Grey Panthers Savannah

Category: hardware

  • Maximum memory for Lenovo Yoga 370

    (and the Asus Q170T) I’ve picked up a Lenovo Yoga 370 because (amongst other features) it has a removable / upgradable RAM slot (yes, two slots would have been even better :)). You can find various sources (including ChatGPT) claiming it to be 16GB, however, if we look up the processor for this particular model…

  • Upgrading the Options (GlobeTrotter) GI515m

    Recently I needed to install an Options (GlobeTrotter) GI515m 3G USB modem on a machine which previously used an older version of the modem (the iCON 225). This seems a pretty common scenario (an existing user getting an update), however the process seems less-than-straight forward: Get a second computer with the same operating system version…

  • Fixing a dead Asus WL-500g

    A short story with a happy ending: my Asus WL-500g locked up and it wasn’t starting, even after I hard-reset it (removed the power and plugged it back in). All the LEDs were constantly on (normally, when you plug in the power, they should light up for a second or so and the turn off).…

  • Taking apart the Dell Inspiron 9400

    A word of caution: taking apart your laptop will void your warranty. Do this operation at your own risk. If you are not comfortable doing this operation, I would recommend against it. Disassembling a laptop is harder than taking apart a desktop computer (mostly because of the confined space), so you shouldn’t do it if…

  • Geek pr0n – time lapse video of building racks

    Via run-virtual.com.

  • Secure erase

    Fun (curious) fact: all recent (newer than 2006)  have ATA commands in them specifically for wiping the data off of them. There are at least two advantages to this method: It wipes all sectors (including sectors marked as bad by the internal tables) It is faster You can get the program which initiates such a…

  • Enabling / disabling the SD card reader on laptops

    Just a quick note: it seems that on some laptops (the Dell Inspiron 9200 for example) the SD card reader is enabled / disabled together with the Firewire port. I found this it because I always disable firewire ports on laptop, given that it can be used to dump the contents of the memory and…

  • Fixing a hibernation problem with Intel network cards

    I had a problem with hibernating a Windows XP system containing an on-board Intel(R) 82566DC Gigabit NIC. The hibernation was ok, but it would wake up in a couple of seconds after shutting down. Today I looked around a little more and found the following setting: “Wake On Directed Packet”. Unchecking it solved the problem.…

  • Hardware hacks are cool but dangereous

    Via H_I_R’s bookmarks I found the following post: Make use of your old PS/2 ports. The blog is currently down. Coincidence? 😛 The idea of the post was to take your unused PS/2 ports and use them as a power source to charge your mobile phone, which would otherwise support charging through USB. The idea…

  • Note to self

    A Dell Optiplex (755 if I recall correctly) is refusing to start from time to time. Unplugging it and replugging it after ~10 seconds helps, but I would like to get to the bottom of the problem. I made sure that all the extension cards and memory modules are properly seated. Now it actually gave…