Music

Eee PC 900 Bios Version 802

Posted by on February 12, 2016
Posted in: Books, Music, Photos.

eeepc900I’m posting this for any of you unfortunate enough to have an ASUS EEE PC 900 Linux with bios version 802.

I snagged one on eBay for $30 figuring I could repair it with parts I had on hand and load Windows XP on it. But 802 bios does not recognize SATA drives and so XP would not boot from my new 64 gb SATA SSD. So a bios update was required and everyone agrees 1006 is the way to go. The problem was when I went to flash the bios nothing worked.
ASUS apparently forgot they made millions of these and no support is available for anything prior to the 900HD.
I tried ALT + F2 when booting up to the ASUS screen and the computer just went into Bios Setup.
There is no EZ Flash tool in the Bios anywhere.
I tried formatting a USB key to FAT and renaming the update to 900.ROM and booting up with that in the left USB port – it ignored it.
I tried ASUS Updater but it said it couldn’t read the Bios image
I tried AFUWIN flash app and it couldn’t find the image
I made a bootable USB key with Freedos and Win32 Disk Imager and tried AFUDOS. Freedos ran fine but
I tried every version of AFUDOS 3.5 and up and got the same result: Can’t find the bios files.
I went to American Megatrends AMI.com website and downloaded and tried every bios flasher version they had over a 3 day period. All basically errored out on can’t find bios image or ‘bios does not support AFU’
I tried BUPDATER and got the error CANNOT FIND UPDATE MODULE
I went here https://www.bios-mods.com/ and found some great info but no solution.
I was about to give up and live with a workaround but just before I went to sleep after an all day session I found a post mentioning a very old version of AFUDOS 2.36
I downloaded from here http://pcdriverupdates.com/download.php?link=asus-cm5425-desktop-pc-bios-utilities-driver-dos&model=NTI4ODM=&id=MzczMjE3Nw==
You can also get it here:
http://www.downloadexpo.com/drivers/bios/asus/download-asus-p5b-e-plus-afudos-bios-update-tool_4030.html
I loaded AFU236U on my Freedos USB key and typed in:

afu236u /i900.ROM /o802.ROM

and IT WORKED!!!!
My bios is now version 1006 and Win XP boots up normally and very fast. I can only imagine this EEE PC 900 was an early version and didn’t have the built in bios flasher and that AFUDOS 2.36 is early version to recognize this PC.

Rancilio Silvia Tips for New Owners

Posted by on August 12, 2014
Posted in: Music. Tagged: .

rancilio-silvia

So you bought the Rancilio Silvia, one of the highest rated espresso machines on the market – and you can’t make a decent cup of espresso or cappuccino? I spent several frustrating weeks (not to mention a giant dose of buyer’s remorse) trying too. So now that I’ve got it all worked out I want to share some of my tips with you novices out there.

No Crema, and weak watery espresso? Crema is that brown foam floating on top of your espresso (when it’s done right). rocky_nodose

You may have read by now after doing some research that pretty much everyone says the same thing: the grind has to be fine. Absolutely true. I finally gave up and bought a Rancilio Rocky to go with my Silvia. It works! As long as you keep the grind about 11 or 12 on the dial. I find that setting pretty much works for any coffee bean, as long as you TAMP it down good, you’ll get perfect. beautiful Crema every time.

Little of no milk frothing foam for your cappuccino?

This was my biggest problem. I was so upset I got nothing but watery milk even after watching numerous videos on dozens of web sites. Actually it’s quite simple: Tilt your milk container and insert the TIP ONLY of the Silvia’s milk frother into it. See photo (water was used for clarity). Open the steam valve a full turn and keep the TIP ONLY inserted into the milk until it reaches your desired temperature. Once the process starts it will be very quiet and t    cupohe milk will be swirling – that’s how you can tell you’re on the money. The trick is to just insert the tip into the milk!

froyj

MH370 – Not a Trace !!

Posted by on April 22, 2014
Posted in: Music.

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Now that most news outlets have stopped caring about Malaysia Flight MH370 we maybe can expect something.

There’s no way that plane is at the bottom of the ocean – there would be something floating to the surface. Boeing 777 aren’t water tight and they aren’t armored submarines. If MH370 hit the water there would have been signs, that’s just the way physics works.  Debris, seats, bodies, etc. The fact that the Emergency Locator Beacons never sent a single signals means it didn’t crash – that’s all there is to it.

It’s a good bet the airliner is nowhere near where they’ve been searching. It’s probably thousands of miles away in some remote location and by now all the passengers/ hostages are long dead.

Two or more years from now someone will find some trace of the 777…