You can also quite easily break the security of Ubuntu just trying to install something minor.
Ever had to install a PPA? that is an unverified external package source, easiest way to install a virus on Ubuntu would be to try and install any program that requires an external package source via adding a PPA source to apt-get.
And the worst part, using any other distribution is just asking for trouble and package breakages, incompatability, etc. Which is why the whole point of moving to Linux is lost, its still just a product made by canonical, just like Windows is to Microsoft. Hence the move to Linux is pointless.
Why the hate? : linux
YouTube
I'm personally concerned about Ubuntu/Canonical going down the same path as Windows 10 and forcing me to install proprietary software onto my system. Say candy crush saga but for Ubuntu.
And the Debian alternative is no good, its too old, the packages are outdated.
If you want a serious alternative to ubuntu I would get an unbuntu-derived distribution like Mint.
Even wattos is based on the same ubuntu package distribution that ubuntu uses. A nice little OS if you ask me, lightweight.
DistroWatch.com: Put the fun back into computing. Use Linux, BSD.
DistroWatch.com: wattOS
If I were to recommend an ubuntu based distro for you to try tubelab I would recommend wattos.
Ever had to install a PPA? that is an unverified external package source, easiest way to install a virus on Ubuntu would be to try and install any program that requires an external package source via adding a PPA source to apt-get.
And the worst part, using any other distribution is just asking for trouble and package breakages, incompatability, etc. Which is why the whole point of moving to Linux is lost, its still just a product made by canonical, just like Windows is to Microsoft. Hence the move to Linux is pointless.
Why the hate? : linux
YouTube
I'm personally concerned about Ubuntu/Canonical going down the same path as Windows 10 and forcing me to install proprietary software onto my system. Say candy crush saga but for Ubuntu.
And the Debian alternative is no good, its too old, the packages are outdated.
If you want a serious alternative to ubuntu I would get an unbuntu-derived distribution like Mint.
Even wattos is based on the same ubuntu package distribution that ubuntu uses. A nice little OS if you ask me, lightweight.
DistroWatch.com: Put the fun back into computing. Use Linux, BSD.
DistroWatch.com: wattOS
If I were to recommend an ubuntu based distro for you to try tubelab I would recommend wattos.
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These cheap ($29 to $99) Chinese radios have been available in the USA for several years, and some people and a few radio manufacturers are NOT happy about that. They are user programmable on a large chunk of VHF and UHF spectrum, including public safety frequencies (police and fire) and could be used in an illegal manner, very easily.
The FCC recently issued "Enforcement Notice DA 18-980" stating these can NOT be imported, sold or USED in the USA, even by someone like myself who has a valid ham radio license and would use it only on ham frequencies in a legal manner.
The wording of the FCC document is very unclear and can be interpreted differently by whoever reads it, so parties on both sides of the issue have demanded clarification.
Since these radios may vanish from the US market, and the prices beginning to rise, especially on Ebay for USA stocked radios, I decided to get a Baofeng BF-F8HP analog, and a Radioddity GD77 digital radio.
I live out of town in a rural area, and thus didn't expect to be within range of any ham radio repeaters, but I have found 3 that I can reach with the Baofeng. There are zero digital repeaters within 50 miles of here, so DIY is my only option.
There are plenty of documented MMDVM builds on the internet, complete with source code. That build should be relatively easy. I also plan to build the radio repeater, including the RF hardware.....not so easy, but before retirement, I was a radio designer at Motorola for 41 years, I have the skill set, and I am no longer bound by the Motorola employment agreement that prevented me from doing so.
A $1K+ ham radio is about $1K beyond my budget, and this IS a DIY forum, although there is only ONE thread related to ham radio....do these have a speaker, a microphone, and make Audio??????
Windows 95 used to eat OS2 and it's boot manager!
A trick that I have used all the way back to the DOS / OS2 days on 386 machines still seems to work. Make a bootable drive in one OS (say W10) and install that OS and all the programs you want to run under that OS on it. Make a second bootable drive (say Linux) with the OS and all it's associated programs on it. Make one of these (say W10) first in the boot order of your BIOS, and make the other second. You could make the USB socket first, then the hard drives second and third so you can run anything from a flash drive, but then you must be very careful what you plug into the machine....
You then wire a SPDT switch in series with the red (+5 volts) power lead to each of the bootable drives, such that only one drive receives power at a time. put the switch in the position of the OS that you want to start, and power up. Want to change OS, shut down the current OS and reboot the machine. Flip the switch just as the machine shuts down, but before the BIOS scans the drives, or power cycle the machine. No bootloader needed.
Older machines often needed to have the switch break the 5 volt and the 12 volt wires to the drives. This might be needed on some SATA drives, but I haven't needed to do this. Old machines didn't have a boot order in BIOS, so you juts put the drives in order by HDD port.
The main reason that I would install a Linux distro is so that I can experiment with some of the SDR and music making stuff, and maybe write some of my own experimental code. I can get Teensy and Adruino stuff working. Rpi is cool, but a little lacking in processing power for music or SDR, and writing code for Windows is a cluster****, so Linux is the likely alternative. All of this is down the road a ways, so I'll dig into it when I'm ready. Initial experimentation will be on a stand alone machine that I can afford to mess up......because I know that I will.
I wrote some ATE (Automated Test Equipment) software in "C" to test two way radio bords at Motorola that wran on a Windows box, but that was Borland C under Windows 3.2 and DOS. Things have gotten a bit more complicated today.
That Radioddity GD77 looks nice.
Its beyond my budget too hence a year ago I mentioned getting a ham radio and still haven't, because my budget has been pointed towards my car, A diy SDR would be nice but a diy SDR kit with SMD soldering is beyond my skill set. But if I can find some prebuilt pcbs I should be good:
HackRF 1 One RTL SDR Software Defined Radio Board 1MHz-6GHz w/ Aluminum Alloy AU | eBay
LNA for all
Maybe I can clodge together something in a project box about the same size as an ordinary transceiver. But with a rasberry pi inside along with its own lithium battery pack and a HackRF 1 and a lna4all as a preamp and some diy low pass filters. and a T/R switch: TAPR TR-Plus
Only problem is I would have to upgrade two licence classes before I can consider doing this, plus I've got a lot of other things on my mind right now and I'm itching to get back on the air.
Its beyond my budget too hence a year ago I mentioned getting a ham radio and still haven't, because my budget has been pointed towards my car, A diy SDR would be nice but a diy SDR kit with SMD soldering is beyond my skill set. But if I can find some prebuilt pcbs I should be good:
HackRF 1 One RTL SDR Software Defined Radio Board 1MHz-6GHz w/ Aluminum Alloy AU | eBay
LNA for all
Maybe I can clodge together something in a project box about the same size as an ordinary transceiver. But with a rasberry pi inside along with its own lithium battery pack and a HackRF 1 and a lna4all as a preamp and some diy low pass filters. and a T/R switch: TAPR TR-Plus
Only problem is I would have to upgrade two licence classes before I can consider doing this, plus I've got a lot of other things on my mind right now and I'm itching to get back on the air.
I sincerely wish you good luck with this. Maybe it didn't come across as being sincere for that I apologise.
It sure did. Learnt that a long time ago.
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It showed up today. I had to upgrade it's firmware, then I programmed up several ham repeaters. It looks far more solid than the Baofeng. My curiosity will eventually convince me to take it apart. When that happens, I'll make a Youtube video of what I find.
I got a cheaper Chinese clone board of this without the case. It works OK, but the converters are only 8 bits. I wouldn't expect it to do very well in a big city or any environment where there is strong RF. Where I used to live there was a cell tower across the street that would whack such things. Some external filters may help.
I didn't take it that way. The MMDVM thingy IS really easy, two opamps and a small pre-built ARM processor board, but they get $100 for them, $75 for the Chinese clones. Right now there isn't much demand, hence the high prices.
The RF hardware is not so simple, and that's what for a living at Motorola for 41 years. I have been slowly outfitting my lab to do some serious radio design work, all by "bottom feeding" on Ebay. I have been buying dead HP test equipment cheap, then fixing it. I have enough good stuff to do some radio work now, with more coming as time and $$$ permits. I will put these two radios through some testing to see how they stack up against some of the radios that I helped design......results to wind up on YouTube someday.
I was a beta tester for two versions of OS2 Warp. I had beta copies of OS2 Warp Connect 3.0 and later 4.0. I had the "switch hitter" hard drive setup with a pair of 80 megabyte Seagate 4096's running on an overclocked 386 machine. One drive for OS2, the other for Win 95.
One of my calls to IBM's secret beta testers hotline became a classic.....IBM - "hello, what's the problem." ME - "I put the Printer (icon) in the Shredder (icon) and it ate it. How do I get it back? IBM- "Why would you do that." ME - "Uh to see what would happen." Unfortunately the fix would involve reinstalling some of the software.....and IBM fixed it so dumb blondes couldn't drag any of the desktop icons into the shredder, only documents.....then it asked you if that's really what you wanted.
We would often see IBM guys at lunch. I heard some of them laughing about it the day after I called. You could tell them by the way they dressed. There was a small Motorola facility, about 100 people, the 10,000 person IBM plant, and a college campus with 20,000 students, all less than a mile apart. Guess which group stood out in a crowd? Clue, it's Florida, 90+ degrees F, a pressed shirt with a tie doesn't fit in!
In the mid 90's I worked in an off-campus Motorola think tank that was just down the street from the giant plant where IBM developed the PC. They were poaching our employees at an alarming rate, but that let us know what was going on at "Big Blue." I loved OS2 in those days, With some "secret sauce" from IBM, I could open up X windows terminals on other people's Unix (Sun Sparc 2's and 10's) boxes and display them on my PC. The local HP guy wondered how I was running MDS (now called ADS) on a PC. Unfortunately, those days are gone forever. IBM closed up and moved out of Florida years ago, and Motorola has about 1/3 of one out of the five plants that they had in Florida. It will close down next year.
IBM PS/V Type 2408-NMB 486SLC Microsoft Station - Vintage Computer Win95 PC DOS! | eBay
Check this spiffy good lookin' unit out. Could do a runner for the Apple imac that could.
Check this spiffy good lookin' unit out. Could do a runner for the Apple imac that could.
I had to Google that one since the only "fusion drive" I had heard of was the boosted engines used in the latest installment of the Independence Day movie. It appears to be similar to, and possibly the same hardware, as what's called a hybrid drive or SSHD on the PC.
Seagate Hybrid Drive ST2000DX001 2TB MLC/8GB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s NCQ 3.5" Desktop SSHD - Newegg.com
I didn't know about those. They are definitely small form factor, but have rather wimpy CPU chips. For $200 they might be the best bang for the small form factor buck.
The latest Latte Panda Alpha would eat it for lunch, but cost twice as much. It run a 7th gen quad core i7 with an Arduino for IOP (I/O processing) native 4K 60 Hz video on board, plus a whole bunch of other goodies.
LattePanda Alpha 8G/64GB – A Tiny Windows / Linux Mini PC - DFRobot
that LattePanda is a much nicer mobo.
Reason why I was looking at mobos that size is because I had an idea for a wearable x86 PC with a jelly bluetooth keyboard in my pocket and the pc mobo and battery on my waist like a walkman.
Using these glasses for the display: 98inch 5.8G 40CH Goggles HDMI-IN Virtual Video Glasses RC Drone FPV Receiver | eBay
I suppose it beats lugging a laptop everywhere?
These glasses are better but more $$$: Epson Moverio BT-300 Augmented Reality Smart Glasses for DJI drone AU Wty 9314020623516 | eBay
I could use this arrangement for a wide variety of uses, from fishing and displaying the latest weather radar image for my region, to checking up on weather warnings, to using them for a wide angle rear view of my car when I'm driving on the highway so that I know exactly whats behind me in a large up-above view as if I was sitting ontop of the roof with my legs laying over the back of my rear windscreen.
Could also be used for a car heads up display too, displaying fuel consumption, gps route with voice prompts within an app or tile in the heads up display. Never have to take my eyes off the road.
Could also be used for looking at service manuals and schematics while repairing stuff, I could have a pdf document open on my glasses as if I had a tablet in front of me, but without having to lug around the heavy tablet.
Could also be used for taking notes, voice notes, or speech to text recognition.
I can't wait for these though: YouTube
Reason why I was looking at mobos that size is because I had an idea for a wearable x86 PC with a jelly bluetooth keyboard in my pocket and the pc mobo and battery on my waist like a walkman.
Using these glasses for the display: 98inch 5.8G 40CH Goggles HDMI-IN Virtual Video Glasses RC Drone FPV Receiver | eBay
I suppose it beats lugging a laptop everywhere?
These glasses are better but more $$$: Epson Moverio BT-300 Augmented Reality Smart Glasses for DJI drone AU Wty 9314020623516 | eBay
I could use this arrangement for a wide variety of uses, from fishing and displaying the latest weather radar image for my region, to checking up on weather warnings, to using them for a wide angle rear view of my car when I'm driving on the highway so that I know exactly whats behind me in a large up-above view as if I was sitting ontop of the roof with my legs laying over the back of my rear windscreen.
Could also be used for a car heads up display too, displaying fuel consumption, gps route with voice prompts within an app or tile in the heads up display. Never have to take my eyes off the road.
Could also be used for looking at service manuals and schematics while repairing stuff, I could have a pdf document open on my glasses as if I had a tablet in front of me, but without having to lug around the heavy tablet.
Could also be used for taking notes, voice notes, or speech to text recognition.
I can't wait for these though: YouTube
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I've re-evaluated the Rasberry Pi 3 B and I can confirm now that its usefulness as a desktop/laptop replacement is grossly inadequate in the modern day.
If you were to use it to read and write to and from text and image based websites then I can understand its usefulness, however, in today's modern multimedia internet its usefulness is purely that of as a low power headless server device.
Even overclocked to 1.4GHz (from factory 1.2GHz) with SDRAM and GPU at 400Mhz the hardware is simply inadequate, even with Chrome being used in stead of Firefox ESR. Its too jittery to be of any use to me.
My personal requirements are far greater than that of what a Rasberry Pi can dish out. I require:
DVB-S and DVB-T 1080p HD decoding with IPTV multicasting serving
Realtime VOIP server
Video playback decoding at 1080p and 4k
Youtube 1080p (and 4k preferably) decoding
SDR software operation with considerable CPU/GPU performance required for real time MP3 audio compression
Limited CCTV for my car.
I think the best option is to simply split these tasks into two groups, one for a high powered workstation and another for a low/medium powered server. The Rasberry Pi 3 can do DVB-T and DVB-S IPTV multicasting, the Raspberry Pi 3 can also do VOIP servering.
In other news I found a really nice looking USB 2.0 DVB-T and DVB-S decoder box: TBS GmbH | 5580 Single Tuner, CI - TBS GmbH
Would be interesting getting that working with a Rasberry pi to act as an IPTV multicast server.
BUT FIRST. I'll need to feed a reliable power source to the Rasp Pi 3B through the GPIO connector in stead of the mini USB connector, maybe with a UPS HAT.
If you were to use it to read and write to and from text and image based websites then I can understand its usefulness, however, in today's modern multimedia internet its usefulness is purely that of as a low power headless server device.
Even overclocked to 1.4GHz (from factory 1.2GHz) with SDRAM and GPU at 400Mhz the hardware is simply inadequate, even with Chrome being used in stead of Firefox ESR. Its too jittery to be of any use to me.
My personal requirements are far greater than that of what a Rasberry Pi can dish out. I require:
DVB-S and DVB-T 1080p HD decoding with IPTV multicasting serving
Realtime VOIP server
Video playback decoding at 1080p and 4k
Youtube 1080p (and 4k preferably) decoding
SDR software operation with considerable CPU/GPU performance required for real time MP3 audio compression
Limited CCTV for my car.
I think the best option is to simply split these tasks into two groups, one for a high powered workstation and another for a low/medium powered server. The Rasberry Pi 3 can do DVB-T and DVB-S IPTV multicasting, the Raspberry Pi 3 can also do VOIP servering.
In other news I found a really nice looking USB 2.0 DVB-T and DVB-S decoder box: TBS GmbH | 5580 Single Tuner, CI - TBS GmbH
Would be interesting getting that working with a Rasberry pi to act as an IPTV multicast server.
BUT FIRST. I'll need to feed a reliable power source to the Rasp Pi 3B through the GPIO connector in stead of the mini USB connector, maybe with a UPS HAT.
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That is some expensive Intel silicon.
UserBenchmark: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X vs Intel Core i7-8700K
$518 for the Intel part, $266 for the AMD part.
Almost twice the price for an extra 16% performance boost on the intel chip, But you are paying for the intel's dependability and compatability.
UserBenchmark: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X vs Intel Core i7-8700K
$518 for the Intel part, $266 for the AMD part.
Almost twice the price for an extra 16% performance boost on the intel chip, But you are paying for the intel's dependability and compatability.
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Speaking-of ASUS products. My Radeon RX570 Graphics Card just died yesterday while gaming. It sounded to me like the fan didn't spin up to compensate for rising temperatures and it subsequently died. I did have the air conditioner running at the time so it was quite cool in the room.
Today I'm sending it off for an RMA.
This is their supposed reliable version (really?), the expedition model.
Today I'm sending it off for an RMA.
This is their supposed reliable version (really?), the expedition model.
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..... My Imagination, runnith over ....
Attachments
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I used to be an AMD man through and through.
About 10 years ago I looked at what processors were available.
The fastest Intel processor was twice the speed of the best AMD offering.
So my last few processors have been Intel.
It seems AMD have caught up, so next time I might go back to AMD.
I write a lot of software and do pcbcad work so I need a fast pc.
You will probably think its funny but I don't use a PCIe video card I just use the onboard graphics. It does the job and uses 100+ watts less power !
Venus Fly: I think you should compare i7-8700 with the AMD Ryzen 7 2700X , the price for the amd cpu is , as I write this, 309$ and for the i7-8700(non k version ) is 309$.
Nigel: I loved amd since I was a 16years old, loved the k6, k6-2, 3D-now, k6-3 3D-now, Duron, Athlon until I met Intel core 2 duo... Since then I had no desire to buy amd products , I had only intel stuff. Indeed Amd offers great cpus now, a switch might happen .
You should use an external graphic card , even for the 2D applications, onboard video is actually now on the cpu video ...
Nigel: I loved amd since I was a 16years old, loved the k6, k6-2, 3D-now, k6-3 3D-now, Duron, Athlon until I met Intel core 2 duo... Since then I had no desire to buy amd products , I had only intel stuff. Indeed Amd offers great cpus now, a switch might happen .
You should use an external graphic card , even for the 2D applications, onboard video is actually now on the cpu video ...
Some spend a lot of money on this "technology".
(Below ) is a 280$ ebay XEON X3450 W7 server.
The Xeon cost 11$ - 4/8 core hyperthreading at 3.2ghz.
2 - 4tb hitachi helium HDD's (server pulls <1000hrs)
1 - 1gb Seagate (Seagate sucks) only one that survived , the 5900rpm
surveillance drive.
1- Samsung 120gb SSD.
- Asus GT760 new old stock
-WG55 socket 1151 full-size geek board with post code display.
-Asus sound card (used).
-New old stock corsair PS/fans.
-16gb Corsair ram used.
Found a 24" dell monitor for 20$ ,set to go.
Won't run W10 , same as my local hospital won't (HIPA - no privacy). Have
a 1GB install stripped down Russian windows 7 , best OS there is.
My kids all have socket 1151 intel I3's , can buy new old stock Dell vostro
motherboards with ram for 30$ , case for 20$.
As far as PC's having a limited life span , most of my previous generation
Intel Core duo's lasted from 2002 - 2004 , some still run . NONE are DELL's
or HP's ( Antec/asus). Intel Processors / ram (corsair) ... 12-15 years easy.
Wifes core duo is 2.4gb 2006 asus - 12 years.
For the Xeon with the hyperthreading . HT makes little difference except to add
a third sidechannel (like meltdown and spector) weakness.
Have not seen many apps that can take advantage of it - I leave it OFF.
I ditched all my AMD's axcept for my oldest daughters FX 8 core on the asus
board - the only one that survived the 21'st century.
On video cards , AMD .... thrown out many . Nvidia , only a few 2002-2012 GTxxx's
out of dozens in this house and 100's sold.
Now after trashing so much PC waste -
Memory/power supplies/SSD's = Corsair/Samsung
Motherboards/ Processors - Intel or intel based
HDD's = Hitachi or WD enterprise units. NO seagate.
OS
(Below ) is a 280$ ebay XEON X3450 W7 server.
The Xeon cost 11$ - 4/8 core hyperthreading at 3.2ghz.
2 - 4tb hitachi helium HDD's (server pulls <1000hrs)
1 - 1gb Seagate (Seagate sucks) only one that survived , the 5900rpm
surveillance drive.
1- Samsung 120gb SSD.
- Asus GT760 new old stock
-WG55 socket 1151 full-size geek board with post code display.
-Asus sound card (used).
-New old stock corsair PS/fans.
-16gb Corsair ram used.
Found a 24" dell monitor for 20$ ,set to go.
Won't run W10 , same as my local hospital won't (HIPA - no privacy). Have
a 1GB install stripped down Russian windows 7 , best OS there is.
My kids all have socket 1151 intel I3's , can buy new old stock Dell vostro
motherboards with ram for 30$ , case for 20$.
As far as PC's having a limited life span , most of my previous generation
Intel Core duo's lasted from 2002 - 2004 , some still run . NONE are DELL's
or HP's ( Antec/asus). Intel Processors / ram (corsair) ... 12-15 years easy.
Wifes core duo is 2.4gb 2006 asus - 12 years.
For the Xeon with the hyperthreading . HT makes little difference except to add
a third sidechannel (like meltdown and spector) weakness.
Have not seen many apps that can take advantage of it - I leave it OFF.
I ditched all my AMD's axcept for my oldest daughters FX 8 core on the asus
board - the only one that survived the 21'st century.
On video cards , AMD .... thrown out many . Nvidia , only a few 2002-2012 GTxxx's
out of dozens in this house and 100's sold.
Now after trashing so much PC waste -
Memory/power supplies/SSD's = Corsair/Samsung
Motherboards/ Processors - Intel or intel based
HDD's = Hitachi or WD enterprise units. NO seagate.
OS
Attachments
Onboard VS. PCI-E video.
(below) is the normal web/youtube general power consumption of a "power hog"
Asus GT760 ( 170W tpd). Just averages 12% ! That is <20W.
Your typical I3/5 or and older northbridge based onboard will use at least that
much extra dissipation to render.
These newer cards scale back PCI-E link speed , run fewer cores , same as Intel speedstep.
Only way to get over 100w is to game or run a benchmark.
Nothing in my case gets over 30C without a real workout.
The big jump in processor/video scalable efficiency came in hardware after 2008.
OS
(below) is the normal web/youtube general power consumption of a "power hog"
Asus GT760 ( 170W tpd). Just averages 12% ! That is <20W.
Your typical I3/5 or and older northbridge based onboard will use at least that
much extra dissipation to render.
These newer cards scale back PCI-E link speed , run fewer cores , same as Intel speedstep.
Only way to get over 100w is to game or run a benchmark.
Nothing in my case gets over 30C without a real workout.
The big jump in processor/video scalable efficiency came in hardware after 2008.
OS
