New Toy: USB Turntable for Digitizing Albums

This arrived from Amazon yesterday afternoon…my first new turntable in, oh, about three decades. It’s an Audio-Technica AT-LP120-USB direct drive model, and it’s pretty awesome, considering my rather modest needs and expectations. We have a turntable but it has a few shortcomings. First, it doesn’t play 78 rpm records; more about why that’s important in… Continue reading New Toy: USB Turntable for Digitizing Albums

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Categorized as Music, Technology

Hotter’N Hell 16.09

The photo shows one of the computers on our tandem bicycle following our ride this afternoon. The number in the lower left corner of the screen is the temperature in degree Fahrenheit. No, it wasn’t 10ยบ in Midland, Texas, in August; the computer is obviously not designed for hot weather as the temperature readout only… Continue reading Hotter’N Hell 16.09

Hands on with the Nest Cam

I purchased and installed a Nest Cam wifi security camera yesterday and so far I’m finding it to be exactly as advertised: easy to install and configure, and impressively useful. The device itself is small and elegantly designed. We already have Nest smart thermostats in our home, and the camera integrates seamlessly into the account… Continue reading Hands on with the Nest Cam

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Dispatches from the Texas Hill Country: The Charred Edition

We spent another long* weekend at Horseshoe Bay, where the six-week dry spell was broken, albeit in an insignificant way, by a quarter inch rain shower on Saturday morning. Normally, we would have groused about the disruption of our plan for a morning bike ride, but in light of the drought conditions we were happy… Continue reading Dispatches from the Texas Hill Country: The Charred Edition