Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[Vince]

Agree that the screen is toast. Regarding the image, my "route of least resistance" on Win & Linux is called Balena Etcher. The Linux version comes as "App image", no installing or even compiling necessary! Yes, it is all simplified and has few colorfull big buttons, not like Linux at all  But so far, it has not failed me to do the job!

Google pointed me to that S/W, so I have already tried it before you posted. It did the job but warned me that, to it/him, the ISO I gave was NOT bootable ?! 
...and when I try to boot from it, it fails. The lapto does recognize that there is a USB stick, the boot menu does list it as a bootable device but.. .when I select that, it boots Windows on the HDD instead...
So that means it failed to boot from the USB stick. So maybe  Etcher was right and the ISO is not bootable ?!
Weird... I picked it from the old Ubuntu repositories, that ISO file worked fine back in the day, I don't see how it would not be bootable today 
but who knows... I will download another ISO file just in case...

I Picked this one : version 10.10 i386 "Alternate" installer (not the live CD) :

https://old-releases.ubuntu.com/releases/10.10/ubuntu-10.10-alternate-i386.iso

[Specmaster]

Speak for yourself grandad!    The only time I've driven a car with crossply tyres was literally sitting on my dad's knee.

I was of course thinking of people of similar age to me, I'm 73 and yes, old enough to be a grandad. In the 1960's when I learnt to drive, radial tyres were the domain of the very expensive cars and family cars used crossply tyres hence why I mentioned them, and they had considerably less grip than radials. So people who learnt to drive on those, also quickly learnt how to stay within the safe zone.

[BU508A]

but who knows... I will download another ISO file just in case...

I Picked this one : version 10.10 i386 "Alternate" installer (not the live CD) :

https://old-releases.ubuntu.com/releases/10.10/ubuntu-10.10-alternate-i386.iso

If you want to have a linux tool collection, I'd recommend grml:  https://grml.org/

[factory]

A very quick post, that will be lost amongst all this car crap. 

Tek 422 with AC/DC power option is now working again.        

You may now resume the usual motor vehicle related nonsense.

Are you gonna make a battery pack too? What solution if so...?

mnem
                         
I vote for 18650s and commodity BMS module...

Not sure what to do with that part yet, sadly as the original batteries are gone, that also means the frame that held them in place, with the built-in connections is also missing, no pictures on Tek wiki, the only reference is in the manual.

It did come with both the AC power cord & an unused DC power cord, here are some pictures together with the AC/DC PSU boards that aren't on Tek wiki.


DC power converter board before repair.



DC converter step up transformer & one of the switching transistors.



DC power control board.


The battery pack connected to the two banana plugs.


Fuses, AC/DC power inlet & selector switch.


Some views of the construction, it's impossible to separate the boards without desoldering the connections to the step up transformer, I had to work from the topside of the PCB, as I sometimes do with the HP stuff.



Back of the Type 422 scope with PSU removed.


DC power converter board after repair, one blown Sprague 109D wet tant, one shorted Kemet solid tant and the diodes, one was shorted & the other open circuit.



Reassembled & both inputs checked again with the HP 209A.


David

[factory]

Extra pictures for post above.

[Vince]

Will keep digging. Maybe I can download a different utility that does that same thing, or find instructions on how to do it from the command line.

commands are in blue
warnings are in red

- login to your linux machine
- download bootable linux image, e.g. lubuntu.img
- open two console windows
- on the first console become root: su -
- go to the directory, where lubuntu.img is - let's assume, the image has this path:  /home/vince/download/lubuntu.img and the directory is /home/vince/download/
- on the second console do a:  tail -f /var/log/syslog
- on the second window: press several times enter - this makes it easier to spot the new entries
- now plugin an empty USB stick. recommended size: at least double the size of lubuntu.img
- watch the console window with the running tail command. look out for something like /dev/sdb, /dev/sdc etc.
- write down your finding - let's assume, you've found /dev/sdc
- now on the console window where you are root, do this. Be careful! Using the wrong parameter for "of=" can destroy your OS immediately!
  command:  dd if=/home/vince/download/lubuntu.img of=/dev/sdc bs=512 status=progress
  explanation:
  bs is the blocksize in Byte
  status=progress will give you status updates of the progress
- now wait until dd has finished its work
- unplug the USB stick
- plug it into the computer you want to check
- boot from USB stick
- done

HTH

When I failed with "Etcher", I tried with dd, usng this article Google found for me :

https://vitux.com/ubuntu-bootable-usb-stick/

Does that same things as you but with a larger BS of 4M , and adds the oflag  "sync", whatever that does.

sudo dd bs=4M if=/path/to/ISOfile of=/dev/sdx status=progress oflag=sync

So I tried that, and it still won't boot 

[BU508A]

Try grml. worked for me all the time.
Edit:
once grml has been booted, it comes up with the ksh zsh on the console. If you don't like the zsh, do this: exec bash

[mansaxel]

Make a bootable USB stick and you have USB-HDD.
Lubuntu is light.

Just downlaoded an old Ubuntu ISO, 10.10 , that is, which came out right after that laptop was released.

Linux, for all its amateuristic bloat, useless init system replacements, and other warts, will usually work fine on old hardware too. You do not, repeat NOT, want to run an old release. That is dangerous and full of now discovered bugs. 

Get the latest network install image for a Linux distro that you want; it usually is about 500MiB disk image, comes in variants for burning to CD or dd'ing to USB sticks.  Make sure you get the right CPU type, 64- or 32-bit and so on.

Follow BU's instructions on writing it out to a memory stick, and go along.

[Vince]

No, I need an old version that contemporary of that machine (so that the drivers are in the kernel). Modern Linux needs 4GB of RAM, laptop only has one.

Don't care about bugs, have been using Linux for 20 years now, bugs are never fixed. It's just a huge pile of bugs that somehow kinda works, it's a miracle that it works at all...

[Vince]

Download a different ISO file, 11.04 this time.

I used dd using BU's parameters this time.

Still won't boot.

I give up, moving on....

[BU508A]

Download a different ISO file, 11.04 this time.

I used dd using BU's parameters this time.

Still won't boot.

I give up, moving on....

I don't know what you are doing. 
Download the grml iso image, it comes in a dual-boot version.
Quote:
"Grml provides an excellent selection of software packages for installation, deployment and system rescue. You'll get sysadmin's favourite tools. Choose between a x86 and an amd64 version depending on your needs or just grab the multiboot ISO grml96, providing 64bit and 32bit ISOs in one single place."

With this, you should be able to boot from USB. As I wrote: it never failed to me. 

[Specmaster]

By dint of good luck BWM supply their own aftermarket dashcam, which I won't be getting as it's ~£500 fitted for something that's on a par with £100-£150 dashcams from other suppliers. BUT, there are fitting instructions available from BMW that even call out the correct spare fuse slots that you should use to supply switched and unswitched power to the dashcam. Nice.

Perhaps its worth pointing out that you need to make sure that the dashcam actually supports the dual feed, most that I have seen don't, and operate solely on a 2 core cable, which might explain why the BMW camera is so much more expensive because it  is configured to accept a permanent feed that is switched by the car being hit hard enough for a vibration switch to activate the camera when in the parked mode and when it receives a start signal from the ignition switch on its switched feed line, switches the dashcam into being fully awake and recording as long as the start signal is present.

It's the other way around, because I've been looking at dashcams that have three wire power feeds that I was looking at how to fit one on  the BMW. The third wire is not an impact sensor feed, it's just the normal ACC wire that would switch on, say, a radio while it takes a +12V on another wire to keep it alive. Dashcams repurpose this to differentiate the car being in 'ignition on' and 'ignition off' and so switching into 'surveillance mode' when parked.

The BMW camera is so much more expensive not because it has any advanced features but because it has a BMW logo on it.

Hmm, you may need to double-check the dashcam for 2 or 3 wire connections. This video shows a quality dashcam from Nextbase  which is a mid-range dashcam supplier. As you see in this video, it is wired to switch on with the ignition switch so that it is always ON when you are driving and there is no chance for you to forget to turn the camera on. Watch closely when he wires it up, and you will see it is, the same as mine, a 2 wire device so that when the ignition is off and the car parked up, the dashcam is deactivated.

[Vince]

Download a different ISO file, 11.04 this time.

I used dd using BU's parameters this time.

Still won't boot.

I give up, moving on....

I don't know what you are doing. 
Download the grml iso image, it comes in a dual-boot version.
Quote:
"Grml provides an excellent selection of software packages for installation, deployment and system rescue. You'll get sysadmin's favourite tools. Choose between a x86 and an amd64 version depending on your needs or just grab the multiboot ISO grml96, providing 64bit and 32bit ISOs in one single place."

With this, you should be able to boot from USB. As I wrote: it never failed to me. 

OK I just downloaded the grml bootable ISO, the double big mac version, 1.5GB, 32+64bits.
Googling it, looks like the Atom CPU was a mixed bag in this regard : 64 bit on desktop, but 32 bit on laptops.
I used Etcher for convenience and the laptop seems to like it, it boots, yeah !! 

Don't know why the Ubuntu ISO don't work... they always work when I burn them onto a CD to install on my desktop computer 

OK so I wanted to start paying with grml, but big problem : looks like the guy who wrote it does NOT like French people !
Once I have booted the thing, it asked me to set my keyboard layout, great but... it gives only 4 or 5 choices, like German Spanish or American but NO French ?! 

It's a huge mess, I can't type anything, I am screwed, can't go further 

EDIT : OK I painfully managed toi type the command "grml-lang" and it gave the option to set a French layout, PHEW !

Will run cfdisk to wipe the zillion partitions Lenovo put on the HDD, then try to install Debian on the disk. Let's see...
Need to do that before running the installer, because it let's you select what partition you want to use, but does not let you delete/create partitions on the fly.
So I need to partition first, then only run the installer.

[mansaxel]

No, I need an old version that contemporary of that machine (so that the drivers are in the kernel). Modern Linux needs 4GB of RAM, laptop only has one.

Don't care about bugs, have been using Linux for 20 years now, bugs are never fixed. It's just a huge pile of bugs that somehow kinda works, it's a miracle that it works at all...

That is plainly wrong.

• Drivers are still in the kernel, or as modules, even for very ancient things.  I run Kernel 5.something on 2005 hardware. No problems.
• I'd guess 1GiB RAM is sufficent to boot any Linux kernel. The apps are different, of course.
• Bugs are your problem too. And they get fixed; it pays to run updates religiously. If you run insecure code and happen to get something infected, your machine will be a drone worker spewing shit on others

In your case, you'll have serious usability problems from ancient TLS libs and defaults, even before the non-updated CA store will cause you to reject half the world as is.

[mansaxel]

it gives only 4 or 5 choices, like German Spanish or American but NO French ?! 

That's because AZERTY (and to some extent QWERTZ) is  Wrong.

 

[Vince]

The installer fails BU !

See below...   

Anyway, at least I managed to make a bootable USB stick, get the laptop to boot from it, and Linux managed to load so.... it's still a victory.

So I will try other Linux install disks until I find one that works...
I am very curious to understand why the fuck the Ubuntu ISO can't boot, it's nonsensical.

[Vince]

No, I need an old version that contemporary of that machine (so that the drivers are in the kernel). Modern Linux needs 4GB of RAM, laptop only has one.

Don't care about bugs, have been using Linux for 20 years now, bugs are never fixed. It's just a huge pile of bugs that somehow kinda works, it's a miracle that it works at all...

That is plainly wrong.

• Drivers are still in the kernel, or as modules, even for very ancient things.  I run Kernel 5.something on 2005 hardware. No problems.
• I'd guess 1GiB RAM is sufficent to boot any Linux kernel. The apps are different, of course.
• Bugs are your problem too. And they get fixed; it pays to run updates religiously. If you run insecure code and happen to get something infected, your machine will be a drone worker spewing shit on others

In your case, you'll have serious usability problems from ancient TLS libs and defaults, even before the non-updated CA store will cause you to reject half the world as is.

Yes, that's why I said what I said !  Linux is useless to me on this laptop if I can't run a desktop and apps ! 

[mansaxel]

TE update:  Finally won a 2465, and it's as I've hinted (at least on Discord) a 2465CTS! It's fairly close to me, pickup only, and I'll try organising that during coming week. More info as I have it.

[mansaxel]

Yes, that's why I said what I said !  Linux is useless to me on this laptop if I can't run a desktop and apps ! 

Your challenge will be to fit a web browser in those MiB; the rest will work just fine. 1GiB is lots of RAM for all real problems; it's only too small for problems unsolved and bodged by throwing-hardware-at-them methods.  (Yes, that is pretty untrue for some real problems, but unless you design jet engines or are avoiding to have to actually test your nuclear weapon, you're mostly safe from those fringe cases.)

Important note: It is generally a violation of the AUP to make high-energy physics calculations on most Japanese supercomputers.

[Zucca]

Leaving computers in charge is no substitute for learning to drive properly

AMEN!

Ditto. 100%. 

I never said that a computer can substitute a good driver. I agree with you all.
You seem not to understand that the same computer is design to save your ass, and it can help to learn how to drive properly if you know how it works (in this case do your experiments NOT in public roads, once again).

Just want to be clear, if you deactivate the DSC or any stability system on public road you are risking your life and the lifes of other driver on the same road with you.
D O  N O T   D O   T H A T   I N   A N Y   C I  R C U M S T A N C E S !

If you do not agree with me it is fine, your choice, your freedom, your life.... I sincerely hope you will not regreat your choice one day in the future.

This is my last message about this topic.

[Cerebus]

By dint of good luck BWM supply their own aftermarket dashcam, which I won't be getting as it's ~£500 fitted for something that's on a par with £100-£150 dashcams from other suppliers. BUT, there are fitting instructions available from BMW that even call out the correct spare fuse slots that you should use to supply switched and unswitched power to the dashcam. Nice.

Perhaps its worth pointing out that you need to make sure that the dashcam actually supports the dual feed, most that I have seen don't, and operate solely on a 2 core cable, which might explain why the BMW camera is so much more expensive because it  is configured to accept a permanent feed that is switched by the car being hit hard enough for a vibration switch to activate the camera when in the parked mode and when it receives a start signal from the ignition switch on its switched feed line, switches the dashcam into being fully awake and recording as long as the start signal is present.

It's the other way around, because I've been looking at dashcams that have three wire power feeds that I was looking at how to fit one on  the BMW. The third wire is not an impact sensor feed, it's just the normal ACC wire that would switch on, say, a radio while it takes a +12V on another wire to keep it alive. Dashcams repurpose this to differentiate the car being in 'ignition on' and 'ignition off' and so switching into 'surveillance mode' when parked.

The BMW camera is so much more expensive not because it has any advanced features but because it has a BMW logo on it.

Hmm, you may need to double-check the dashcam for 2 or 3 wire connections. This video shows a quality dashcam from Nextbase  which is a mid-range dashcam supplier. As you see in this video, it is wired to switch on with the ignition switch so that it is always ON when you are driving and there is no chance for you to forget to turn the camera on. Watch closely when he wires it up, and you will see it is, the same as mine, a 2 wire device so that when the ignition is off and the car parked up, the dashcam is deactivated.

As I said "I've been looking at dashcams that have three wire power feeds", I don't think I could have made it any plainer. I know that they have three wire feeds, it's part of my selection criteria because I want it on the car battery, not the internal battery, when it is recording in parking mode.

[Cerebus]

Leaving computers in charge is no substitute for learning to drive properly

AMEN!

Ditto. 100%. 

I never said that a computer can substitute a good driver. I agree with you all.
You seem not to understand that the same computer is design to save your ass, and it can help to learn how to drive properly if you know how it works (in this case do your experiments NOT in public roads, once again).

Just want to be clear, if you deactivate the DSC or any stability system on public road you are risking your life and the lifes of other driver on the same road with you.
D O  N O T   D O   T H A T   I N   A N Y   C I  R C U M S T A N C E S !

If you do not agree with me it is fine, your choice, your freedom, your life.... I sincerely hope you will not regreat your choice one day in the future.

This is my last message about this topic.

That is a hysterical overstatement of any risks, couched as fact, a definitive statement. Not even an "in my opinion". You can get away with "That's my opinion and my last message on it", but making a definitive statement as if of fact and then refusing to engage won't alter the fact that your claim is unsupported and unsupportable; and indeed quite cogent and sensible points have been made that undermine it by several people. Taking a position like that, in that way, is made worse by the implicit condemnation of others in "you are risking your life and the lifes of other driver on the same road". It the smacks of an ex cathedra statement rather than how one expects an engineer to engage in debate on an engineering question.

Dirty pool, old chap, dirty pool.

[vk6zgo]

Activation of a car's advanced safety systems should never just rely on a warning light in the instrument cluster, it should also be accompanied by at least an audio alert to make it unmissable to the driver that their style of driving is forcing one or more of the cars safety features to be activated.

Edit:
My car has both light and audio alerts for such events, I remember sitting in a side road, waiting to join a major road by turning left. That turn was also going uphill, and on this occasion it had been raining. As I stepped on the throttle to slot into a gap in the fast moving traffic, because of the cars' attitude, the wet road, the throttle being applied and the cars weight transferred to the offside, it caused the nearside front wheel to spin (FWD) and the traction control kicked in, alerting me via audio bonging and a flashing light.

Just a note because we have lots of non-native English speakers here: "Nearside" is a UK term for the passenger side of the vehicle (ie: the the side nearest the pavement) and "Farside" or "Offside" for right. I don't think this term is used anywhere else in the world and definitely not used in foreign languages, so I thought it's worth mentioning.

McBryce.

And doubly confusing because you Brits and Irish drive on the wrong side of the road. 

And Australians, & New Zealanders, & Indians, & Japanese, & South Africans, & various others.......

But, I doubt that "nearside" & "farside" are current usage anywhere else---after all, the Poms call the mudguards (OK, "fenders') "wings"!

[vk6zgo]

Well, that was not too hard so far, especially with all the transistors socketed.

Looks like the 7704A blew two transistors in the CRT intensity circuit (Q4163 and Q4175), part number 151-0223-00 for both, apparently they are 2N4275 parts.
Now to see if I have any, or find a substitute. Any ideas?

NTE123A direct cross. But Amazon is out of stock. NTEPartsDirect has them but doesn't ship to Japan. Have you looked at Ebay for exact replacement?

If you can't get a replacement let me know and I'll buy here and ship to you.

 

Edit......I just checked Ebay and there's many sources but I dunno if they ship to Japan. And most are in plastic cases. I'll bet yours are metal cans which really shouldn't make a difference.

Cool, thanks for the info. I'll see what I can get shipped to Japan before I bother you with errands.

All these transistors in my unit are plastic, it's a 3xxxxx serial number, so maybe a later one. But in practice, metal or plastic is fine, as long as it works. 

Have you checked this website?
https://alltransistors.com/transistor.php?transistor=4051

This is their suggestion for replacing the 2N4275. No idea, how accurate it is.
https://alltransistors.com/crsearch.php?mat=Si&struct=NPN&pc=0.28&ucb=40&uce=15&ueb=4&ic=0.1&tj=125&ft=400&cc=4&hfe=30&caps=TO106

I have little faith in equivalents lists.
I work on the following basis:

Does it have three legs? (8, 14, 16, etc for ICs )

If so, what is it used for?-------is it a characteristic critical circuit?

If so, does the equipment use the same type elsewhere in a non critical position?---this is often done to reduce the required inventory.

What do Tek use in other models?

And what was always the biggie, although not so much these days, for obvious reasons-------what do Philips use in a similar application?

[vk6zgo]

The best way to clear out the garage is with a pressure washer. If you ask nicely the fire department will being their high volume, high pressure one to do the job for you. 

If you live in parts of the Eastern seaboard of Australia at the moment, "The Almighty", "Mother Nature", or whatever, will do the "high volume" bit.
You then don't face the agonising choice of what goes & what stays----it all goes!!!