Free consultation. Call 614-205-1285, send photos to email for some diagnosis.
Bring it in. If I fix it, $40 minimum, $40 per hour.
No charge if I don’t fix. No surprises. I communicate what I’m doing.
Internet from Bottom to Top: What is it?
Physical Computers in Physical Buildings on Physical Real Estate: Server Warehouses
Examples: AWS, …
With fluffy terms like “internet” “internets” and “cloud” it is easy to forget that there has to be something physical somewhere.
Amazon Web Services is currently the largest server owner in the world. They have huge locations around the world. You may have never actually seen one of these buildings. They are extremely high-security, so much so that they are often built in rural locations. While they cannot be completely incognito, their specific physical locations are not advertised. Physical access to these buildings is strictly controlled.
A server is just a computer with a specific purpose: to “serve” websites. Server warehouses are really just giant computer labs with rows and rows of man-sized computers (called servers), but the human users are remote. Anytime you are on the internet, you are trading information from a computer in a large server building.
Server Operating System
Examples: Linux, …
Personal computers typically run Windows or whatever Apple’s OS is called. Some geeks use Linux at home. Servers almost always use Linux as their operating system.
Physical Cables
Examples: underwater fiber-optic cables, …
Forget satellites and over-the-air smartphone data. Data transmission requires energy and transmitting data through the air is extremely inefficient. Satellite internet will never take over and the 5G on your phone goes through a fiber-optic cable all the way to the base of the cell phone tower. Intercontinental data transmission is done by underwater bundles of fiber optic cable, not satellite and not magic.
By now you have probably seem workers installing underground fiber-optic cables. They go under roads and through neighborhoods.
The Physical Cables to our House
Physically Connecting the Cables: Routers and Core Routers
Examples: these are not common to know about or see.
Core routers are a lot like servers in that they require extremely high security. They are also typically located outside of cities but they have to be near cities, for example in the suburbs, to do their job. Core routers also look like servers. They are man-sized. Core routers have hundreds of fiber cables plugged into them. Cisco Systems is the most famous manufacturer of core routers.
There are various smaller routers throughout cities. They might be located, for example, in the small utility buildings under cell phone towers.
Routing Software Directing the Traffic: TCP/IP
Internet Protocol is the language the hardware uses to communicate to each other how to send information over the cables and routers that make up the internet. IPv4 was the original and is still dominant. IPv6 began deployment on the public internet in 2006.
Web Browser to Server in a Warehouse: Physically Finding a Website
When you type a web address into your browser, your computer takes several steps to be connected to the appropriate server that delivers the website information.
The first source of information is the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. ICANN keeps the official list of who owns what site and therefore the owner of the site has the right to define where the traffic going to a domain name is directed. ICANN is the “global phone book” of the internet. Your web browser sends an internet address request to ICANN and ICANN responds with Name Servers. The Name Servers are servers maintained by a large hosting company to manage all of the websites hosted on their many servers. Name servers are like the “local operator” who further directs your call based on your request. Each request contains all the required information for the entities to respond with further routing instructions. As a website manager, you set your Name Servers through your host who forwards them to ICANN and it can take a few hours to “propagate” because it is a global system.
The lowest readable level of an address is an IP address, for example 108.174.197.50 . The IP address is used by all of the physical hardware from cables to routers to servers to physically make the connection and transfer information between the correct two computers, usually a personal computer or phone to a server.
Computers Talking
To continue clearly, we will specify the two definitions of “server.” “Physical server” is the physical man-sized computer mentioned above. Each physical server can “serve” hundreds or thousands of different websites to thousands of users simultaneously. Often, the physical servers are internally compartmentalized into “virtual servers.” Each virtual server can be maintained by an individual user, managed remotely, and rented from the physical server who performs the service for hundreds of “virtual server” renters. The virtual server renters collectively pay for the physical server they never see. So a virtual server is a physical server or at least contained on a physical server.
Once your web browser is connected to the name server, the name server uses Domain Name System to further direct the traffic. Example DNS record entries are “A Record” and “CNAME” for example. These are maintained by the hosting company. They do not take long to “propagate.”
Via physical cables and routers to ICANN to name servers to the hosting company to DNS records to the individually-managed server, there are now two computers talking to each other. We have arrived at the software level. The personal computer web browser software speaks to Apache on the server running Linux. There is one more type of traffic direction, the 301 and 302 redirect. In Apache, the redirect is usually located in the .htaccess file. The .htaccess file gives all visitors higher access to the server and so is therefore not enabled by default.
Apache2
Like your own computer, the operating system doesn’t do much by itself. Linux on a server by itself cannot “serve” a website. There has to be software to receive a request for a website over a cable and send the appropriate data to internet users. The most common server software is called Apache. So a server manager installs Apache on the server using Linux commands and then the websites are installed on Apache and served through Apache
- upload files to var/www/html/site-name
- create site-name.conf file in etc/apache2/sites-available
- enable the site with sudo a2ensite site-name
- reload apache2 with systemctl reload apache2
- What a “host” is
- The one we will use is bluehost.com
- The host stores the files for your website and sends it to users when someone goes to your site. Bluehost costs ~$12 per year to maintain the site
- Pick your domain name
- Others are godaddy.com, www.ipage.com, …
- What a web design platform is
- WordPress is the one we will use, available at www.wordpress.org
- Removes the necessity to work with actual code, like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP
- Others are squarespace, tumblr
- What a theme is
- “theme” = “template”
- I use Twenty Eleven for my store. It’s very simple and you can customize all the colors and have a heading image.
- How to present items for sale
- WooCommerce is the plugin that we will use.
- What do you want to sell?
- Make your site searchable on google and other search engines:
- “Search Engine Optimization” (SEO) is the name for this
- WordPress SEO is the plugin we will use.
- What words do you want to be searchable on your site?
- You can customize how your site looks when somebody searches it, particularly on Google
- How to measure, categorize and track the traffic to your website
- Google Analytics, set up a free account
- Plug-In: Google Analytics for WordPress, makes implementation easy
- Important to be able to profile your customers
- The traffic you generate may become valuable to advertisers and you can sell to them
- Make a separate website for free using a subdomain
- You already own the main domain, adding subdomains is free.
- It doesn’t take customers completely off your site.
- For example, you can make store.yourdomain.com be the place where you actually sell products and it can be separate from where you advertise and describe the products.
- Set up e-mail at your own domain name, and send and receive e-mails using your existing webmail.
- How to receive somebody’s money
- PayPal
- Amazon is another option.
Other Remarkable Clocks
The Antikythera Mechanism
an Astronomical clock from ~100 – 200 BC found in a shipwreck near the island of Antikythera.
Optical Lattice Atomic Clocks
Proposed in 2001 by University of Tokyo Professor Hidetoshi Katori, these are very much more accurate than standard atomic clocks. They are accurate enough to measure relativity and geologic density. Experimentally demonstrated in 2005.
Jun Ye, Boulder Colorado Strontium Optical Lattice Clock
https://spectrum.ieee.org/optical-atomic-clock-advantage-expands-electronics
Increased Accuracy by Accounting for Quantum Noise
With a quantum “squeeze,” clocks could keep even more precise time, MIT researchers propose
10,000 Year Clock
http://www.10000yearclock.net/
Astronomical Skeleton Clock
Commissioned by Mark Franks in Chicago. Built by Buchanan in the UK.
Yes Watch
Suppliers, Surplus, Related Companies
Watch Parts and Tools
https://www.esslinger.com/ – has lots of tools.
https://www.startimesupply.com/ – good for batteries and miscellaneous watch parts, must be a verified business to order. Some watch bands.
http://www.julesborel.com/ – see the JBC watch parts database. Renata batteries.
Cas-Ker Watchmaker and Jeweler Supplies
– based in Cincinnati, tools and parts.
Otto Frei Jewelry Supply and Watch Parts – large selection of watch crystals
Merritt’s for cleaning fluids.
GS Supplies for custom watch crystals
Ranfft.de – for old Swiss caliber number look-up.
Mikrolisk.de – for database of trademarks and trade names
CBS Watch Material – advertised in AWCI email. Advertises Rolex parts.
https://www.watchmaterial.com/ – looks like a well-organized site.
SNPR Leather Works for leather watch straps
The Strap Smith custom watch straps
Valle Alexander custom watch straps very expensive.
Used Stuff
Retail Surplus
Government Surplus
https://www.govdeals.com/ – Ohio State sells their surplus here.
Auctions
Miscellaneous
Mobilinkd, Terminal Node Controllers for Amateur Radio
Watch Parts References
Illuatrated Manual of American Watch Movements available from Cas-Ker
BestFit Catalog, part of AWCI’s database, or print available from McCaw
Slogans
Do more with less tech.
I hate technology.
The medium-tech technology company.
Reviewing the recent centuries of tumultuous tech advancement.
The only company addressing the most common malfunction in tech: user error.
The next-gen is medium-tech.
Tech has reached diminishing returns.
Version 3 means better.
Car Radio Installation
I do not do car radio installation. I offer better for a comparable price. Take the Time v3 Zero to Hero in Audio Tech class and understand how straightforward a car radio is and how similar a car radio is to most other consumer audio tech.
Bluetooth to phone is one tech feature worth having in your vehicle. If you have basic tools like screwdrivers and if you can strip and connect two wires together, I recommend installing your own Bluetooth radio. The radio itself is not so expensive. Allowing a shop to install is often more costly than the radio itself, but you can do it yourself in just a few hours.
How Difficult Will This Be?
By far the most difficult part of installing a radio in your car is removing the old radio and the dash around it. Everybody hates removing radios and dashboards. Some vehicles are very easy, others are difficult. Fortunately you can know how difficult yours is without touching your car. Just search on YouTube “[ vehicle make / model ] + remove radio ]” and decide if you want to tackle the project.
Watching somebody remove the dash on video helps you greatly by showing which panels must be removed, which are held on by screws, where the screws are, and which panels are snap-fitted.
Disconnect the vehicle battery first, it prevents making a mistake and blowing a fuse or worse, causing an electrical problem.
Which Radio?
Go to Crutchfield.com, enter your vehicle’s make and model, and Crutchfield automatically shows you radios that fit your vehicle. There are two main standard sizes, single DIN and double DIN.
If your car fits a double DIN radio, I recommend a Kenwood DPX504BT. (or a Kenwood DPX304MBT, same as the first but without a CD player). If your car fits only single DIN, I recommend a Kenwood KDC-BT278U.
- These radios are not touch screen, so you use buttons while driving, which is more responsive, more convenient, and safer while driving.
- These radios have an external microphone, which is a million times better call quality for the user’s voice, as in very very good versus often unacceptable for a microphone built-in to the radio.
- These radios offer a quality Bluetooth connection, including dual phone connection, meaning a passenger can “DJ” while the calls go to the driver’s phone, for example. Once set up, they connect automatically when the radio comes on.
How to Physically Mount the New Radio?
Order the radio on Crutchfield along with the installation kit for your vehicle, which is usually included when you put the radio in your shopping cart online. The installation kit fits your car’s dashboard to the standard aftermarket radio size.
How to Connect the Wires?
The Crutchfield installation kit includes a wire harness made to adapt your vehicle’s harness to the standard wire coloring scheme of aftermarket radios. You can use their harness and just connect the matching color wires or you can look on the provided harness which colors go to what and connect the new standard radio wire harness directly to the vehicle’s existing wires for a better connection with no extra work. You will have to connect one set of radio wires no matter what.
I recommend soldering with a butane-powered soldering iron. Gas powered is much hotter than electric and more heat means easier and faster when soldering.
Zero to Hero in Audio Tech Class
Price: $200 for a group of up to 4
Pretty much all audio tech revolves around the idea that a sound wave can be converted to an electrical signal and converted back to sound we hear. In just two hours, see and understand how this is done and be a smarter audio tech consumer for life.
You will be presented demonstrations of the following during the class:
- sound waves
- microphones
- electric analog audio signals
- digital audio signals
- speakers
- headphones
Besides learning the underlying concepts, you will learn the standard terminology and how it applies to everyday consumer products:
https://nathanruffing.com/audio-terminology/
Sign up today by calling or sending an email.
Cutting Edge Timekeeping Technology
When we imagine cutting edge timekeeping, we think of fancy watches, atomic clocks, GPS, expensive jeweled Rolexes and complex Breitling “chronometers.” A conversation on historical timekeeping advancements usually includes the railroads and the need to synchronize schedules among towns previously separated by long horse rides.
The common images attest to the success of the various marketing campaigns, but they are piggy-backing on previous advances of the technology itself, which usually happens more quietly – at the real cutting edge. The following are the points in history where an advance in timekeeping significantly advanced what is possible for mankind.
1759, John Harrison’s H4 Pocket Watch Enables Navigation
Determining longitude for navigation at sea was practically impossible until timekeeping advanced to make it possible. Just pause to consider this. Without a watch, you know your latitude easily by the sun or stars, but you only know your longitude by dead reckoning, which is a fancy way of saying you’re guessing. Imagine if your GPS only told you how far north and south you are but did not know east / west. The navies and governments of the world knew what the this technology would mean and offered various rewards for it.
Until 1759, some clocks were accurate enough to be used for navigation, but clocks with pendulums can only function on stable ground, not a ship. In 1759, clock maker John Harrison was the first to design a watch accurate enough to navigate at sea.
1927, Warren Marrison’s Quartz Frequency Standard for Bell Labs
1969, Seiko’s Consumer Quartz Wristwatch, the Astron SQ35 Wristwatch
https://www.seikowatches.com/us-en/products/astron/special/story_qa50th_1/
Atomic Clocks, GPS, and Metric Time Standard
Laser Light Pulse Clocks, Quantum Physics, Earth Density, and Seismic Activity
Watches and Clocks Career
Ohio is home to one of the main professional institutes:
Various schools around the country:
https://www.awci.com/rec-schools-2/
NAIOSWM WOSTEP program, Dallas
Central Ohio
Existing American Companies
Other
During the quartz crisis in Switzerland, Swatch bought Eta, who made 90% of the movements at the time. Swatch made movements nearly impossible to obtain for mechanical watches. Tag Haur and Breitling stood up to Swatch and bought movements from a new company, Saleta, who copied the movement from the old Eta.
Audio Terminology
Stereo Versus Mono
Stereo sound means left and right can be a different audio signal. Usually the two signals are nearly identical, but sometimes the difference is very noticeable. A stereo signal is two mono signals. Most people are familiar with this concept.
“Channel”
When buying mixers, pay attention to what “channel” means. Each stereo input is two channels. Therefore a “four-channel” mixer or recorder can often only properly handle two inputs. Indeed each channel is a separate audio signal, but if configured as stereo, there will only be one volume control for two channels together, for example, among other inconveniences. The mixer I bought is 12 channels, 4 microphone (mono by their nature) and 4 stereo inputs for a total of 8 separate volume controls. 8 has been plenty for me and I expect to never exceed it in my whole life.
Balanced Audio Signal Versus Unbalanced Audio Signal
Balanced audio uses two separate conductors carrying the same audio signal with opposite polarity. There is also a third conductor called ground or shield. The advantage is any noise picked up by the cable is picked up equally on each of the two conductors and therefore the noise cancels itself out leaving only the audio signal. The most common example is a microphone connected to an XLR input. See the XLR pin diagram below as the archetypal balanced audio example.
Unbalanced audio uses a single conductor to carry the audio signal, plus a ground. The most common example is headphones. There are three conductors because of stereo sound but each of the signals is a single unbalanced audio signal to the headphone speakers.
Microphones: Dynamic, Condenser, Electret Condenser, MEMS
Dynamic microphones use a magnet and coil to produce the audio signal. Advantages: do not require phantom power as the moving coil produces the electric signal, no self-noise, better at loud sounds, usually rugged and durable. Disadvantages: not as good at capturing detail. The most common example is the Shure SM58 performance mic.
Condenser microphones are delicate studio microphones that require phantom power to charge a “backplate.” While they produce some self-noise, they are better than dynamic mics at capturing sound detail, especially with with quality phantom power and using balanced audio signal. The most common examples are studio music recording mics and tech nerd podcasts. There are large diaphragm and small diaphragm condenser mics but if you care about that you are reading beyond this post.
Electret condenser microphones cheap and small. They don’t match professional mics in quality but they are very good and make up for the quality with small size and price. They are condenser microphones because they use a capacitor (charged plate) to produce the signal, but they do not require phantom power because the “backplate” is chemically charged in a way that does not decay for hundreds of years – pretty much permanent charge, like a permanent magnet. Note: I have had little success connecting these microphones to an audio mixer. While the description says they do not require power, I have also heard that they require 5V or 12V or 3-12V that is provided automatically by the computer or phone they are connected to. … ?
Cell phones use MEMS microphones (MEMS = microelectro-mechanical systems) because MEMS microphones are etched directly onto a silicon chip, often together with required circuitry, and they require very little power.
Phantom Power
Condenser microphones require phantom power to charge a backplate.
- Music mixers provide phantom power on their XLR inputs.
- Phantom power is almost always de-selectable with a switch on the mixer.
- Although dynamic mics do not require phantom power, most will not be damaged by it. Many musicians use phantom power with dynamic mics all the time without knowing what it is and the only result is a barely-audible hum.
XLR Input and Pin Diagram
An XLR input is a dedicated balanced input typically designed for microphones.
Male Versus Female
I don’t need to explain “the birds and the bees” here, but pay attention with XLR because it’s not immediately obvious especially when buying cables. Pictured above is female XLR that would require a male cable to connect.
TRRS Diagram
TRRS stands for “tip ring ring sleeve.” The only use I know for TRRS is stereo sound plus microphone:
*Note: some TRRS diagrams show the microphone as a ring and the sleeve as ground, but I believe this was probably an old standard now obsolete that was abandoned because the audio signal could interfere with the weak microphone signal.
TRS and TS
TRS is “tip ring sleeve.” The standard example is stereo headphones:
Notice the two signals on standard TRS headphones are unbalanced, therefore unbalanced stereo. Unbalanced sounds “bad” but it is just slightly more susceptible to noise than balanced audio, an effect less important than many other factors in most cases.
TS is, you guessed it, “tip sleeve.” The most common TS example is a mono audio signal. The tip is the audio signal and the sleeve is ground.
“Phone Plug” Sizes (“Phone Plug” = TRRS, TRS, & TS)
I quote “phone plugs” because although it may be the official term, you will have better luck searching TRRS / TRS / TS. “Phone plugs” come in the following sizes:
- 1/4″ = 6.3mm = “phone plug” = “the big ones”
- 1/8″ = 3.5mm = “mini-phone” = “normal headphone”
- 2.5mm = “sub-mini phone plug” = “the tiny little ones”
Balanced Audio on TRS
TRS can be used to carry a (mono) balanced signal (not common). For example, see the female 6.3mm TRS input on the XLR diagram above. The TRS input says “BAL OR UNBAL” beside it. A TRS balanced signal looks like this:
Signal Levels: Passive, Powered, Amplified
These are not “official terms,” but I would say there are three “signal levels.”
A passive signal is the signal a microphone produces for example. The signal is generated by the physical movement of the internal parts of a microphone. These signals must be amplified and are therefore sensitive to noise because any noise picked up will be amplified along with the audio signal. For this reason, passive signals often use balanced audio. Passive signals cannot even drive headphones.
A powered signal is the most common type. Once any electronics are involved, there are small amplifiers to drive the signal. Any powered signal can drive headphones, but usually not a speaker without external power.
An amplified signal can by itself drive a large speaker that does not have external power. Notice, with mono audio, some amplifiers will output an amplified signal via TS capable of driving a large speaker. You must use a robust TS mono cable to carry this signal to drive the speaker and not all TS mono cables are capable of this.
RCA Connectors
RCA connectors are common enough to warrant their own heading. They usually carry unbalanced mono signals and come in color-coded pairs for stereo.
Analog Versus Digital
All signals I refer to here are analog. USB is a good example of digital. Digital signals can be manipulated by software and digital can travel lossless over long distances. Digital has its advantages, but the conversion to digital and back to analog means delay even locally so once you are dealing with digital signals, you cannot listen to locally-produced sounds in real-time because you can perceive the small delay.
Bluetooth Transmitter
Once you have an audio signal on a standard headphone TRS, notice how versatile a Bluetooth transmitter can be with battery-powered Bluetooth speakers. Search for a Bluetooth transmitter and find many options, very affordable.
Bluetooth Receiver
If you want to mix in a pre-recorded track, a Bluetooth receiver is a great option to connect a music-playing smartphone or other digital device to your mixer. Many options, very affordable.
Surround Sound
I don’t know! I’m sure a home theater system salesman can talk for hours about it for free though!