Tinkering with the background eraser, desaturation, noise, blur, and lens flare tools, I came up with this.

Full sized image (1.13MB)

Monitor setup:

• 37″ Westinghouse @1920×1080
• 22″ KDS & 1680×1050, Total resolution 1920×2130

Computer:

• ECS KN3 SLI2
• 4GB G.Skill DDR2 800
• AMD X2 6000+ @ 3.08GHz
• eVGA GeForce 8800GT 512mb
• 1x160GB Hitachi SATA2
• 3x500GB Hitachi SATA2
• 1x320GB Seagate SATA2
• Turtle Beach Montego DDL
• Samsung DVD±RW SATA
• 5lbs of dust
• Windows XP Pro SP3 + Ubuntu 8.04 via Wubi

I pulled my 7900GS card, since it was getting too hot and I didn’t use the 3rd monitor all that much. I now use my 3rd monitor when I am repairing other systems or if I want to connect a monitor to my laptop.

Note: This is an old post that was retroactively added to the new wordpress site

5.1 switch schematic

This is a switch that I designed (with the help of a co-worker) that allows me to input 5.1 analog audio from two different sources (two computers) and send to the same set of speakers. Both sources cannot be used simultaneously, due to noise/feedback from one source to the other. It is a simple dumb switch. I originally was going to sell a complete switch, but didn’t find a big enough market, so it got put on the back burner. I list here all the components necessary to build your own switch from scratch. (more…)

Note: This is an old post that was retroactively added to the new wordpress site

So I was driving through Arizona on highway 60, traveling north towards Salome. I was in my relatively new RX-8, cruising along at about 80, when this patch of freshly laid asphalt came up. It was slightly curved and the smoothest part of the road I had been on the whole trip. Well, I kinda wound up the car a little bit, maybe hitting 95ish when I noticed there was traffic ahead of me, well just a gray maintenance type truck. I slowed down to about 80, figuring I would pass him when the next broken center divider line came up. Well, as I came up to the truck, and I could see the line breaking on the upcoming straight away, I stepped on the gas a little to pass him (safely of course, there was no oncoming traffic, and he was the only other vehicle I had seen on that road for 10 minutes). (more…)