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AMB γ1 Is Complete

Published January 29, 2009

The completed AMB γ1 is a bit smaller than a business card.

An order arrived from Mouser today, which means that I was able to complete the AMB γ1 Modular Miniature DAC that I’ve been building. Complete it’s a bit smaller than a standard business card and feels very solid. The board assembly slides forward and back ever so slightly in the case when inserting or removing the USB cable, but it’s nothing that’s a problem. (A/B this photo and this photo to see the shift.)

Tonight I’m using it connected it to to the Millett Hybrid Maxed that I built last year, my most-favorite Sennheiser HD570 headphones, and each of my computers, and this sounds darn good. Now I’m realizing just how low quality some of the audio recordings on my computer actually are, but better than that I can now† listen to high quality audio at reasonable levels while Danielle sleeps in the next room. Yay!

I’m really enjoying this.

† Yes, I realize that I could have just used the high quality line out in my Mac Pro with the amp, but I’m also expecting to use this when at work or with computers with crap audio (eg: Dell D620).

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Atari SIO Connectors

Published January 26, 2009

Controller board from an old Atari / Okidata printer. This was sent to me so that I may reuse the SIO connectors on it.

A few months ago I mentioned that I’d like to build an Atari SDrive as an electronics project. Well, one difficulty in doing that was obtaining SIO connectors. Well, thanks to I now possess a controller board from an Okidata printer bearing two SIO ports. Yay! I’ve heard that the Atarimax guy will be selling connectors-only soon, but I’m not sure how true this is, so this will have to do for now.

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AMF Threadworks / Trail’s Edge Moose Mitts

Published January 25, 2009

AMF Threadworks / Trail's Edge Moose Mitts on my Specialized bike. These work very well in lower Michigan winters.

Quite often when riding in below-freezing temperatures just gloves aren’t enough to keep your hands warm. While the Pearl Izumi Gavia Gloves are quite windproof, they don’t do a very good job of keeping icy wind from chilling my hands. I haven’t had much luck with other gloves either, as my hands still tended to get cold pretty quick. So, on recommendation from a number of friends I went ahead and ordered a set of AMF Threadworks / Trail’s Edge Moose Mitts. I received them this evening and went for a reasonably quick (for snow) test ride on my single speed (the D.I.S.S.) through Clinton River Park with some friends of mine.

While these moose mitts look like the sort of thing which would tie one to a bike, I found that I never really felt as if I was stuck to the bike. Even as I took a fall (tires slid out as I rounded a corner) that hand was just suddenly out of the mitt without any problems.

Warmth-wise, wearing those Gavia Gloves beneath the Moose Mitts proved to be a bit too much as my hands were sweaty after riding. For the next ride I think I’ll try going back to my normal fingerless, clearance bin gloves from REI. If the wind blocking / insulating isn’t enough, inside of each mitt are small pockets for chemical hand warmers and loops for hooking them to the ends of the bars and keeping them solidly in place when inserting one’s hands. One could also store gels in there so they remain liquid and easily edible.

All in all, I’m really glad that I bought these. They kept my hands properly warm, didn’t get in the way when I fell, and were overall comfortable. Being made out of a really heavy nylon I also suspect that they’ll last quite a while. Here is a photo of me with my hands in the Moose Mitts, standing over the bike.

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Hastily Assembled Veggies

Published January 25, 2009

Hastily assembled (and photographed) veggie stir fry, roasted garlic and butter on toast, and Bell's Two Hearted.

Tonight’s dinner is a hastily purchased, prepared, and photographed mix of things of vegetable origin. On the left is home-made bread, toasted and topped with the roasted garlic left over from a few days ago and melted butter. The bowl of veggies is Birds Eye® Freshlike® Broccoli Stir Fry cooked in a bit of soybean oil and some leftover Hormel, House of Tsang-brand Korean Teriyaki stir fry sauce. The beer in the back is Bell’s Two Hearted, a favorite of mine.

The hastiness of the photo is evident by the crap DOF.

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Smallest Part Soldered Yet

Published January 24, 2009

U1D, a Texas Instruments TPS2115APW compared to a US dime. This TSSOP-8 part is the finest pitched part on the board.

Since I’m in a posty mood tonight, have a photo of the smallest thing I’ve soldered to date. It’s nowhere near as small as what some folks I know have done, but I’m pretty happy with it. This part, U1D, is a Texas Instruments TPS2115APW, which handles automatically switching the AMB γ1 between wall and USB power, giving priority to USB whenever it is plugged in.

The package of this part is TSSOP-8, which has 0.65mm between centers of the pins, with the pins being 0.19mm – 0.30mm wide. I soldered it with a Weller WES51 with an ETO tip. Kester 24-6337-6417 (Water Soluble 331 Solder Wire, .025″ dia., Core Size-66 Sn63Pb37) solder was used along with a 2331-zx flux pen. Chemtronics Soder-Wick Rosin SD desoldering braid, in size 3, was used for cleanup.

Soldering was done with the iron set at 700°F. The area was coated with flux, a pad was tinned, more flux was added to that pad, then the part was placed. The iron was then touched to the edge of the pad and the part settled into place. Any slight adjustment would be performed by reheating the pad and moving the part slightly with fingers or a pin, but this wasn’t needed. I then fluxed the legs of the part and very quickly tacked each leg with a bit of solder.

The solder braid was then quickly run across the legs to pull off any extra solder. When washing the PCB after assembly the rosin flux from the desoldering braid was first removed with 99% isopropyl alcohol, then while the board was still wet it was washed with hot water.

(Click here or on the image above for a full res copy of that image.)

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Empty Bag from Digi-Key

Published January 24, 2009

Digi-Key mis-shipped me a part. This bag was supposed to contain a small Kemet capacitor.

I’m building an AMB γ1 Modular Miniature DAC and as part of this I had to order a number of components from Digi-Key. Unfortunately, one part was missed. As can be seen above the bag was sent, but there was no part in it. At least it was only a $0.21, 0.1μF ceramic cap.

Even if I had received this cap I wouldn’t be done. It seems that I forgot to order some connectors for mating the two boards and screwed up a tiny SOT23 AND gate, so there’s now a couple other parts which I have to (re)order as well. Missing cap (C3U) and AND gate (U2U) can be seen here and the missing pin receptacles here.

On the upside, I had no problems soldering any of the SMT parts. I just put that aforementioned one in the wrong place and didn’t have any facilities for safely desoldering it. At least it only cost $0.40 or so.

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NEWSFLASH: Competant Comcast Employee!

Published January 23, 2009

After last night’s terrible experience with Comcast I decided to call and get verbal confirmation that the bill I received should be ignored and that I am to receive a credit. After sitting on hold for 40-some minutes I spoke with someone who informed me that my account has a credit of US$64.98, which I will be receiving 30-45 days from disconnection. This person was actually able to understand what I was asking and clearly and quickly answered my questions.

Upon asking why I received the bill, I was informed that while my service was terminated on 29-Dec, the physical disconnection hadn’t occurred until after the bill was generated. Because of this Comcast had not completely closed out the account, prompting the generation of the bill. I don’t agree with this timeline for account termination, but at least it’s a reasonable explanation.

Now I just have to keep an eye out for the refund from Comcast. Once I receive that (and no more bills) I will be content.

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Kirkland (Costco) Toilet Paper Repackaging

Published January 23, 2009

Kirkland (Costco) Bath Tissue (toilet paper / bog roll) now come individually wrapped in plastic. This bothers me.

In today’s episode of tilting at windmills I’m going to complain about Costco‘s changes to their Kirkland-branded bath tissue / toilet paper / bog roll. I’ve been buying this toilet paper ever since first getting a Costco membership in 2001. It is a nice, basic, soft two-ply which is reasonably priced and which feels nice on my behind.

Unfortunately, when I went to purchase a new pack a few weeks ago (it comes in such quantities that I only have to buy some a couple times a year), I found that each individual roll is now wrapped in plastic. Additionally, the texture of the paper itself seems to have changed. The surface area of each roll is still listed as the same (53.1 sq ft / 49.2 m²), but the new roll seems to have a different texture and feel softer. A non-representative sampling of one roll each (the two above, unwrapped) showed that the new roll has a mass of 171g compared to the old roll’s 161g.

The texture of the paper is not a concern as it’s still sufficiently (and comfortably) capable of removing filth from my nether regions and capturing my nose blowings, but I really don’t like the move towards plastic packaging. While the large pack of rolls has been wrapped in plastic for as long as I’ve been purchasing it, the previous paper wrapping seemed considerably more environmentally conscious.

Personally, I would like it if both the outer and per-roll wrapper were made from non-plasticized paper, with the inner core (the tube) degradable and thus flushable. Or, maybe the core could simply be removed†. It would be nice if the outer wrappings were also degradable, but simply making them from a compostable material is would be sufficient.

† I have seen, and used, tubeless toilet paper dispensers in public restrooms, but they use a dual-peg system to holding the paper instead of a through-axel like design. In these the paper is wound from the center all the way out, with a very tight winding in the center which is indented on the sides for the pegs. This would make these new rolls incompatible with the defacto world wide standard holder.

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Comcastic Billing Failure

Published January 22, 2009

After cancelling Comcast service on 29-Dec-2008 (and returning the equipment on 30-Dec-2008) I was sent a bill asking me to pay for service for February, 2009.

As mentioned before, back on 29-Jan-2008 I had Wide Open West cable service installed at home, cancelling Comcast service the same day. The following day I waited in this long line at the Comcast office in Troy to return the cable modem, obtaining this receipt showing that the hardware was received. Save for the refund I am owed for January service, this should have completed my business with Comcast.

Today when I arrived home from work I found this bill from Comcast, requesting payment for service for 30-Jan-2009 through 29-Feb-2009. After two phone calls which resulted in the IVR system telling me that there were extended hold times, no available automated callback times, and that I should call back later before hanging up on me, 9pm rolled around and Comcast’s billing department closed.

Going against my better judgment I tried the Comcast Live Chat Support. After being passed off from Jennifer.25657 to Charlon.35491 I had a difficult, convoluted chat resulting in my being told that “Yuo can dis regard the bill you received.” (Here [PDF] is a transcript of the chat, if you’d like to read it. It does a great job illustrating Charlon.35491‘s outstanding reading comprehension skills.)

Tomorrow I will be attempting to call Comcast again (possibly recording the call) to double-confirm that there is no expectation of payment and that I am owed a refund for overpayment in January. What baffles me is how a company which supposedly has an integrated, electronic billing system can list a service as canceled but still issue invoices for it. I guess this is the Comcastic service that one should expect.

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