So, from a few years ago I have a couple of Logitech Webcams. I’d report the model number but they leave that off the device. On a little tag on the cord one says M/N V-U0016 and the other one says M/N-U0023. Embossed into the body of the webcams – which look identical – it says they support a microphone, auto focus and 720p. They are missing a shutter to block the camera which all new models have, but a piece of black tape solves that problem if you care. These webcams are perfectly great for Discord or Zoom calls. Here’s one web cam taking a portrait of the other in Discord, running on Linux Mint 22.2.
You might argue that it is not sharp but for a discord or zoom call its just great. I’ll not show my face here, but it was perfectly reasonable for 720p. Sure the new ones are 1080 or 4k, but who cares? If you really need that, then you don’t care about saving this old webcam.
I’m using OpenRGB to light up my Logitech G213 keyboard. This is on Linux Mint 22.2. I added a command to the startup events so OpenRGB starts when the system boots. That works great, but OpenRGB does not automatically start on resume from Suspend.
Here’s a summary of what I have so far.
There is a bash script in /etc/pm/sleep.d that runs OpenRGB. The problem is that it fails to find the profile. There is apparently something I don’t understand about the environment. There is a terminal, set to root, and set to the /etc/pm/sleep.d directory. So I get the same error when I run the script from there.
I have a gripe about computer cases. Well older computer cases. Something you should be careful about if you build computers, as I do.
Older cases are not designed to accommodate modern video cables, and GPU [Graphics Processing Unit] aka Video Cards. Let’s look closer.
This is the expansion slot area in the rear of the case. The mother board allows cards to be installed, the perforated plates are removed and then, possibly, cables are plugged into the expansion cards through these slots. Notice the protruding ridges above and below each slot. These ridges are designed to stiffen the thin metal strips above and below the card slots. However, they were designed back in 2012 or so before video cards were a common thing.
Here’s the situation where a Graphics Video Card is installed and one of the cables is plugged in. Notice the cable on the right. The Display Port video cable standard was available but not widely used on video cards when this case was released in 2013.
A few days ago, I posted about a Sony Bravia TV occasionally hanging up and requiring a power cycle to cause a reboot. At this point the TV has died permanently. Power cycling no longer boots the system. It remains black.
I’ve purchased a new Samsung TV for about 1/3 the cost of the Sony TV from five years ago. The label indicates the Sony TV was manufactured July 2020, and it was purchased in October 2020. For the new TV I spent an extra $100 for the QLED model. I hear that QLED is a more modern screen technology, and it seemed reasonable to stay up to date for that small amount of money. The screen looks very nice.
Several things required changing to accommodate the new TV.
My five year old Sony Bravia TV works perfectly well, until it doesn’t. I think the TV, and Android operating system of the TV are fine, but the three apps I use are getting more and more complex and memory hungry as time goes by.
July 2020 – Manufacturing date of this very nice TV. And like I said it works perfectly well most of the time. But after a few trips through Youtube, and sleeping the TV now and then through the day or over several days, eventually the TV just hangs up. I click on a Youtube video and the screen goes black. I hit HOME and it eventually – a few too many seconds – goes home. There are 2-3 second delays as I move between selections on the home screen.
Time for a reboot. I have a remote switch – one of these from Amazon. So I can just power off the TV, count to 10, and turn it back on. All is better, for a few days until it happens again.
Five years ago the memory capacity and processor speed were just fine for this TV. And streams play just fine watching movies on Netflix and Prime, or YouTube videos. But all three of these Apps have gotten increasingly complex in the way they deal with thumbnails and a dozen other things that keep using more memory and processor time.
Someday soon this TV is going to be replaced, not because it doesn’t work, but because it has not kept up with the apps. Oh wait. Is there a Generic App runner that I can use? I used to run a Linux Box as my streaming system. I’m not sure I want to buy into the Roku thing. But maybe some generic box? Google stopped making Chrome Cast. Hummm… Well someday I’ll check into that. For now, rebooting works. :ww
The last time I wrote Java code was about five years ago in 2000. At that time I needed a program to display a series of LibreOffice Impress slide shows to build an artwork display using a Linux System with a large monitor.
Recently I’ve gotten bored with Gaming and have decided to go back to programming and have decided to rewrite QtScreenShotArchive in Java. QtSSA is a program that I wrote back in 2013 to back up and organize screen shots for games I play. The program works great, but it is complex enough to provide a challenge for some Java coding. If you are interested in the current C++ QtFramework based, QtSSArchive program, it’s available from the page above.
Things have changed quite a bit since I last programmed Java. As I recall I was using the Eclipse IDE. Eclipse is still around, but the flashiest guy on the block is now Itellij. If you go there to download, be sure you scroll down to the bottom of the page to get the free community version rather than the free trial of the paid version. Unless you wanna pay. LOL
Here’s what IntelliJ looks like:
I suggest you use two monitors for development. I use IntelliJ on one and web pages for research and sample code on the other. And GitKraken is waiting in the background to check stuff in. There is an example of the GUI for the SSArchive program as well.
I am looking forward to the demise of Windows 10. Just kidding. I am doing the last conversion of my systems to prepare for the demise of Windows 10 in October 2025 – No more updates to Windows 10, esp security updates, after that time. And while Microsoft says stuff about being able to install Windows 11 on “any system” recently, they are not walking back this end date for security updates on Windows 10. Yep there are other ways. But they have an end date too, and cost a few bucks a year. Not sure I want to pay for home-grown security updates. So I’m going to move all my systems to Windows 11, or Linux Mint. Linux never said anything about not supporting older processors.
To review:
The new machine upgrade I did a while ago, when a power supply died, went straight to Windows 11.
Two more recent systems, upgraded in-place, which no glitches, from Windows 10 to Windows 11. No problems.
One machine – my “mail machine” – runs Thunderbird to support about a dozen email addresses. I moved that machine to Linux Mint.
This last machine is my Network Backup machine which runs Carbonite. Linux is notoriously finicky about file sharing with Windows. This machine serves as a dumping ground for important things from all the other Windows systems and then backs them up to Carbonite. I decided that I needed to buy a less than bleeding edge system that would run Windows 11.
Note: While the Banner for this post, and the images were created by AI, the text was created, for better or worse solely by me.
As you may have, I’ve been watching the progress of AI to generate images and even videos for a couple of years now. I’ve not been interested in “signing up” for one of the services since it is pretty clear that it will run into a lot of money to do anything serious. However, I have a couple of extra computers with GPUs so I thought it would be time to try to run AI image generation locally.
ComfyUI Seems Too Complex
I took a look at ComfyUI. It looks way too complex. While I’m familiar with the concept of connecting the boxes – from texture creation in Blender among other places – I’d rather just check some boxes and paste in a prompt.
To Summarize: I’m using two monitors and one of the monitors does not wake from sleep without a power cycle. Most recent update is at top, in blue. The initial post is below in White Text.
Update: 17 Mar 2025 Problem seems to be with the Asrock Phantom Gaming Monitor not waking up from sleep. Setting the computer to never sleep has fixed the problem while I’m using the computer. Of course, when the computer is put into sleep mode over night, then the monitor does not wake up in the morning and needs to be power cycled to wake up. I have not done this testing with the previous monitor or graphics card. Maybe it is an interaction with the other ASUS monitor in some way. I have other systems that have two DP attached monitors – both 27″ ASUS monitors – and they never have this problem. Hum…. Maybe I’ll do a test: Replace the 32″ monitor with the 24″ monitor and see if that fixed the issue. Hummm. Eh Nope. That does not change the problem. 24″ monitor replaces the 32″ monitor and the 27″ monitor still fails to wake from sleep..
Update: Nope. Sorry. Replacing the cables did not fix the problem. This is not the whole answer. The main monitor clicked off again after I replaced both connections with Display Port. I’ll continue to try to find a solution.
Update: Fixed the problem by replacing the cable to the monitor that kept going black. The cable, which had a latch, to the primary monitor is faulty. If the cable was wiggled at the monitor, the monitor would go black. I was confused earlier when the monitor would go black with nothing being touched on the cable or monitor. Replacing the DP cable fixed the problem. BTW, none of the DP cables I saw on Amazon had latches. The pictures of the ends of those cables were shown in such a way that the latch side of the connector was not shown. Newegg, however, as far as I can tell, only carries DP cables with latches. I’m not clear on the point of a DP cable with no latch. That’s the whole point of DP rather than HDMI which has no latch option. Cable converters between DP and HDMI contain no logic, but just wires. I suggest you always use DP cables with latches and my experience shows that cheaper cables, even with latches, can cause problems.
For over a year, I’ve been using two monitors with my gaming rig. One is a 27″ 2K monitor, and one is a 32″ 2K monitor. I was using a 24″ 2K monitor as the primary, and it seemed to have a problem that caused it to Pop and then go black. The pop is apparently the speakers in the monitor being disconnected. Audio is carried over the monitor connection to speakers in the monitor.
After getting the 27″ monitor, it had the same problem.
I’ve finally tracked the problem down. I think.
The problem is apparently that Nvidia graphics cards / drivers have an issue if you connect two monitors using different connection types.
My primary monitor [ smaller one, currently 27″] 2K QHD resolution has been connected with Display Port.
The secondary monitor, which is larger since it is actually farther away, is a 32″ monitor and I used HDMI to connect it since I had a long cable to use.
I recently got a nicer 27″ gaming monitor for the primary monitor, again using Display Port. And it has the same problem – Goes black. So the problem is not the monitor. And I’ve changed computers, and graphics cards – RTX 1060, RTX 3060. Same issue. Usually just once shortly after I start a game – any game FFXIV, GW2, ESO, you name it – the monitor on display port goes black, and I usually have to power cycle it with the switch to get it going again. This usually happens just once during a session. If I shut down a game an play another one, it is likely to happen a few minutes after starting the second game.
Well I just changed the connection to the 32″ monitor from HDMI to Display Port – got a long nice Display Port Cable. And it stopped happening.
So, either the driver or at least two generations of Nvidia GPUs have a problem that if you mix Connection Types, the Display port monitor go black and usually require a power cycle to get a display again. As you might imagine this can be annoying if you are the tank and you have just entered a dungeon with a party. Sigh…
Anyway, I’ll continue to test, but it looks like this is a long surviving problem with Nvidia Drivers / GPUs over several generations.
So don’t cross the streams! Er, I mean don’t mix the connections. :ww
I use Linux Mint in Virtual Box virtual machines on Windows Hosts. I’ve been using Linux Mint 21.2 on a Windows 10 machine for some months now and it’s all fine.
Notice the following examples of text in the windows:
Notice how sharp this text is. My monitor size is QHD [2560×1440]. I use Nvidia GPUs. This first example is on Windows 11 host with a Linux Mint 21.2 client on VirtualBox 7.1, no guest extensions [or not recently anyway]. GPU is a Nvidia RTX 3060. This text looks the same sharpness on Windows 10 host with earlier VirtualBox releases. It looks great.
Windy Weather 