I set up a Harmony Hub with Google Voice and lo and behold, it can only be controlled by me. When others try to give it commands, it complains that it doesn’t recognize them. Well that’s useful.
Category: hardware
Rubik’s or Klingon?
I’m finally learning how to do a Rubik’s cube after all these years. I just googled how to solve it and am learning the simplest one. Even then, it’s a lot of memorization of patterns and rotations. To commit moves to memory, I memorize odd phrases like “fful riff l’ ruff” (Front, Front, Upper, Left, Right Inverse, Front, Front, Left Inverse, Right, Upper, Front, Front) Once I learned it, it’s more fun than the usual “I can only solve 1 or 2 sides” thing…more of a game than some impossible puzzle. Interestingly, you can go to a site to give you the best solution. You enter the configuration of your cube and it tells you the moves to make. Instead of the 100 or so moves I’d make, it’ll do it in something like 20 moves.
The Rubik’s Cube was invented in 1974, so it’s almost as old as I am. The cubes you can buy seem to be a lot better quality than they used to be. Sean bought a set of cubes with different numbers of faces. They turn really smoothly even though they seem to be unlicensed.
Aviator Desk
A friend of mine is selling hand-made furniture, including this aircraft-style desk. Beautiful.
Fix your headphone jack with USB
Had a headphone jack go out on your PC? Plug this into your USB port and you’re good to go!
corroded SD cards
I’ve had several SD card adapters that have been sitting on a shelf for some time. Turns out the metal pins on SD cards get pretty corroded just sitting out in the open. If they came with a case, keep them in there.
The return of remotes without batteries
The first TV remotes in the 50s used a mechanical clicker to make a sound that the TV detected to do things. No batteries. And now, Phillips Hue lights have started using the power of you pushing buttons to create a short wireless signal without any batteries. Neat idea. We’ve now got RFID and NFC running tiny chips without their own power.
repairing a cracked phone screen
I dropped my phone the other night. There was a single rock on the porch and it hit that and cracked the screen. I was figuring the entire phone was done for, but looked into it and it’s apparently a $5 pane of glass that usually breaks. You buy the replacement on ebay and *voila, you’re good as gold.
* Voila may involve a panicky 3 hour experience where you place the glue strip backwards and have to redo it because the kit comes with no instructions and you have no idea what you’re doing.
cheap Android phones just aren't worth it
We finally got too tired of the crashing, freezing, and unresponsiveness of our LG Optimus Elites. These were our 2nd cheapo Android phones. We first had LG Optimus Vs, which were just as bad. We got Samsung Galaxy S3s now, which are night-and-day difference, even though they’re a couple of generations behind. Smooth experience and lots of features added from Android 2 to Android 4.
wouldn't ya know it
Blu-ray player went out 1 year and 2 days after purchase. Guess how long the warranty was?
Yoga 2 Pro Netflix spacebar pause
Why won’t the spacebar pause the Netflix app on a Yoga 2 Pro? Works on my son’s Windows 8 desktop.