Anyway, after updating packages on Mei-chan yesterday (which included VLC), I was watching a movie, since I didn't feel like doing much at all. I decided to hit the subtitle hot key for VLC since I had previously clicked on the video window, and it changed the setting; I hit the key a couple more times before testing the space key for play/pause. I was quite pleased to see that it was finally fixed (whatever the problem was), since the only other way to fix it was to compile VLC from source code... Which is something I'd like to avoid.
Now I don't have to make sure to click on the controller window whenever I watch something, and it'll save me a lot of hassle if my controller's buried underneath another window and I need to pause whatever I'm watching.
On a different note, it seems like there wasn't ever 13.2 Beta 2... And during my G5 escapades, I snagged RC1, since I realised that I had missed and forgotten about Beta 2 (not knowing then that it never happened). I've done a bit of testing, but still have a bit of testing left, along with taking some screenshots; hopefully I can have the 13.2 RC1 post up by tomorrow evening, since I was busy with the G5.
15 October 2014
Finnix and SystemRescueCd
I stumbled upon these as I was looking for PPC-based Linux distributions (well, SystemRescueCd is strictly x86) and decided to give both a whirl. I was hoping to find something that stayed updated with GParted, fast to load, and hasn't any annoying setup options (boots straight to X).
Finnix was fast indeed and had no setup, but the major thing I found was that it's strictly command line. No X to get into to use GParted. I also found this site that told me what I needed to know about Finnix (though the article was on a slightly older version). Needless to say, it was not a viable candidate.
SystemRescueCd uses X and GParted, however, while booting, I saw the textual setup that's in GParted Live, so at the first question (I believe the keyboard map), I ejected the disk and did a hard shutdown. While I can understand the point of SystemRescueCd, I'd rather use GParted Live If I'm going to have to set up the language, keymap, etc. SystemRescueCd is not going to be something I use either.
Since my GParted Live is old (0.17.x vs 0.19.1), I'll have to test it out, but I'm expecting it to be not much different than before with the setup options. At some point, I may spin my own distro where it boots directly into X and opens GParted, just like GParted Live, but without all the annoying setup questions; however, that will be when I learn how to do so... Heck, I may just respin GParted Live to use the default options to make it how I'd like and finally kill off PartedMagic.
Finnix was fast indeed and had no setup, but the major thing I found was that it's strictly command line. No X to get into to use GParted. I also found this site that told me what I needed to know about Finnix (though the article was on a slightly older version). Needless to say, it was not a viable candidate.
SystemRescueCd uses X and GParted, however, while booting, I saw the textual setup that's in GParted Live, so at the first question (I believe the keyboard map), I ejected the disk and did a hard shutdown. While I can understand the point of SystemRescueCd, I'd rather use GParted Live If I'm going to have to set up the language, keymap, etc. SystemRescueCd is not going to be something I use either.
Since my GParted Live is old (0.17.x vs 0.19.1), I'll have to test it out, but I'm expecting it to be not much different than before with the setup options. At some point, I may spin my own distro where it boots directly into X and opens GParted, just like GParted Live, but without all the annoying setup questions; however, that will be when I learn how to do so... Heck, I may just respin GParted Live to use the default options to make it how I'd like and finally kill off PartedMagic.
11 October 2014
Apple PowerMac G5 1
My best friend wanted to essentially turn it into an NAS (or FTP server, essentially the same thing), but there's a couple problems. First problem is that it's missing a temperature sensor, so the fans are at full blast; and second, the highest it can take is OS X 10.5.8. While I'm not sure when updates to 10.5 will end, I'd rather it stay updated than not - even if it's not going to connect to the internet very often, if at all. Also, with his iBook G4 that I'm using, the file transfers via OS X's built-in file sharing (which essentially makes it an FTP server) didn't seem to transfer the files correctly, so that is another additive to why I'm weary about using OS X. (Though the iBook has 10.4.11, but nonetheless, it doesn't make that much of a difference, since I don't think Apple updated the FTP "package" at all).
I started with installing 10.4 since I had the disks and I wanted to get more info about the machine itself from the horse's mouth. I had forgotten to look at the sticker that has the model's specs that's usually somewhere partially hidden (on the inside of the G5's case, near the groove for the side panel) which would've given me the info I needed quicker.
Obviously, the only other option is a Linux distro, to which I started with Ubuntu (technically Lubuntu) 14.04. I booted into the live and was met with a weird graphical glitch, and eventually tried the suggested
When I was moving it from the loft into the other room (which has my entertainment centre), I decided to swap the Dell's monitor with a Dell monitor I had refurbished (but left to the side) which I was using as the monitor for the G5, and when I was going to boot into Ubuntu 12.04, I missed the timing for the boot from CD command (holding "c" at the startup sound) and booted into Lubuntu from the hard drive without any problems. I was very confused (since I didn't realise that I had missed the timing) and looking for the install shortcut. After rebooting into the Ubuntu disk, I was still a bit confused, but started the install process anyway, which is when I realised that I was actually in Lubuntu when I missed the timing; I finished with the install anyway and tested out how it was before reinstalling Lubuntu. I couldn't find vsftpd in the software manager, so I decided to update to see if that made any difference, and in a way it kinda did: it froze. Trying it again yielded the same results, and I did it one more time with a different hard drive just to see if it was the drive or not ("luckily" it wasn't the drive). I installed Ubuntu and began updating it, which also resulted in the crash - needless to say, I was quite off-put about it.
Gentoo was next, which I began installing, but after taking 3-4 hours to get halfway through the installation process (not to mention it was 3 in the morning), I decided to go to bed instead. (For those who are unfamiliar with Gentoo, you must manually install it, which gives greater compatibility with the programs you install later.) Gentoo will be one of the last few I try, since it'll take quite some time to install (I think the BSD bunch are also "manual" install types, I don't know yet).
I recently tried Fedora, but it wouldn't boot from the DVD for whatever reason. I've just recently reburned it, so maybe it'll work... If not, one more reburn at x1 speed, then I'll have to try the net install... Which always seems to give me troubles.
For now, I will say that I'm quite determined to get a Linux distro on this thing, as it's probably going to make it a more reliable FTP server than OSX will. My best friend will be getting a replacement sensor, so hopefully that will help the fan speed problem (when he gets it) and a couple of large hard drives (hopefully it reads the entire size). I will also make another update, but I'm sure you've already expected that.
I started with installing 10.4 since I had the disks and I wanted to get more info about the machine itself from the horse's mouth. I had forgotten to look at the sticker that has the model's specs that's usually somewhere partially hidden (on the inside of the G5's case, near the groove for the side panel) which would've given me the info I needed quicker.
Obviously, the only other option is a Linux distro, to which I started with Ubuntu (technically Lubuntu) 14.04. I booted into the live and was met with a weird graphical glitch, and eventually tried the suggested
live video=ofonly, which cleared it up. (Though this was after I became more patient with it booting from the DVD.) After installing Lubuntu, I had a lot of troubles getting it to go to the desktop - if I left it alone, it'd hang; if I used radeon.modeset=0, it'd boot into the system but corrupt the video so bad I didn't know what was going on (only way I could tell was that when I hit the power button, the broken video would change a bit and hitting enter would shut it down). I tried a lot of things - even putting the hard drive I was using in the Dell to read the logs - but eventually just took a break and left it alone.
When I was moving it from the loft into the other room (which has my entertainment centre), I decided to swap the Dell's monitor with a Dell monitor I had refurbished (but left to the side) which I was using as the monitor for the G5, and when I was going to boot into Ubuntu 12.04, I missed the timing for the boot from CD command (holding "c" at the startup sound) and booted into Lubuntu from the hard drive without any problems. I was very confused (since I didn't realise that I had missed the timing) and looking for the install shortcut. After rebooting into the Ubuntu disk, I was still a bit confused, but started the install process anyway, which is when I realised that I was actually in Lubuntu when I missed the timing; I finished with the install anyway and tested out how it was before reinstalling Lubuntu. I couldn't find vsftpd in the software manager, so I decided to update to see if that made any difference, and in a way it kinda did: it froze. Trying it again yielded the same results, and I did it one more time with a different hard drive just to see if it was the drive or not ("luckily" it wasn't the drive). I installed Ubuntu and began updating it, which also resulted in the crash - needless to say, I was quite off-put about it.
Gentoo was next, which I began installing, but after taking 3-4 hours to get halfway through the installation process (not to mention it was 3 in the morning), I decided to go to bed instead. (For those who are unfamiliar with Gentoo, you must manually install it, which gives greater compatibility with the programs you install later.) Gentoo will be one of the last few I try, since it'll take quite some time to install (I think the BSD bunch are also "manual" install types, I don't know yet).
I recently tried Fedora, but it wouldn't boot from the DVD for whatever reason. I've just recently reburned it, so maybe it'll work... If not, one more reburn at x1 speed, then I'll have to try the net install... Which always seems to give me troubles.
For now, I will say that I'm quite determined to get a Linux distro on this thing, as it's probably going to make it a more reliable FTP server than OSX will. My best friend will be getting a replacement sensor, so hopefully that will help the fan speed problem (when he gets it) and a couple of large hard drives (hopefully it reads the entire size). I will also make another update, but I'm sure you've already expected that.
25 September 2014
openSUSE 13.2 Beta 1
Quite a bit of noticeable changes, and from what I've seen, it's between a mix of under-the-hood and graphical.
Nautilus has tweaked a bit and looks a bit different, but mostly with the file save/open dialogue - the open/save buttons that used to be at the bottom of the window are now at the top (possibly to make it a bit more accessible?).
The combined menu (top right one) now has a "Location" entry, which I assume is for any sort of ARM install (phones/tablets/etc) that has a GPS and/or cell connectivity.
Hitting the "Activities" after a cold boot no longer takes the time it used to and appears instantly; however, the trade off is that hitting "Show Applications" now takes a bit of time to load. This is good for those who have things to quickly get to in the favourites bar right after booting, and bad for those trying to use this with a lower-end system (more on this in a bit).
The installation screens to install have also changed (mostly graphical), along with the suggestion partitioning scheme. With 13.1, it used to be that it'd suggest "x" amount of space for swap (since I've almost always had a swap partition, I don't know what the default suggested swap space is), "y" amount of space for "/" formatted as Ext4, and nothing more. Now it suggests "y" amount of space for "/" formatted as BTRFS, and "z" amount of space for "/home" formatted as XFS. While I'm not sure if this change will continue to carry over to the actual 13.2 release, it's a just different from what I expected.
While I'm on the topic of BTRFS, I searched around a bit and found a comparison between it, Ext4, and another commonly used Linux file system (might have been XFS?). From what I remember, BTRFS has the reliability, while Ext4 has the file-access speeds, and this is why I've decided to stop using BTRFS for testing. Though it honestly doesn't matter what file system I use to test with, why not test what I'm going to actually be using? Though I could test twice, but it's a bit out of my league to test the file system, as I haven't a clue how to properly test it - it'll be something I'll have to look up.
Unfortunately for me, I was unable to test VLC like I usually do, seeing that the H264 codec was missing from the repository. I may use a different file format to test, but I'll probably just see what happens in beta 2.
Rhythmbox is updated, and doesn't seem to exhibit the "album art crash". The other crash I can't immediately test for, as it requires me to play hours of music (Rhythmbox crashes after quite a few hours of music, so I'm not sure if it's a specific song/artist/album or just a random occurrence).
While I've technically given up on the Iris icon set, I did test it, as I found it on Triela's drive; however, results weren't any different - it still doesn't work. One thing different is that instead of replacing the window icons (close, settings, etc.) with icons to show you that it's broken, it just uses the default GNOME ones.
That was all the changes I noticed that I could find under my normal "usage". I'll need to do a bit more testing, but I'm thinking I may upgrade to 13.2, seeing I really like not having to wait for the "Activities" screen thing to load.
On the Dell, it operated decently fine; however, "Show Applications" causes 13.2b1 to crash and force a log out. I'm assuming I'm probably going to have to upgrade the processor to a dual-core, since it seems like it's unable to load the applications list correctly. I can, however, search the applications I want to run to start them that way, but that'd be something to get used to.
On Triela: 13.2b1 is fine in itself, and is how I was able to test my "usage". The actual problem I had was with the installation and myself. I was a somewhat tired while installing 13.2b1 to the test partition and didn't thoroughly look over the partitioning summary, which caused it to format my 13.1 partition to XFS to use as "/home". So what was supposed to be a quick 1-2 hour test, turned out to be a 3-4 hour ordeal to reinstall, update, and setup 13.1 close to how I had it. At this time now, I've got it even closer, but I need to use Firefox sync to partially set up Firefox without having to do much. While I'm lucky I didn't lose anything important (if anything at all), it's still annoying. Needless to say, I'll be more careful next time.
I might update if I find anything more after a bit more testing, and if not, I'll be back for 13.2 Beta 2!
Hitting the "Activities" after a cold boot no longer takes the time it used to and appears instantly; however, the trade off is that hitting "Show Applications" now takes a bit of time to load. This is good for those who have things to quickly get to in the favourites bar right after booting, and bad for those trying to use this with a lower-end system (more on this in a bit).
The installation screens to install have also changed (mostly graphical), along with the suggestion partitioning scheme. With 13.1, it used to be that it'd suggest "x" amount of space for swap (since I've almost always had a swap partition, I don't know what the default suggested swap space is), "y" amount of space for "/" formatted as Ext4, and nothing more. Now it suggests "y" amount of space for "/" formatted as BTRFS, and "z" amount of space for "/home" formatted as XFS. While I'm not sure if this change will continue to carry over to the actual 13.2 release, it's a just different from what I expected.
While I'm on the topic of BTRFS, I searched around a bit and found a comparison between it, Ext4, and another commonly used Linux file system (might have been XFS?). From what I remember, BTRFS has the reliability, while Ext4 has the file-access speeds, and this is why I've decided to stop using BTRFS for testing. Though it honestly doesn't matter what file system I use to test with, why not test what I'm going to actually be using? Though I could test twice, but it's a bit out of my league to test the file system, as I haven't a clue how to properly test it - it'll be something I'll have to look up.
Unfortunately for me, I was unable to test VLC like I usually do, seeing that the H264 codec was missing from the repository. I may use a different file format to test, but I'll probably just see what happens in beta 2.
Rhythmbox is updated, and doesn't seem to exhibit the "album art crash". The other crash I can't immediately test for, as it requires me to play hours of music (Rhythmbox crashes after quite a few hours of music, so I'm not sure if it's a specific song/artist/album or just a random occurrence).
While I've technically given up on the Iris icon set, I did test it, as I found it on Triela's drive; however, results weren't any different - it still doesn't work. One thing different is that instead of replacing the window icons (close, settings, etc.) with icons to show you that it's broken, it just uses the default GNOME ones.
That was all the changes I noticed that I could find under my normal "usage". I'll need to do a bit more testing, but I'm thinking I may upgrade to 13.2, seeing I really like not having to wait for the "Activities" screen thing to load.
On the Dell, it operated decently fine; however, "Show Applications" causes 13.2b1 to crash and force a log out. I'm assuming I'm probably going to have to upgrade the processor to a dual-core, since it seems like it's unable to load the applications list correctly. I can, however, search the applications I want to run to start them that way, but that'd be something to get used to.
On Triela: 13.2b1 is fine in itself, and is how I was able to test my "usage". The actual problem I had was with the installation and myself. I was a somewhat tired while installing 13.2b1 to the test partition and didn't thoroughly look over the partitioning summary, which caused it to format my 13.1 partition to XFS to use as "/home". So what was supposed to be a quick 1-2 hour test, turned out to be a 3-4 hour ordeal to reinstall, update, and setup 13.1 close to how I had it. At this time now, I've got it even closer, but I need to use Firefox sync to partially set up Firefox without having to do much. While I'm lucky I didn't lose anything important (if anything at all), it's still annoying. Needless to say, I'll be more careful next time.
I might update if I find anything more after a bit more testing, and if not, I'll be back for 13.2 Beta 2!
07 August 2014
VAIO 2
I tried to use it to pull off the things from the Performa 550's floppy disks, but it didn't work very well. I also found that for whatever reason, I was unable to write to the floppy disks that were formatted in whatever MS-DOS format, even making sure the write-lock switch was in the unlock position. I may have to install Windows XP on it to get more functionality from the floppy drive whenever it comes time to pair it with the Yamaha keyboard.
Ziggy 4
Sometime ago, I pulled Ziggy out to make a fan duct out of cardboard to direct the airflow from the GPU heat-sink into the exhaust blower fan two spaces under it. While I really wanted to have the blower fan directly underneath the video card, the 6-pin video card power was put toward the front of the card and coming perpendicularly off of the board which makes the space just small enough to where the fan doesn't fit.
When I booted Ziggy, I had the problem where the screen was black and wouldn't POST. Eventually it posted and so I thought it was just some sort of static discharge when I was dragging Ziggy across the carpet to get him out of the corner enough to pick up.
I was in my other room last night and saw an old MacBook Pro remote and decided to open the battery compartment to see what it used out of curiosity, and I was pretty ecstatic when I saw the "CR2032" size printed on the battery. I set it aside since I didn't feel like dragging Ziggy across the house to check the voltage on his battery, but I did check the battery I pulled, which read 3.1 volts.
I opened Ziggy up not too long ago and pulled the battery for a reading, which at first I had trouble getting, but it was definitely dead. I plopped the new battery in and set the BIOS settings back to how I remembered them being before booting into openSUSE to shut down. After putting Ziggy away, I did another reading of the old battery, which gave me a value of .075 volts. I've never seen a battery that dead, but I'm assuming it's what the problem was back when I thought Ziggy's CPU was dead; I never thought back then to check the battery, but at least now I know to make it part of non-POST diagnostics.
Sadly, no ideas on a use for Ziggy yet. Well, I need more Wifi cards before I figure a use for him, as I need two more - one for the VAIO and one for the Dell (which is using the one Ziggy will eventually have).
When I booted Ziggy, I had the problem where the screen was black and wouldn't POST. Eventually it posted and so I thought it was just some sort of static discharge when I was dragging Ziggy across the carpet to get him out of the corner enough to pick up.
I was in my other room last night and saw an old MacBook Pro remote and decided to open the battery compartment to see what it used out of curiosity, and I was pretty ecstatic when I saw the "CR2032" size printed on the battery. I set it aside since I didn't feel like dragging Ziggy across the house to check the voltage on his battery, but I did check the battery I pulled, which read 3.1 volts.
I opened Ziggy up not too long ago and pulled the battery for a reading, which at first I had trouble getting, but it was definitely dead. I plopped the new battery in and set the BIOS settings back to how I remembered them being before booting into openSUSE to shut down. After putting Ziggy away, I did another reading of the old battery, which gave me a value of .075 volts. I've never seen a battery that dead, but I'm assuming it's what the problem was back when I thought Ziggy's CPU was dead; I never thought back then to check the battery, but at least now I know to make it part of non-POST diagnostics.
Sadly, no ideas on a use for Ziggy yet. Well, I need more Wifi cards before I figure a use for him, as I need two more - one for the VAIO and one for the Dell (which is using the one Ziggy will eventually have).
01 July 2014
Sony DVD-RW
One of the optical drives that was removed from the VAIO. It isn't compatible with +RW media -- if I remember correctly -- which is weird since my understanding of Sony is future-proofing (i.e. PlayStation 2), so maybe it was made by a 3rd party under Sony, I don't know.
I don't remember anything about this drive between when I received the VAIO from my parents and yesterday, so I'll just leave it out.
Yesterday, I tried to use it to boot from disk to install openSUSE 13.1 from DVD, but it wouldn't read it. I've tried it in the Dell with same results, though I found that the Parted Magic CD worked just fine. I opened it up and saw nothing wrong (not that it would've solved anything anyway), and at least saw why the thing is heavy -- the inside frame is metal!
Not too long ago, I ran some more tests with it in the Dell and found that it won't read DVDs at all, bootable or not, +R or -R. What I'm thinking is that the laser diode is probably slowly dying (or maybe the lens-focusing mechanism, but I highly doubt that) as I remember the external CD-RW drive I used to have did something similar before it died (it wouldn't burn reliably, then would only read, then stopped reading). So right now, it's only able to read CDs, which is unfortunate since some live distros are barely over 700MB if not about 900MB. While it might be able to burn CDs, but it'd be a bit pointless to.
I don't remember anything about this drive between when I received the VAIO from my parents and yesterday, so I'll just leave it out.
Yesterday, I tried to use it to boot from disk to install openSUSE 13.1 from DVD, but it wouldn't read it. I've tried it in the Dell with same results, though I found that the Parted Magic CD worked just fine. I opened it up and saw nothing wrong (not that it would've solved anything anyway), and at least saw why the thing is heavy -- the inside frame is metal!
Not too long ago, I ran some more tests with it in the Dell and found that it won't read DVDs at all, bootable or not, +R or -R. What I'm thinking is that the laser diode is probably slowly dying (or maybe the lens-focusing mechanism, but I highly doubt that) as I remember the external CD-RW drive I used to have did something similar before it died (it wouldn't burn reliably, then would only read, then stopped reading). So right now, it's only able to read CDs, which is unfortunate since some live distros are barely over 700MB if not about 900MB. While it might be able to burn CDs, but it'd be a bit pointless to.
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