, the ready-to-go carrier and jets and munitions would be more than most people could afford out of pocket change, but that’s not the point.
Looks interesting for desktop/laptop use, but for a server, I think I would be more inclined toward a traditional OS running virtual machines. I think the weakest link would be my use of the same web based email account in all of my domains. Although opening each attachment in its own untrusted domain may remove most of the issues having to do with that.
Mrs. OFD hauled it away from the wall earlier while I was at the VA, unplugged it and then fired it up again; yup, a reboot of its computer.
Seems like it would be easier to just cycle the breaker.
We’ve got a crisis here in Texas. The Ozarka plant in Hawkins was hit by a tornado last week and will be down for quite a while.
https://www.ozarkawater.com/weathering-the-storm/
There was not any Ozarka water at HEB last night either. I’m glad that I’ve got my hurricane supply of 60 cases in the garage. Nestle water just does not taste as good to me.
“Seems like it would be easier to just cycle the breaker.”
Ya know, Mr. Ray, that’s a dandy idea. Too bad she did it before I got home. But I am also guilty of reinventing the wheel here today; I screwed around with all kinds of arcane Linux commands to try to get FF on the Fedora box, as I keep going back, like always in Linux, through multiple file dependencies, and lo and behold, all I hadda do was:
“yum install firefox”
Bingo. Done in about ten seconds. What a retard I am sometimes. Linux user since Y2k and enterprise-level drone for RHEL at IBM for several years.
But what about the CHILDREN???!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??
The streets will run with blood!!1111!!1!!!1
It’ll be like the OK Corral at high noon!1!!!!!!11111!!!
nick
ADDED guess I should hit refresh before posting, it’ll make more sense that way….
Y’know, nick, I think you might need to adjust the trigger threshold of your panic dial. OFD installing Firefox rather than whatever the “acceptable” browser is now is unlikely to result in any deaths, let alone of multiple children.
re ovens, ours gets spastic once in a while, too, usually after my mother-in-law cleans the grease splatters off the control panel. (I don’t have a clue how she does it. I’ve tried several times to make the computer crash but have never managed it. She does it a couple times a month.) I could cycle the breaker, but I prefer to pull the range out to pull the plug. This gives me a chance to check for mouse poop and such back there.
I think I’m going to start using my Raspberry Pi 3 as my secure web surfing machine rather than switch to the Qubes OS.
Hey, Mr. SteveF. If you ever need another wife, this lady is available. She fits right in with the typical ‘Murkan female.
Or is she for Mr. MilesTeg?
Is this a micro or macro aggression?
“(I don’t have a clue how she does it. I’ve tried several times to make the computer crash but have never managed it. She does it a couple times a month.)”
If she uses wotta during that exercise, any residual wotta or any wotta turning to steam can short the circuit, as we have found a couple of times now. Or just a damn teakettle steaming away on one of the back burners can do it. We were warned about this by the stove peeps.
“… but I prefer to pull the range out to pull the plug. This gives me a chance to check for mouse poop and such back there.”
Indeed. Although our three murderous and savage felines generally dispose of all rodents and other vermin here. But ya know what? Utensils and other stuff fall behind it ALL THE TIME here. I should check now and see if she grabbed those…
“I think I’m going to start using my Raspberry Pi 3 as my secure web surfing machine rather than switch to the Qubes OS.”
What o.s. dost thou have on your RP3?
I may just hang it up for PC-BSD and Fedora on this ThinkPad laptop; the stuff I wanna do with it are too much hassle for those operating systems. I may just throw Qubes on it and see how it works. But I think Mr. Dave is probably right; I’ll stick with my original plan to run CentOS, NethServer and OwnCloud on that other machine in the attic, eventually.
“She fits right in with the typical ‘Murkan female.”
Oh my, the daughter’s a real looker, too! Go for the jailbait, SteveF and Miles_Teg!
I’ve seen several 400-500-pounders up here but nobody that yuuuuuuuge!
I am a svelte and debonair 245 today. A halt and lame 245 today, also.
And on the home kitchen appliance front, our electric glass-top stove went on the fritz the other day with error messages and the ovens wouldn’t work. Mrs. OFD hauled it away from the wall earlier while I was at the VA, unplugged it and then fired it up again; yup, a reboot of its computer. Seems to be fine now.
All these new digital devices seem to need a hard reboot (power off for ten seconds) on some timely basis. I miss the old days of analog devices that just worked forever.
“All these new digital devices seem to need a hard reboot (power off for ten seconds) on some timely basis.”
Or any Windows machines whatsoever.
“I miss the old days of analog devices that just worked forever.”
You might be an Analog Man:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il1Byvn_vMA
And I just got my dishwasher back working yesterday.
It kicked an error indicating a bad motor, and wouldn’t run. The interwebs seemed to say it was either a worn thru wire (easy to find and fix) or replace the whole sump assembly.
It wasn’t the wire.
I did find a bone fragment jamming the main motor, and some other debris. I cleaned all that up, but had to order a replacement gasket.
Gasket got here, machine is back together, and I once again have a happy wife.
Turns out it’s a good thing it jammed. I wouldn’t have found the torn up gasket until it started leaking. So really it just needed disassembly and cleaning, but I caught an issue, and fixed it for $8. The whole sump assembly is $135 and the service call would have been about $150-250
Reckon I saved at least $300.
As soon as the new $4 thermostat gets here, the fridge is in for a thorough cleaning and part replacement. That should solve the periodic coil freezing over issue once and for all. If it does, it will save me $1700 which is what my wife wants to spend on a new fridge!
nick
(funny that no one suggested that the motor might be jammed and should be examined for debris….)
“…funny that no one suggested that the motor might be jammed and should be examined for debris…”
Yeah, real funny. They always wanna sell 1.) a spanking new machine, 2.) parts and a major service call. Check for that kinda chit like we should first check for disconnected cables and suchlike on pooters and tee-vees and radios, instead of immediately disappearing down Google and RTFM rabbit holes.
Just the current standard, Raspbian Jesse. Probably not the most secure OS in the world, but it has to be more secure than Windows. I’m thinking about using an Odroid C2 with their standard Linux instead of the Raspberry Pi 3. The Odroid C2 is a Raspberry Pi like SBC with more RAM, a faster CPU and a heat sink standard. ESR mentioned it recently.
“…but it has to be more secure than Windows.”
Thanks for the laff. I bet DOS is more secure than Windows. Ya know, you CAN get Windows 10 on an RP…though why anyone would want to is beyond my ken.
I’m gonna go ahead and play with Qubes on the ThinkPad, see what kinda usefulness it may have.
Just a heads-up for those individuals who are both ham radio and Linux peeps; I’ve tried to install/run Andy’s Ham Radio Linux several times on different machines and it was a PITA every time; he’s got great tools/apps on it but I kept running into login issues and not being able to do other stuff with it; he really stripped down an Ubuntu o.s. and while stripping it down, also took out some functionality that we get used to having.
I’ll probably put various radio apps and tools on my RP cluster when I get it built, and/or a Panasonic Toughbook eventually.
“The Odroid C2 is a Raspberry Pi like SBC with more RAM, a faster CPU and a heat sink standard.”
Huh. That looks pretty interesting.
http://odroid.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=en:odroid-c2
Peeps on Amazon seem to dig running Android o.s. on it. If you get it, keep us posted, please.
Carl Gustav: 84mm Recoilless Rifle with a RAP round. Marines use (used?) it.
I could have fun with one!
“I could have fun with one!”
Could be the linchpin weapon of a thriller-diller PA novel or screenplay plot:
1.) Nasty white supremacist types, filled with rayciss hate and bigotry, and sporting various SS tattoos and Viking runes, acquire a few of them, and among their first targets is the Presidential limousine.
2.) Mohammadan jihadis link up with Maoist cadres recruited from Ivy League university humanities and social “science” departments and get a couple of them, and among their first targets are the jail where various Cliven Bundy followers are imprisoned and the RNC HQ.
3.) Teenager hackers working out of their moms’ basements tinkering with robot electronics and small-factor nuke warheads find a way to manufacture the warheads in Gustav RR calibers and begin patrolling several major urban landscapes, thinking they’re legitimately inside a massive online player game of Call of Duty: BlackOps 3.
4.) ATF agents eager to make a name for DHS, use a Gustav rifle to perform a false flag event.
Amazon has tactical boots on sale today, even styles for the ladies. Be the best dressed prepper on the line:
http://www.amazon.com/b/ref=lp_14322466011_gbps_tit_s-3_8062_e92441a8?rh=i%3Afashion%2Cn%3A14322466011%2Cn%3A14322466011&ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&node=14322466011&field-enc-merchantbin=ATVPDKIKX0DER
“tactical boots”
I have funny effin feet; I can’t buy shoes or boots online; gotta try ’em on personally and locally. Victor Charles dint hab no tacticool boots, though, and he did OK a lot of the time. ‘course he was in the rice paddies or on the muddy trails (and off them, just like us). Our jungle boots worked OK there but you hadda take good care of your feet. Regardless of the boots. I’ll be checking out various hiking boots soon at our local chain store, which have done good by me in the past.
5.) Spetznaz commandos wielding Gustav rifles hopscotch across various Middle East capitals, taking out Mohammedan heads-of-state and our Incumbent President bullies NATO into taking it as an act of war, and World War IV blows up the northern hemisphere.
5.) Spetznaz commandos wielding Gustav rifles hopscotch across various Middle East capitals, taking out Mohammedan heads-of-state and our Incumbent President bullies NATO into taking it as an act of war, and World War IV blows up the northern hemisphere.
Tom Clancy’s standin, Mark Greaney, already beat you to this one. Except they used a Russian B-10 recoilless rifle on a Russian troop train as a false flag event.
https://www.amazon.com/Tom-Clancy-Commander-Chief-Novel-ebook/dp/B00Z8VTJA8
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-10_recoilless_rifle
Well damn it all to H&ll. I try and I try and still can’t keep up with the big gunz.
Also can’t make PC-BSD, Fedora or Qubes do what I want on the ThinkPad, therefore, with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven I said F&ck it and am installing Ubuntu Mate instead; less aggravation (famous last words). I’m in the vein of wanting chit to JUST WORK. Not willing anymore to futz around for many hours with code and shell scripts unless I’m being very well paid for it.
So I’ll forget Qubes for now, and move on with other stuff. The RaspberryPI and other projects in the attic are gon hab to wait a bit.
We had a 90mm recoilless rifle in my day, and the blast from the back was almost as deadly as what came out of the front.
No joke! I note that his buddies are well off to either side.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Gustav_recoilless_rifle#/media/File:US_Special_Forces_soldier_fires_a_Carl_Gustav_rocket_during_a_training_exercise_conducted_in_Basrah_Iraq.jpg
I keep reading that Cankles’ campaign is crumbling.
One can only hope.
Trump 2016! “I’ll print as much money as we need!”
“I note that his buddies are well off to either side.”
No chit. If you’re standing upright behind him, you’ll catch it in the chest and face and it won’t suck. Much.
If he’s going for trajectory, all the loose chit in back of him, i.e., rocks, gravel, body parts, etc., will de facto become shrapnel. Also won’t suck. Much.
“I keep reading that Cankles’ campaign is crumbling.”
Crumbling or melting? Maybe the ghost of Judy Garland is throwing wotta on her.
Trump 2016! “I’ll print as much money as we need!”
I do note that Trump is planning to take the country through Chapter 11 bankruptcy (reorganization and discharge of debts).
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-09/trump-debt-renegotiation-you-never-have-default-because-you-print-money
Of course, he could also try Chapter 7 (liquidation).
OK, let’s pretend this is a gen-yoo-ine democracy and vote!
A or B
A: we do the 11 or 7 thang and keep printing currency.
B: we declare national default
I’ll start, ’cause I’m the arrogant mofo who dreamed this up:
I vote B, default and get it over with. No more kicking of cans down the road. Sooner the better.
I vote B, default and get it over with. No more kicking of cans down the road. Sooner the better.
That goes against Trump’s point that the USA never has to default. All it has to do is print more money. Just get more wheelbarrows.
But he wants to bring the debt holders to the table by threatening to print more money which will devalue their tbills. He will trade them cash for their tbills. A lot less cash than the face value of the tbill.
C: We wage war on and either destroy or conquer the major overseas holders of US debt. Private holders can be assassinated or kidnapped.
This avoids the messy ethics involved in defaulting or devaluing debt.
Well, we will just have to see what the debt holders have to say about that; you do realize that the majority of them are right here in this country and are Murkan citizens?
6.) A terrorist group consisting solely of cisgendered, heteronormative white males clinging to their guns, religion, and NASCAR obtain a case of recoilless rifles and plot to destroy everything good in life. Luckily, a strike team made up of differently-abled persyns of unspecified gender and sexual preference manage to defeat the plot and demonstrate to all the virtues of tolerance of all viewpoints (except the icky cisgendered heteronormative white male Christian viewpoint).
Numbuh 6 winz da innernet 2day!
Hater. We know you don’t really mean it.
We know you’re….gasp…one of Them!
The real answer is a good old fashioned Biblical Jubilee, it takes care of essentially everyone. Let’s wipe the slate clean.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jubilee_%28biblical%29
Sure buddy, we just gotta get the cycles and the timing down.
In the meantime, keep practicing on your shofar, at the very least, it will annoy the neighbors.
6.) A terrorist group consisting solely of cisgendered, heteronormative white males clinging to their guns, religion, and NASCAR obtain a case of recoilless rifles and plot to destroy everything good in life. Luckily, a strike team made up of differently-abled persyns of unspecified gender and sexual preference manage to defeat the plot and demonstrate to all the virtues of tolerance of all viewpoints (except the icky cisgendered heteronormative white male Christian viewpoint).
I predict that this book could, probably could, win a Hugo award.
“In the meantime, keep practicing on your shofar, at the very least, it will annoy the neighbors.
Yes, I play a pretty mean ram’s horn 😉
“I play a pretty mean ram’s horn”
Better that than a skin flute.
@OFD, I have used Andy linux from the boot cd on the toughbook that normally runs XP.
Doesn’t support the touchscreen, but SDR# and anything I tried seemed to work. It even kept up with the waterfall display w/out choking or stuttering.
Damn, ANOTHER wreck happened right in front of me. I was just minding my own business, working on a fence, when — Phapp! Slow speed rear end collision with airbags. Look over and see smoke pouring out. Jump in the truck and drive the 100 yards, so I’ll have my gear close if I need it. Turned out to be just the smoke from the airbags- filled the cabin though. All ok, including toddler in car seat. Driver that was rear-ended slid into the dash and messed up his knee a bit. Don’t know if he had a belt on or if it just didn’t constrain him enough. Add another to the tally…
nick
@Nick
Remind me never to drive anywhere near you.
Yes, we’ve previously discussed the “strange” number of accidents happening around you. Now, far be it for me to suggest you cause them deliberately, in order to be the hero or so you can show your wife how useful all your prep stuff is. No, it might not be deliberate. It might be an out-of-control psychic power. Heck, it might be one of your emergency medical instructors arranging all the accidents as a kind of final exam or ongoing training.
I was thinking of attending an event in Houston this fall that’s about 15 minutes out of Houston from Hobby Airport just off of I-45. I think I just decided not to do that because it’s too close to Nick, and it would involve renting a car and driving in the same city as Nick.
@ Dave, I think you are safe, Hobby area is 45 minutes away from me… unless I was on that side of town for some reason…….
Think of the millions of driver miles that DON’T involve being near me!
I’ll admit, it does seem a bit suspicious.
Did I ever mention the number of shootings that happened within a block of me? In three different states even. Or that I had a boss who later murdered one of his workers after work?
nick
@Nick,
Do you have any advice on buying Panasonic Toughbooks from Ebay? It seems I can get a CF-52 for about $100 without a HD or OS. I was thinking of running Linux so I might as well get it without a HD, and put in an SSD. I’m thinking I might want to have another one for parts. Is the CF-52 new enough that it uses SATA instead of IDE? Or is there a different model? Do I need to think about something else like replacement batteries?
I want an inexpensive Linux laptop, I’d be happy with a Pi-top, but the keyboard sucks according to the reviews I have read.
Turned out to be just the smoke from the airbags- filled the cabin though.
Indeed, from personal experience, quite a bit of smoke. Also the actual deployment of the bags is a really violent event. Hands on the top of the steering wheel or at the 10 and 2 position will get slammed against something as the airbag deploys displacing the appendages in a not so pleasant manner. Fortunately the seat belts yanked me back and the knee air bag also deployed keeping my face out of the airbag. Left hand was cut up and was bleeding but nothing broken.
Don’t know if he had a belt on or if it just didn’t constrain him enough.
Seat belts on many vehicles now have active retraction via a small explosive charge. When the airbags deploy so do the seat belt restraint. Thus yanking the occupant(s) back into the seat, rather quickly I might add. Generally results in chest bruising which is better than an airbag imprint on the facial cheeks.
When I was rear ended in 2008 the airbags did not deploy and apparently that was by design. The seat takes the impact. In my case it broke the seat back. New seat was $6,000 and that along with other damage caused the $30K vehicle to be totaled. Dealer’s body shop said even without the seat cost they would not fix the vehicle regardless of what the insurance company stated.
It is amazing how well the passenger compartments hold up and protect the occupants. Massively crumpled body panels and suspension parts all askew. But doors open and and glass stays broken but intact.
The last accident was two years ago. The cretin that caused it has not been convicted. Case moved from traffic (DUI) court to criminal court. I have been to court six times and always a delay. Meanwhile he continues to drive. Apparently in criminal court any DUI convictions more than five years old don’t get considered while sentencing. Thus his attorney is causing as much delay as possible. I personally want to shoot the bastard as it is his fifth DUI. Charged but not convicted thus still allowed to drive.
Is it possible to make a good estimate of Nick’s “alleged” effect on the economy? The amount of property damage, the deaths, the tourist dollars not coming into the area where he lives because people are afraid to go there. Is “weapon of mass economic destruction” a thing?
Man Ray, that is effed up.
@Dave, any that you buy on ebay, that is not totally set up and running, might have small issues.
Look for listing that has the actual machine hours listed. That will be a pro seller. Low hours is better…
Batteries won’t be guaranteed, but you might get lucky. I am getting great battery life on my CF-30, core2 duo, 1.6ghz, SATA drive, SSD about 160G. (SSD on ebay, ~$30)
Ram is cheap, as is SSD, but you will probably need to buy the hard drive carrier and possibly the cable too which are not cheap. ~$35
You will want the DVD drive for install and bootableCDs. Messing around with bootable sd or usb sticks is a pain. ~$35
Make sure a power supply is included. or else ~$25
If a touch screen, look for the stylus.
There are several different configs, usually 3 levels- basic, ok, and loaded. Look up the actual model numbers off the sticker on the bottom. That will tell you how it started life.
Depending on where they sourced it, it will have wear. Shiny keys, smooth touchpad, missing port covers. Decide how much you can live with. Better cosmetics cost more…
I use mine all the time for work. Running wifi survey software, network stuff, device config stuff. I don’t use it as my primary machine. It’s basically test gear, and works great for that. I leave the psu in my briefcase, and just carry the TB by the handle, no case. Super handy.
There are at least 2 good forums for toughbook owners/rebuilders and they have LOTS of great info.
The drivers are available from Panasonic, but there is confusion about which drivers work with which hardware, and they are generally a pain in the @ss, but once running are rock solid. I’m running win7 on my CF-30 with no problems. It’s peppy due to added RAM and the SSD. I’m running winXP (and tested Andy Linux) on the older CF-29. It handles XP or the stripped linux just fine even with less ram and a spinning slow lappy disk.
WRT buying on ebay, it comes down to what your tolerance for building a project is. If that will be fun, getting all the pieces and doing the config, go for it. If not, look at one that is complete, and then swap the disk…..
nick
@SteveF, I’m a one man wrecking crew!
Actually, considering the sh!t I was involved with/near/aware of during my younger days, it’s a bit surprising the outcomes weren’t a LOT worse.
There are days when I wonder if I’m really lucky to have come through it all with as little ill effect as I did, or if I’m really UN-lucky to have had all those bad things happen in the first place. (given my Taoist beliefs in the concept of “necessity” I really wouldn’t change much of it. I’m pretty happy with who I am, and that person was shaped by those experiences. Without them, I wouldn’t be quite as much ‘me’ as I am. I would spare some OTHER people grief and pain, if I could.)
nick
(oh, there’s a long list of accidents and near misses too. the scars hurt some days, but I’m here to feel the pain.)
@ dave,
I forgot, there are at least a couple of different keyboards too, some backlit, some rubberized waterproof, etc.
I wouldn’t worry about a second as a parts machine. The stuff that breaks will be long broken. And every little part is available separately. Other than that, it’s disk failure, worn out batteries, noisy fans, ordinary stuff.
nick
My CF-30 is SATA, my CF-29 is mini-IDE. The spec’s online should list the disk interface.
I’ve been to Houston once in my life – for under 24 hours. Not enough time for the Mr Nick curse to affect me. Though I did scrape a landscaping rock. Does that count?
Re: the toughbook 52: I have 3 of them. One is a centrino with Windows Vista. The others are Core2 Duo machines. One still on Win7, the other on Win 10. I plan to pick up at least 2 more before July so I can have 4 on Win 10. Solid machines.
I strongly recommend replacing the spinning drive with the SSD. Even on the Vista machine it makes a good bit of difference in performance.
I concur w/ Mr. Nick. Low hours are better. If they don’t show the info screen in the photos, I just stay away. I’ve purchased my last two as units from lease buy-backs with low hours. Hoping to get another deal, but haven’t seen any lately. Should be able to get decent machines for $200-$300 with SATA. Add $100 to replace the drive with SSD and get decent machines.
My $0.02
Thanks for all the info on Toughbooks, guys; I’ll be on the lookout at some point this year; meanwhile I have a Libertas tablet enroute here and will post more info on it once I get it up and running.
I have no business scheduled anywhere near the Great Lone Star State and should Mrs. OFD have any, I will advise her to avoid Mr. nick Territory accordingly.
I got Ubuntu Mate up on the Thinkpad now and it is looking pretty good. VirtualBox installed OK after I got DKMS itself installed and then recompiled the module. Always something but one learns a lot. Now doing update/upgrade on the Whonix Gateway, to be followed likewise by the Whonix Workstation. All on an encrypted hard drive, which thankfully Ubuntu and some others have as an option during the initial installations. We will also be seeing if the Tor browser installs OK on the Whonix Workstation; it wouldn’t on Fedora or PC-BSD hosts. Could be their server, though. For laughs I’ll see if it will download/install on the Ubuntu host.
I have PerfectPrivacy VPN running on this Winblows 8.1 machine and will do the same for the CentOS server, Ubuntu Studio box and probably the Thinkpad as well. OpenBSD laptop can take care of itself, I reckon.
Now waiting for codeine/Tylenol mix to kick in so I can attempt a real night’s sleep. Working on Linux machines should help with that, too.
APC’s down the block ordering us to pile up our guns at the intersection?
https://westernrifleshooters.wordpress.com/2016/05/11/bracken-sends-74/#respond
Molon labe, cupcakes, molon labe.
The daughter was too skinny for my liking… 🙂
“The daughter was too skinny for my liking…”
Then dive on in, son! Roll her in flour first.
8.) PCB_Duffer, given his family history with recoilless rifles, takes out a large group of nasty white supremacist types who were threatening (and have threatened) him for, among other things, violating the anti-miscegnation laws and opining that R. E. Lee should have been hanged as a traitor.
And I was in Houston once. Big, big, big place. I would up buying breakfast for the *very* nice waitress from the previous evening.
“…opining that R. E. Lee should have been hanged as a traitor.”
A traitor to what? Certainly not Virginia. And funnily enough, both Grant and Sherman recognized that if they’d lost that war, they would have been rightfully hanged as war criminals. And said so.
Optimism:
https://straightlinelogic.com/2016/05/04/murdering-america/
re the Tons o’ Fun family, your tax dollars at work. And it’s a good thing your tax dollars are at work, because those two sweethearts certainly aren’t.
Lee was a commissioned officer in the US Army who resigned said commission in order to wage war against the United States. Treason.
When we lived in San Antonio, we drove to Houston all the time to work with the school district. I guess we’re lucky to be alive.
“Lee was a commissioned officer in the US Army who resigned said commission in order to wage war against the United States.
Treason.”PatriotThere fixed that for you.
Too bad today we do not have any military brass with the brass balls to do what is necessary. Any doubt about what I mean by necessary, I hope not.
‘Course, I’ll TRY to help you when you end up in distress near me, and I probably won’t try to steal your wallet, phone, or purse…..
n
“There fixed that for you.”
Just as much of a patriot as his illustrious Virginia ancestors. The War Between the States was the third of our “cousins’ wars,” after the War of Independence and the English Civil War. And back then “United States” was taken to mean “united states,” a union of states, from which a state or states could legitimately secede. If there was justice in this world, the southern states would have been allowed to split off in peace and they would have ended slavery peacefully within a generation anyway, like other countries did, including the UK. Or if the war had occurred and the Confederacy had won, yes, Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Lincoln and Stanton should have been tried as war criminals and duly hanged.
Just as much of a patriot as his illustrious Virginia ancestors.
Also, Robert E. Lee was married to the only grandchild of George Washington.
If there was justice in this world, the southern states would have been allowed to split off in peace
Several of the southern states were purchased by the USA government in the Louisiana Purchase and the Florida Purchase. There is no way that the feddies would let them go without a fight.
Texas is the only state that entered the Union as a peer if I remember correctly. We had the right to secede in the original agreement but that was superseded after the war.
Virginia got short shrift in the Northeastern publik skool and college history textbooks and in the prevailing dominant New England (primarily my home state of Mafffachufetts) mythologies and ideologies, which became the Accepted and Conventional View in the 19th-C. Since then, it’s been Calvinist/Puritan/New England Yankee-centric. And WRONG.
For much more accurate history, read the late Shelby Foote, our current greatest living historian Clyde Wilson, and the late Murray Rothbard’s magnum opus on the subject.
In essence, the wrong side won the War Between the States and it was mainly a foregone conclusion, sadly. And I say this as having been born in and grown up in a state with among the highest per capita Union KIA, and currently living in the state with the highest. The majority of soldier statues on New England town commons are Union infantry, followed by a distant second of the Great War doughboys, and the Minuteman down in Maffachufetts, of course, esp. eastern MA. There was even a right-wing youth division of the John Birch Society called the Minutemen when I was in high skool. Let me check that…
…nope, not a youth group, per se, but I knew several other kids into it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_DePugh
A splinter group of mostly wack jobs. Then he got into “Christian Identity,” always a nightmare, like that stuff Gary North is into.