tastewar.com

Author: tastewar

  • Catch-22

    Bought a new printer today, to replace the Canon Pixma MP-500 that has been our main family printer for a few years. It started being all squeaky last week, and then it started completely missing horizontal bands. Tried all the head cleaning options, and finally tried removing the cartridges and the printhead and cleaning it by hand. A lot of ink went down the drain, but to no avail.

    For a replacement, I wanted a multi-function printer (to be able to send the occasional fax and make copies and scan things), and also one which supports Apple’s AirPrint so our many iDevices can print. After a couple of hours browsing Amazon, and reading magazine articles, and other sources of online reviews, and then seeing what was available locally, I decided upon an HP PhotoSmart 7520, which I could pick up at Staples for $149, plus we had a $10 off coupon, so even with the tax it came in around $149.

    Brought it home, and after the unpacking ordeal I connected it via USB to our AirPort (actually, TimeCapsule with built-in AirPort). On both Macs, the new printer came up right away when going into the System Preferences, Printers area. They both had to download and install software, but all that went smoothly, with no reboot or anything. Printing worked fine, and I was able to print a couple of sheets of business cards for Clara with no problems, on card stock, too!

    Later on, I wanted to get the AirPrint going, so I went through the on-screen menus to setup the Wireless. I can’t tell you how many devices I’ve connected to our home network over the years, both wired and wireless. Many vintages of Mac, PC, Linux computers; many iDevices, many other small devices, too. I have 3 WiFi routers (2 configured as AP only) that all expose the same SSID, and this has worked fine for years. But not for this printer — it would not connect. One of the AP’s (the AirPort!) is right next to it, even. I begin to lookup whether there are firmware updates. Sure enough, some digging turns up how to update your printer’s firmware. And guess what? (Hint: this is where the title comes into play), the way you update firmware is via WiFi.

    Huh?? I’d like to know what brilliant person came up with *that* scheme. The printer even has a memory card reader socket on the front. Why not allow firmware updates that way?

    In any case here are some of the things I tried to work around the problem:

    • connect to our “open” wifi AP, in case the problem was with passphrase recognition
    • connect to a neighbor’s AP, in case the problem was connecting to our specific router.
    • use a portable router I keep in my laptop bag. It wouldn’t stay powered on, though.
    • setup ICS on my laptop, but kept getting an Access Denied error.

    Finally, I turned WiFi on, on the old Fios router that’s there for our cable boxes to connect back home. Even that took some trial and error, but did get it working, and the printer did connect, and download firmware. After that, it connected to our network OK, but when I then moved the printer back downstairs, it no longer would. I finally changed the SSID on the Apple Airport (Time Capsule), and then it could connect to the original network. Maybe it doesn’t like Airports, or maybe the signal was too strong, but all of this just goes to show that WiFi can still be tricky, and building a product that can only get updates via WiFi is ill-advised. It works now, and AirPrint works, but it was quite an ordeal.

    Logging back into my router, I realized how old the distro I’m running is — it’s a version of DD-WRT from May of 2008. I had another problem with it recently, where after a power outage, it wouldn’t connect back to the internet right away. Only after a couple of hours,  (and presumably, the expiry of the DHCP lease), was it able to. Might be time to update this thing, and I’m thinking of using OpenWRT instead this time, as DD-WRT doesn’t seeem to have been updated much (at least as far as official releases go) in the intervening 4 years. Any non-spambot comments?

  • Travelling Daze

    Friday and today (Saturday) have been/will be travel days. Friday, we drove back to Centennial from Breckenridge. It was a nice trip along I-70, though we first went over the Dillon Dam road, which was beautiful, and had an awesome looking bike path along side. In fact, that was one of the most notable things about Breckenridge and many of the mountain towns out here — lots of bike trails. Of course, it’s easier to include them when there’s just so much open space, but regardless of why, it does make it very inviting to cyclists.

    After arriving back at the Rowell Ranch, we had lunch, ran some errands, and tried to go swimming again, but there was thunder within earshot, so the pool remained closed for the duration of the afternoon. We had a lovely taco dinner together, thanks to Donna (and Emma), and then the Stewarts went off to visit Susan’s high school friend, Nina. We visited with her and her family for a bit, got to meet their dog, Ruby, and cat, Oreo, and play on their trampoline.

    Today is an easy day of packing up, then a late afternoon flight through Chicago that gets us home (well, to Logan) after midnight. Then church awaits, bright and early Sunday morning!

  • Breckinridge, Day 3

    This was our big celebration day, and we started off with a scenic gondola ride from town up the mountain to the small amusement park there. We got to hike up a short way to touch snow in July, then we took a chair lift up to the alpine slide and slid back down! Fun! We walked around town a bit more before heading back for lunch at the house. We spent a quiet afternoon there, then went out for dinner to celebrate Grammie’s birthday, then back for cake and games.

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  • Breckinridge, Day 2

    We enjoyed a lively Independence Day in “Breck” today. We went into town to watch the beginning of a bike race, and had 800 bikers pass us by, after which the parade went by, which lasted nearly an hour and a half. Lots of fun entries but only one band. After the parade we walked around the town and visited many of the little shops, and had a quick lunch of hamburgers before heading back to our rental house.
    Mid-afternoon, grampa took a group to see the railroad museum nearby, where there were a couple of snow clearing cars. I walked home after a brief excursion back into town.

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  • Breckinridge Arrival

    We have arrived safe and sound in Breckinridge. We have a lovely half of a duplex a little ways out if town. After unpacking the van, we drove back into town to find our favorite pastime, ice cream!

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  • Celebrating Centennial

    Taking a while to get into gear, but here we are in Centennial, CO, visiting Susan’s folks to celebrate her mom’s 80th birthday. We flew into town on Friday, via a very pleasant non-stop flight on Southwest with a comedienne for a flight attendant. Dusty picked us up in a van he rented far away from the airport, at a fraction of the cost it would have been there. It’s always a great time at the Rowells’ — they are the best of hosts, have a lovely home, and even have a pool in their development. It’s Monday now, and the kids have been to the pool every day. We’ve been working on divvying up cooking duties among the next generation, so Mom Rowell can better enjoy the time with family. Donna’s on duty for dinner tonight, and as her husband Ben couldn’t make the trip, she has adopted Emma as her cooking partner. They are cooking up some halibut that Donna caught in Port Angeles, WA, and brought with her (frozen). Susan’s sisters Donna and Nancy, and Nancy’s husband Craig are in town. Brother Mark, Mark’s wife Rosa, and Rosa’s sister-in-law Violet live nearby, and we will all be traveling to Breckenridge to share a home for 3 days and see the sights together.

    I failed to bring a camera, but I can’t let that be an excuse, as the phone takes generally acceptable photos. Hopefully, I will post more regularly for the rest of the week, with photos.

  • Hilarity Ensues

    Probably some background would be helpful to appreciate this, but, well, just watch…

    http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/06/11/mark-reads-shadow-war-of-the-night-dragons/

     

  • Dusty Turns 100K

    My truck is no longer young.

    It’s called parallax error. I definitely wasn’t going more than 60… 😉

  • Unfortunately, this CharlieCard isn’t valid for usage with in the system

    The MBTA has for years now had available a “stored value” type of card for subway, buses, commuter rail, etc. All very neat. You can go to a vending machine at subway stations and refill the card with cash or use a debit or credit card. It’s even possible to refill them on the bus, but I always get flustered trying to do it, and the drivers are often impatient about it. More recently, they’ve added a web-based system for refilling your card, which sounds pretty handy. But I’ve tried many times to enroll my ancient CharlieCard, only to get an error back. I assume it was because it was too old, and pre-dated when the started allowing access via the web.

    Yesterday, I was on the bus and ran out of money on the card, so I went to refill it. I was asking the bus driver “What do I do next?” but he wasn’t really answering me. I failed to follow the correct sequence, and ended up with a paper ticket with $5 on it, minus the cost of the bus fare. Argh! When we got to Harvard, I picked up a *new* CharlieCard, so I’d be able to enroll it in their system. When we got home, I did try to enroll the card only to get the same error message back. Sheesh!

    I emailed the support email address listed on the site, holding out little hope that I’d actually receive an intelligent answer. But less than 10 minutes later, I did get a response: “Unfortunately you would have to grab another card at the station. This error is due to a glitch in the MBTA’s system, and there’s no way to tell in advance which cards are compatible with the online system and which ones are not. I apologize for the inconvenience. Thank You”

    So, kudos to the MTBA (or their partner) for providing an “answer” so quickly! Generally, at best I’d expect a response about a day later, telling me that the company had received my inquiry, and telling me how important I am to them, etc., etc. And then I may or may not hear back in a reasonable timeframe. However, the MBTA (and/or their partner) get a failing grade for the content of the response.

    Guess I will be picking up a stack of cards next time…

  • Winter Hobbies

    During the good weather, I enjoy riding my bike a bit with my free time, but in the winter I am often de-motivated. That makes it a good time to focus on one of my other hobbies: electronics. I had a pretty fruitful weekend (so far!) on the electronics front. For Christmas, I had bought Tyler a “Game of Life” kit. This isn’t the board game you are likely thinking of, but rather a one (or zero, depending on how you look at it!) player computer simulation of a colony of organisms. A grid of cells is represented by LEDs, and their death or birth is dependent on the level of crowding in their neighborhood. Tyler did a great job soldering the kit together, I think we counted over 100 connections had to be soldered! Certainly, the most challenging project he’s put together thus far.

    Trouble is, although you can connect multiple boards together (very clever!), they do cost $$ and a single board ends up with very fleeting generations. I thought to myself, “Well, since this is a board with a software programmed micro-controller, I ought to be able to change the delay between generations!

    That idea ended up causing me a lot of work (and/or expense…). First, I had to build the AVR programmer kit that I’d bought previously, figure out how to install a driver for it (on my Win64 system), install all the AVR dev tools, solder a programming header on the board, figure out just enough to be dangerous, mod the code, and upload the new firmware.

    Happily, this all worked pretty well! Except for the final step. It should be obvious, but I can’t figure out where the delay between generations comes from, ultimately. But, in preparation, I did all the rest of the above, along with re-building the current firmware, and just reloading that.

    I’ve posted a question or two in the Adafruit forums on where the delay might be coming from, so hopefully someone will help me out there.