Brontesaurus Blog

If you haven’t heard (and with every single tech blog and social media sites being completely saturated with Apple news, I can’t see why the hell not) Apple announced their latest and greatest [citation needed] handheld product, the iPad. I think this announcement took a lot of people off guard and wasn’t what many were expecting. It was long rumored that Apple was coming out with a tablet mobile device. When the word tablet is heard, people think of a fully functional touch screen PC, and this didn’t make a lot of people happy.

A lot of complaints is that this new device lacks a lot of basic functionality and some hardware. Some of the top complaints included:

• The huge bezel
• No camera
• 4:3 force aspect ratio
• No multitasking

If we have learned anything from Apple is that the first generation of any device is going to lack features on purpose. Theres more money to be made in making 3 devices instead of 1 device that does it all. The 1st gen iPhone is a great example with no 3g, copy paste, or video.

With that being said, I think there might be some great promise with later generations of the iPad that would cure some of these “OMG APPLE YOU ARE SO STUPID FOR NOT HAVING THIS” mentality. In later generations I would expect to see:

1. Better price for storage
2. Included 3g support in the price
3. Make the bezel smaller and overall slicker looking device, aka something that doesn’t look like its for your grandma or 2 year old.
4. Widescreen support, not being forced into 4:3
5. Multitasking (I would love to see Apple put OSX on it, but more money is to be made with their app store so that will just have to stay a dream)
6. Camera (If an ipod nano can have one, why not this?)

All in all, I’m not trying to courage or discourage anyone from getting this device. If you have a use for it and like, great, get one. If you are on the fence about getting one, and if history has taught us anything, I would suggest waiting a year or so. Let the OS updates to come out, let more iPad apps to come out, and maybe there will be a price drop or a 2nd gen iPad in a year or so.

When I found Magic Prefs which is a Magic Mouse preference and configuration utility for OSX. Without this program, the mouse only comes with 2 touch sensitive gestures. I have no idea why Apple wouldn’t want to capitalize on more features with this fully functional multi touch surface. But the good news is, with Magic Prefs you can configure a very broad range of clicks, touches, swipes, and pinches to actions with your mouse making it a true multi touch surface.

I have had my Magic Mouse for a couple weeks now and my biggest pet peeve with is was the physical click. It’s not like other mice where its easy to press down on left and right click, the Magic Mouse is very noticeably harder and you really tend to notice it after couple hours of use. With each click I seem to be more and more conscious of my physical ability to left and right click. Lucky for me with Magic Prefs you can configure tap left and right tap clicks just like the multi-touch pad on the Macbook Pro. It’s a very little and simple feature, but has made me a much happier Magic Mouse user.

I highly suggest checking out Magic Prefs if you own a Magic Mouse.

Only about an hour ago it was announced that the droid has been rooted.

Alldroid.org post with download + instructions etc.

Authors Post:

md5sum of initial exploit zip: 94a0c30ea9104c2776d042e760bfd716

URL: http://rapidshare.com/files/318204448/d … t.zip.html (Down now?)
URL2: http://www.4shared.com/file/168496608/8 … -root.html (thanks, blunden)
URL3: http://www.mediafire.com/?ydaqjmditjh (thanks, blunden)
URL4: http://www.multiupload.com/XYPZLK4K22
Also attached in a thread post.

The exploit provides a /system/bin/su from AOSP (that is, you can only use it from adb shell).
Other payloads can be arranged, but I’m too lazy to make them myself.

Provide a decent payload and I will turn it in to an update.zip that the Droid will apply.
Restrictions: The payload zip must be <63k
I can add files already in the official update to it (update-binary).

Some possible install instructions (unconfirmed):

md5sum of the boot partition:
3e49d99b320cf5c20bedf09343c1155c /dev/mtd/mtd2

HOWTO

Download the zip file (see mirrors in posts below)
Rename to “update.zip” and copy to the sdcard

Power off the DROID and power back on while holding the X key
When you see a “/!\” symbol, press both vol+ and camera
Use the onscreen menu to install update.zip

Once installed you will be able to run “su” from your adb shell.

I recently flashed my Palm Centro which used to be on Sprint and now after flashing/unlocking it is now on Cricket. Most carriers will let you use whatever compatible phone you want with their network, but a lot of carriers like to lock phone to be exclusive to their network *cough* Sprint *cough* AT&T *cough*. Fortunately for you and me, we have Google, where you can find out how to do almost anything. It took me about 3 hours of googling and figuring stuff out to get my Centro completely unlocked and turned out to be a fun project.

Before I explain the technical details on unlocking, there are a few things you will need.

1. Qualcomm Diagnostic Drivers – Download
   This was probably the hardest part of the whole process, finding the correct and working drivers. The Palm Centro uses a standard qualcomm chipset and you need the diagnostic drivers for that chipset. Keep in mind these are not the standard drivers your PC will use to hot sync with the Centro.
2. QPST – Qualcomm Service Programming Tool
   This tool lets you get down and dirty with the internal programming of your phone. Due to QPST being copyrighted software, you will have to search google for this one. It is pretty easy to find, especially if you are on mobile phone forums. I believe the latest version is 2.7.
3. UniCDMA 1.095+ – Download
   This is a basic memory prober which will let you read out a bunch of phone information and specific addresses.
4. Cricket PRL – Perfered Roaming List – Download
   This is basically a file containing all cell phone carrier fun stuff.

There is also some lingo you should be aware of.

• SPC – Service programming code. This is a 6 digit number which when entered allows access to the carrier programming screen.
• PRL – Perferred roaming list. The Preferred Roaming List (PRL) is a database residing in a wireless (primarily CDMA) device, such as a cellphone, that contains information used during the system selection and acquisition process (wikipedia).

The goal when flashing the Centro is you want to set the SPC to “000000″. This will allow the phone to be used on any CDMA network. With sprint, sometimes if you call them they will give you the SPC or if you have the SPC written down somewhere when activating the phone, then you will be able to skip setp #3 below.

1. Enter diagnostic mode on yoru phone by entering “##3424#” on the phone screen. A menu will pop up and make sure “diag” is checked. If this doesn’t work you might be able to enter diagnostic mode by unplugging the phone from the usb, taking out the battery, plug int he phone, and holding down the hot sync button.
2. Plug the phone in to your computer via usb. When you plug it in you should see 2 new devices recognized. Go ahead and install the drivers from above to that device (I believe 2 qualcomm devices show up when installing the driver, if one doesn’t work, just try the other).  The driver will assign it to a virtual COM port, you can set what COM it gets set to in the Device Manager settings.
3. Now you need to find out your SPC code. Open up UniCDMA and in the setup tab, set the COM to the COM port set in your Device Manager. Hit read all and you will should see all the fields get populated with information from the phone.
   
   Next go to the memory tab and you want to read 6 bytes from the address 0×00947F12.
   
   Click read and save to file. Then open up the file in a hex editor or just notepad and the first 6 characters should be your SPC.
4. Now comes the fun part, open up QPST Service Programmer and you should see your phone in the list.
   
   Open that phone up and then click “Read from phone”. This will prompt you for your SPC, enter the number you found in step #3. It will take 5 seconds or so for all the information to load from your phone.
   
   Before you continue its a good idea to backup all your phones settings by hitting “Save to file”. Now just enter “000000″ to the service programming field on the Settings tab (1st tab) and hit write to phone. Your SPC should now be changed to “000000″, you can test this by entering “##000000#” on the phone screen and a screen should show up saying “Activating your phone” where you can set your mobile number and MSID.
5. This step may not be necessary, but it wouldn’t hurt to do. You want to load Cricket’s PRL into your phone. When having your phone open and loaded in QPST Service Programmer go to the “Roam” tab, hit browse and select the PRL you want to load then write to phone.
   
   

Your Palm Centro should now officially be unlocked. I dont make any calls on my centro, so I am unsure about the significance of having the Cricket PRL loaded.  Also if you have a data plan, you might want to read this this forum thread about getting data working.

Resources:

• Howard Forums
• Google

Aside from a chat client, Skype is a great solution if you are looking to have another line. Currently I use my skype number as my office phone. At 3$/mo for unlimited calls, it is a steal. I have been shopping around for a good skype phone for a long while now and I have finally found one. The IPEVO S0-10W Wifi desktop skype phone. I have been using this for a few days now and it is great.

The phone features speed dial settings, 3 dedicated speed dial buttons, speaker phone, wifi capable, and a whole slew of other features. This phone is a nice compact size yet feels very sturdy when handling it. The buttons feel nice when you press them. You feel like you have really accomplished something while dialing a number. When I first pulled htis out of the box and plugged it in I was able to set it up in minutes. All I had to do was set the date and time and then sign in with my skype account. It will also automatically check for firmware updates, no need for a computer, completely indedpendent. Any settings you can set in the desktop skype client you can set on this phone (even your skype status and note).

Overall I am very happy with this phone. You can find this through IPEVO’s website.

Update: I just noticed that the base/handset has magnets in them to keep the handset on the base, very cool.

Ah the fun of naming servers, but what on earth are you going name them and how are you going to come up with 5, 10, 100, 500 different names? At my previous job and at home I used BSG callsigns to name machines. Apollo, starbuck, hilo, boomer, hotdog, etc. 

If you need some help naming machines, maybe these ideas will help you out.

Battlestar Galactica Callsigns 

• Apollo
• Starbuck
• Helo
• Boomer
• Hotdog 
• Athena
• Racetrack

Star Trek Characters

• Picard
• Riker
• Kirk
• Worf
• Data
• Spock
• Crusher
• Chakotay 
• Tuvoc
• Dax
• Kaelas 
• Odo

Simpsons Names

• Bart
• Lisa
• Homer
• Marge
• Maggie
• Moe
• Carl
• Lenny
• Barney
• Skinner
• Flanders

Rectal Foreign Bodies

This is the #1 upvoted and accepted answer via stackoverflow.

• Bottle
• Jar
• Lightbulb
• Tube
• Apple
• Bananna
• Icepick
• Flightlight
• Pen

If you need to name ALOT of machines, I suggest going for river names or mountain names. Almost endless amount of names you could use. Of course you could go with generated machine names, but actual names are easier to remember and a lot more fun.

[Via Stackoverflow]

I recently put a completely new rig together freaturing the new Intel i7 processor and let me tell you, this thing is a beast. Greatest x86 multitasking CPU out there. I went with the i7 920 @ 2.66ghz. This is a quad-core chip with 2 hardware threads on each core so a total of 8 cpus. 

Full specs:

• CPU: Intel i7 920 @ 2.66ghz
• Motherboard: Asus P6T Deluxe 
• RAM: Patriot DDR3-1333 1gb x4
• GPU: XFX GTX 260 Black Edition
• HDD: WD 300gb 2.5″ VelociRaptor 10k rpm
• PSU: CoolerMaster 750w

After purchasing and finally building and configuring my new system, I was looking through google trying to find more information on the i7 I just purchased and it came to my attention that the exact chip I bought is very over-clockable. 

The guys over at bit-tech.net were able to push their 920 up to 4ghz and they got some pretty good benchmark results. 

Tom’s Hardware was able to oc their chip to 3.8, but thats nothing compared to one of their users who got their i7 965 to 5ghz!

So after seeing how easy it was to overclock this thing and that I had the same hardware as most of these overclockers, I decided to give it a try for myself.

First I ran a couple benchmarks with stock settings and this is what I got. 

Then I was able to get my CPU up to 3.2ghz. I have stock cooling and some crap ram so I am kind of afraid to push any farther. Plus I am plenty happy at 3.2 anyways. 

These are the voltage and clocks I set:

• CPU Multiplier: 20
• Base Clock: 160
• DDR3 Frequency: 1280 (this is where I really regret buying the cheap ram because the next step up after 1280 is 1604 and if I try to push my ram past 1500 the whole system craps out. Though there is much more potential here if I got better ram.)
• CPU Voltage: 1.35
• CPU PLL Voltage: 1.90
• QPI/DRAM Core Voltage: 1.35
• CPU Differential Ampiltude: 800mV

There were a few CPU related features I turned off/on based on what I saw in the bit-tech article.

• C1E Support: Disabled
• Hardware Prefetcher: Enabled
• Adjacent Cache Line Prefetch: Enabled
• Intel Virtualization Tech: Disabled
• CPU TM Function: Disabled
• Execute Disable Bit: Enable
• Intel HT Technology: Enable
• Active Processor Cores: All
• A20M: Disabled
• Intel C-State Tech: Enabled
• C State package limit settings: Auto

I’m sure I could of gone to a higher clock speed and maybe I will once I get better cooling equipment and better ram. It seems that the DRAM clock and the over all CPU base clock are relational and I can only set the DRAM clock in certain 200mhz steps and those steps based on what the CPU base clock is at so my DRAM clock options are usually too high, or too low. Since my ram seems to crap out at around 1500mhz, the best thing for me to do is to try to take the CPU clock higher until I can hit a theoretical sweet spot clock speed (though it would still be better to have bought the better ram in the first place).