Sunday, December 31, 2006

Repair an RPM database safely

cd /var/lib
tar zcvf rpm.tar.gz rpm
rm -f /var/lib/rpm/__db*
rpm -vv --rebuilddb

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Digital Pianos with good Hammer Keyboards

Brochure of many Digital Piano models

Yamaha

GranTouch
Natural Keyboard
Graded Hammer 3 GH3, damper with half pedal effect
P140, N100, CP33, CP330 Premium Graded Hammer Effect GHE GH
P70, P85, MM8 (initial touch), YPG-625, DGX620, Graded Hammer Standard GHS
P65, CME VX8 (initial aftertouch), Weighted Graded Hammer Action
S08 (initial touch), MO8 (initial touch), S90, S90ES, MOTIF XS 8, Balanced Hammer Effect BH BHE initial touch / aftertouch
S70 synthesizer, balanced hammer, initial touch, after touch

GranTouch real grand piano keyboard and pedals
Yamaha Advanced Sound Technology: Keyboard Touch Response
YAMAHA 的技術
Clavinova Piano Finder

Graded Hammer 3 (GH3): 2 sensors, Damper with half pedal effect CLP-230 CLP-240 CLP-270

"Natural Keyboard": wood with sensors CLP-280

Natural Keyboard: wood with 2 sensors and 6 steps in grading instead of 4 in GH CVP-900

Natural Wood Keyboard: wood with 2 sensors and 8 steps in grading CLP-990

Yamaha Japan Digital Piano

CME VX8 controller graded hammer-action weighted keyboard, initial after touch, $1000, distributed in the US by the Yamaha Corporation of America

Yamaha Electone STAGEA electronic organ (ELS-01C with horizontal touch)

Pedal keyboard  Concave Radiating 32-note AGO spec, MIDI, 61-note keyboard manual
Expression pedal swell, volume
Allen Organ Video
Rodgers 905B 3-manual digital (with MIDI) integrated with a pre-existing (1950’s vintage) Moeller 4-rank pipe organ digital organ, 905b
Lothar Bandermann church
Find an Organ Teacher, Find a Substitute Organist
Pipe Organ Encounters, POE at Stanford (8/7-13/2016)

LDS Organs
Viscount Unico CL6 toe pistons AGO-spec 32-note radiated/concave pedalboard
Rodgers Classic 559 10 piston AGO-spec 32-note radiated/concave pedalboard
Allen Historique I 6 piston AGO-spec 32-note radiated/concave pedalboard, or compact
Johannus Studio 170 61 + 61 + 30 RACO or AGO concave radiating
Hauptwerk Organ Console

Wersi Scala 61 + 61 + 25-note parallel pedalboard
Hammond Sk2 61 + 61 + 25-note radiated pedalboard
Roland AT-900 Platinum Edition 56 initial + 76 initial/after + 25 radiated
Roland C-330 61+61+30 parallel concave
Lowrey Marquee EX5000 61+61+25 parallel

Kawai DT9 61+61+25 radiating
Yamaha Electone DDK-7 Stagea 49+61+20-note pedalboard

Roland portable digital pianos
FP-7 Progressive Hammer-Action II Keyboard $1900
RD-300GX PHA alpha II Keyboard $1500
RD-700GX PHA II Ivory Feel Keyboard with Escapement $2500

Roland pianos with Escapement:
KR-107 intelligent upright
HPi-7 interactive piano
HP-207
HP-203
HP-107

Best keyboard, "Solid Progressive Hammer-Action Keyboard Ivory-feel with Escapement" and “Natural Look Effect”, Wood-tone sides, PHA II, Touch sensitivity: 100 levels

Roland Fantom-S88 Fantom-X8 Sampling Workstation with Progressive Hammer-Action mechanism and channel aftertouch $3000

Korg portable digital piano with Real Weighted Hammer Action 3 (RH3)
SP-250
Korg M3 Workstation / Sampler with RH3 and aftertouch $3500

Japanese RH3

Casio
CASIO Celviano PS-20 PL-40R AL-100R Naturally Scaled Hammer Action (lighted)

Kawai

Digital Piano Actions
AWA PRO Wooden-Key Graded-Hammer Action

ES4 portable digital piano with AHA IV Advanced Hammer Action with Acoustic Reaction AR Technology

Suzuki Deluxe Hammer Action, Velocity Sensitive pianos
Deluxe Hammer Action

Fatar Fatar  keyboard

Central Music CME USB Midi Keyboard, 中音, CME, Virgin Musical Instruments Video

CME Xkey, 2013, 2014 XKey37, midi controller, velocity sensitive, polyphonic aftertouch
XKey News
XKey Compatible Apps
XKey Piano  free
Free One Red Dog Media XK-1 Sounds $2 sound library
Arctic ProSynth $10
Grand Piano  $0
WI Orchestra free + 3*sections
FL Studio Mobile $15
Animoog $30
Cubasis $50

Saturday, December 23, 2006

silent mouse

Buffalo BOMU-SL

Friday, December 22, 2006

hand held GPS

Magellan eXplorist XL 3.5", 176x220, 16-color, 30MB Map, 30MB data, SD card, 14 channels, 4AA, 19 hours, 2.9"W x 6.4"H x 1.33"D, 12.25oz, Hot: 20 seconds, Cold: 60 seconds, Initial: 2 minutes

MotionBased supported GPS

Garmin Comparison of Handhelds
Comparison of 3" mapping handhelds
Topo Map supported products
Garmin Oregon 400t 3", 400x240, microSD, 2AA, 16 hours, 2.3" x 4.5" x 1.4", 6.8oz, Electronic compass, Barometric altimeter, 300 does not have Topo map
Garmin eTrex Vista HCx 2.14", 220x176, 256-color, microSD card, 2AA, 25 hours, 2.2"W x 4.2"H x 1.2"D, 5.5oz, Electronic compass, Barometric altimeter
Garmin nüvi 360 3.5" 320x240, 5.1oz, 8 hours, 3.87"W x 2.91"H x .87"D (9.83 x 7.39 x 2.21 cm)
Garmin nuvi 660 4.3" 480x272, 6.2 ounces (176 g), lithium rechargeable 7 hours, 4.9"W x 2.9"H x .9"D (12.4 x 7.4 x 2.3 cm)

Lowrance iFINDER H2O C 2.83", 320x240, 256 colors, MMC/SD card, 16 channels, 2AA, 14 hours, 2.5 x 5.6 x 1.2, 8.7oz

WAAS

Top 10 GPS

SiRF star III chipset
SiRFStarIII
STMicroelectronics Teseo
NemeriX low power
u-blox

Garmin eTrex H series uses MTK chipset
GPS Chipset comparison MediaTek MT3 SiRF Star III Semtech XE
Solar GPS Solar Bluetooth GPS receiver (MediaTek MT3), Transystem iBlue-757 (NemeriX)

Garmin GPSMAP 60Cx 2.6", 240x160, 256-color, microSD card, 64MB card, 12 channel, 2AA, 18 hours, 2.4W x 6.1H x 1.3D, 7.5oz, Warm < 1 sec, Cold < 38 sec, AutoLocate < 45 sec

GPS market SiRF vs Global Locate

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Best Buy Expands Private-Label Lines

Wal-Mart iLo Walmart Durabrand
Bestbuy Insignia
Circuit City NexxTech
Target TruTech
Radio Shack Accurian

Monday, December 04, 2006

Children First Dictionaries

Preschool Dictionary

The American Heritage Picture Dictionary 144 pages, 900 words, ages 3-5, grades k-3, 2006
Best Picture Dictionary Ever! 128 pages, 700 entries, baby-pre k, 1998
Scholastic First Picture Dictionary 112 pages, 800 words, 16 illustrations, ages 3-5, 2005
DK My First Dictionary 96 pages, 1000 words, 4-7 years, 1993
My Big Dictionary 40 pages, 170 words, age 3-5, grade pre k-k, 1994

First Dictionary

Merriam-Webster's Primary Dictionary 448 pages, 1000 entries, 3000 words, 700 illustrations, grades k-2, ages 5-7, 2005
The American Heritage First Dictionary 416 pages, 2000 entries, 700 photos, drawings, 5-8, 1994, ..., 2003, 2006
Macmillan First Dictionary 400 pages, 2200 words, age 5-8, K-3, 2008
DK First Dictionary 256 pages, 1000 entries, 4000 words, 700 illustrations, 5-8 years old, 2002
Scholastic First Dictionary 256 pages, 1500 words, 600 photographs, 4-8, 1998, 2006
Kingfisher First Dictionary 176 pages, 1500 words, ages 5-9, 1995, 1998, 2002
The Little Dictionary 176 pages, 1500 words, ages 5-8, 2003

First Thesaurus

Kingfisher First Thesaurus 144 pages, 100 key words, 1000 secondary words, grades K-3, ages 5-8, 2004

First Encyclopedia

+DK First Encyclopedia 160 pages, ages 5-8, 2002
The Kingfisher First Encyclopedia 160 pages, grades k-3, ages 5-8, 2005
Usborne internet-linked first encyclopedia series

Children Dictionary

+DK Merriam Webster Dictionary 960 pages, 35000 definitions, 3900 illustrations, 8-12 years, 2008
Webster's New World Children's Dictionary 2nd ed, rev, 944 pages, 33000 entries, 750 illustrations, ages 8-11, 2006
The American Heritage Children's Dictionary 864 pages, 8-12 years, grade 3-6, 13000 main entries, 1000 photos, 2006, new version coming? 1998
Merriam-Webster's Elementary Dictionary 624 pages, 32000 entries, 600 full-color illustrations, grade 2-4, ages 8-11, 1994. 842 pages, 2009
Macmillan Dictionary for Children 832 pages, 35000 entries, 1100 color photos, ages 8-12, grades 3-6, 2001, 2007
Webster's II Children's Dictionary 800 pages, 1200 drawings, 8-12, 2003
Scholastic Children's Dictionary 656 pages, 9-14, 2005

The Kingfisher Children's Illustrated Dictionary and Thesaurus
320 pages, 4000 words, 5000 headwords, 600 illustrations, grade 2-5, 7-10, 2003

Children Thesaurus

Simon & Schuster Thesaurus for Children 296 pages, 800 main entries, 5000 synonyms, ages 8-12, grades 3-7, 2001
+The American Heritage Children's Thesaurus 288 pages, 4000 main entries and 36000 synonyms, 8-12, grades 4-6, 2003, 2006, 2009
Scholastic Children's Thesaurus 240 pages, 500 entries and 2,500 synonyms, grades 4-8, ages 9-13, 2006

Children Encyclopaedia

DK Children's Illustrated Encyclopedia 6th edition 800 pages, 500 entries, 2000 subentries, 4500 full-color photographs, ages 8+, 2006, 600 pages for 2010 edition
Scholastic Children's Encyclopedia 720 pages, 600 entries, 2000 full-color illustrations, ages 9-12, 2004
The Kingfisher Children's Encyclopedia 480 pages, grades 4-6, ages 10-14, 2004
DK The New Children's Encyclopedia 304 pages, 6-9 years, 6 2009
+Children's Encyclopedia of American History

Science

The American Heritage Children's Science Dictionary 288 pages, 2,600 definitions, 350 detailed, full-color photographs and illustrations, 150 biographies, grade 4-6, 2010
+DK Encyclopedia of Science 448 pages, 280 major entries, 1900 subentries, 10+ years, 2006
+DK Encyclopedia of the Human Body 304, 2002

Kids Almanacs

+Scholastic Kid's Almanac 8+
+The World Almanac for Kids 2012, ages 9-12
+Time for Kids Almanac 2010 256
+The Old Farmer's Almanac for Kids 2009
+National Geographic Kids Almanac 2011 352, age 8-12
+Geography of the World 304 pages, 8-12, 2003
+National Geographic United States Atlas for Young Explorers

Usborne Illustrated Dictionaries
Illustrated dictionary
Illustrated dictionary and thesaurus
Illustrated dictionary of biology
Illustrated dictionary of chemistry
Illustrated dictionary of maths
Illustrated dictionary of physics
Illustrated dictionary of science
Illustrated thesaurus
Junior illustrated maths dictionary
Usborne Quicklinks

Student Dictionary

+Macmillan Dictionary for Students 1216 pages, 90000 entries, 1900 illustrations, grade -7, ages 9-12, 1984
The American Heritage Student Dictionary 1088 pages, 65000 entries, 2000 photographs, grades 6-9, ages 10+, 2009
Webster's New World Student's Dictionary 1056 pages, 50000 definitions, grades 5-8, 1996
Merriam-Webster's Intermediate Dictionary 998 pages, 70000 entries, 1000 photos, grades 5-9, ages 11-14, 2008

Student Thesaurus

Merriam-Webster's Intermediate Thesaurus 896 pages, 30000 main entries, grades 5-8, ages 11-14, 2012
The American Heritage Student Thesaurus 384 pages, 6000 entries, grade 7+, age 12+, 2009
Scholastic Student Thesaurus 208 pages, 1000 entries, grade 5-12, ages 10-18, 2002
The American Heritage Student Science Dictionary 384 pages, 4500 entries, 425 full-color photographs and drawings, and 175 fascinating feature notes, 2009

High School Dictionary

The American Heritage High School Dictionary 4th new ed, 1664 pages, 200000 entries, 2500 illustrations, grades 7+, ages 12+, 2007 2010
Merriam-Webster's School Dictionary 1280 pages, 100000 entries, 1000 illustrations, grades 9-11, age 14-17, 2015
The American Heritage High School Dictionary 5th, 1104 pages, 70,000 definitions 2016

High School Thesaurus

Merriam-Webster's School Thesaurus 704 pages, grades 9-11, age 14-17, 2004

College

Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition 1664p 2003
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition 2112p 2011
Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fifth Edition 1728p 2014
New Oxford American Dictionary (3 ed.) 2096p 2010

YourDictionary