• 0 Posts
  • 47 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: June 12th, 2023

help-circle








  • I’m sure there would be a way to do this with Debian, but I have to confess I don’t know it. I have successfully done this in the past with Clover Bootloader. You have to enable an NVMe driver, but once that’s done you should see an option to boot from your NVMe device. After you’ve booted from it once, Clover should remember and boot from that device automatically going forward. I used this method for years in a home theatre PC with an old motherboard and an NVMe drive on a PCIe adapter.




  • People here seem partial to Jellyfin

    I recently switched to Jellyfin and I’ve been pretty impressed with it. Previously I was using some DLNA server software (not Plex) with my TV’s built-in DLNA client. That worked well for several years but I started having problems with new media items not appearing on the TV, so I decided to try some alternatives. Jellyfin was the first one I tried, and it’s working so well that I haven’t felt compelled to search any further.

    the internet seems to feel it doesn’t work smoothly with xbox (buggy app/integration).

    Why not try it and see how it works for you? Jellyfin is free and open source, so all it would cost you is a little time.

    I have a TCL tv with (with google smart TV software)

    Can you install apps from Google Play on this TV? If so, there’s a Jellyfin app for Google TVs. I can’t say how well the Google TV Jellyfin app works as I have an LG TV myself, so currently I’m using the Jellyfin LG TV app.

    If you can’t install apps on that TV, does it have a DLNA client built in? Many TVs do, and that’s how I streamed media to my TV for years. On my LG TV the DLNA server shows up as another source when I press the button to bring up the list of inputs. The custom app is definitely a lot more feature-rich, but a DLNA client can be quite functional and Jellyfin can be configured to work as a DLNA server.





  • I briefly experimented with it ages ago. And I mean ages ago, like 20+ years ago. Maybe it’s changed somewhat since then, but my understanding is that Gentoo doesn’t provide binary packages. Everything gets compiled from source using exactly the options you want and compiled exactly for your hardware. That’s great and all but it has two big downsides:

    • Most users don’t need or even want to specify every compile option. The number of compile options to wade through for some packages (e.g. the kernel) is incredibly long, and many won’t be applicable to your particular setup.
    • The benefits of compiling specifically for your system are likely questionable, and the amount of time it takes to compile can be long depending on your hardware. Bear in mind I was compiling on a Pentium 2 at the time, so this may be a lot less relevant to modern systems. I think it took me something like 12 hours to do the first-time compile when I installed Gentoo, and then some mistake I made in the configuration made me want to reinstall and I just wasn’t willing to sit through that again.

  • Several years ago I was getting a lot of acid reflux. Went to the doctor, he gave me the “no-fun diet” list with all the foods to avoid because they can cause indigestion. Everything I loved was on that list. Beer. Cheese. Fried foods. Hot peppers. And, of course, coffee. I was highly motivated to achieve some kind of resolution to these stomach problems so I gave up everything on the list except coffee. Lo and behold, the symptoms remained. I switched the roles and gave up only coffee. The stomach symptoms disappeared, to be replaced by the worst fatigue headaches I’ve ever encountered. It took two weeks for the headaches to finally fade, and now I’m a tea drinker for life.

    I drink Earl Grey tea, mostly because I’m forgetful as hell and I need a tea where I can just leave the tea bag in there for as long as it takes me to remember that I made tea. With most other black teas if you don’t yank the bag out at the right time your tea will get bitter as hell. Not Earl Grey, you can forget that shit for half an hour and the Earl don’t mind. You’ll still come back to a cup of tea that’s still perfectly drinkable. When I want to take it to the next level I get some Cream of Earl Grey, the kind with the little blue flower petals in it. Heavenly.




  • I’ve got a Garmin Vivoactive 3 and it works great. Heart rate tracking seems decent, and it will also do pulse oxygen though I usually leave that off because it drains the battery faster. The price is good too, they can be had new for $230 Canadian, so probably sub-$200 US.

    Android app works well often, mostly I just use it as a bridge to get my calories burned data into a calorie tracking app (Chronometer, free version). The calories burned estimate seems to be decently accurate. I’ve been trying to eat 500 calories under the estimated burn rate, and I’ve lost 30 pounds since last November. Not a linear process, there were lots of events and trips where my willpower went right out the window, but those weren’t the watch’s fault!