Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bd139]

Completely agree there. But sometimes I want to sit on the sofa and chill

[Mr. Scram]

Can't argue with the efficiency of a laptop though, or those little boxes bd139 bought.

[Specmaster]

I do as it happens, have an i7 laptop, but its built like a tank and is designed for hard work, problem is though, I once thought like you, sofa, chilling etc, but the truth of the matter is the noise of typing annoyed SWMBO when she was watching the blasted soaps ( ) and of course, the battery life is not great. They get hot very quickly on your laptop as your clothing restricts the cooling air flow and if you plug them into the mains while using them, the cable becomes yet another hazard with the potential of doing massive damage to them if some gets the feet caught up with the cable. Consequently, my 2 laptops, are sitting beneath my bench with batteries that need charging up because they go flat all the time because they are not used 

Laptops are perfectly fine for business people who might need to use one in a customers premises to do a presentation etc but otherwise IMO they are a waste of money.

[Specmaster]

Can't argue with the efficiency of a laptop though, or those little boxes bd139 bought.

Equally you can't argue with the efficiency of a city car or indeed a bubble car (which I used to have) but you certainly would not want to drive very far in one 

[McBryce]

oopsie. have a look at Louis Rossmann's channel if you want to learn everything about Macbooks you never wanted to know ...

Watching Louis just confirms all the reasons why I stay miles away from anything Apple makes. My first and last Apple acqusition was an iPod which as a device I like, but the fact that I need a >110MB program just to shovel MP3's over a USB connection makes me mad every time I need to use it.

McBryce.

[Mr. Scram]

I do as it happens, have an i7 laptop, but its built like a tank and is designed for hard work, problem is though, I once thought like you, sofa, chilling etc, but the truth of the matter is the noise of typing annoyed SWMBO when she was watching the blasted soaps ( ) and of course, the battery life is not great. They get hot very quickly on your laptop as your clothing restricts the cooling air flow and if you plug them into the mains while using them, the cable becomes yet another hazard with the potential of doing massive damage to them if some gets the feet caught up with the cable. Consequently, my 2 laptops, are sitting beneath my bench with batteries that need charging up because they go flat all the time because they are not used 

Laptops are perfectly fine for business people who might need to use one in a customers premises to do a presentation etc but otherwise IMO they are a waste of money.

I don't think the issues you're having are hardware related. The truth of the matter is that a modestly specced laptop is up to the job in almost every case. Sometimes you need more oomph and that's where the desktop shines. High performance laptops always seem to be a worst of two worlds compromise.

[Mr. Scram]

Equally you can't argue with the efficiency of a city car or indeed a bubble car (which I used to have) but you certainly would not want to drive very far in one 

Almost every owner of an exotic car also has a much more practical car to get around, which is likely used a lot more. Horses for courses.

[Wolfgang]

Yes apart from keyboard the two main annoyances...

Ooops there goes my top end i7 15" MBP... dropped 3 inches  £400 that cost
 


USB-C only on the MBA... 



Will stick with the thinkpads for now.

Thats why I much prefer proper desktops or towers, greatly reduces the risk of damage to them, plus of course far more powerful and better air flow thus cooling making then far more capable of being used for extended periods or even 24/7.

Now its an UPPLE  . Get away from this GULAG of extraordinary prices ! 

[mnementh]

With newer vengeance memory, none of my Ryzen systems boot, they just do not pass POST, even though they are running at slowest settings.   Older vengeance modules did work, and the ones I have here do POST without any issues in Windows systems.   It's a weird incompatibility, but apparently I am not the only one experiencing the issue.

in the attachment you can see passmark 9600k vs Ryzen 5 3600x. You can easily recognize the Ryzen from the CPU marks, it is at about ~21000, whereas the i5 is at roughly 14000.
Beware, there is a Zotac 2060 in the i5 and a Zotac 2070 in the Ryzen, therefor the graphics scores cannot really be compared.

Both are nice systems though.

PassMark 9 on a Ryzen 3xxx is cheating (at least on the percentile aspect); you're only comparing yourself against the fastest last-gen tech (Ryzen2xxx). They had to rescale with PassMark 10 just for the new Ryzens.

Try raising the RAM voltage in BIOS .02 to .05V over that in the XMP profile. (this is the voltage at which the RAM's over-clock-ability is "learned" on boot); it will probably boot fine with XMP enabled. I had to raise mine to 1.39V vs 1.35V in the profile; this was determined per the OC Calc created by 1usmus. Slightly higher voltages here can result in dramatic increases in the auto-OC provided by some MB's FW. 

Cheers,

mnem
 

[Saskia]

Hi Mnem,

the problem is that the Stick is not recognized at all during POST.
It works fine in an Intel machine-

[Specmaster]

Equally you can't argue with the efficiency of a city car or indeed a bubble car (which I used to have) but you certainly would not want to drive very far in one 

Almost every owner of an exotic car also has a much more practical car to get around, which is likely used a lot more. Horses for courses.

I was not talking about exotic cars, just about normal everyday family cars. To me a city car is small, easy to park, small engined but capable of the 20-30MPH speed limits and thus economical and normally carrying just 1 occupant. Family car capable of carrying up to 4 average sized people and capable of meeting the national speed limits while still being reasonably  economical and an exotic car is something that is capable of far more in terms of sheer speed, performance but can be a single seater or more and would normally be used for sheer pleasure or a statement piece.

I certainly would not want to drive a city car on a trip from say London to Bristol but I'd gladly do that in a family car. You may have other views however I suspect that not many would would use a city car for journeys which involved speed limits of 40mph and higher.

[Specmaster]

With newer vengeance memory, none of my Ryzen systems boot, they just do not pass POST, even though they are running at slowest settings.   Older vengeance modules did work, and the ones I have here do POST without any issues in Windows systems.   It's a weird incompatibility, but apparently I am not the only one experiencing the issue.

in the attachment you can see passmark 9600k vs Ryzen 5 3600x. You can easily recognize the Ryzen from the CPU marks, it is at about ~21000, whereas the i5 is at roughly 14000.
Beware, there is a Zotac 2060 in the i5 and a Zotac 2070 in the Ryzen, therefor the graphics scores cannot really be compared.

Both are nice systems though.

PassMark 9 on a Ryzen 3xxx is cheating (at least on the percentile aspect); you're only comparing yourself against the fastest last-gen tech (Ryzen2xxx). They had to rescale with PassMark 10 just for the new Ryzens.

Try raising the RAM voltage in BIOS .02 to .05V over that in the XMP profile. (this is the voltage at which the RAM's over-clock-ability is "learned" on boot); it will probably boot fine with XMP enabled. I had to raise mine to 1.39V vs 1.35V in the profile; this was determined per the OC Calc created by 1usmus. Slightly higher voltages here can result in dramatic increases in the auto-OC provided by some MB's FW. 

Cheers,

mnem
 

I don't like overclocking, I run mine at stock speed for longevity.

[mnementh]

Perfect mnem, just the sort of stuff I wanted needed to know. Much appreciated. 

Fairly sure in the never throw out pile I have some old LPG BBQ regs with perished hoses and just maybe, some that aren't sealed so to bodge the diaphragm spring to 2 PSI.
I tried tweaking one for a 3 ring burner and could never get enough gas flow/pressure to get the thing fair roaring to get my big spud pot hot enough however I do have a 15 PSI LPG regulator .....a dumb thing at that with zero in the way of gauges and preset pressure.   Maybe I should just cut and run with that, whaddya reckon ?
Anyways, with yours and Pats tips and bit more Gurgling and some trial and error should get me sorted.

If you can add a 3PSI gauge and get the pressure down, might be worth a try. Otherwise, for safety's sake, I'll recommend you live with the low pressure/flow of a BBQ reg and limit yourself to thinner metal rather than trying to run without knowing what your pressure really is.

oopsie. have a look at Louis Rossmann's channel if you want to learn everything about Macbooks you never wanted to know ...

I'd rather stand in the middle of a busy off-ramp and drill screws through my feet anymore. If half the things he's heard or made up about Apple are true, they're built by slave baby yodas, powered by the life-force of infants, and the OS is composed of actual demons, not daemons... 

Hi Mnem,

the problem is that the Stick is not recognized at all during POST. It works fine in an Intel machine-

As in, it will post if mixed with other RAM, but not even seen? Or as in will POST if set to boot by SPD, but no POST if XMP is enabled? The latter was my situation, and I'll say, it's very hard to believe it wouldn't boot with XMP disabled. That's running at like P5 speeds*. 

mnem
*okay, slight exaggeration. But still... your watch should be able to run at those speeds.

[Saskia]

as in: the machine will not post with the stick as its only one, it will post but not initialize/recognize the stick even without XMP. I cannot overvolt, because I don't get to the BIOS screen.
Once again, it works fine in Intels.

[mnementh]

oopsie. have a look at Louis Rossmann's channel if you want to learn everything about Macbooks you never wanted to know ...

I know of Rossman and know all about his opinion. In fact I've had an argument with him on here because I disagree with him almost universally. In this day and age, FRU replacement maximum or just recycle the device entirely. It's not worth repairing stuff unless it's simple FRU replacement unless you're an enthusiast or scrap collector (I am arguably both).

Really he's running a quite successful marketing operation that preys on people who didn't get AppleCare or other insurance, didn't back up their shit or hang out on YT. His reputation is entirely undeserved or at least on par with any other premium high street repairer. I would use none of his hardware after board level repair other than for DR. Get your data off and dispose of it quickly. It's a liability once the board is compromised.

Really the killer is don't buy it if you can't afford to replace it or don't know how to use it. He's got a lot of customers who fit both those categories. The only valuable thing in IT is solving problems and generating new knowledge and charging for it. Hardware is mostly moot as it's so damn cheap these days. Selling the repair lie these days is unethical I think.

Agreed. Aside from replacing a busted screen or port, fuggitt. Some of the bodges I've seen him do I would literally not GIVE away; would never EVER let it out of the shop.    I'd only do them to resurrect a machine long enough to recover lost data.   

mnem
 

[Saskia]

I cannot see what's wrong with swapping out a charge chip ...
These things do blow up, I don't see any reason not to fix it.

[mnementh]

as in: the machine will not post with the stick as its only one, it will post but not initialize/recognize the stick even without XMP. I cannot overvolt, because I don't get to the BIOS screen. Once again, it works fine in Intels.

Yup. Gotcha. That may be a FW bug I've read about where the MB doesn't properly roll back to SPD/JEDEC settings when it can't initialize the RAM. Can you boot it with other RAM long enough to disable XMP or crank up the RAM voltage?

I cannot see what's wrong with swapping out a charge chip ...  These things do blow up, I don't see any reason not to fix it.

[EDIT]

The charge chip is like one of a handful of legitimate "fixes" in the hundreds of repairs he's done online. Even that "fix" is problematic in that is there's a lot more than JUST the charge chip in that circuit, and you don't know if it was damaged by reverse-polarity or arcing or if other components have been damaged but are in "walking dead" mode, hanging on by their toenails but going to fail in a day or a month. This is an increasingly common phenomenon since the advent of Apple-style micro-miniaturization; the more complex things get, the smaller they get, the less forgiving they get.

Apple understands this; it is part of why they don't give a duck what Rossman thinks about them sealing their shit up tighter than a frog's arsehole; they're trying to make it a PITA to dick around inside their shit so the fumbducks get frustrated and move on, or ideally hear that it's a PITA and don't even bother.

mnem
 

[Mr. Scram]

I was not talking about exotic cars, just about normal everyday family cars. To me a city car is small, easy to park, small engined but capable of the 20-30MPH speed limits and thus economical and normally carrying just 1 occupant. Family car capable of carrying up to 4 average sized people and capable of meeting the national speed limits while still being reasonably  economical and an exotic car is something that is capable of far more in terms of sheer speed, performance but can be a single seater or more and would normally be used for sheer pleasure or a statement piece.

I certainly would not want to drive a city car on a trip from say London to Bristol but I'd gladly do that in a family car. You may have other views however I suspect that not many would would use a city car for journeys which involved speed limits of 40mph and higher.

Have you driven any of the modern city cars? They've become surprisingly mature cars. Long distance driving tends to be somewhat more comfortable in a larger car of equivalent age, but the difference isn't nearly as profound as it used to be. When I add in the additional fuel and maintenance costs I'm not sure which I prefer. The city car is definitely more fun.

[Saskia]

@mnem: nope. It won't get through post, the screen is black, the fan keeps blowing at max setting and does not tune down, ...

[mnementh]

Hmmm... hard to say. May just be a random timing incompatibility. they do still happen. 

mnem

[bd139]

Heads up. Good stuff on eBay UK only https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/124174495081

See sellers other items as well.

[bd139]

I was not talking about exotic cars, just about normal everyday family cars. To me a city car is small, easy to park, small engined but capable of the 20-30MPH speed limits and thus economical and normally carrying just 1 occupant. Family car capable of carrying up to 4 average sized people and capable of meeting the national speed limits while still being reasonably  economical and an exotic car is something that is capable of far more in terms of sheer speed, performance but can be a single seater or more and would normally be used for sheer pleasure or a statement piece.

I certainly would not want to drive a city car on a trip from say London to Bristol but I'd gladly do that in a family car. You may have other views however I suspect that not many would would use a city car for journeys which involved speed limits of 40mph and higher.

Have you driven any of the modern city cars? They've become surprisingly mature cars. Long distance driving tends to be somewhat more comfortable in a larger car of equivalent age, but the difference isn't nearly as profound as it used to be. When I add in the additional fuel and maintenance costs I'm not sure which I prefer. The city car is definitely more fun.

Think mine is classified as a city car (Citroen c3). Absolutely great long distance. Also only 1.0L and runs on gnats farts. I haven’t put any petrol in it since February now  . Think in the 2 years I’ve had it, it’s cost me £520 inc full service. My fathers Range Rover that he had would eat 3x that every service.

[Saskia]

argl. I would like that beast, but I am not in the UK, and my contacts have a stiff upper scottish lip and tell me that my English sucks ...

Nice stuff he has ...

[Saskia]

my city car is a small Ford, a 2003 Expedition ...

[Mr. Scram]

my city car is a small Ford, a 2003 Expedition ...

When "fuel economy" means buying enough fuel to keep the economy afloat.