Yes, Steve, people do make fake crappy network cards

In fact, the 8139C-for-Charlie is the first version of the 8139 that I’ve had work reasonably reliably out of the 8139 series — genuine or not — earlier models would do stuff like go off-air after some random number of hours (or minutes, in some cases), and the cards made out of 8129s (note the 2 not 3) sucked big-time, often needed special DOS drivers to configure them, and they were better than many of the previous Intel-clones and others (some of which seemed to need a chisel and some patience for configuration).

RealTek went on to releae an 8139D-for-Delta, which was an almost-reliable chipset, then moved to the 8140 etc. Let’s just say that I don't regard the chipset as exactly a kiss-of-life for a card.

The 8139D had odd limitations which made the writing of drives into a PITA [read the Linux driver source for details], like odd DMA boundaries which implied CPU-copying of network packets to make it all work.

Why someone would deliberately use those chips as the basis for a new card is seriously beyond me. It can’t be cost, because there are plenty of better network chipsets kicking around at low cost.

Comments

every-application-is-part-of-a-toolkit at work

I have a LibreOffice Impress slideshow that I wish to turn into a narrated video. 1. export the slideshow as PNG images (if that is partially broken — as at now — at higher resolutions, Export Directly as PDF then use ‘pdftoppm’ (from the poppler-utils package) to do the same). 2. write a small C program (63 lines including comments) to display those images one at a time, writing a config file entry for Imagination (default transition: ‘cross fade’) based on when the image-viewer application (‘display,’ from the GraphicsMagick suite) is closed on each one; run that, read each image aloud, then close each image in turn. 3. run ‘Imagination’ over the config file to produce a silent MP4 video with the correct timings. 4. run ‘Audacity’ to record speech while using ‘SMPlayer’ to display the silent video, then export that recording as a WAV file. 4a. optionally, use ‘TiMIDIty’ to convert a non-copyright-encumbered MIDI tune to WAV, then import that and blend it with the speech (as a quiet b

new life for an old (FTX) PSU, improved life for one human

the LEDs on this 5m strip happen to emit light centred on a red that does unexpectedly helpful things to (and surprisingly deeply within) a human routinely exposed to it. it has been soldered to a Molex connector, plugged into a TFX power supply from a (retired: the MoBo is cactus) Small Form Factor PC, the assorted PSU connectors (and loose end from the strip) have been taped over. the LED strip cost $10.24 including postage, the rest cost $0, the PSU is running at 12½% of capacity, consumes less power than a laptop plug-pack despite running a fan. trial runs begin today.

boundaries

pushing the actual boundaries of the physical (not extremes, the boundaries themselves) can often remove barriers not otherwise perceived. one can then often resolve an issue itself, rather than merely stonewalling at the physical consequences of the issue.

Plantagenet Penguinista

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