I had previously posted about getting sound to work… the problem was that when you plugged headphones the laptop speakers would still be on and if you muted them the headphones muted… Today I dug around and found a simple solution that really works…

add the follwing line to the bottom of /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

options snd-hda-intel model=lenovo

Everything from packs to tarp tents to compression sacks can be made at home.  If you dig the outdoors, wilderness, survivalism, bushcraft or whatever..  ..then you’ll love this.

Here’s the link: Homemade Outdoor Gear

Here’s the link:
Personal and Historical Perspectives of Hans Bethe.

When I switched to cross on bottom / f2l on bottom of the Rubik’s cube it was like I had to translate every move as I solved. I used to do Cross on top / f2l on left.

Anyway… I practice f2l slow a lot. I’m getting better at using d (little D, bottom 2 layers) turns instead of cube rotations when possible.

My cross time is definitely getting faster but it was decent already.

I gave each f2l pair a name and though of some key things that it’s color reminds me of… this made it a lot easier to see them around the cube as I insert each other pair. Great look ahead trick and it’s also helping to lock in unconscious competence of the order of colors (like what’s left and right of what). I wrote about this on my cube site.

Anyway… just thought I’d drop a quick F2l Update.

I’ve received a few cubes since the last time I posted. I have some black and some white “old” type 1 (A) cubes. They are great as I indicated in another post.

I’ve also received a type 2 A cube (or is it type A 2?). It’s clicky and it locks up easily. Not the best corner cutter. The type A 2 cube is stable when it comes to piece popping but that’s about all it has going for it. It has raised guides and grooves that are supposed to keep it stable but they prevent it from corner cutting properly.

I’ve also received the New White 3x3x3 speed cube. This is the smoothest cube I have. It has very soft plastic. I haven’t been able to get it to stop popping pieces yet but I’ll keep messing with it. If I can stabilize it then it will make a very perfect cube… not to clicky and not to poppy. That seems to be hard to get.

I wrote these up on my cube site… helpmechris.com/cube/   the site is a work in progress.

I also have a couple of diangsheng (diykit type E speed cube) cubes on the way. I’ll let you know how those work out.

I have some averages to post here… this is where I come back to see my progress… as always… this is just for me but if it helps you solve the Rubik’s cube faster then great.

April 2:

Average: 00:47.79
Best: 00:34.46
Avg. 5: 00:48.32
3 of 5: 00:47.57
Avg. 10: 00:47.05
10 of 12: 00:48.39

April 3:

Average: 00:53.83
Best: 00:44.85
Avg. 5: 00:49.67
3 of 5: 00:48.05
Avg. 10: 00:54.06
10 of 12: 00:52.10

April 5:

Average: 00:47.36
Best: 00:38.07
Avg. 5: 00:50.68
3 of 5: 00:50.08
Avg. 10: 00:47.51
10 of 12: 00:47.13

April 6th:

1:
Average: 00:50.01
Best: 00:38.65
Avg. 5: 00:45.58
3 of 5: 00:45.85
Avg. 10: 00:50.45
10 of 12: 00:49.51

2:
Average: 00:48.07
Best: 00:41.84
Avg. 5: 00:47.48
3 of 5: 00:47.65
Avg. 10: 00:48.57
10 of 12: 00:47.81

I took about 2 weeks to really know them all and now I’m still getting faster at recognition and execution. Here and there I mess up and have to start over on the LL… it’s becoming less and less… I’m starting to feel them.  I’ve also been gaining skill with cross on bottom and F2L on bottom.

For PLL I memorized badmephisto’s (they guy with the youtube videos) algorithms from his web site. I also watched his tips videos and found them helpful for learning recognition. Also, check out his pll trainer… it’s a nice way to find  your weaknesses on the pll step.

If you read my previous posts you know that I switched to cross on bottom about a month and a half ago. This was an easy switch… my cross skills were already bad so they didn’t get any worse. Now I’m happy to report that I can almost always identify the cross solve during the 15 second inspection time. Rarely does the timer start with me still contemplating the cross solve. I’m even getting to a point where I’m looking for corner edge pairs before the timer “dings”.

I also switched to F2L on bottom. This was much tougher than I expected. I’ve been doing F2L on the left for years now so switching to f2l on bottom has a big learning curve. After a month or so of this I’m getting where the little tricks and shortcuts that I knew on the left are starting to feel natural with cross on bottom. Cube rotations still feel clunky. I believe that the cross on left grip is more natural for cube rotations. However, with cross on bottom it’s eaiser to pair and insert without rotating the cube when I would have before. I’m still not as fast as I was with F2L on left but I can see and feel how F2l on bottom will enable me to gain more speed than I had before.

Anyway here is today’s average. I post this mainly so I can come back later and compare but if it helps you or makes you feel good then awesome.

Average: ……..00:55.35
Best: …………..00:46.42
Avg. 5:………..00:54.78
Avg. 10:………00:55.08
3 of 5:………….00:55.20
10 of 12:………00:55.59

My cube4you order finally came… it took over a month with air shipping. I made another order and used EMS so those cubes should be here in the next week or so.

The diycube type A (old or type A 1) definitely lives up to the hype! My old sanded/lubed store bought felt so great but now it feels like a garage sale cube. If I were you I’d hit cube4you.com and order a few of the old type A’s right now.

Wow, this cube is loose, fast and light. Once you get the right tension it doesn’t pop at all but you can spin a layer with one finger. At first it was almost too loose for me but once I became comfortable using less pressure with my fingers it was cube perfection. I will say that even though it doesn’t lock up it is a little bit clicky. I’m weary of sanding it because I’m afraid it will become and edge popper if I do.  I ordered 4 more so I’ll sand one and see how it works out.

The diycube type A 2 is a bit disappointing. It has internal ridges which I think are supposed to prevent popping but they cause bad lock up… when the layers are perfectly aligned it does turn smooth but cutting corners is no good with this one. I am definitely going to sand the ridges so that they are smooth on the edges… this might be the answer for the diycube type a 2. I’ll write about it when I do.

I put cubesmith textured tiles on my diycube A 1 and they are awesome. I actually ordered smooth but when I received the package they had sent textured. As soon as I felt them I was glad about the mix up. I have been using their stickers for a while and the tiles definately live up to the cubesmith quality that I’m used to. The texture is not rough or uncomfortable. It feels a lot like a kitchen counter or desk top. Very nice indeed.

So the verdict is in. Textured tiles on a diycube type A 1 is a beautiful combination. Give it a try.

add the following to /etc/modprobe.conf

options snd-hda-intel model=6stack-digout

by the way, the soundcard is an intel HDA

Also, even though I haven’t taken any averages I can tell that my cross and f2l times are going lower… I’m getting down close to 30 seconds for cross + first two layers of the rubik’s cube. That’s not fast enough… After another week or two I will start focusing on f2l and taking averages. I also take notes as I cube so that I can track my set-backs and work on the things that slow me down.

I also ordered a DIYCUBE type A 1 and a type A 2. They say that the type A 1 is the best of the best… I’ll know soon enough. I’m excited about receiving my diycube but it takes forever to ship from china unless you pay twice the price of the cubes for shipping… not me… so I’m waiting. I’ll write an update about my type A diycube when they arrive.

Anyway, here are the results from today’s average.

Average: 00:52.82
Best: 00:41.98
Avg. 5: 00:52.78
Avg. 10: 00:52.07
3 of 5: 00:51.71
10 of 12: 00:53.09

I used to do it like this: orient edges, permute corners, orient corners, permute edges. This was good but didn’t work for building up to a full Fridrich Last layer. I’m still a little bit clumsy on the corner orientation algorithms but I’m getting smoother.

Really I’m rusty at f2l too… having to think a little more than I should. When you have to watch the algorithm it makes it hard to look ahead. I could probably get back down to the 40s if I’d just work on f2l for a week but I decided to go ahead and learn new LL algs first so that I would be practicing them as I worked on f2l.

Anyway, here are today’s averages:

Average: 01:00.46
Best: 00:48.52
Avg. 5: 01:03.35
Avg. 10: 00:59.58
3 of 5: 01:00.90
10 of 12: 00:59.37

I’ve been working on my f2l algs… working on the ones where I still have to think about what I’m doing and working out finger movements for the ones that I know subconsciosly.

I use a hybrid of dan knights’ and lars petrus’ method for LL… I need to start learning the Fridrich algs huh?

I’m going to add a cube page… I had one on fidosrevenge.com so maybe I can resurrect some of the info.

I took my average a little while ago… here are the results..

Average: 01:06.51
Best: 00:59.53
Avg. 5: 01:05.34
Avg. 10: 01:06.21
3 of 5: 01:03.88
10 of 12: 01:05.00

I mainly post these so I can come back and see them later. If they somehow help you then awesome.

TTYL

Here are my results for today:

Average: 01:08.44
Best: 00:56.08
Avg. 5: 01:07.63
3 of 5: 01:06.17
Avg. 10: 01:09.23
10 of 12: 01:08.16

Average:      01:24.46
Best:      00:59.75
Avg. 5:     01:33.85
3 of 5:     01:33.76
Avg. 10:     01:23.66
10 of 12:     01:24.23

…not bad for a guy that only solves the Rubik’s cube once ever couple of days. I used to be down in the 35-45 second range though. Not enough hours in the day for that kind of perfection.

Wow… I should have done it as soon as I got the phone! I was a wuss… I was afraid that I might brick my iPhone.

I used QuickPwn from the iPhone Dev Team and had no problem. I already had the 2.2 and 2.28 modem firmware on my phone so I used iTunes to backup my phone and then went for it. I ran the installer (which was way more user friendly than I’m used to) and basically just hit ‘next’ over and over.  It was a little strange on the step where you hold the iPhone’s home button and then the power button without letting go of the home button, but no big deal.

Cydia is awesome.  It’s like the jailbroken equivalent to app store.  Cydia is Much Much Much better than the apple app store when it comes to functionality. Finally a real package manager for my iPhone!

The first jailbroken iPhone app I went for is Cycorder (the iPhone video recorder) installable through Cydia. I can’t believe the iPhone doesn’t ship with a working video camera. Cycorder is cool but like the faq says… to get the best fps you need to have good lighting. Cycorder badly needs audio attenuation… I tried to record a live band and ended up with a seriously distorted audio track.

Next I installed categories… this is another functionality that is missing from the iPhone… a way to categorize your apps into folders. My only complaint about Categories is that it takes a couple of seconds for a folder to open from the springboard. No big deal.. keeps my springboard clean. Once I installed quickgold it was totally ok.

Quickgold is super efficient. Launch apps, bookmarks, make phone calls, etc etc etc all from a search box that pops up when you hit the home button from the springboard…. AWESOME!  I use the hell out of lsxcommand on my windows computers (yes I still run litestep instead of explorer) and on my Linux boxes I follow suit, so this is the perfect iPhone equivalent for my computing style.

Before I publish this post I’ll also mention that winterboard and SBSettings allow me to really get the look and feel that I like. When you combine all of that with the homescreen winterboard theme that turns the lock screen into a “today” screen then you really have something special.

The iPhone is way to restricted out of the box. Lack of configurability and also the whole app store process is a F***ing joke if your an advanced user, but either way the iPhone is the best handheld or phone I’ve ever owned.

Anyway, don’t be scared.  Jailbreak your iPhone.

Link: The Outlaw Radio Show

Earliernibsaw one of the best musical performances I’ve ever seen… Alex on guitar, jay on sax, chad on bass and dan and phill on drums.

No joke this was some seriously great shit.

Here are the photos.

Here are a couple of stills that our director Joe Harris sent over.

Lots of good musicians out tonight.

I’ll post amy cool stuff that I learn. I also owe you all some Colorado photos from our wilderness vacation.

Anyway… I caught a documentary last night on sci channel called Parallel Universe…. it was really a mind opener…

It was great to see a proposed timescale that goes back beyond the initial singularity of our universe… it’s about time

Also, the weakness of gravity and ideas about how the gravity that we detect is leaked from other “branes” made a lot of sense to me… It also made me ask…

Is our universe’s dark matter and energy an effect of another brane which is currently undetectable from the brane in which we perceive our universe? Also, if so, is this why we detect a matter deficit in our universe?

Perhaps the matter that we know as dark matter doesn’t reside in our brane at all.

Check out the M-theory article on Wikipedia for some background info.

65 Resources for Grid-Based Design | Vandelay Website Design

Talk to ya later world…

Realities of Going Primitive: wilderness living and its difficulties.

In Rainbows doesn’t dissapoint if you like these guys… it’s another Radiohead album  and it lives up to their discography.

Read on if you are interested in riaa ranting and the future of music

I bought the album for $1 in order to sample it… since I like it I am going to buy it again for a friend and pay somewhere between $5 and $10.

I hate the RIAA , all of their flying monkeys and other their other sub-conglomerations… which is strange because I’m a liberal in almost all aspects of life, but fiscally I’m a conservative…  I’m what you might call a “business hippie” but when it comes to music I’m all about the art form and quality, which the major record companies obviously aren’t.

Cheers to Radiohead, fuck you to the RIAA labels and hell yes to the artists that follow similar models.

Even if there is a minimum price ($2.50 per album might be acceptable since it’s widely known that bands make less than $2 per CD sale in most cases) this is still an awesome model for music sales. $.99 per song is a rip off, and so is $8+ for a full album.

anyway… this is nothing formal… just a quickie to mention that the future is here, sort of.

bye bye

I based my layout on the gaussmarkov layout… this is supposed to be quieter and solve some of the noise issues that previous layouts have had.

I have not built this box previously so I can not compare the noise level to other layouts, however, I will say that this is a noisy build and I can see by moving the wires around that it would be even noisier if it wasn’t layed out as it is.

Day 1: I started out by making a layout for perfboard from the gaussmarkov layout and comments here at this thread. I also found an old box meant for switching one keyboard between two computers. Nice and big.

Day 2: I went ahead and populated the perfboard and soldered it all together.

Day3: I completed the build by soldering all the wires, pots, switches, the led, and the jacks. It was easy to bias the jfet drains to 4.5v.

Night 3: I added the build to my pedal board and went to the gig…

This thing was extremely noisy!!! Waterfall sound like crazy, I guess that’s white or pink noise… I should do my homework about the names of noise eh?

Anyway… I still used it, but even with the guitar volume at zero it made so much noise that it was obvious to everyone on the stage. We’re a rock cover band that also does jam music jazz, fusion, and blues… we play loud.. for others to be able to hear my the noise it had to be extreme.

I came home from the gig knowing that the hundred or so posts that I had read about quieting the Dr. Boogey would pay off.

Day 4: I went back through the forum posts that I had bookmarked and got some ideas about lowering the noise. The first thing I did was changed Q1 from J201 to MPF102…. This helped substantially and left so much gain that I still probably won’t set the gain knob to full. While I was in there I added a 100pf cap parallel with the 20pf cap…this slightly tamed some of the highs… there was just a little too much high end crunch for me before.

When I went to re-bias the build I realized how much trimmer noise I was getting. I set Q1 to about 4.8v and the rest at 4.55ish and tested it one last time… sounded great, still a lot of waterfall sound…

I bit the bullet and replaced the trim pots with fixed resistors….WOW WOW.

Taking out the trim pots took away 85% of the annoying waterfall sound…

I brought home my Twin Reverb and my fx board and tried it out with my normal rig at stage volume…

Now my Dr. Boogey is only slightly noisier than my fulldrive2. It’s about as noisy as a fuzz face or something.

AWESOME!!

Big thanks to the DIY community for making fx building information available to the world!!

Photos:

Parts and Board

All wired up… check the old school foam pad

Wiring details

Slightly modded

All done

Back side

Added to board

Top 10 custom JavaScript functions of all time

Marc Sabatella’s Jazz Improvisation Primer: 3/7 Voicings

I’ll post more about tonight when I get the videos this weekend.

If you are around the DFW area and you like real blues check out Hash Brown when you can. Here’s a link to their videos page.

World first: Flying high on pond scum (Stuff.co.nz) – environmentally friendly aviation fuel, made of wild algae

Narrowing it Down

I know of a couple of sites that let you narrow down your font selection one step at a time by identifying the traits that your target font has. You can search by sight at identifont.com which I’ve been playing with all day and you can also try to the search by sight tool at fonts.com

Another option is to try myfonts.com where you can upload an image file which will be processed and compared to their database for close matches. Very cool.

Going Old-School

A last resort is utilizing methods that have been around forever. You can do take old fashion approach of looking through hundreds of fonts using windows font preview or a font manager such as Suitcase or ATM, but from here on out you can at least try taking a shortcut before you trace a logo or dig through a thousand fonts.

Hopefully we’ll never have to endure the accumulated weeks of time that we’ve all spent in the past tracing text from client’s logos. It’s great that the future is here.

Happy font hunting.

The songs are Pride and Joy and Tell me Something Good. There is some really good playing on these clips… top quality musicianship. We have a saxophone player in these clips. His name is JB Saxx. He is from LA. He gigged with us for a couple of months this summer but he left today to go back to cali. He will be missed; we had an awesome time making music with him.

I better get to work, I have about 20 clips left to upload (what a slow deal) Public plea to YouTube: give me ftp upload please

Link: Chris Brown Guitar Videos on YouTube

Beryl has features such as hotkeys and and desktop switching that go much further than anything else I’ve used. On top of that, the window and desktop switching looks amazing… Desktops on a 3D cube and a killer alt-tab; AWESOME.

Pretty window animations and all sorts of crazy effects such as watter ripples when you drag and release a window or variable transparency are a few of the cool extras that some people will want to enable.

I turned off most of the effects because I’m into lite and minimal, but I couldn’t help keeping the 3D desktop switching.

I read a comment somewhere that said something like “Apple and MS give you windows but Linux gives you the whole house.” true true

Please check out the videos and go to the Chris Brown YouTube Channel and leave me some 5 star ratings and comments etc etc.

Thanks Friends!

I’ve been working on an OSCommerce customization for one of our clients and today I’ve done all of the php work in Quanta without ever wishing I was using something else. So far so good.

Everything is running smoothly now.

modprobe snd-hda-intel model=3stack

All good. Restart and it works.

The setup is fine other than my wifi card not working out of the box. Its an Intel 3945ABG. I know exactly what needs to happen to make it work and I’m in the process of doing it now.

As with nearly every linux intall that I’ve done, my sound is not working…. yet… but I’m confident that I will get it working quickly. This is probably the most common desktop linux problem after intsall but not once have I ended up with truly unsupported hardware. I can always seem to get it to work.

I hooked up eth0 and ran yum update. Next I need to get the drivers for my wifi card.

I’ll post again in a little while.

I decided to leave a 20GB partition of my HDB to store my wamp folder and work files. I had a few other software configuration issues that would have had me reconfiguring stuff for a few hours to keep my windows software happy.

I love litestep… I’ve been slowly tweaking my minimal theme for years now… a systray and a command box/clock and that’s it! I leave a 2px area at the top of the screen that can always be clicked to access menus.

I’m installing Fedora because it’s easy but real. I grew up on Slackware but I’ve also used my wife’s Ubuntu a lot… Ubuntu is nice but it seems a little bit too user friendly for me. Fedora is a good in between.

Anyway… It’s time to insall linux on my laptop (Toshiba Satellite A135-S4477). I miss the 1337 feeling of linux desktop.

At this point I’m doing drive cleanup. I have a 90GB HDB that I’m going to install on but it was half full. I’m almost done transferring files to my 300GB external drive. This is a bit of a hassle because my WAMP folder is on HDB and I’m going to have to reconfigure the ini files later. Oh well.

Once HDB is clean and I’ve burned my Fedora DVD I’m going to delete the partitions and start the install.

I’ll keep posting about the process.

The lineup is Chris Brown (me) on guitar, Mike Brown on bass, JB Saxx on Saxophone and Bono Saunders on drums.

Here is the first in a series of videos from that gig…

Find it here

Color Inspiration from the Masters of Painting

The 35 Sexiest Designed Websites you’ve Forgotten, part 4 – PhilRenaud.com

The sIFR site says ‘sIFR is meant to replace short passages of plain browser text with text rendered in your typeface of choice, regardless of whether or not your users have that font installed on their systems.’

sIFR 2.0: Rich Accessible Typography for the Masses

The Secret to Understanding Design – Baekdal.com

Look…

Wife shot photos while we etched but we didn’t get all the steps…

After painting the sides before re-sanding the top… hanging dry:

I forgot about taking photos during the ironing steps… sorry

Painting the air bubble cutouts…

Paint dry (we actually put a hair dryer on a metal wine rack

aiming at the enclosure to speed things up LOL):

We forgot to photograph the etching… sorry…

Etch completed… ready to wet sand again and clean up..

Sanding the mask and paint mask etc…

Final coat of paint before wet sanding the top for the last time…

After sanding the top of the enclosure for the last time YAY:

Things we learned or will do different next time:

Spend more time on the initial sanding… keep on going with the 220 grit until the nicks and scratches are worked out. I think the initial sanding is probably the most important step for a beautiful box.

Work the edges more when ironing the pnp blue

Use good paint… after having this thing on the stage about ten times it has a few indented spots in the cheap flat black i used… ($.99).

Questions I have (haven’t searched for the answers yet).

What type of spray can paint would be best for in the etched areas… something that won’t get nicked or indented.

Any tips for the edges of a PNP transfer… they were the only place I had trouble on this etch… same for my first pcb etch (another post soon)… what is it about the edges that makes them resist the PNP blue so well?

Thanks for reading… please share your thoughts and experiences with aluminum enclosure etching.

I used the late 60s Boutique Fuzz Face Schematic from GeneralGuitarGadgets and adjusted the caps to let those bass frequencies through. On my previous boutique fuzz face build I used my own perf layout but on this one I used the Andrew Carrell layout that can be found in Aron Nelson’s gallery.

The transistors, sockets, LED and the trim pot are from SmallBear. The box, switch, LED Bezel and jacks are from PedalPartsPlus. Everything else is from Mouser.

Each of my builds has been prettier on the inside… I really worked to keep the wires down in this one but it still ended up looking like the back of a mixing console in there. I learned a lot about what I can do next time to make it beautiful on the inside.

The sound is awesome… Sounds like a real GE fuzz face… Steve at small bear is doing us a huge favor and saving us a ton of time by selling those matched transistors (thanks Steve).

Compared to my other Boutique fuzz face this thing has much more bass response / low end.

With my strat it really has “the fuzz face sound” with some added oomph.

With a Fender Jazz bass it’s warm, punchy and very fuzzy… makes you feel nice.

With a Music Man Stingray it is has lots of edge and a nice buzz and by turning down the input gain (bias knob) a tiny bit it warms up even more.

All in all I’m very happy with this build and I recommend the GGG Boutique fuzz face build to everyone who likes the FF sound.

Tychobrahe Octavia w/ body mod

I used the schematic from GGG on this one and did the Tobias Karlsson body mod. I did the layout my self using DIY Layout Creator by Branislav Stojkovic (cool software).

The transistors, diodes and the stomp switch are from Aron Nelson’s Store. The box, LED+Bezel and jacks are from PedalPartsPlus. dpdt from the shack. Everything else is from Mouser.

This was a fun project. I took me longer to do the layout for a small board than it did to solder… I found out that I really enjoy the layout process.

I should have used a bigger box… the Hammond B style box was a tight fit with that huge radio shack switch and all… I ended up using foam to keep the board from touching the box… really tight fit and no space for a battery.

The sound is awesome. The octave effect doesn’t respond well to notes below the 10th fret (7th on little E) or so but that’s not what it’s about…. I love the Jimi sound and this can really get the “purple haze solo” just right. It’s ugly and beautiful all at once. Put this thing in front of a fuzz or distortion and set the intensity knob about half way… F****** Awesome!

I’ve used this on stage at every gig since the day I built it and I love it every time I step on the switch.

From what I understand there are more versatile octave/fuzz builds like the FTM which I look forward to building, but the octavia really has a special sound. It’s definitely worth the build…. especially if you want the “purple tone”.

A big thanks to everyone who posts their guts out on this forum!!!!!!! Without you I probably wouldn’t be buried in wires and components all the time!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kindest regards,

Chris Brown

Some of the time I achieve this sound by leaving out the root. I’ll use standard 7th chords and alterations that I play a lot when we do blues stuff as an example…

Here’s an example progression… try it out…

G7 / / / G13 / / / G9 / / / G13 / G7+5 /

C9 / / / C7 / / / G7 / / / G9 / / /

D7 / / / C13 / / / G7 / / / D7+5 / / /

For the D7 and D7+5 chords I would use the same shape as I do for the C chords (in most cases)

I like to use the augmented chords (7+5 – said seven sharp five or just augmented) to get some cool movement from the one to the four of the progression and also for the 5th on the turnaround

I also like to use a 3625 turnaround but not in this lesson.

Buy Chris a Beer

Do Yoga at The Smokers Lounge of Denver International Airport – SOLVED

Find mobile satelite solution to trasfer video to NOC – SOLVED

Remove glue from guitar finish – SOLVED

Program articles in phpnuke without using the autonews table – SOLVED

MSWord will not open – SOLVED

Find travel time in personal jet from point A to point B – SOLVED

Convert component video signals to composite – SOLVED

Recover deleted files when recovery software wouldn’t detect them – SOLVED

Copy and Paste won’t work or freezes the computer – SOLVED

Need “add to” buttons for rss feeds and podcasts – SOLVED

Encode and transfer video from Las Vegas to Houston within an hour from end of filming – SOLVED

Find low cost mobile video encoding and streaming solution – SOLVED

Capture from JVC HDV100 on the fly – SOLVED

Help my computer will not start up – SOLVED

Use windows media encoder on a media center computer to capture and encode – SOLVED

–

This list is incomplete and to be updated.

Chris Brown

Link: DeArmond Tremolo

Read about this cool trem from the late 40s that worked by using a motor to shake a tiny brass canister of liquid which would short the instrument signal to ground over and over again… very cool…. the liquid is the same stuff that we know as windex. neat yes.

http://homepage.mac.com/danielformosa/dearmond.html
Thu, 08 Feb 2007 23:05:05 -0600
Chris Brown
Link: “Piggybacking” trannies for lower gain

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=17513.0
Thu, 08 Feb 2007 18:34:45 -0600
Chris Brown
Link: Bypass Options

Mucho Info about bypass… read
Wed, 25 Oct 2006 20:48:36 -0500
Chris Brown
Link: The awesome pedal PAINTING thread

Info packed forum thread at Aron’s about painting the box… Read More
Sat, 21 Oct 2006 14:42:08 -0500
Chris Brown

Link: What does that bit there do? Learning to understand circuits.
Great forum post where circuits are picked apart and each component’s purpose is described… one of the best beginner resources I’ve seen.

Read More
Sun, 15 Oct 2006 14:35:41 -0500
Chris Brown

Link: The basic transistor amplifier
more info on transistors

Read More
Sun, 15 Oct 2006 14:15:15 -0500
Chris Brown

Link: Designing Bipolar Transistor Audio PreAmplifiers
Interesting article…

Read More
Sun, 15 Oct 2006 14:00:42 -0500
Chris Brown
Link: Booster Bar
Tons of boosts… pcb layouts and schems

Read More…

Sun, 15 Oct 2006 13:39:01 -0500
Chris Brown

Link: Is It Okay to Clone?

From Guitar Effects & Audio/Music Electronics:

basic principles involved when we consider cloning a pedal that some other person has designed and produced

Link

Thu, 12 Oct 2006 14:27:58 -0500
Chris Brown

DIY Guitar Effects – Authoritative Sites

Aron’s Stompbox Page

AMPAGE

AMZFX

GEOFEX

General Guitar Gadgets

Small Bear Electronics

Tonepad.com

Paul Marossy’s DIYGuitarist.com

Blueguitar.org

Tonefrenzy.com

DIY Guitar Effects – Specialty Pages

Fuzz Central

The Technology of the Tube Screamer (GEOFEX)

Technology of Envelope Controlled Filters (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Fuzz Face (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Univibe (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Bypass Switching (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Wah pedals (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Phasers and Flangers (GEOFEX)

The Technology of the Oil Can Delays (GEOFEX)

DIY Guitar Effects – People’s Articles, Info and Links

Mark Hammer’s place on AMPAGE

Plate to Plate

Doug’s DIY Pedals and Amps

JC Maillet’s viva Analog

Jim Radmer’s DIY site

The Tone God

Jeff’s Guitar Effects

Peter’s Guitar Effects Projects Page

Stellan’s Site

John Hollis – Assorted Circuit Designs

Stompbox Stuff – E.G. Hensel

DIY Guitar Effects – Projects, Schematics and PCBs

Effectronics (Electra Distortion)

Runoffgroove.com

Tim Escobedo’s Circuit Snippets

Robin Tomtlund Edman’s new electronic pages!

Riccardo Ferranti’s site

Joe Davisson’s Analog Alchemy

Laurier Gendron’s Handy Dandy Little Circuits

Michael Allen’s Noise (PCBs)

Treble Boosters

GM Arts Schematics page

Music Electronics µArchive

Parts Info

Transistor Database

Semiconductor Data Sheets

Capacitor codes

Resistor Calculator

All Datasheets

Come hear him play hit songs and lot’s of cool jazz and blues stuff.

Check the calendar at BoneDriven.com

Just like on sideways and I love pinot too.

The other day we swam as it thundered… the storm passed us by and it was a nice swim with the water warmer than the outside air… This was Stinson’s birthday swim, yes… Tell him happy birthday next time you see him.

Of course I’ve been internet marketing and making sites, etc etc… it never stops and the residual income keeps growing. hell yes.

I’m soon to finish up a new ebook and launch an internet marketing community… I’ll keep you posted.

Our jazz band (The Brown Brothers) is playing around the metroplex… Our site for that will be up soon so you can find us and come enjoy the sounds.

Have a good one…

Peace, CB

“My brother in law gave me a dart board, and I’m pretty bad at darts. Christ the Reverend Chris Spurrier beat me repeatedly the first night we played, but my skill is increasing.”

“I practice guitar for at least three hours each day. Practice can go all the way up to five hours, and on a day that I perform I can get as much as 8 hours of guitar playing in one day.”

“I spend three to six hours a day as an internet marketer. This includes developing new web sites, sending and answering emails, exchanging links, writing and developing new content for my sites, researching new niches, and all types of related things. Internet marketing is truly hard work, but it is rewarding and fun.”

“I spend two to four hours per day working on client’s projects and web sites for other people. Need a web site? Check out www.IsThatMy.com.”

“Since the summer creeped in, I swim on any day that it’s not raining me down. An hour and a half, or two, up to four or five hours per day at the pool is a great way to spend time if you ask me. Apparently my friends enjoy it too. You’ll find that I’m extra social in the summer, hosting pool parties weekly and small gatherings nearly every other day. “

“I’ve been trying a wide variety of import beers lately, and I’ve got to tell ya’ that domestic beers are really missing something special. Pay the extra dollar or two on a six pack, or if you’re buying twelve, pay the extra four to ten dollars and enjoy quality beer… Enough of this over-marketed american headache water crap. If you are buying a case of beer, my advise is to buy a case of cheap domestic beer and a sixer of something yummy, but honestly, I’d rather buy four six packs of four different imports. Yum.”

“Oh yes, and also… Our Jazz band is on the patio at Cheddars at I-20 and Carrier every Thursday. I haven’t seen you there. Or, have I?”

If you’d like to see Chris’ answer about something then drop him a line and say what you want to say… he might actually address your questoin on FidosRevenge.com.

See you there

I’ve been so busy this last week or two… I’ve got new services launching, and some products in the later stages of development… I’m excited, but the only thing I’ve done besides work is my taxes… OH WAIT

The other day I got in our swimming pool for about ten minutes, I swam across the pool a couple of times, and I jumped in. The water was freeeezing…. No, not really frozen, but here in Texas, we’ve just barely broken 80 degrees so far, and our pool water is low 70s, maybe in the 60s… We need a thermometer… I need a spell checker…

I’ve got plans for a fun summer, a totally kick ass, party and grill, jump in on a whale, up all night, and even a ‘you can sleep here’ summer… Don’t miss us this year…It’s only hot for a few months. I’ll be having guests on Sunday for sure, and also, we plan to host many Friday/Saturday night gatherings….

See you here.

-CB

Life has been nice. The last couple of weeks have been beautiful for me.

I finished the book Sleight of Mouth by Robert Dilts… Super awesome… one of the arts of changing minds… Check it out if your into NLP/persuasion/people helping.

Although we haven’t gone out partying lately, we did in fact crack the punch. We thawed our Jamaican rum punch from Halloween… Amanda and I had a fun night running around our house and yard, drinking punch. I had just as much fun as if I had gone out with a bunch of friends to the club or whatever. Good times.

I’ve been working my ass off programming PHP for my latest script – RSSBIN Lite: Podcast edition. This sweet little script will syndicate your information across multiple domains OR we could just say this: “you can now syndicate your articles and audio to anyone with a RSS aggregator.” But I’m not going to get into that here… I post this type of stuff on my “Internet marketing from home weblog” give it a visit here.

Early next month I plan to have a “photo night”… probably at cave’s lounge, but we’ll see.

What is a photo night? Take a look at the gallery.

If you’ve been absent from our recent photos then stay tuned to fidosrevenge.com and find out when and where you can get in on the action.

What I’ve been listening to: Holdsworth, Martino, Miles Davis etc etc… Not a lot different this week.

Oh yeah… Our jazz band, The Brown Brothers will be playing live soon… Keep your eyes peeled for an announcement about our web site… We are kicking ass! We sound great, we practiced last Saturday and everything was perfect… I’ll be sure to post some audio clips or a podcast of us.

OK, we had a big gathering at Cave’s Lounge and it was AWESOME… then we went to Jay & Sheridan’s house to continue the party.

I snapped 106 pictures, and I’ll have nearly all of them online by tonight or tomorrow.

Check back soon.. Really soon…

Peace

I do various audio projects… here is a less than descriptive ‘step by step’ for you…

If you already have a means by which you can hook your tape player up to your computer, then all you need is some software that allows you to record. Windows sound recorder won’t work because it has a 1 minute restriction, but something like a shareware clone of sound forge will do the trick. Try Audacity… I haven’t used it, but I hear that it is of the highest quality, and it is FREE! http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

1) Test input level (must be below 0.0)
2) Cue tape
3) Press record on audio software
4) Press play on tape
5) Stop tape and recording process
6) Save file

Good luck on finding noise reduction software that is affordable. Most are pretty steep. Waves restoration bundle and ray gun are the good ones… maybe they have trial versions??

Have fun!

by Chris Brown

As I stared out over the court I could feel the heat rising throughout the crowd. It was a kid’s basketball game, and the tensions were building.

Apparently the team we will know as ‘grey’ had the best chance of winning. They were destined for glory in a world of let downs, and they weren’t letting anyone slip through their cracks.

I took note that a hoard of well dressed men, boys, and old ladies from the guest team, the ‘blues’, had crowded into the grey team’s bleacher area. If these people had had any focus on the game, it was all lost as they sunk into some strange version of a family gathering.

The grey and the ‘blue’ team pounded endlessly as they dribbled the ball from one side to the other, and down this court of madness. Hoping that they could get the ball close enough to the net so that their associates would push it through the hoop, grey continued on to the point that they were destined to gain.

Through all of this family noise, and the natural shrieking of a bleacher set full of parents, I could somehow see through this fog of activity that our grey team had a few silver bullets. Already loaded and fired, these advanced players seemed like they were being paid to play. With each small mistake, they seemingly lost a piece of them selves and their buoyancy dwindled slowly. But, as they went on to do more good than bad, in the end, they had constructed glory.

They were floating on the tube of yet another victory. They had won another game, and their task of entertaining their relatives again was finally complete.

For the players, this game’s day had been another hit, and as usual, they were ready for the snacks.

Yo! If anyone (that knows me locally) wants to buy a box of 50 lighters for $20 call me or get in touch with me via email. They aren’t zippo or even bic, but 19 out of 20 work perfectly.

Talk soon…

It was a great experience to see all the people… it had been a long time.

It is a good thing that we took the camera, and it’s a great thing that we remembered to take photos while we were there.

I have already added pictures to the gallery, so go check them out.

I’ll write at you later… peace

I’ve been chillin’ – enjoying life.

I’ve spent some time working more on the articles database at sitemy… I am almost finished with the submission process… people will be able to submit an article and I can go approve it at an admin page, etc etc… right now I’m adding each one manually etc etc eek eew.

I’ve been helping out at 2GOclub.com lately too… little php programs and also some office work, moving stuff around… It’s been fun.

It’s true… gotmo.net has the worst CTR I’ve seen since my first adwords campaign… no doubt about it, they ain’t clickin’. I guess it’s because the know the site owners?? Um, I figured that this would be more of a reason to support us than to not… wrong?

FidosRevenge.com is still going through updates… soon I will add pictures from highschool… get scared… you might be in one of them If I know YOU.

I’m out for now… peace.

This morning I’m listening to Billy Childish…. awesome… I love the brit/garage sound.

I’ve been comparing my google adsense channels… It’s odd, the sites that I run which are online communities, mainly visitied by friends, family or people local to the specific community…. these sites have horrrrrriiiibbbbllleeeee conversion rates. Now, I have thousands and thousands of pages that are designed to spit information out and put ads on it…. these sites convert fairly well… also, my counter-strike site… it gets a decent conversion… strange… marketing woes.

Last night I was up until about 3:50am working on yet another song… I really enjoy pushing the hours like that… a delightful way to write.

What else is new? I’m excited about the upcomming summer…. MySpace.com is fun… Upgrading the FidosRevenge.com system…

EEk, I’ve got to get going… I’ll post again soon.

The summer is slowly creeping up on us – we’ll be in the swimming pool soon.

Our jazz band had another practice today, and I’ve ‘gotta’ say, we’re sounding really good… I hope you all come see us when we start performing. I know you will.

I was looking at the pictures of Titan, Saturn’s moon… Really cool. Apparently they have an ocean of oil or methane or something like that. I hope the spacecraft is able to send back lots of photos. But, then again, who doesn’t.

Now that’s not very innovative is it?

When one person teaches another, learnings are processed, adapted, and taken down by the unconscious, we know this is true. If this wasn’t true then we would have all of our thoughts all the time, right? It’s task is to spit your memories back at you when need, and sometimes when you don’t, as a thought, memory, idea, a phrase, and countless others.

So, why would we educate somebody about something…using the exact terms and structures we learned originally… if from practical use of the knowledge… a person has found tweaks, or changes to the system…

Simply change the style a bit. If a style restricts the possibility for growth within a given field, it might be time for a style change.

Chew on that. Hear me later.

Our newest batches of incense are great! I’m on the 1st drying phase of a double dipped sandalwood, a sweet sandalwood smell… it’s very nice. We’ve also got a new patchouli, “Double Patchouli Origional” we might call it… I don’t exactly like it, but everyone else seems to… It’s like a true, not sweet, Patchouli… very vintage. My fender stratocaster turns vintage next year too

My studio computer needs repairs, recording hasn’t been happening… need to back some stuff up and get a new motherboard ASAP, but that’s kind of a good thing…new hardware for new times ahead right?

Come back and visit!

You live on, through music. You will not be forgotten.

I’m thinking that by now, you must have realized that something was going on…

Lack of updates, odd posts, more advertising etc etc…

It is true, I earn a living from the internet, and it’s also true that I’ve spent the last year studying marketing, or to be more specific, let’s say that I’ve spent the last year studying internet marketing and learning about ‘self’.

But first let’s touch on the marketing. I’ve been through ‘get rich quick systems’, I’ve marketed affiliate products, I’ve spent a large amount of time with the internet marketing warriors (In fact, the warriors are my favorite group of online friends, ever (other than bitchie woman, jhawk, drew and all of WTW)), I’ve started and ended a custom lighter company, I’ve produced a few web sites for local businesses, I’m producing some now, I’ve marketed through google, I’ve marketed through forums, through blogging, through my counter-strike site, in person, over the phone, virally, I’ve marketed work at home opportunities, I’ve marketed hangover pills, I’ve marketed Game related products, and all types of ill shit… etc etc….

I’ve also been working on some products, the restaurant staff book, a card trading book, a few music books, a musical instrument resellers guide, and internet marketing book or two, lighters for a while, and I’ve started a few others recently. The goal behind each product is to have it add to my current weekly income… Each ‘line in the water’ could be the one that catches the ‘big one’, right?

SO, you’ve got to be wondering, “What did Chris Brown learn this year?”, because as one knows, Chris Brown is always learning. Other than the marketing studies I’ve done, I’ve learned quite the collective. I’ve learned about my mind, and about the minds of others. I’ve learned how to make incense. Chris Brown learned that one must meditate and experiment with one’s own mind. I’ve absorbed much of the NLP knowledge that I built up last year, I consider that part of learning, my sensory acuity has increased dramatically. I didn’t learn how to spell… I’ve learned how not to forget my Rubik’s cube method over long periods of not cubing… Most of this learning has been achieved not through reading, not through conscious thought, but through meditation and unconscious activity… I’ve got a site coming soon that will be all about YOUR MIND!

I’ll drop out right here and say peace…

- Birdsnake

-Birdsnake

Thank You.