Spare Parts Archives - The Silicon Underground

Make a 3/16 scale Marx ore car

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 28 Mar 2017 11:00:15 +0000

Marx fans often complain Marx didn’t make quite enough variety in its 3/16 scale line. Fortunately, it’s pretty easy to get a bit more variety out of it by making a 3/16 scale Marx ore car. And you can do

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Attach Marx lighted accessories and hide wiring in one step

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 22 Apr 2016 11:00:09 +0000

A frequent question I read is how to attach tin accessories, such as Marx light posts and light towers, to a layout in a semi-permanent but reversible manner. I have found a way to do this, and as a bonus,

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Selling Tyco trains

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 18 Apr 2016 11:00:08 +0000

I got an inquiry last week about selling Tyco trains. As a child of the 70s and 80s, I certainly remember Tyco, and in recent years Tyco has gained a bit of a following. If you’re looking to sell some

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Bombshell: Ballmer steps down from Microsoft

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 24 Aug 2013 17:54:23 +0000

I’m sure you’ve heard by now that Steve Ballmer is retiring. It’s time. If anything, I agree with the people who say he would have been better off retiring years ago. But I really didn’t expect it. In spite of

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Lionel in the non-hobby media

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 11:00:33 +0000

Cnet took a field trip to the official Lionel repair facility and wrote a feature story about it. It’s nice to see the attention outside of the hobby press, since it’s frequently news to people that Lionel is still around

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Hot-rod Cyanogenmod 7.2

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 10:55:13 +0000

Whatever you do, don’t call this post Optimizing Android 2.3 for Games, Graphics and Multimedia. I’ll kick your… nevermind. But of course the first thing I wanted after I installed Cyanogenmod 7.2–which is based on Android 2.3.7–on my Nook Color

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I hope BYOD 2.0 goes better than BYOD 1.0 did

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 12:42:52 +0000

BYOD is “bring your own device.” It’s the hot new trend in IT, except it’s nothing new. But it was bound to happen, I guess. Companies are tired of buying computer equipment, so they want employees to provide it. And

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Why do European trains look so much better than U.S. trains?

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:20:49 +0000

I guess there’s something floating around Facebook right now comparing sleek, elegant European trains against clunker, junky trains that roam the rails in the United States. I haven’t seen it yet, but I’ve already had some questions about it. There

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WordPress may be coming soon. I hope.

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 03:15:34 +0000

I'm experimenting with Wordpress. I have it up and running on a system built from spare parts, but importing from this archaic blogging platform that nobody uses (and for good reason) is less than obvious. A filter exists but isn't officially blessed, so you can't just go grab it like you can for a common blog platform like Movable Type or Greymatter.

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Leave your DIY PCs at home

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 23 Jul 2004 04:21:03 +0000

This is a response to the eWeek editorial Bring DIY Systems to Work. Nice theory. Unfortunately, lab theory and the real world don't always mesh.

I like building PCs. I built my first PC in early 1994, back when everything was on a separate card and you had to set interrupts and DMA channels using jumpers and DIP switches and in most cases you had to tell the BIOS exactly what size drive was in it--it wouldn't detect anything for you. I built my main PC at home myself. I built my secondary and tertiary PCs at home myself too. And my girlfriend's PC, and my mom's PC, and my sister's PC.

Get the idea?

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