model m Archives - The Silicon Underground

Upgrading a Compaq Evo D510 for Windows 10 and beyond

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 13 Aug 2015 11:00:10 +0000

I had an old Compaq Evo D510 full-size tower/desktop convertible PC, from the Pentium 4/Windows XP era, that I wanted to upgrade. The machine long ago outlived its usefulness–its Pentium 4 CPU is less powerful than the average smartphone CPU

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Don’t buy a “desktop replacement” laptop

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 23 Oct 2014 11:00:38 +0000

I found this oldie but goodie Lifehacker article: When two computers are cheaper than one. It advocates buying a cheap laptop and building a desktop PC to meet your computing needs. I think it makes a lot of sense. A

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A not-quite-heir to the Model M

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 10:00:11 +0000

So today I came across the story of a new Cooler Master keyboard, which claims to be very IBM Model M-like, but with modern styling and conveniences. The verdict is that this keyboard is even stiffer than the Model M,

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Teleworking on the cheap

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 19:08:11 +0000

As I’ve mentioned recently, my new job allows me to work from home one day per week. They provide me a laptop to take home, but that’s it. If I want other hardware, I have to provide it. Fortunately for

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Cleaning up a venerable and battle-worn IBM Model M keyboard

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 27 May 2012 12:42:56 +0000

I scored an IBM Model M keyboard recently. Usually when you find 30 year old keyboards, they’re pretty dirty. Here’s how I clean an IBM Model M keyboard. I’m notoriously picky about keyboards. My weapon of choice is an IBM

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Living with a past-its-prime computer

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 13:12:56 +0000

I’m playing catch-up a bit. This weekend, Lifehacker ran a guide about living with a computer that’s past its prime. I’ve made a career of that. One of my desktop PCs at work (arguably the more important one) is old

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I’ve seen the Windows 8 screenshots, and I smell panic

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 01:58:46 +0000

I’ve seen the Windows 8 screenshots. What I see in them reeks of overreaction. Pundits are predicting a post-PC era, so Microsoft is trying their best to make a PC look and feel like a smartphone. Why does a PC

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Saying goodbye to my Lexmark 4039

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:49:51 +0000

Today we hauled my trusty Lexmark 4039 off to recycling. Unfortunately its paper handling was shot, and parts and documentation for that model are nearly impossible to find. I found the alleged service manual, but couldn't make sense enough of the documentation to fix it.

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The Western Electric 500

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 02:56:20 +0000

Another year, another cordless telephone/answering machine.

I bought a cordless phone to replace an aging and failing 2.4 GHz model this week. Our luck with modern phones makes me long for the old days.

I like the old Western Electric 500 (also known simply as "The Bell Phone") because it was specifically designed not to break.

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Dead computer? Check the CPU fan.

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 23:53:19 +0000

My wife came upstairs last night. "The mouse froze," she said. I walked downstairs to the computer. Sure enough: Frozen mouse, no caps lock light, no vital signs to speak of. Ctrl-Alt-Del didn't do anything either. I shut down, powered back up, and got the black screen of death.

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