Viperfang Networks

This will not make much sense to 99.9% of the population.. but to a few people it will. Greetings from the UK!

There are some really tallented people out there that have made some brilliant remixes to the song “Still Alive” which occures at the end of the game “Portal” from Valve. Partially to bring them together, and partially to make sure they dont go missing, I have put them together here. If you are the author of one of these tracks and would prefer me to link to it insead of hosting it, please get in touch (via the comments) and we will sort it out!

All this work has / should have some attribution to John Coulton, for his brilliant work on Portal.

Remixes:

Title: The Device Has Been Modified v2 (A more polished version)
Artist: Victims of Science
Download

Title: The Device Has Been Modified
Artist: Victims of Science
Download

Title: Portal Beatz
Artist: (I have no idea!)
Download

Title: Triumph
Artist: MFE / Jonathan Coulton
Download

More to come…

With the idea of finding some boot roms, for some NIC’s that lack them, Ive been raiding a box of old computer equipment. As I didn’t have that much time I grabbed every chip that was in a socket,  below is what I found!

Above: Identified components. Part IDs are links to datasheets. If there is no link, I couldnt find the datasheet.

I have eight chips (Ok, so three are the same) which I can find no information on, any help appreciated!

[1st] (Qty: 3) 20 pin DIP Chip reads:
AAA1M304P-08
NMBS     9146

[2nd] (Qty: 1) 20 pin DIP Chip reads:
OTI068 850167-243
OAK TECHNOLOGY
INC A9202 501A

[3rd] (Qty: 1) 28 pin DIP Chip reads:
9205
OTI066ADV-66
OAK TECH.

[4th] (Qty: 1) 28 pin DIP Chip reads:
UMC
UM70C188
9446A
N20474

[5th] (Qty: 1) 28 pin DIP Chip reads (I know this one is a samsung) :
KDA0476CN-66
KOREA 219

[5th] (Qty: 1) 28 pin DIP Chip reads:
Winbond
W27F256-12
94401

I also got a stack of other eeproms, but the are all OPT (One time program) so they are useless to me. Im not binning then though, I have a project in mind. Well, 2. But an extreme voltage overload is only funny whilst you have 2 eyes.

So, if you have any datasheets that match the chips in the table above or you have any info (the data sheet would be amazing) for the chips listed as unknown, please send them to me!

I have the 30GB model of this brilliant little player.

The sound quality is good and the battery life is brilliant. It does not, however, play OGG, FLAC or SID files. It is because of this that I decided that I would like to run rockbox on it. This seemed like little more than an idea when I first looked into it, as there was only the beining of a project page open about it.

However, things have changed! It would appear that it is not too far off. There is a replacement bootloader and rockbox has been booted on one. It is not yet functional, but this is a very big step towards that.

I would liketo say a big thanks to everybody that has worked on Rockbox, not only the main application but the porting og it to various devices. It is something that, for the moment, is way more advanced than I am able to do.

I will be keeping an eye on this, I might soon be able to abandon restrictive MP3 for the open OGG Vorbis format.

I’ve picked up a Victorian mantle clock. I know nothing about them, except I love clockwork movements.

It does have 1 small problem…. it doesn’t run.

The movement has “(L.T.M)” stamped onto it around the rim of the face that is covered by the case. “9150″ is also visible there as well as on the pendulum and the back of the movement. “45″ is also present on the back of the movement.

The movement itself is run by a “going barrel” so that tension on the train is not lost during winding. This not only keeps the clock ticking, but improves time accuracy. The design is a generic design, used my many manufacturers, so no clues there. As the dial shows by the single key hole, it has no chime… Good!

On the bottom of the case, the number “105″ is clearly visible in the cement.

The face looks like an enammeed tin, due to its opacity, with painted roman numerals. There is some inscription on the back of the dial, but it looks like the bezel is holding it together. There is no way that that is going to be seen, shame, my curiosity is going to nag at me now.

I have been reliably informed that it looks like it was English made, due to some decent work on its construction, Bonus! The number “9150″ and “45″ could lead me back to the manufacturer of the movement (sans case, hands and dial), or maybe the jeweler who fitted the mech into a case etc. the 105? A serial or case type, although unlikely. It has been sujested that it was scratched there by a pawn broker to identify to him who sold it to him, nice eh?.  L.T.M could be the clock maker.

I have been informed that it is really hard to track this kind of thing, so I’ll probably do some googling, but I don’t hold much hope.

I know the case is slate, other than that, this is all I know about it. Any more information would be great!

The DVD is only there as a size guide.

Updated 12/11/2008: Added a few more chinks of info courtesy of DrJeep

So, I thought this would be a little bit of fun aswell as a bit educational. I have some parts lying around, and I wanted to give this a shot. I want this system to be able to:

• Burn ISO images of single layer DVD
• Burn the contents of a folder to DVD
• Duplicate discs
• Create ISOs of discs to HDD or network

All of this should be available via a remote interface, and all options should be able to use multiple drives.

So thats the idea, first step is the hardware. Here are the components I will be using:

• Lian Li case (It was recently made redundent) (4x 5.25″ bays 2x 3.5″ 3x 3.5″ HDD bays)
• 350W PSU (Not branded)
• 300W PSU Codegen
• PSU Tester (to bring the second PSU online)
• AOpen AK77 Pro-A 133 Motherboard
• AMD Athlon 2100+ XP
• Arctic Cooling Copper Silent 2 (CPU Heatsync and Fan)
• 512MB DDR 400 (That’s PC3200) (Thanks to Steve Peace (http://www.stevepearce.info))
• nVidia GeForce MX-440 8X 64MB
• Realtek RTL8169S Gigabit Ethernet NIC (Unfortunately no boot ROM)
• Fujitsu MPC3065AH (6.5GB) IDE - This will be the system drive
• Maxtor 90651U2 (6.5GB) IDE - Temp drive (For disc images)
• Pioneer DVR-109 IDE
• Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7170A IDE (Only reads/writes DVDs - It was free)
• Toshiba Samsung SH-S182 IDE
• NEC ND-3550A IDE
• iTE IT8212F IDE Controller (2 channel)
• Floppy Drive (was already in the case, dont need the bay and I can’t see a blanking plate)
• 2x 120mm fan

As I have a floppy drive, might consider grabbing that as a boot record…

Ok, so I’ve hooked it all up, and mounted the PSU on the top of the case (temporarily) with cable ties and black tape.

( Click pics to see bigger versions )

Now that its all together, lets see if it boots!

It didn’t at first, but I reseated the memory and now it runs as expected. Now for the software!

Everyone in this world is significant, often more so than you would think. If you asked ten married people, for example, how they met their wife, how many of them would tell you an obscure story about how they bumped into them whilst shopping, she dropped the eggs and they started talking? Such a simple act introduced two people that otherwise would never had met.

Annother example could be that you got lost in some obscure town when you went for a drive, but instead of asking for directions, you pulled the sat nav out of the glove box and hit the big “take me home” button. You never went to the little coffee shop that was the only one open that sunday and sat with the girl at the coffee bar and asked, “Where the hell am I?”.

Has technology made us less social? Is it removing those little meaningless interactions with other people? How many times has a GPS or some other piece of technology got in the way of meeting someone who you will now never meet but could have been the best mate you would ever find? Or did she sell you the GPS?

It really is amazing the lengths people go to, just to avoid doing something. For those who do not know what procrastination is, here are a couple of definitions:

> the act of procrastinating; putting off or delaying or defering an action to a later time
> dilatoriness: slowness as a consequence of not getting around to it

Sound familiar? Thought it might!

So far I have updated my website, posted countless (alright… quite a few… I really can’t be bothered to count them) entries on twitter not to forget various other bits of code and website trickery.

It is amazing how ones prorities can so easily be altered, just because you dont want to do it. Yet it is the thing that needs to be done the most.

On with the coursework I guess…

My static page with html, css and php seem to no longer cut it for me. I have never got around to actually writing my admin area. I have decided to use a combination of word press and a wiki instead.

This, however, was not my idea. Steve Pearce put me onto the idea. I have had a small blog which I have only recently started to use. It does seem to be one of the easier ways of doing things.

Alot of areas of this site shall remain. The projects page will move into multiple pages in a projects catagory for instance, but they will still be located at http://projects.viperfang.net/project-name-here as this allows very easy management of files. Including updates and news items, although I may add a framework for my projects in the future.

As you may notice, this site is more than a little bare… or should I say less than…

Over the next couple of days I will be building up the entries… you can always subscribe to the feed to keep a check on whats going on!

My name on the internet is Viperfang. I live in a 3 bedroom house with my mum, still at college, cash is a bit tight, and I spend most of that time on one of my computers.

Every time I go online i use it to sign into almost everything. I think I have done this to the point where I respond quicker to viperfang than my real name.

I think that when I am on the internet I am a different person almost. Like split personalities but not so extereme. Maybe just a more confident, happier person.