#Usb device not recognized

[sysig]

I’ll be fine, I just have to get it all out of my system (Patreon)

[relto]

i hope whoever at bluefors who had the genius idea to solder 3 different devices together to use a single usb port steps on a lego

[phoebepheebsphibs]

Double-Mutated Mikey

Chapter 40: Biofilm

Continued from the short story written by @boots-with-the-fur-club

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Donatello races down the hallway, checking his trackers every few minutes to make sure everything is going smoothly with the others. After this is over, he's thinking of adding hidden cameras to their masks as well, so he can also see where they are, not just know their longitude and latitude. What good is knowing where a person is if you can't know what's going on?

Donnie started getting into the trackers phase when they'd first come up against the Foot Clan, and Raph had accidentally eaten a tracker meant for a salami paper stack. That had been the inspiration to start tagging his family. He'd installed the subdermal trackers sometime after then, working on different updates and methods of inserting them under the skin or under their shells when they weren't looking or conscious or aware or -- well, you get the idea.

But as time went on, he'd started thinking maybe adding a visual or audio aspect to the tracers was a good idea. It was starting to annoy him that his brothers and father would go places alone for long periods of time and he wouldn't know why or what was happening. Donnie would never consider himself 'clingy'. Or at least, he'd never admit that he was. Donnie was just... concerned for their well-being. And it always seemed like their well-being was coming into question whenever he was not with them. He should have added the video/audio feed to the trackers a long time ago.

He'd have known what was taking Leo so long to get them back after they'd been portaled to Tahiti.

He'd have known what Leo and Papa were doing with Big Mama while they dealt with the Shredder.

He'd have known where the Shredder and the Foot Lieutenant and Foot Brute and Cassandra took Splinter and Barry when they attacked their old lair.

He'd have known what the Krang were doing with Raphael when he was captured.

He'd have known what happened to Leo in the Prison Dimension.

He'd have known about Mikey's captivity and recapture.

He'd have known how to be the genius they all needed him to be.

He'd have known how to be a better brother...

Donnie swallows the thoughts and keeps on moving. He turns a corner and sees a strange laboratory, filled with machines and mechanisms and lasers and weird gadgets that Donnie would be more than happy to take home with him... But it also has what looks like a few medical devices stored in there as well. A CT scanner, an X-ray machine, other devices that Donatello recognizes from science-fiction films and spy movies that definitely won't be found in any normal hospital.

This looks like the kind of place that a man specialized in engineering and robotics would be hiding in...

Donnie sneaks over to the room, not caring about dodging cameras. The building's been evacuated, and even if it hadn't been, everybody already knows that they're here.

The door was left open by a careless employee trying to leave in a hurry. Perfect! Donnie's ninpo can create all kinds of stuff, but making small items to hack into things like security systems takes a lot of brainpower. And -- you didn't hear it from him -- it's difficult. His ninpo works like his mind, building the items piece by piece, engineering the weapons or defense mechs however he sees it in his head. And while he is a genius, even geniuses have trouble keeping track of hundreds of thousands of lines of programming. Even a small item like the USB flash drive he gave April earlier would take a lot of internal interfacing and coding... it's exhausting. But not impossible.

But fortunately, it isn't necessary.

Donatello sneaks in cautiously. It's strange how the room is a Frankenstein mashup between a doctor's office and a robotics lab. Secretly, Donnie is taking mental notes on how to incorporate some of these ideas and designs into his own lab.

There are desks covered with tools and blueprints. Cabinets with vials and liters of mysterious multi-coloured liquids. Tables with a few unpacked boxes stuffed with strange items and labels scribbled messily onto the cardboard. On one said table is a crate. Poking out of said crate, Donatello can see a wooden staff with purple wraps, two familiar blue hilts for what he can assume are twin katanas, and the edges of a battleshell.

"Our stuff!" he whispers to himself. They definitely need to get those back...

Donnie rushes to the box and starts rummaging through it. Yep, it's all here... Dee's gear, Leo's swords, Raph's sai. He reaches in and retrieves the weapons, looking them over for anything like tags or trackers that the TCRI or EPF would have placed on them. They look fine...

"My goggles!" Dee cheers, grabbing them quickly and placing them over his eyes to inspect the software. "Oh, thank God they didn't mess with my babies..."

"Don't thank Him just yet!" a voice cries out from behind him.

Donnie yipes before ducking, narrowly avoiding a swing from a madman behind him. He doesn't look like a guard, but instead wears a standard white lab coat. His hair is wild and unkempt, dark eyebags sag on his face, his chin is stubbled with untended scruff. By the looks of it, his only diet is caffeine and the suffering of others. He must be a scientist, then. His voice sounds familiar; Donnie's sure he's seen or heard him before...

"You were on the video files from the previous building!" he realizes, quickly grabbing his bō from the box and readying himself. "You made Mikey fight monsters in the Interaction room..."

"I see someone's been doing some research!" the man chuckles, his eyes wide and firey. "I'm flattered you recognized me. The name's Dr. Rod Timothy, not that you'll have much of a mind to recall that after I finish with you!!"

Donnie dodges as Dr. Timothy grabs a futuristic weapon from the table and fires it at him. Burning red blasts of light fly through the air. Dee ducks quickly, jumping to the side as he tries to come up with a weapon of his own. His mind always goes straight to the extreme -- 'go big or go home,' 'more bang for your buck', etc. Typically, the villains he fights are durable and super-strong mutants, they require bigger weapons like missiles and giant drills or hammers, etc. Humans are small, easy to break, but fierce and determined. They're harder to gauge, and Donnie has to search his mind for a weapon he can use against him without actually causing too much damage. Not just to the human, but also to the building itself. So missiles are off the menu.

Donnie's palm fills with parts and pieces that instantly grow together and attach in method and order, creating a mini grenade. He taps a button and sends the round object flying towards the scientist. It lands just a few feet in front of him and -- BOOM -- the flash grenade goes off, blinding the man as Dee uses his goggles to guide him through the room and find a place to hide.

"AGH!" Timothy screams, covering his watering eyes as he staggers around. "Y-you... you see, this is exactly why I was hoping you'd come here..."

Donnie peeks out from behind a giant scanner, watching as the mad scientist stumbles around chuckling.

"You creatures always have such a strange tolerance... it's superhuman...!"

The man looks up and looks around, pupils dilating like crazy as he frantically flails his arms and hands, feeling for something.

"And soon, I will be too..."

He really is insane, Donnie thinks to himself.

"If you're so keen on mutants, why'd you experiment on my brother?!" Donnie snarls.

Dr. Timothy reels around and stares blindly in Dee's direction, trying to listen as Donnie ninjas away to a new location to watch Timothy... and lure him into a trap.

"Oh, yes," Timothy laughs, the tears from his watering eyes streaming down his face. "You're brother was loads of fun. I enjoyed our little exercises and examinations thoroughly... Such a fun little plaything, a wonderful puzzle to take apart and put back together."

"Anyone ever tell you to get psychiatric help?" Donnie growls.

"More often than you'd think," Timothy cackles. "But they don't see the necessity of my methods! The vision! They're all sniveling, spineless, mindless plebeians who cannot understand the future..."

"What future is that?" Donnie asks, purposefully directing the man towards the far back of the room.

"Oh, one that you'd approve of!" Timothy laughs, blinking quickly, eyes darting back and forth. "A future free of humans. A future of mutants."

"What are you talking about?" Donnie asks, genuinely confused. "Chaplin wants to eradicate the mutants, why --"

"Oh, he's nothing more than a COWARD!!" Timothy bellows, fist pounding on the side of the table and sending small items flying. "He's a pathetic hatemonger who can't see that the only way for humanity to advance is to literally advance as a species and evolve! He thinks that what we need is to take out the competition!"

Dr. Timothy smiles so wide, his face contorts as though it's made of flabby plastic.

"I say we need to switch flags."

Donnie purposely knocks over small rolling cart of supplies, causing Dr. Timothy to stagger towards the sound.

"Chaplin is a visionary, though. And a golden goose. I never would have been able to pursue my research without his funding..."

"Well, the golden goose won't be laying anymore eggs for you psychopaths," Donnie huffs. "Chaplin's dead."

Timothy grunts at the news. Donnie can't tell if he's laughing, or making strange sad noises. The deranged fiend turns to stare blankly at the table, almost wistfully, reminiscing his fellow evil scientist.

"Well... he was a very significant man. Powerful, resourceful, determined... but I can't say that I'm not a little glad that he's gone."

"Oh?" Donnie chuckles. "No love lost between coworkers?"

"I had respect for the man, it's true," Timothy grumbles, reaching across the table strewn with supplies as he feels his way around. His fingers curl over a few of the objects laid before him as he moves forwards. "But his values and ideals were misguided and foolish. Only the strong come out on top."

"I'd like to think the smart ones have a pretty good chance, too..." Donnie remarks, stepping into a side room and waiting for Dr. Timothy to tag along.

"Oh, I agree!" he laughs, following Donnie's voice into the dark room. "Which is why I hate to see you die."

Timothy grips one of the items pulled from the table and clicks a button. A long laser-weapon activates, and he laughs as he runs in after the softshell.

"Nice sword-axe-laser-combo," Donnie smirks. "Where'd you get it? Hollywood Studios in Florida?"

"Do you like it?" Dr. Timothy grins sarcastically. "It's just one of the few things I thought to bring with me for this climactic stand-off..."

He presses a button and the door behind him slams shut with a mechanical hiss. Dr. Rod Timothy brandishes the weapon casually at the mutant teen who cooly holds his bō staff out at the man as well, ready for a duel.

"Does this room look familiar?" Timothy cackles. "If you really did the research, then it should. It's the same as the one your sweet little science experiment of a sibling was made to fight in! Only right we made another one for the experiments to follow... And I can't wait to see what happens to you in it."

Donatello smiles.

"You want me to fight you? The same way you made my baby brother fight your mutant monsters?"

"Oh, you can fight one of my monsters too if you want!" Timothy shrieks with laughter, holding up a small remote control. "With a push of a button, they can come pouring in. But for now, I want to see what you can do. See what parts of you to keep and what to... scrap."

Donnie sneers.

"So this is an assessment, then."

"I suppose so," Dr. Timothy shrugs. "But we'll see who wins."

Timothy charges, laser weapon at the ready. Donatello grips his bō staff and swings it, blocking Timothy's attack. A purple shield forms and pushes him back. Timothy grunts with effort as his feet skid across the tiles. He laughs hysterically, eyes growing ever wider.

He charges again, swinging the battleaxe around before striking again. Donnie's battleshell opens up and reveals a small jetpack, which takes him up into the air. He launches over Timothy and lands behind him, clicking a hidden button on the shoulder pad and activating a wire that wraps around the mad scientist. Dee launches again and prepares to strap the man from the ceiling and literally leave him hanging.

Dr. Timothy squirms about and manages to pull an arm out, fumbling with the laser device and cutting the line. As Timothy freefalls, Donnie's jetpack crashes him into the ceiling as it attempts and fails to compensate for the sudden loss of weight. Timothy pulls another device he'd taken from the table and points it at Donnie. A small gun, almost like a pistol, which fires out a sudden blue blast at Dee's jetpack. The rotors freeze, ice covers the exhaust ports, and the whole jetpack itself malfunctions and sends Dee crashing to the ground.

"Your brother showed a severe aversion to cold, so in order to keep him in line we created a series of ice-generating weapons like this handy little prototype," Timothy boasts, twirling the pistol around like it's a toy.

Donnie growls in fury. Timothy fires a few more shots, blasting the turtle in the arm and leg as he tries to get back up from the fall. Donnie yells in pain as his limbs suffer from ice burn and start to turn red and swollen from the cold blasts. Shards of frost and ice crystals form on the skin. Donnie gasps from the pain and starts rubbing his limbs, careful not to let the injuries turn into frostbite. Timothy fires another shot, but this time Donnie is careful to dodge it, jumping out of the way despite the pain. Timothy fires again. Dee swings his bō at the man, creating shield that blocks the blast. He swings again, dissolving the shield and reforming it to create a replica pistol that fires directly at the weapon, clogging the barrel of Timothy's gun with ice.

"That was good!" Timothy laughs, dropping the gun before his fingers freeze to the metal. "Nice deflection! And it's clear that I could not defeat you physically. Your mutant genetics must have enhanced your bone structure and muscle mass, yes?"

"That's one theory," Donnie snarks at him. "Or you could just be a weak old guy with a pathetic toy gun."

Dr. Timothy laughs again.

"I'm technically not old, I'm 36."

"That's old, dude."

"Kids these days..." Dr. Timothy sighs. "If brawn cannot win, then perhaps brains shall..."

Dr. Timothy starts clicking buttons on the remote, setting off a few movement-tracking firearms. Donnie recognizes the sleek black metal machine guns from some of Mikey's recorded sessions in the Interaction Room. Dee creates another shield and avoids the torrent of bullets and darts that fly as Dr. Timothy advances again.

"Let's see how you fare against two threats at once!"

Donnie ducks back, hand and staff flying forward as he thinks up a quick weapon to make for his defense. A purple ninpo hologram forms over the wood, creating an imitation of his old tech-bo. A giant mechanical fist ignites at one end, and Dr. Timothy and Donatello exchange blow for blow, guarding and attacking as the two simultaneously dodge bullets from above.

"Where do you come up with these weapon ideas? Jupiter Jim's 19th Return to the Moon?"

"Two distractions at once, and he still finds the mental capacity for a rib!" Timothy laughs. "I should spar with my creations more often..."

"I am not your creation!" Donnie yells. "AND NEITHER IS MY BROTHER!!!"

Donnie suddenly snaps, kicking Dr. Timothy in the chest and sending him back into the wall. Timothy's weapon knocked from his hand, Donnie grabs it and flings the laser cutter towards the turrets, tearing them in half and destroying them completely.

"Very well done!" Timothy chuckles nervously, as he half-struggles to get up. "Well done indeed! You are quite the adversary. But, I would wonder how well you'd fare after I become one of YOU!"

Donnie watches in confusion as the scientist pulls a syringe from his pocket. It's glowing green.

"This is a mutation formula that I've reverse-engineered from some samples I found over the years. Your brother is one of them, true... but the majority of the formula comes from a few mosquitos we found buzzing around..."

"Draxum's ooze," Donnie gapes, his voice a horrified hush. "You're going to mutate yourself?!"

"It's about time I evolved into the higher species!" Timothy cackles madly, his mind fully gone. "And now with Chaplin out of the way, there's no stopping me!!"

"Wait!" Donnie tries to warn. "You don't know what that will do to you!!"

"I know exactly what will happen!" Timothy screams back. "I will finally be the apex predator!! Now watch as I become a random creature of mass destruction!!"

Timothy stabs the syringe into his arm, the re-created ooze seeping into his veins.

"Random?" Donnie questions. "No, you'll just turn into the last biological organism you came into contact with."

"Wait, what?" Timothy questions, sobering for one second. "What do you mean, the last thing biological organism?"

"The ooze combines your DNA with that of whatever you touched last. Didn't you know that?"

"No! How would I know that?!" Timothy screeches, gripping his sides in pain as the ooze starts to recreate him.

"Looks like somebody didn't do their homework after all..."

"What am I going to become?!" Timothy shrieks, his whole frame shaking.

"Well, what did you touch last?"

"YOU!"

"No, you never actually touched me," Donnie clarifies. "You're wearing gloves, and your weapons hit mine, but we never came into actual contact -- details matter in science, you know..."

"W-WHAT'S HAPPENING TO M-M-MEEEEEE?!?!" Timothy screams, his voice fluctuating and gargling as he begins to sweat profusely.

It's not sweat.

His skin is melting.

Donnie watches with a sickened expression as Dr. Timothy's body begins to turn into a sludge, the skin tone changing into a slimy fungus-green, every part of him slowly dissolving and gooping together in a way that turns Donnie's stomach. He looks away, and forces himself to keep away even as the man screams and pleads for mercy and help. His voice is literally drowned out as his vocal chords liquify along with the rest of him.

It goes quiet. Donnie shakily turns to see what has become of the poor deranged man. Nothing remains but a puddle of gelatinous ooze wobbling on the floor several feet ahead of him.

"L-looks like your reverse-engineered formula wasn't complete," Donnie gulps. "Or maybe the ooze really did transform you into the last thing you touched... which would have been the ooze itself. Whatever the solution, I'm not going to stick around for --"

A gurgling scream tears the room apart, as the gelatinous blob starts moving, shifting, and reforming into a sloppy mess of a man.

"Lₒₒₖ wₕₐₜ yₒᵤ'ᵥₑ dₒₙₑ ₜₒ ₘe!" Timothy shrieks, his voice a wobbly, watery mess as he slowly pulls himself together. "I wₐₛ mₑₐₙt ₜₒ ᵇe ₐ fᵢₑᵣcₑ ₘᵤₜaₙt! Nₒₜ ₐ ᵇₗᵤbᵇeᵣᵢₙg … ₜhᵢₙg!!"

The newly transformed Timothy charges at Donnie, his arm elongating and stretching like those slappy hand things Mikey was obsessed with at the age of six. Donnie dodges it at the last second, the hand slinging across the room and sticking to a panel on the wall. It rips the panel straight off, revealing a section of machinery hidden behind it.

"Whoah!" Donnie yells, dodging once again as the arm comes slinging back.

"I dᵢdₙ'ₜ wₐₙₜ ₜhiₛ!" Timothy screeches as he continues his tantrum. "I wₐₛ sᵤpₚₒₛₑd ₜₒ bₑ ₜₕₑ ₐₚeₓ ₚᵣₑdₐₜₒᵣ, ₙoₜ ₛₒₘe ₚₐₜₕₑₜᵢc ₛₗᵤdgₑ fᵣₒₘ ₜₕₑ ᵇoᵗₜₒₘ ₒf ᵗₕₑ fₒₒd cₕaᵢₙ! ᴺᵒᵗ a gˡoʳⁱᶠᵢₑᵈ aₘebₐ! ₙₒₜ ₐ Lᵢvᵢₙg Wₐₗₖᵢₙg MUD PUDDLE!!"

Timothy's body morphs again, his form splattering in twenty different directions and splashing onto several frames and tiles from the walls, ceiling, and floor. He pulls them apart, releasing a robotic arm that reaches down and attempts to attack the two of them. Donnie slides to the side and avoids the robo-arm. Dr. Timothy's tentacle releases from a section of the wall and accidentally tangles around the mechanism, getting stuck inside the gears and causing it to malfunction. The arm swings back and forth, trying to catch Donnie or Dr. Timothy before becoming hopelessly trapped in the glue-like goo that the scientist has become.

"Wₕₐₜ ₕₐᵥₑ yₒᵤ ᵈᵒₙₑ! ᵂₕₐₜ ₕᵃᵛe yoᵤ dₒₙe! Wₕₐₜ ₕₐᵥₑ yᵒu ᵈoₙₑ!" Timothy wails as he flails about the room.

His arms knock loose the devices hanging from the ceiling. They come crashing down, splatting Timothy flat and trapping him momentarily.

"Sorry doc, but this was all you," Donnie states, dodging one of the slimy appendages before tuck and rolling towards the door. "And no offense, but I've had enough slimy tentacle-induced sensory issues for one year, so I'll just see myself out..."

"Yᵒᵤ ₕₐᵥₑ ₜo ₕeˡᵖ ₘₑ!" Timothy screams, reaching out for the ninja in desperation.

"There's nothing I can do for you now, Tim," Donnie scoffs as he picks up the remote from the floor, avoiding Timothy's sludge and slime. "You wanted to be a mutant, so now you're a mutant. Congrats, welcome to the family."

Donnie stares down at the remote and all the little buttons it comes equipped with. He presses one, and the door opens.

"But don't worry. After everything you did to my brother, I won't just leave you here alone to rot..."

Donnie turns to face the mutant man, and gives him a cold smile before pressing every button on the remote.

"You said something about 'monsters flooding in at the push of a button,' right?" Donnie asks, his smile becoming almost like a snarl. "How about I leave you with some company?"

Every trapdoor in the room opens up, and hundreds of glowing red eyes appear from the darkness. The sounds of snarling and growling and howling and yowling starts to fill the enclosure.

"ᴺᵒ… ʸᵒᵘ caₙ'ₜ ₗₑₐᵥₑ ₘe ₗiₖₑ ₜₕiˢ!" Dr. Timothy begs.

"You said you wanted to be a mutant," Donnie sighs, clicking the button to close the door. "You can chill with your own kind now. See how long you last."

"Nᴺᴼ0oₒo0Oᴼ--!!!"

The doors close just as the monsters creep in and pounce for the slime man.

Donnie blinks for a moment before exhaling loudly.

"...Karma... is absolutely insane."

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[barbatusart]

heya! i just went through your music making guide and it's great, but i still feel fairly illiterate, lol (not your fault, just a whole new world for me). one thing i hoped to find there but didn't, is how i might set up an actual keyboard (i have a yamaha psr-e373 in case it's significant) to work with reaper. i'd like two scenarios to be possible: to supply just the notes via kb (so use it as midi input, i guess?) while using VST from PC like in your examples; and use VST from kb itself (because the piano on it is flawless and there are quite a few other decent ones too). the kb itself has a "local on/off" function that lets you switch between these scenarios. i managed to set it up for cakewalk following a video tutorial, but no luck figuring out the settings in reaper. can you help? like, if you use a kb yourself, could you screenshot the relevant settings and show me?

many thanks!

i can try! ive got like 2 midi devices set up (i use the akai mpk mini & the korg nanokey2) that i use for the usual melodic walking around, chords themselves i put together on mindful harmony & then import that midi in & adjust as needed

for reaper what you want to do is have reaper detect your keyboard as a midi in device. make sure your keyboard is connected to your computer via USB (idk what itll be detected as but im assuming itll pop up as PSR for you) and then do the following:

Options > Preferences > Configure MIDI Devices

my nanokey2 isnt plugged in currently but you can see that it's ready to go under MIDI Inputs and MIDI Outputs for whenever i do plug it in. yours should pop up here; right click both and make sure theyre set to Enable, then hit Apply and OK.

reaper is now primed to recognize your MIDI track as input. what you need to do now is arm your specific track to accept MIDI input

on the left the red O button is the record button, and if you leftclick it it'll start receiving input. rightclick it to change what kind of input it accepts - change it to Input: MIDI > Virtual MIDI keyboard > All Channels like so:

then click the Record button again so it lights up to activate it on your track. now we've told reaper that itll only be accepting sound input from your keyboard. last thing you need to do is tell reaper what kind of sound it's going to make, because without that information it just wont make any sound, so get a noise-making VST ready (your lovely piano VST that you mentioned!) which is FX button > Add > pick your sound VST

NOW try pressing some keys on your yamaha and you should hear the keyboard VST sound you selected!

[taperwolf]

So I often see novel computer keyboard designs, but I hadn't really felt inspired to make my own until now.

See, Hackaday recently ran a piece on Stephen Holdaway's "Unicode Binary Input Terminal", which lets you flip switches to input any Unicode character — by flipping switches to indicate its binary value in UTF-8 encoding.

It displays the character on the little display, and you can then flip another switch to send the character like a keyboard would over USB.

Among the usual comments about how Holdaway should have built the device by using only 555 timers came the suggestion that UTF-8 is unwieldy, and that he should have added even more toggle switches to enter longer bitstreams directly. Now, I don't want to take that tack on it; toggle switches get expensive. But there are other ways to input long sets of binary data!

Years ago, I found this panel in some surplus or thrift shop; I honestly don't remember any more. It's got two sets of eight hexadecimal thumbwheel switches; each one can be set to a hexadecimal "digit" between 0 and F, and the binary pattern of that hexit read off the leads in the back.

(If anyone out there recognizes where this panel originally came from, let me know; it has no other markings besides the visible ones, and the switch banks just each bear a sticker saying they came from the Digitran Company of Pasadena, California, and were probably made in 1972. (Remarkably, Digitran still makes very similar switches — I think there's a military spec for them — though they're presently owned by Electro Switch Corp, and are of the sort that don't list prices on the webpage. For similar devices, Surplus Sales of Nebraska has 6-hexit banks, albeit with shorter numbers, available for $225 each, or slightly taller ones for $15 per hexit and you have to fabricate your own frame.)

At any rate, the switch banks are easily removed from the panel. My plan is to set them in a new panel with a display between them and have a toggle or slider switch to change modes, so you can enter UTF-8 streams (anywhere between eight ASCII characters and a single dual-character-point emoji; the wheels are currently set to display the US flag) or sets of UTF-16 or UTF-32 characters; a final button would again send the character(s) over USB.

I'm currently dithering over how best to implement this. Obviously Unicode isn't going to fit in any of my usual microcontrollers, and the 64 data lines required to read the switches will need some GPIO expanders or shift registers. I do have a couple of unused Raspberry Pi ZeroWs lying around, which would let me leverage Linux font and Unicode handling, and then I could hook it to an Arduino or Teensy to handle the USB part, unless there's an obvious way for a Pi to be a USB client. The display is a similar dither; I've got some small graphical LCDs and a tiny OLED display, and even some e-ink displays that might work for this. Heck, I should see if I can find those dot-matrix VFDs I have somewhere. It's more likely to be a color LCD if I want emoji support, but requirements are flexible right now.

[foone]

oh thank fuck all my drives successfully reconnected after a reboot.

my windows 10 install has a weird problem where sometimes it stops recognizing USB devices, and once of these is an external USB drive. I was afraid it had died on me!

[bryan360]

No "On This Day" posting I'll be focusing today.

Also….

(NO COPYING OR PLAGIARIZING FROM ME AND ONE OF MY CLOSEST FRIEND’S WORK! THAT INCLUDES OUR CHARACTERS, DESIGNS, STUFF, ETC. IMPOSTERS AND SEXBOTS ARE NOT WELCOME TO FOLLOW MY BLOG WHATSOEVER! 😡 That will be all….I mean it.)

2024 Review - Seagate 2TB Portable Drive (Second Half - Installing and Formatted)

Hey, guys! Sorry for keeping this waited from past weeks that I’m trying to write I got. Nevertheless, it’s time for the second half part of my portable drive topic review without leaving behind. Last time where I’d covered the unboxing portion during the first half, I’m now moving onto to install with my gaming system which I’d did awhile back. Before I can show you around, there’s something I wanted to bring I’d kept secret from past years. I should’ve brought it sooner if I had such time left til now. Nevertheless, it’s for my gaming console itself as a previous upgrade that my family give me.

(From January. 6th; 2:29 to 2:30 P.M.)

This here’s my actual Xbox One S console (not the Xbox Series S/X, though). It happened back in December. 16th, 2019 that my family give me as a late Christmas gift by surprise. Well, a surprise for me back then from before. There’s also a second gift that would be save for another time. Anyways, It’s been past 6 years later after decided to move on with my Xbox One S system. Its longevity usage runs well of playing games I have; which I’ll get to that for my final part soon. As for what happened to my original Xbox One, the one I got from April 2015; is thankfully kept into my closest that doesn’t have scratches. Don’t worry, I still got everything for my Xbox One S system with its data that was originally carried from my original gaming console.

(From 2:32 to 2:56 P.M.)

So anyways as I continue on, we’re bringing you this step where I installed with my portable drive and its USB cable. Took about few seconds to connect with both items together, but finally got it of what’s on screen display right after turning my gaming console. As you can see, there’s a front USB slot down left corner below where I’d placed there. It was my second attempt when my gaming console recognize not too long ago. Of course there’s some USB slots on the backside I’d tried to get around minutes before that. I don’t know why or if I would’ve paid attention closely, but the front USB slot is one way to go. Now, I went to options setting to manage storage devices; where you can see I could select on either media and for games with my portable drive. Obviously, I’m here to formatted any games I got. As of now though, it read about 1.8TB instead of 2TB from what the box advertised. It does happens for other hard drives, so that’s alright.

(From 2:58 to 3:01 P.M.)

Just holding on til I'd promised I can finished off for the final part soon. In the meantime, I've given to formatted my portable drive that didn't take long to complete. I'd given its name of "My Games" first during this recording. Looks good so far as I'm moving to store with one of my games I got. That said, that's gonna be it for this second half part of my portable drive review. I’m sorry that things weren’t according as planned I’d would’ve do more for this month. I’m just having some trouble scheduling while I’m stuck doing at the program for weekday mornings. Even though I would be doing during the weekends by any point, I’d tried my best to write some stuff. Nevertheless, at least I’d gotten with this second half covered; especially finally showing my previous gaming console after years later.

My Overall Thoughts (so far):

As of now, It’s nice to installed with my portable drive and its 3.0 cable to my gaming console in respond. So far, I’d went through formatted with my device before I can move on with my other games to store later. And I just had one game that deserved to start up for my final part soon. Hope you’ll be ready for this. 👍

Reveal - Link Here

First Half - Unboxing Impressions - Link Here #2

Tagged: @murumokirby360 @carmenramcat @alexander1301 @rafacaz4lisam2k4 @paektu

[andmaybegayer]

Last Monday of the Week 2024-01-22

Snowing again

Listening: Went looking for some very funky guitar and came across the album Parallels by Evan Marien and Dana Hawkins. Here's "Forever"

Reading: Not The End of the World by Hannah Ritchie, a book focussed on taking a realistic eye to sustainability.

This book largely rehashes stuff you'll already have seen if you read Ritchie, albeit in a nice compact form factor and with a lot of your generic pop-sci book flourishes. Better than median pop-sci because it has sources cited.

I do think that knowing these kinds of things is important. It helps you recognize what is worth worrying about and where you really don't need to obsess so much. Much of this book is about agriculture and food, since food is the easiest part of most peoples' lifestyles to change and this is squarely focussed on individuals, but it does also cover other pollution, general habitat loss, disease, disasters, and plastic pollution. A lot of this still ends up linking back to food, because agriculture is a huge user of land, and land use drives a lot of those things.

There's also a lot of debunking of bad stats that get quoted, which is useful. You see a lot of these On Line and even if you avoid propagating sensationalist headlines, you still read them and they can be sticky. In general this book doesn't as much assuage anxieties as try to shift them to more productive terrain.

Even if you disagree with the philosophy of the solutions proposed here, the data are mostly pretty good and well covered, it's solidly grounded more often than its not. Having relative comparative values for things like land use from meat vs plant foods, relative proportions of plastic landfilled vs recycled vs dumped in different parts of the world.

Watching: Porco Rosso, because like three years ago someone told me to watch it and I finally did it. Perhaps the lowest time to fantastical flying machine possible in a Miyazaki movie, although I haven't watched Nausicaa.

It is so funny that he's just some guy who got cursed! The human hands and pig head form a perfect comedic item. Killer one liners. It's tricky to make a movie simultaneously about fascism in Mussolini's Italy and also about a big cartoon pig who outsmarts a bunch of goofy pirates.

Playing: Still on Dark Souls, made it into The Depths, video on that just went up.

Making: Did some microscopy over the weekend, on a random snow sample. Not as interesting as algal samples or pond scum, but the pond is frozen over at the moment. I'll go back once it's melted with a stick.

Tools and Equipment: If you keep on dealing with shit-ass audio from your computer, a dedicated audio handling device is probably going to solve your issues.

I've spent years dealing with crap audio from devices plugged directly into my motherboard but I recently got a Zoom H1n portable recorder and I'm using it as a basic USB mic interface plugged into my old Video Mic for the Video Games Recordings seen above and my audio is SO clean. I can finally actually do proper audio stuff like recording with headroom and gaining in post without destroying my noisefloor, I did not know just how much goddamn noise my motherboard was dumping into audio signals.

I like doing video and audio to complement my photography but unlike with photography, I've never really used good quality tools to do that, so I'm in the process of changing that.

[enarei]

okay here's my problem currently:

there's some bug in the official arch iso from 2022 I have installed in this USB drive. it does not recognize my sata SSD and freaks out when I try to partition it. I can't simply update the packages because there's not enough space on the live CD media.

I need to install a newer version of the archiso. I do not have a working computer with an operating system installed (reason I'm trying to install arch in the first place), and I can't flash a new image onto the USB drive without one.

I'm using ventoy to have two live CD media on the same USB drive, and it just so happens I have have another iso with kubuntu in a different partition. it occurs to me I can use the live kubuntu environment to download the newest archiso and flash it over the old one.

BUT. I can't mount the arch partition, because the device it is on is currently busy (running kubuntu). I can't unmount the USB without everything breaking because kubuntu has not been loaded to ram. I can't reboot and load it to ram because I can't access the grub boot options from the legacy/bios version of grub. I can't change to UEFI grub because I explicitly set up ventoy with the legacy/bios configuration. and I can't change the way ventoy is setup BECAUSE I DON'T HAVE A COMPUTER

[louisiananeedsme]

The Louisiana Times #2

Louisiana Times Games: WORDLE CONNECTIONS

Fat32 needs to take a walk.

during the entirety of my school year, my dad and i had agreed that when summer break comes around, we'd have to go on walks because a) we're fat and b) he has joints on the brink of withering away (his knees hurt when he walks). We agreed that we'd go out and walk for a while then come back home and watch a movie.

It seemed like a plan, i spend an hour looking for my flash-drive, spent another 30 minutes to format it and import the movie we were gonna watch in it. The movie was in 4k quality and i wanted to play it directly on my TV instead of using Miracast from my laptop to get it onto my TV. but since the flash-drive was formatted in Fat32 (can't take a single file over 4gb because i don't know someone in 1995 thought it was ok) and the movie i was gonna play was SIX GBS (Batman Begins 4k60fps.), so i simply change the formatting from Fat32 to exFat so it can handle the file. Before i go out i insert the USB into what i think is the USB port in my TV but nothing shows up. i go the homepage with all devices, and the flash-drive IS there, the TV recognizes it but it requires it to be formatted. My dad says that i apparently inserted in the wrong slot, an HDMI Insert instead of USB. After further inspection on my behalf, i conclude that:

It had a sticker that indicated that it WAS a USB port.

If i DID put it in the HDMI cable port, the TV wouldn't have recognized it.

I still stood corrected but at that point these was nothing that i could've done other than buy a 2k pound external hard drive. But good news, i did get to go on a walk and play on the swings.

happy ending.

-

TLT MEDIA REVIEW:

HIT ME HARD AND SOFT :: BILLIE EILISH:

SKINNY: 9/10

Notes: I haven’t seen a lot of attention for this song when it literally sounds so good. The instrumentals at the end are beautiful. 

LUNCH: 9/10 

Notes: Pretty solid production, personally can’t relate to the lyrics but i mean.. let's go lesbians! I can see why it’s one of the most popular songs on the album right now.

CHIHIRO: 10/10 

Notes: Could possibly become one of my favs on this album?? Reminds me of some of the songs from WWAFAWDWG sonically.

BIRDS OF A FEATHER: 9.5/10 

Notes: A Gumball & Darwin edit would eat to this song ngl 

WILDFLOWER: 8/10

Notes: May sad girl summer begin,,

THE GREATEST: 10/10 

Notes: The chills i got in the last half of the song was beyond amazing. Now THAT'S how u make a gut-wrenching song.

L’AMOUR DE MA VIE: 7/10

Notes: Bored by Laufey’s more depressed, less jazzy and more whisper-y alter ego, but personally not for me.

THE DINER: 8/10

Notes: the change of the choruses in the song is what i really liked, maybe I’ll try calling the number to see if it works for me??

BITTERSUITE: 7/10

Notes; again not really for me but i did like the little snippet of blue at the end

BLUE: 9/10

Notes: I might be biased towards this because i've listened to this before but the violin at the end is really beautiful. 

OVERALL RATING: 86.5 / 100 ~ 8.7/10

Probably one of her favourite albums of mine so far, i’m happy that she is making longer songs and exploring who she really is in them. Some aspects of it sound similar to WWAFAWDWG whether intentional or not i think it’s a nice touch.

[relto]

ohoho not only could i isolate the issue (though idk if its possible to fix it) i also by chance figured out what was causing the other weird ass problem they were having!!

[horrorsequel]

my new USB storage was working fine and then in the middle of trying to moce files it said there was no destination and now it won't show up in file explorer or let me look at the files through any other route. Like it recognizes that it's plugged in and when I troubleshoot the drvice it says it's working fine and updating the driver did nothing cos it said it was up to date. But then it also won't let me eject the device safely? i also uninstalled/removed it and then plugged it back in to reinstall it and that did nothing. also google is not being helpful and neither are the people on the kicrosoft help forums. like I'm SO stressed cos this thing cost me 30 some bucks which is a fucking LOT for me I'm seriously about to hold my breath until my brains shoot out my ears.

[kichimiangra]

Me when my computer keeps randomly telling me a USB device isn't recognized before immediately playing the "usb connected" sound

[adafruit]

Desk of Ladyada - Yaaar it's a Bus Pyrate!

👩‍💻 Ladyada and her dedicated team at Adafruit🍇 have been tirelessly working on an innovative hardware project 🛠️, which revolves around the Bus Pirate 🚍🏴‍☠️. This tool was widely recognized for its role in interfacing with hardware.

The Bus Pirate 🚍🏴‍☠️ was a USB 🔌 serial device cherished in the hacking 🔓 and hardware interfacing world for its versatility. It gained popularity due to its affordability 💰 and the assortment of protocols it supported, including I2C, SPI, JTAG, among others 🔄.

Sadly, the Bus Pirate 🚍🏴‍☠️ is no longer in production, potentially a victim of the global chip shortage 🌍🍟.

However, Ladyada didn't settle for merely recreating the Bus Pirate 🚍🏴‍☠️ as it was. Instead, she chose to revisit an old project 🔄, a port of the Bus Pirate to CircuitPython 🐍, which had been previously abandoned due to memory constraints on the SAMD21 chip 🧠💾.

The freshly designed hardware aims to be roughly the same size and maintain similar functionality as the original Bus Pirate 🚍🏴‍☠️, targeting a reasonable price tag of around $20💰.

The new and exciting hardware, dubbed as the "Circuit Pirate" ⚡🏴‍☠️, is powered by the RP2040 chip 🎛️, a more available and cost-effective alternative to the previously used SAMD21.

The Circuit Pirate ⚡🏴‍☠️ is currently in its prototyping phase 📝, and it's expected to undergo multiple revisions 🔄 before reaching its final form.

[anon853]

ggg

Just fixed my main computer system. A couple weeks ago I did a pull apart and dusting out because it had been a couple of years. I put everything back together and suddenly started having some strange problems like taking forever to boot. I also couldn't get software shutdown or restart to work (needed to hold down the power button or press the restart button because the computer would crash before shutting down/restarting), and Explorer was crashing when I moused over "cast to device" in the right click menu and USB devices stopped being recognized unless they were plugged in at boot. I was also having network issues, and couldn't install/uninstall any programs.

Because this is a pretty old build now, I thought I had some drive corruption going on, but everything checked out, and after trying my Windows PE boot disk as well as a Clonezilla CD with various issues, I started thinking there was a hardware issue. The high pitched noise(autistics can only hear) while the computer was off I couldn't find seemed to confirm this. Digging into error logs and tracking down services that wouldn't start got me nowhere, There were no real reasons why the services wouldn't start.

Playing around tonight, I tried a few things, checked some caps on the board and found nothing. I decided to dust out the rear ports again just in case something was shorting out and unplugged a USB hub and the noise stopped.

Turns out this ancient USB 2.0 hub I have got plugged into a USB 3.0 port and it didn't like it for some unknown reason. Problem solved, but I still spent money on a couple new drives (spares now!). At least I didn't need to reinstall Windows and dozens of programs though! I also didn't buy a new motherboard either yet!(that's what tonight's testing was supposed to determine)

Still going to replace an old storage drive/scratch disk with over 95,000 power on hours though! Its only SATA II so there will be a bit of a performance boost after I finish the migration! Most of the data has been migrated to the local RAID in the computer as well as my server RAID so I could technically eliminate it, but I still have a few things pointing to the volumes on it so right now its easier to just replace the drive because more drives = more performance.

[lampfaced]

I knew this day would come but I am still not ready for it.

Long story short; I have obtained a brand-new car. My other one was on its last legs and felt like it was about to shake apart on me whenever I drove it.

I have also been using an iPod as my main music receptacle since at least... 17 years ago? My “current” device has been serving me since 2012.

My new car does not recognize it as a device when I plug it into the USB media port. And as far as I can tell, there is no aux port.

I now have to figure out how to get all my music files - many of which, thanks to Apple’s shit, are unable to be transferred and are unavailable on my other devices - onto something that can be recognized, like my phone. The iPod is still chugging along just fine and would otherwise still be usable if not for this “not supported” BS.

gdi I just want to do what I’ve been doing and have my MP3 files in one place that aren’t reliant on some sort of subscription service and/or internet connection and can’t be deleted at a moment’s notice from the database, and also have a tiny private screen so I can shuffle through songs without feeling self-conscious about anyone else seeing (I’m weird about other people perceiving my tastes like that for some reason).

I KNOW, I’M OLD AND NOT WITH THE TIMES.