Slashback: Playstation, CueCat, Games 306
Maybe a bad day at the factory? An anonymous reader submits: "I'm not sure where the other fellow got his WAP11, but mine don't show the dirty output his does." See this diagram for a much more desireable outcome, if you care to play with (a little bit of) fire.
First application should be a GPL'd AIBO obedience school. gonz writes: "An update to the previous reported linux on ps2 kit has been submitted by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) to the people previously registering interest on their technology sites. The update consist of that it will be released in May on both SCEA (us) and SCEE (pal areas, including Europe and Australia) territories. A website has been set up at this place. On a side note, registering for notification when pre-ordering can apparently be done too: 'Finally, although sales haven't yet started, if you send an e-mail with the message "subscribe" to ps2linux-request@technology.scee.net we'll let you know when pre-ordering starts.'"
Lessons in obviousness. John Kozubik writes: "I have written an article describing, in a manner I have not yet seen, why the court decision by the U.S. appeals court in SF that claimed in-line linking was not fair use was inherently flawed. It is a short piece written for both the technical and the non-technical, and I think it raises a strong point concerning the arbitrary nature of browser behavior."
If they'd launch some pigs, perhaps global phones would be affordable. Guppy06 writes: "Many of you may be surprised to learn that Iridium (famous for trying to compete with cell phones and failing miserably) is still throwing up satellites (I sure was). The article on CNN tells of the technical woes of getting this particular Delta II off the pad in Vandenberg as Iridium tries to put five more spares into orbit."
Couldn't they have spayed or neutered them instead? Speaking of old hardware, Anonymous Radio Shack Employee writes: "RadioShack has sent a notice to all of its employees to destroy all CueCats (preferably with a hammer). Apparently the CueCat is among a couple of dozen items that RadioShack has given up on, and wants destroyed. The memo says that store employee's can not benefit from the items on the list. Which sucks because my store has over a hundred of these things just sitting in the back room." This week's Linux Weekly News has a great, detailed followup to the recent flap over relative OS security sparked by a post in Windows Informant.
Speaking of flawed links.. (Score:5, Funny)
cuecat (Score:2, Insightful)
*destroy* seems like overkill, explain please
Re:cuecat (Score:4, Insightful)
They may well want to sever their relationship with the digital:convergence to, and smashing the things to bits is a great way to send that message.
Re:cuecat (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe it's for some kind of wacky accounting purposes??? I don't know.
Maybe its like bagels? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Maybe its like bagels? (Score:2, Informative)
I used to work at Publix and asked them the exact same question. Stores can't give out food because if a homeless man gets sick, the stores could be sued. Of course, Im sure homeless people would sign a release in a second for some free fried chicken...
Re:Maybe its like bagels? (Score:4, Informative)
My first job ever was at a franchise of a certain somewhat large fast-food chain [mcdonalds.com], and it wasn't long before I asked why the food that was "QC'd" was pitched instead of held and shipped off to one of the local shelters. Liability was the primary reason...if some bum got sick off of a freebie burger, he could've contacted any of the hundreds of ambulance chasers [switchboard.com] in this town and sued the store into oblivion. It was hella wasteful...about the only thing you could do is keep an eye on production to minimize the waste, but it was nearly impossible to eliminate it completely.
Re:Maybe its like bagels? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Maybe its like bagels? (Score:3, Informative)
Food can be donated instead of tossed! (Score:3, Informative)
As far as I'm aware, in some places restauranteurs are misinformed about local rules for food donation. Second Harvest and similar organizations work to provide correct information as well as the go-betweens to organize and monitor such donations.
A quick survey on the net for "surpus food" or "food rescue" (a common term for this) turned up several meta-lists of organizations, including this one [pcma.org] which has listings for the US and Canada. It seems like there's more a misperception of legal reason that actual restrictions.
Re:Maybe its like bagels? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:cuecat (Score:2)
Also, I think giving away leftovers could be thought of encouraging unpopularity. IE, hide an item so nobody can buy it. I know that happens at places like Target because Target gives employees breaks on leftovers.
I could be wrong, but what your saying would seem logical.
Re:cuecat (Score:2)
AFAIK, this may be implying that by possessing such a book, you may be in violation of copyright law, but I do not know for sure.
Re:cuecat (Score:2, Informative)
1) The university didn't want people dumpster diving
2) Any equipment that was donated to the university from companies like Fluke had to be destroyed prior to disposal because the agreement with Fluke stated that you weren't allowed to make a profit from donated equipment... so, no salvage (because the U still makes a profit from salvage auctions) which is how most U items go out. Also, I think to adhere to the strict letter of the agreement they didn't want that equipment getting out into peoples hands via point 1)
Not sure what the exact agreement was with the makers of the CueCat but I imagine it may well boil down to "if we don't profit from 'em, nobody should! damnit!"
Don't forget (Score:3, Insightful)
And did you ever see the Simpsons episode where Homer bought the trampoline?
No lawyer would ever advise a company to give away overstock when they could be destroyed instead.
Re:Don't forget (Score:2, Interesting)
America, where stuff is so plentiful we have to throw away a lot of it before it ever gets used.
Re:Don't forget (Score:2)
Hmmm... I don't get it? Does the law distinguish between large and small manufacturers? When was the last time Boeing or Airbus got sued for a plane that came down? All I ever hear is the airlines shelling out big money and the manufacturer pre-emptively sending experts to find out what went wrong and how it could have been prevented.
So basically, I think the liability is stuck to the people who do the mandatory inspections and overhauls on the machine. A clogged fuel filter is very certainly a part subject to wear and therefore something to be checked repeatedly and changed if needed. Would someone get through with suing Dodge or Ford because he rear-ended into a truck with nearly no brake pads left on his car? I doubt it.
Re:cuecat (Score:3, Interesting)
By and by a fun gig, they had an unlimited IT budget, so they had things like $12,000 plasma video screens thoughtout the office, and IBM Intellistations as office computers.
The coolest thing was building Half Pipe, full size, to do a presentation on the X-games toys.
Re:cuecat (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:looniest destruction story I ever heard. . . (Score:3, Interesting)
When stuff is imported via cargo ship from Japan, a certain number of damaged units are expected, and so they ship extra ones in order to make up for this. On paper, it all works out in the insurance, and so everybody is happy.
However, when a shipment arrives with no damage, these 'extra' items must now be paid for by the receiver. Since some of these items are sometimes worth tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, when you suddenly have to pay for more than you bargained for, it hurts the balance sheet.
A friend of mine described how a government tax agent and several company officers had to witness the destruction of a perfectly working, hand-crafted, grand piano. Warehouse workers raised and dropped the two ton monster fifteen times from a forklift before it was destroyed to the point where the tax agent would allow it to be written off.
Spend a month hand crafting a top of the line musical instrument, ship it overseas, and then have it destroyed. All just to satisfy the red tape. This is so Muggle/Douglas Adams, it makes my head spin!
I almost look forward to the day when society is decimated by a comet!
-Fantastic Lad
Re:looniest destruction story I ever heard. . . (Score:2)
This makes me sick. I kinda wish I never read your comment because now I'm damn angry! The people who would do such a thing deserve to be shot (preferably with frozen shit) and then pissed on!
Re:looniest destruction story I ever heard. . . (Score:2)
THIS is legal? I mean a tax inspector actually watches the destruction of an item before he allows it to written off?
This planet never ceases to surprise me.
i proclaim... (Score:5, Funny)
Just imagine... (Score:2)
Re:i proclaim... (Score:3, Insightful)
Just think of the entertainment. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Just think of the entertainment. (Score:4, Funny)
Cuecats being destroyed . . . (Score:5, Funny)
I dance a jig on their grave. See where empty-headed threats and intellectual property rhetoric lead?
Re:Cuecats being destroyed . . . (Score:3, Informative)
Ah, see, and people laughed at the CueCat Collectors Club [techsynthesis.com]! Buwahahahaaaaa!
Nah.. (Score:2)
Anyway, though I'd like to believe it, I don't think it's the IP tactics that did them in. The simple fact was that they had an absolutely retarded business plan. Nobody wants to scan barcodes from a magazine. It wasn't even fun for the novelty value.
Re:Nah.. (Score:2, Funny)
Reminds me of the early '90s in Japan when business cards started sporting barcodes, encoded with the phone and fax numbers printed on the card.
I could never quite grasp why anyone would want to use a scanner to scan the number, which would then output the touch-tones to the phone, instead of just punching eight buttons.
I admit I'm not totally immune to technology for technology's sake, but...what were these people thinking!
Great (Score:3, Funny)
Oh... they're not *real*?
Irridium is still sending stuff up? why? (Score:2, Interesting)
Sigh... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sigh... (Score:2)
I guess I forgot the old adage "never chock up to lame humor, anything that can be attributeed to stupidity"
CueCat Accessories? (Score:2, Informative)
Radio Shack Addendum (Score:3, Funny)
The Cue::Hammer, when connected to your computer's serial port, will digitally scan any object it is used upon and automatically take you to a website featuring...
oh, never mind.
Radio Scrap (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Radio Scrap (Score:2)
Re:Radio Scrap (Score:3, Insightful)
Hey, the policy's not lame. It's a blast. I once replaced a VCR that was deemed "uneconomical to repair." We pitched the dead one off the roof of the building my store was in. It was a hoot.
And trust me, after you've just finished dealing with an infuriating customer who took all the anger of his entire life out on you, taking his returned, worthless answering machine out behind the store and beating the crap out of it with something big and heavy is a very satisfying release.
::Cue::Cat (or however you spell it) (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:::Cue::Cat (or however you spell it) (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:::Cue::Cat (or however you spell it) (Score:2, Insightful)
As for the food, it's spoiled; safe or not, I'm sure that no business wants to expose itself to the lawsuit that might ensue if someone got sick after eating their abandoned food.
The books are an intellectual property issue. I'm sure every Slashdot readers knows about the difference between buying a copy and licensing a work. When a bookstore destroys a book, they get a refund from the publisher, because although the paper was wasted, the content (which is much more valuable) can be sold again somewhere else. If they simply gave away the books, someone would have to pay royalties to the author and everyone else involved. A little hard to swallow, perhaps, but it makes sense.
Of course, none of this applies to the CueCat, as far as I can tell.
Re:::Cue::Cat (or however you spell it) (Score:2)
on coverless books (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, it's: the bookstore gets refunded for all returned books, but postage to return them would be ridiculous, so the torn covers are sent instead as proof of non-sale.
Many a publisher has gone under due to returnable policies. Publisher pays for print run in advance, 1 year later gets a bunch o' torn covers plus a refund request for 60% cover price for each. No books and no pay = big loss for publisher.
Re:::Cue::Cat (or however you spell it) (Score:2)
Radio Shack (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Radio Shack (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Radio Shack (Score:5, Interesting)
There's a bank I worked for a little while ago which recieved 40 17" monitors that it had since decided it didn't want.
Since the supplier wouldn't take them back and the bank had a stupid "destroy all obsolete computer equipment" policy, the brand, spanking new monitors, still in their unopened boxes, where taken to the landfill where a large hole was dug, the monitors dumped into and run over with a bulldozer.
In the words of one of my university going friends: "The university computer department would have killed for those"
I would have taken those monitors off their hands, for free. A 40 monitor wall display would have been cool.
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Troll)
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Funny)
Trust me, when I heard of this occurance, I shed a tear for those poor, defenseless CRTs, being dumped in an umarked, undignified grave when there where thousands who would have given them the love they needed.
I often wake screaming with guilt (or it could be caffine induced insanity, same diff I suppose).
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Informative)
t.
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Interesting)
Its the same with book stores. If they have a title they don't want/need. They rip off the front cover to send back, then toss the rest of the book. Every major boodstore will fire you if you try to take home the book, even without the cover.
Basically, its cheaper to do this.
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Interesting)
But it really is apalling that it is cheaper to destroy extremely valuable stuff, especially computer equipment, rather than give it away to some charity or other needy organiztion. Anyone have ideas on solving it that doesn't involve new legislation?
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Radio Shack (Score:3, Informative)
Magazines? they just rip the cover off. Still a perfectly readable magazine. Heck, I had about a gazillion amarays(the black vhs tape boxes they always used).
Re:Radio Shack (Score:2)
it kinda sucks when you want to buy something and all the boxes are stickerfied though
Re:Radio Shack (Score:2)
I have always refered to these as the Stickers of Shame. Occasionally I have bought a shamed box from Fry's when there was no other option... and every time it was DOA. When will I learn?
Now I live in Seattle, where there is no Fry's. I hate it and miss it at the same time.
The ever-useful cuecat (Score:2, Interesting)
I took a few home and SNIP!
Guess I'll do something with the cuecat guts sooner or later.
- James
Re:The ever-useful cuecat (Score:2)
Home-made barcodes? (Score:3)
Re:Home-made barcodes? (Score:2, Informative)
So, yes, these little annoying plastic things can read home-made barcodes.
Re:Home-made barcodes? (Score:2)
I use weather-proof Avery labels which are kind of slick (smooth), which probably helps for multiple reads.
Re:Home-made barcodes? (Score:3, Interesting)
Most TTF fonts I have seen for barcodes support 3 of 9 encoding as it does not have any interleaving or require a checksum. It does require a start and stop code however. (usualy a *) As a font the spacebar will place on unreadable gap in the barcode. To print the code that represents a space to the reader, an alternate translation charactor must be typed. (in my font it's an exclimation point!) 3 of 9 barcodes support the following 0-9, A-Z (uppercase only), and hyphen, period, Dollar, slash, plus, percent, and space. (yes you can barcode
*JOHN!HENRY*
A search of HP's website will get you the full extended 3 of 9 information. Another tidbit.. If you hack the Cat, all 3 of 9 is output in lower case instead of uppercase by the Cue Cat.
Re:Home-made barcodes? (Score:2)
Re:Home-made barcodes? (Score:2)
Typical stupid retailer behaivoir (Score:2)
It's moronic moves like this instead of just throwing them away or how about dumping them on a electronic junk wherehouse for a few cents?
Most places like EIO will pay for shipping.
Re:Typical stupid retailer behaivoir (Score:2)
Personally, I'd love it if they at least called a local not for profit orginization that specializes in used hardware and say "hey, we got these if you want them you have 2 days to pick them up."
On a side note, I've been to radio shack several times and have yet to even see one.
Re:Typical stupid retailer behaivoir (Score:3, Informative)
Whats sad is the tax system ought to encourage radio shack to take the box down the local school or college and throw them into the "fun stuff for electronics lessons" bucket
It's economics (Score:2)
Even the "electronic junk warehouse" doesn't make a lot of sense for a manager who gets paid the same in any case. Dealing with the warehouse would require all kinds of extra effort to get the stuff packaged, shipped and actually paid for. The company obviously has the necessary paperwork for when inventory is destroyed but they probably don't for when inventory is resold. That's probably not a decision they want to leave in the hands of a mere store manager. "Now that there are P4s out, we'll never sell these PIIIs, I guess I'll make room by unloading them at the junk warehouse for 75% cost."
Iridium's reincarnation (Score:4, Insightful)
Iridium was bought by a company no one had ever heard of, for a bargain price -- after "securing" a long term contract from the US Government that basically pays for their operating costs. Any additional commercial subscribers is just gravy.
Common speculation is that this company is really a front for one or more of the many three-letter agencies in Washington that saw an opportunity to establish a secure means of global communication.
Re:Iridium's reincarnation (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe They Have Rabies! (Score:2, Funny)
Digital Convergence (Score:4, Interesting)
It looks like they changed their business plan (of course) and are now *selling* the CueCat reader [crq.com] and books [crq.com] (this last one is a ROFL site. Look at the titles: Online Weight Loss Assistant, WAR ON TERROR (PHASE ONE: AFGHANISTAN & USAMA BIN LADIN), and so on...)
Re:Digital Convergence (Score:2, Funny)
i bet thats what they thought the first time.
Headline (Score:4, Funny)
Now that would be cool.
Re:Headline (Score:2)
damn sony.
The Kozubik Article (Score:4, Insightful)
I fully agree that any material placed on publically accessible web servers should be referencable under the "fair use" doctrine. However, I think the court's descision is correct in light of this. Mr. Kozubik's main complaint seems to be that the behavior of browsers as regards linking are entirely arbitrary. He is correct. However, fair use is by its very nature a doctrine which will be interpreted on a case by case basis, respecting precedent.
Rather than fearing, as he does, that the court will constantly have to "revise" the decision as technology changes, I think courts will be able to read the intent and wisely apply it to many other decisions. After all, a court decision is not a law, defined by the precise wordings, but rather a carefully considered opinion on the burden of evidence. Future courts should be able to apply the same fundamental distinction--linking that is designed to automatically reproduce the work vs linking that is designed only to show the location of the work--irregardless of the precise technology involved.
nastiness (Score:3, Funny)
I mean, what does the 1st one look like to you?
(CueCat) Blockbuster does the same thing... (Score:5, Interesting)
My friend works at blockbuster, and he says that periodically they'll be told to destroy videos or games that are no longer being sold.
It's worth mentioning that not one thing is ever *actually* destroyed-- that's one of the few perks of a minimum wage behind-the-counter job.
My guess on why this happens is that the original distributer (who sold the videos to Blockbuster or CueCat's to Radio Shack) made Blockbuster or Radio Shack sign a contract saying explicitly that they couldn't give extras of these items to their employees. If Radio Shack is in effect giving away CueCats to all their employees, then none of the employees are going to go out and buy new CueCats. The decision isn't in the hands of Radio Shack's management at all, but in the contract with Radio Shack's distributor.
In other words, Radio Shack doesn't care if they're destroyed or not, but they tell the employees to destroy them in order to avoid legal trouble.
Hope that helps
Linux vulnerabilites?!?! (Score:3, Interesting)
Take a look at the LWN article again. It includes mailman (a mailing list manager), openssh (secure access to the box), proftpd (an ftp server), (l|m)icq, sendmail (a mail server), and an IMAP/POP server, just to name a few. When is the last time you saw Windows (including NT) come with utilities like those?
Let's reduce this down to a common denominator: if you only include the packages that would be required to "duplicate" windows functionality, we have:
1) the kernel
2) KDE (for "network transparent" FTP browsing, etc [FYI no bias against gnome, just picking examples])
3) XWindows for the GUI
4)Apache (if we are talking NT with IIS, or 9x with PWS, which has security issues of its own
5) a dhcp client, most likely
6) Maybe a few others
Now how many vulnerabilities do you have? Granted, Linux servers run other things, like POP/IMAP, FTP, etc, but if we're going to compare apples to apples, then let's include the security problems in POP/IMAP servers on Windows, and FTP, and DNS, and, and, and. The comparison is not fair in the least, as Linux is taking a hit for all the problems generated by auxillury packeges. On the other hand, Microsoft is only having to update (and only getting hit) for problems in Windows proper, and not for all the extra programs that you need to make Windows a fully functioning server!
Hey IBM, where's my cat dammit! (Score:2, Interesting)
Grr... I wanted to use it with ReaderWare! I mean how cool is that software?
Re:Hey IBM, where's my cat dammit! (Score:2)
Destroying Stock (Score:2, Informative)
Open Source CueCat Software (Score:2, Interesting)
If only I had known!
Ah well, I'll just look in the dumpster behind one of the radio shacks near me. I hope the employees at it are too lazy or don't have enough aggression to smash them.
This is somewhat alarming!! (Score:3, Funny)
Uh... what does it say in their fine print about a 'retirement plan' again???
My problem is... (Score:4, Funny)
It may be destroyed or it may not. I can't be sure.
;)
=tkk
One doesn't (Score:2, Informative)
Re:How does one do that thing with oscilloscope? (Score:5, Informative)
The instrument used to make those screen shots is a spectrum analyzer [ebay.com], not an oscilloscope. Both instruments display amplitude on a vertical scale, but an oscilloscope displays amplitude versus time while a spectrum analyzer displays amplitude versus frequency. They are very different tools, and any serious RF hacker will own both.
In general, an analyzer is much more sensitive (they normally display RF signal power on a log10 scale, so their dynamic range in voltage terms can exceed 100,000,000:1.) If you had a fast-enough/fancy-enough oscilloscope, you could run an FFT on its display and get the same basic information, but the SA is still the tool of choice for most RF work above 500 MHz. The insanely-fast scopes that can do microwave FFT analysis come with Ferrari-size price tags (literally), and they still don't have the dynamic range of a $3,000 spectrum analyzer. Different horses for different courses.
Sorry for the rather basic questions, but I'm not an EE, and I've only used an oscilloscope very briefly about 12 years ago. I really want to find out where the interference for my 2.4GHz phone is coming from, and how moving the base station helps. I also want to put an FM transmitter on my sound card, and so I want to see how that works too.
For both of those purposes, a spectrum analyzer would be the right way to go. An analyzer capable of 2.4 GHz coverage can be had for under $2K on eBay, but not much less. Some 802.11 hardware can give you reasonably-decent pictures of the 2.4 GHz spectrum, so I'd investigate that possibility first.
Re:How does one do that thing with oscilloscope? (Score:2)
1) This guy's spectrum analyzer output looks too perfect, which makes me think that it's not very sensitive at all. This guy also needs to do some serious calibration on it, as the line is way too "thick"
2) Back in school, we had spectrum analyzers that used regular oscilloscopes for display. They're a cheap, but very good alternative. I forget exactly who made ours, but they were based out of Quebec
Re:How does one do that thing with oscilloscope? (Score:2)
Besides using too wide a resolution bandwidth to distinguish the apparently-unwanted sidebands from the information-carrying ones, he might have gotten some blurring due to excess CRT intensity cranked up way high (to make the photos look OK, maybe).
He still gets major points for actually measuring the WLAN hack instead of the usual hand-waving I-got-50-HP-from-my-new-coffee-can-exhaust approach. I think his conclusion is basically valid: the sidebands are undesirable IMD-like artifacts, growing at a faster rate than the main lobe's power is increased, but they're not likely to be strong enough to be a real nuisance to anyone.
Re:How does one do that thing with oscilloscope? (Score:2)
Also, that "clean" look is just video filtering in action. Perfectly normal. It looks fine to me, except that I would probably have taken the shot at 100 kHz RBW instead of 1 MHz or 3 MHz like he did.
You can make your own spectrum analyzer attachment (Score:2)
You can make your own spectrum analyzer out of:
An oscilloscope with a high-persistence screen and a horizontal sweep output.
A receiver for the desired frequency.
A handfull of components
provided you're willing to hack up the receiver. Here's the basic drill:
Probe the receiver's AGC feedback line to feed the osciloscope's vertical deflection circuitry. (This gives you a roughly logarithmic measure of the signal intensity at the center of the IF passband on the way to the detector.)
Disconnect the AFC circuit and substitute the sweep signal from the oscilloscope - with enough conditioning (such as DC blocking capacitors and attenuating resistors) to sweep the radio rather than fry it.
If the receiver doesn't have an AFC, or at least the part that sweeps the receiver, make your own:
Connect one end of a diode to ground near (one of) the local oscilator(s) of the receiver. A variactor (PIN) diode works best, because it's optimized for this service. But essentially any diode will do.
Capacitively couple the hot end to the tuned circuit of the local oscilator (with a small capacitor).
Inductively couple the hot end to a bias and signal network I'm about to describe. The inductor should be large enough to block the RF from the oscilator but small enough to pass the audio-rate scope sweep. At the other end of the inductor connect:
A resistor to ground and another to a handy bypassed power supply connection, providing a voltage that back-biases the diode - say a half-volt - and also providing a load resistance for the incoming sweep signal.
A capacitor-resistor series combination to the wire from the sweep output of the oscilloscope.
Pick your resistors to get maybee a quarter-volt of the sweep to appear at the diode junction. (I'm guessing about these voltages, so play around a bit.)
Set the oscilloscope for a sawtooth timebase, as slow as you can without flickering. Shazam: A low budget spectrum analyzer, at least for the tuning range of the hacked receiver. (Calibrating it is another can of worms, which I leave as an exercise for the reader.)
How it works:
The variable back-bias of the diode (in sync with the horizontal sweep of the 'scope) moves the conduction regions of the two sides of the diode junction closer/farter, making the diode act as a variable capacitor. This is coupled to the tuned circuit of the local oscilator, thus sweeping it in sync with the scope and dragging the receiver's tuning along with it. (Adjust the amount of sweep voltage applied to the diode to adjust the horizontal scale of the display. Don't get too close to conduction or the sweep will get very non-linear.)
The receiver tunes across the signal range you want to observe, and the AGC feedback signal gives you a measure of the strength of the signals that make it through the IF into the detector, which you display on the 'scope's vertical deflection.
To calibrate frequency a small crystal oscilator with a square-wave output will produce a "comb" of frequency markers that show up as little pips on the display. Calbirating amplitude is tougher.
Re:How does one do that thing with oscilloscope? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Your own personal CueCat (Score:5, Interesting)
Whenever an item is written off at RadioShack...say for example, you give replace someone's radio under a service plan...you are supposed to destroy the item. This is done for a couple reasons that I can think of. As an employee, you could take the item, send it to get serviced on the store's tab (Radioshack...We Service What We Sell), resell it, and the void / backout the transaction and pocket the cash while avoiding discrepencies in the inventory. Also, prevents you from other such mischief... sending it to get repaired, and keeping it for yourself.
Since they're being written off, the procedure is therefore the procedure of all written off goods -- destruction by the almighty hammer.
I still can't see how people would profit off them, except maybe selling them as some sort of bizarre techno-geek sex toy / butt plug. I think if you use it to scan your butt, it automatically brings up a link to goatse.
Re:Your own personal CueCat (Score:4, Informative)
Two words.. Labor costs. A portable CD player that sells for $50 costs less than that to manufacture. If the laser or spindle motor or such goes out, you have at least an hour troubleshooting, ordering parts, looking up part numbers, keeping inventory of unique parts, replacing the part, aligning and warrenting the repair. You break even with techs at $20 per hour how?? Short answer.. replace it. Very little sold in radio shack sells for over a $100.00. I used to fix VCR's when they were a 600 to 1200 dollar item. Now that they are a 60 dollar item, I found other work.
Re:Your own personal CueCat (Score:2)
Since Radio Shack was just giving the things away they shouldn't complain if the store employees wanted to take a few dozen to their local Linux Users Group and pass them out.
Some other use (Score:2)
Re:Errata (Score:2, Informative)
Registrant:
Sony Computer Entertainment America
919 East Hillsdale Blvd.
2nd Floor
Foster City, CA 94404
US
Domain Name: PLAYSTATION2-LINUX.COM
Administrative Contact:
Department, Legal domainadmin@scea.com
919 East Hillsdale Blvd.
2nd Floor
Foster City, CA 94404
US
650 655 8000
Technical Contact:
Hostmaster, SCEA hostmaster@scea.com
10075 Barnes Canyon Rd.
San Diego, CA 92121
US
858-824-5500
Billing Contact:
Department, Legal domainadmin@scea.com
919 East Hillsdale Blvd.
2nd Floor
Foster City, CA 94404
US
650 655 8000
Registration Service Provider:
The Discount Domain Registry - Register your domain for only $14.99!, support@discountdomainregistry.com
(801) 991-5540
http://DiscountDomainRegistry.com
Record last updated on 11-Feb-2002.
Record expires on 17-Dec-2002.
Record Created on 17-Dec-2001.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.SCEA.COM 208.236.12.69
NS2.SCEA.COM 208.236.12.67
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