Blog Posts

Nintendo GameCube — laser adjustment and PicoBoot installation

In this article I will be wrapping up the remaining mods I wanted to perform on my GameCube. For a while now my disc drive has been intermittently failing to read discs, so I will be doing an adju...

gaming
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Nintendo GameCube
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repair
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Nintendo GameCube — rebuild for Swiss/SD2SP2

I recently discovered an improved, homebrew GameBoy Player for the Nintendo GameCube which removes the input lag and other issues related to the official Nintendo version. Running this requires us...

gaming
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Nintendo GameCube
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repair
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Super Nintendo cartridge battery replacement 101

It seems like I just can't catch a break with anything Super Nintendo related.  I had been playing Sim City and developing a nice little metropolis.  However, yesterday when I turned my Super Ninte...

gaming
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repair
,
Super Nintendo (SNES)
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Super Nintendo restoration — part 3: testing

After having successfully replaced all of the capacitors, and having given this system a fresh coat of paint...would it work properly again? My Japanese import of Yoshi's Island had just arrived in...

gaming
,
repair
,
Super Nintendo (SNES)
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Super Nintendo restoration — part 2: capacitor replacement

It's always best to test a console for proper function before modding or painting it.  Unfortunately, I did not test my Super Nintendo (SNES) prior to painting it.  It had been in storage...

gaming
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repair
,
Super Nintendo (SNES)
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Super Nintendo restoration — part 1: fix discoloration

All Super Nintendo consoles from the 90s have an issue where most of the plastic discolors into a nasty yellowish mess.  As I understand it, the issue itself is a result of the flame retardant chem...

gaming
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repair
,
Super Nintendo (SNES)
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Nintendo DS Lite top screen replacement

Have you ever failed at something more than once, but kept trying in hopes that it would eventually stick and you’d get it right?  Sure, we all have.  Usually it’s not something involving replacing...

gaming
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Nintendo DS
,
repair
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Code::Stats Visual Basic 6.0 (VB6) Add-in

I'm happy to release my first official open-source program: "Code::Stats VB6 Add-in"!  Great! So...what is it and who cares?

Well, Code::Stats is an online service which tracks and graphs...

software development
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Visual Basic 6.0 (VB6)
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Huawei Mate 9 has issues installing some apps from Google Play Store

The day finally came. I bought a Chinese-branded phone.  And. It. Is. AWESOME.  6GB RAM, 128GB internal storage.  It’s enough to make a person drool.

So what’s my first step on getting my...

Android
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fix
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Huawei
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Use FreedomPop Global SIM Kit for Cr-48's mobile data

Owners of the Cr-48 were given 100MB per month of mobile data on Verizon’s network during the beta-testing period.  Here’s how to change your Cr-48 to use FreedomPop‘s Global SIM Kit to get online...

Chromebook
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Cr-48
,
review
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KeySmart 2.0 — Initial Impressions and Assembly

Wisdom is said to increase with age and experience.  However, the quantity of keys a person has to carry also seem to increase with the natural progression of our age and maturity.  Pocket size, ho...

KeySmart
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lifehack
,
review
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Patch for Super Mario Bros. 2 (Famicom Disk System) to restore original Spiny Egg behavior

If you were to fling a ball from a moving aircraft, would you expect it to fall straight down? Or instead would you imagine it would be affected by things such as momentum, velocity, and trajectory...

gaming
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patch
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Re-learning Japanese With “Human Japanese”

What might a family of three choose to do for fun? Play board games? Travel? No, that’s far too routine!  How about using technology to learn a foreign language which has no apparent simil...

Android
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Human Japanese
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iOS
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Japanese
,
review
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Official response to Cr-48 Chromebook's battery charging problem

Some Cr-48 owners have reported an issue with not being able to charge their Cr-48 properly.  Sadly, I too now have this issue.  Basically, when you plug in the charger it is supposed to charge.  (...

Chromebook
,
Cr-48
,
fix
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Problems with Visual Basic 6 / ADO / MDAC after installing Windows 7 Service Pack 1

Have you been successfully compiling programs using Visual Basic 6 under Windows 7 in the past, only now to find that programs using Microsoft ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) / MDAC now crash with an au...

fix
,
software development
,
Visual Basic 6.0 (VB6)
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