Just a quick note to say that you can now like Scotech on Facebook to keep up to date with the latest posts and tips from me!
https://www.facebook.com/scotechofficial
Thank you!
Joseph Wright - SCOTECH
Sunday, 5 January 2014
NEWS: 05/01/2014 Tech News Roundup
Today in tech:
- Samsung announces 'smart home' system at CES that will allow you to control your home appliances and utilities with a mobile phone app or smartphone app.
- Royal Air Force jets are now being produced with parts produced using 3D printers, these parts have been tested and are now in use on functioning RAF tornado jets.
- The National Security Agency are currently developing a quantum computer that will aid them to break encryption methods faster potentially putting even more stress on public concerns.
- Facebook has been sued due to scanning users private messages for keywords so that they can harvest user information for advertising and web activity profiles.
- Kirsty Cox from Newton Aycliffe has been jailed for 2 years after scamming the general public of £450,000, claiming that she could source iPads at a reduced price but in fact was just scamming people of their hard earned money.
SHOWCASE: Cheapo poundworld SD card reader
I love cheap tech accessories and boy have I got something exciting for you today. BOOM. Poundworld's own brand of technology (doesn't even have a brand on it...) brings for your delectation a 'USB Card Reader'.
Opening the packaging is nice and easy to my surprise, no faffing about with scissors! Once the device is out you can immediately feel the cheapness. Horrible tacky plastic that feels like you could break it just by looking in its direction, but it hasn't done that yet.
DOES IT WORK?
Yes. Yes it does.
Once again thank you for reading and good night!
contact me at: scotechnology.official@gmail.com or leave a comment
Joseph Wright - SCOTECH
FIX IT: Dell Optiplex GX260 (Freebie Computer)
A little while ago while taking rubbish down to the communal bins I noticed 2 computers by the side of one of the bins. One was a Compaq Presario (I forget the model number) and the other was a Dell Optiplex GX260. The Compaq was not to much use to me as most of it's insides had been stripped and the remains were rusting away... However the Dell was in pretty good shape.
Moving on to actually opening the computer there is a difference to modern dells in which there is no spring loaded tab, you have to press on two recessed indents on the top and bottom of the case. My computer though I didn't even need to do this, it's permanently open as the case won't sit flush. Once the case is unlocked all you need to do is tilt the lid towards the front of the computer to gain access.
 |
| The front of the computer is a little beat up, with a missing USB panel door. |
The rear of the computer shows good health with minimal signs of weather damage.
The side of the computer is ruined by scratches, but it's all superficial.
Once the two buttons have been pressed the lid will become loose, ready to be lifted open upon its hinge.
The lid should lift right up until its perpendicular to the rest of the case.
The Dell Optiplex GX260 is by no means a tidy computer on the inside (not at least in the state that previous owner has left it) but the compact form factor does mean cramming a lot into a small space. The whole computer is modular and tool-less which for the time is a remarkable thing. Lets get stuck into pulling this computer apart:
From left to right: CPU Heatsink, Chipset Heatsink, AGP Port, PCI Port
Top of image: RAM ports with 2x RAM sticks in.
Top of image: Power supply exhaust
Bottom of image: PCI Riser board
Left to right: 24Pin ATX connector, 2x RAM cards and CPU Heatsink
12V CPU Heatsink fan with side blower
The mother board is pretty crowded and I'm not going to remove the heatsink for this review as I don't have enough thermal compound in my toolbox to replace what is lost when removing the heatsink. Moving on from the motherboard we can now draw our attention to the media devices attached to the lid of the computer:
This is the bay where the hard drive should be, but the previous owner was savvy enough to remove it before putting it out for rubbish collection! Check out the DIY wire splicing, doesn't seem at all dangerous...
This mess of cables is covering up our view so we can remove them by simply pulling them out. The IDE cables (Ribbon cable) can be pulled out with the use of the orange tab and the 12V molex (4 pin power) can be removed by giving it a hard pull.
To remove the optical disk drive, simply squeeze the green tabs and pull the whole drive assembly upwards, sliding it out of its hole.
The same is applied to the floppy disk drive (what are floppy disks again?). One of my tabs has unfortunately snapped off meaning I had to poke the remainder of the tab with a screwdriver to free the floppy drive from it's hole.
Turning out attention back to the motherboard, I pull out the RAM sticks using the white catches (pushing on them automatically ejects the RAM, as with on any motherboard) and inspect them more closely. This computer has 2x 256MB sticks of Samsung DDR RAM.
The riser card has 2 PCI slots in it, turning the one slot into two. This is handy in particular if you want a PCI (non express) graphics card in the computer or have large profile PCI cards to install as they wont fit into the low profile case normally.
To remove the riser board simply lift the large green handle and pull.
The case looks empty without the riser. Underneath the riser is the Power Supply.
The riser board as you can see has two PCI slots to accommodate large profile cards in a low profile case
And there we have it, one stripped down Dell Optiplex GX260 Computer. To install all the parts just retrace your steps, but for the RAM make sure the notches are lined up and for the riser card ensure that the contacts are aligned properly before pushing back in.
If you have any questions please email me at: scotechnology.official@gmail.com or comment on this post
Thank you for reading:
Joseph Wright - SCOTECH
HOW TO: Programming: Episode 3 - Basic Number Input
INTRODUCTION
By now you should be getting pretty good at programming; we have now looked at basic output and basic maths. Now we are going to combine the two and add input!Resources:
IDEONE: www.ideone.com
If you need to check back on our other lessons:
Basics: http://scotechnologyofficial.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/programming-why-not-give-it-go.html
Maths: http://scotechnologyofficial.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/how-to-programming-episode-2-basic-maths.html
LESSON
Once again load up IDEONE and select VB.NET as your language of choice, you should now be able to do this without a problem. Delete the code there and retype it again to help you memorize it:Imports System
Public Class Test
Public Shared Sub Main()
Like last time we are going to dimension our variables, but we are not going to initialize them with any values as we did last time:
Dim integer_1 as Integer
Dim integer_2 as Integer
Dim result as Integer
Now we want to output some text to prompt the user to enter some information. For this program we will be adding two numbers together, so we will tell the user this.
Console.Writeline("Please enter first number to add: ")
Next we are going to try something new, we are going to take input from the user:
integer_1 = Console.Readline()
As you can see this is very similar to something we tried in our basic maths tutorial where we did this:
"Result = integer_1 + integer_2". To take input, the statement is very similar to the Console.Writeline statement, but instead of writing something to the console we are reading something into the console. We want the integer_1 variable to be set as our input so we read the input in to the variable. The console readline statement reads in any input you make from the next line and will wait until you press enter to take the input in. We can now repeat this process for integer_2:
Console.Writeline("Please enter second number to add:")
integer_2 = Console.Readline()
Now we can use our mathematical programming knowledge to add these two numbers and output the result to the screen:
result = integer_1 + integer_2
Console.Writeline("{0}",result)
End Sub
End Class
There is however one more thing that we can do to tidy this code up:
If you are not displaying any text in the output other than the contents of a variable then you do not have to waste time putting curly brackets in or the referencing number, all you need to do is write the variable name inside of the brackets without quotation marks like so:
Console.Writeline(result)
Bringing all this together, we should have the complete source code as follows:
Imports System
Public Class Test
Public Shared Sub Main()
Dim integer_1 as Integer
Dim integer_2 as Integer
Dim result as Integer
Console.Writeline("Please enter first number to add: ")
integer_1 = Console.Readline()
Console.Writeline("Please enter second number to add:")
integer_2 = Console.Readline()
result = integer_1 + integer_2
Console.Writeline(result)
End Sub
End Class
Looking like this:
Input on IDEONE is done by clicking the button on your code window marked: 'stdin'. Clicking on this will drop down a box allowing you to enter input, enter a number, press the return key and enter another number.
Once you have two numbers click the run button and you will see the result of adding the two numbers in the stdout box!
Once again thank you for reading:
Joseph Wright - SCOTECH
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