I Thought Broadband Is Supposed To Be Simple These Days…

Posted in broadband / 6general

I mentioned recently that I had a 22 day outage on my fibre line. Today is switchover day to go from fibre back to ADSL. The fibre line dropped at midday, and then nothing. I then found that at the same time, my landline was dead, and phoning it …

Rain Attenuation :-

Posted by: mkinga in electronics / 30gen

1.5kM line of sight 890 MHz (approx) link, looks like we can afford at least a 6dB loss before we get a problem, so is rain likely to be an issue? Looking at this suggests not :- http://www…. Ball park guesses a…

Agressive Tax Avoidance Is Immoral

Posted in enquire_within / 56discussion

Agressive tax avoidance is immoral So say the PM and Chancellor (and others). Does that bury Lord Clyde’s 1929 judgement?

Only In Swansea.

Posted by: dhughese in bikers / 15wibble

I had an email from a very old mate in Swansea. I thought this bit was worth sharing with you… ===========… Yesterday I was at my local Sainsburys store buying a large bag of Winalot dog food for my loyal pet and was in the checkou…

Revolting Shareholders

Posted by: jbdp in sasha_lubetkin / 11chatterbox - 17 days ago

I guess that since the following PDF is on the web I am not being too lacking in company spirit in posting this. (Perhaps if I sing the company song — I kid you not — a few times that will do as penance!) Anyway a colleague writes: http://www….

Posted by: pauldormer in opera / general

Damn, I’d been hoping this was an opera about the life of Simon Dee. Can’t say I enjoyed this much. It reminded me of occasions at university 40 years ago where friends tried to widen my music experience by playing things by the Moody Blues. Th…

Podcasts or Downloads

Posted in bbc.radio / 5general

The BBC (at least on the R4 website) seem to have ditched the term “podcast” in favour of “download” – although the iTunes Store still uses the former term. It makes no odds in the great scheme of things but what might be the reasoning behind t…

Posted in sasha_lubetkin / 6serious.chat

“Bolivia is to become the first country in the world to give nature comprehensi… legal rights in an effort to halt climate change and the exploitation of the natural world, and to improve quality of life for the Bolivian people. “Developed by …

Replacing our server

Posted in vmware / general

We are a small company of a dozen or so souls. We currently have a one Windows 2003 domain server machine, which acts as a (not much used) file server, and also runs VPOP3 to handle email. On a second machine, actually an old XP workstation, we…

Microsoft UEFI lock on Windows 8 PC’s

Posted in linux / 15general

Get your non-UEFI hardware while you can! http://www…. t-boot-cert… Fedora Linux capitulates to Microsoft boot certificate Implementing UEFI Secure Boot in Fedora http…

And we wonder why the country is going downhill

Posted in sasha_lubetkin / 6serious.chat

And we wonder why the country is going downhill http://www…. The terrifying thing is that 81% weren’t employable. Somehow I don’t think this is happening just in Scotland. Ken

Self-Sacrifice

Posted in jokes / 24jokes

An escaped convict, imprisoned for degree murder, had spent 25 years of his life sentence in prison. While on the run, he broke into a house and tied up a young couple who had been sleeping in the bedroom. He tied the man to a chair on one side o…

Posted in francophile / 03_general

breathalyse… whats this i just read whereby one has to have a breathalyser in ones car when passing thru france? april 1st? http://www…. geoff

Eurovision

Posted in sasha_lubetkin / 4ask_aunty

There has been much debate as to whether the Eurovision Song Contest should have been held in a repressive place like Azerbaijan. I am inclined to feel that shining the spotlight of publicity on place where the government’s misdeeds might otherwis…

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Missile Batteries In London

Posted in enquire_within / 56discussion

Apologies if this has been done before, but perhaps someone can explain to me how these are supposed to deter suicide bombers? And why is it preferable to have a shot-down airliner crashing on, say, Piccadilly rather than on the Olympic Stadium? …

A Warning

Posted in enquire_within / 81general

Earlier this afternoon I received a call from INTERNATION… claiming to be Windows Support Service. I was bored so played them along for twenty minutes or so, apparently following their instructions on my PC until they go to the point of getting …

Tow-Ball Height

Posted in cars / 41general

It seems that the towball (TowSure detachable type) on my car (RAV4, 2006 model) is too low for the kind of twin axle livestock trailer I want to use. I was rather hoping this would be fixable by buying a “taller” replacement detachable ball uni…

Microsoft And Ebook DRM

Posted in ebooks / chit_chat

There’s been some robust debate in here about DRM on ebooks, the legality and morality of removing it. I have already stated that I remove DRM from ebooks (purely for my own use), simply because I have been caught twice already by two different …

Tow-Ball Height

Posted in cars

It seems that the towball (TowSure detachable type) on my car (RAV4, 2006 model) is too low for the kind of twin axle livestock trailer I want to use. I was rather hoping this would be fixable by buying a “taller” replacement detachable ball uni…

Posted in sasha_lubetkin / 11chatterbox

Drought Is it just me, or is this the wettest drought ever?

Recommendations For Freesat Recorder

Posted in  digital_tv

Our Sky sub finished shortly, and we’ve removed the box. Have been trying out an Elgato freesat recorder, but the ancient Mac Mini in the stack doesn’t seem up to the job, and anyway it’s single tuner. Any recommendat… Ideally I’d like somethi…

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How Much Shadow Is OK ?

Posted in alt.energy / 2chatter

How much shadow is OK ? None. See my evidence here – www.comley…. (today’s post).

Posted in enquire_within / 81general

Carrying medicines on aircraft We’re planning a trip to the Isle of Man. I am on a variety of medicines including controlled drugs. Does anyone know if there are any procedures I need to follow to avoid any risk of being turned over by the airport plod? Regards, Pete

IP Camera With Wifi

Posted in vendor / 15chatter

IP camera with wifi I’m looking for an indoor IP-based camera with wifi. I know Axis are very good but expensive. Who are the best makers to look for after Axis, please? Need reasonable wifi range, 15 ft through two layers of wooden floor. David

Vitamin C

Posted in enquire_within / 81general

Vitamin C The local chemist’s Vitamin C tablets each give 1000mg – 25 times the UK adult RDA. And 10 times e.g. the max USA adult RDA. Why do manufacture… provide such a high dosage? Esp. given that overdose can be harmful.

Posted in investment / 3general

A man in the bank today was trying to sell me a stocks and shares ISA. As I see it, if I put £10,000 in one of these, I will get – typically – about a 5% dividend yield so about £500pa. This will be tax free, so I save 20% of that, …

Browser Statistics 1st Quarter 2012

Posted in html / 16general

Thought I’d share some statistics from some analysis of a website I develop which people sign up for health club memberships. Thus a broad range of users with no technical slant. 28% Chrome 17% Safari (including mobile) 15% Firefox 14% IE8 13% IE…

Time For A New Camera

Posted in photo / 11general

I’ve always had Canon 35mm SLRs, and assumed that I’d upgrade to a DSLR at some point. Since I was given a point & shoot digital jobbie though, my EOS 500 has, sadly, pretty much stayed in the cupboard along with its 35-80mm and 75-300mm le…