A while ago, I suddenly received a friend request from Klaas on Facebook. My first reaction was something along the lines of 'WTF?' Then I clicked on and discovered my Facebook account: apparently I had created one in early August. Probably to check out what all the fuss was about.
After searching around a bit, it seems that most of the people I have connected with on LinkedIn are also present on Facebook. And more: I found a number of school friends that aren't on LinkedIn.
I guess I'll be maintaining two networks in parallel now.
Saturday, 25 October 2008
Saturday, 11 October 2008
Screening
I did another MAG screening again today. I'm getting better and better at it: all eights, except for one seven for driving over a plank of timber and two sevens for the break test. The two tries for slow driving were 14 and 18 seconds.
Quotation is as follows: you start out with seven; for every fault one point gets subtracted (but they don't go negative); for doing something extra you get one point extra (which can be lost in case of a fault).
Nine is for doing the exercise better than the instructor and 10 is reserved for some guy named God.
For slow driving you have to drive 10m and taking at least 12 seconds to do it, without placing a foot on the ground or driving outside a set boundary.
Some photos I took today. I miss my 10x optical zoom; 6x doesn't even come close.
Quotation is as follows: you start out with seven; for every fault one point gets subtracted (but they don't go negative); for doing something extra you get one point extra (which can be lost in case of a fault).
Nine is for doing the exercise better than the instructor and 10 is reserved for some guy named God.
For slow driving you have to drive 10m and taking at least 12 seconds to do it, without placing a foot on the ground or driving outside a set boundary.
Some photos I took today. I miss my 10x optical zoom; 6x doesn't even come close.
Sunday, 5 October 2008
I rest my case
After a few mails back and forth between me and the Canon repair centre it's all clear now.
They told me it was an "exceptional service" of them to replace my four-year-old, out-of warranty camera with a brand new one. Apparently they usually send irrepairable cameras back unrepaired without replacement.
This BS means one of two things: either they are lying to me and they always send a new camera if and older one is deemed irrepairable or would cost too much to repair, in which case they could easily have informed me about this policy before I sent them my camera in the first place. Or they damaged my camera beyond repair themselves and now silently try to make up for it.
Another hint that the latter suspicion may be true is that the official communiqué by Canon for Belgium in which they state that cameras showing the problem I had would be repaired free of charge is dated 22 July 2008. If they were still able to repaire CCDs then, it must mean that spare parts are still available and that they allocated a budget for repairs.
All of this is moot, however, as the repair people stated that my camera had already been sent to Canon for environmentally-friendly destruction and there was no possibility to get it back.
Accepting my defeat, I went to take a look at the CHDK library to check if it was available for my camera (Canon PowerShot G9 firmware version 1.00G). Unfortunately, it wasn't, but searching a bit further, it became apparent that there was some active development going on. Yesterday, I ended up installing the first nearly completely working version of CHDK on my camera (which was out since the day before).
I also installed a script for time-lapse photography, so now I have the most important functionality of my old camera back.
They told me it was an "exceptional service" of them to replace my four-year-old, out-of warranty camera with a brand new one. Apparently they usually send irrepairable cameras back unrepaired without replacement.
This BS means one of two things: either they are lying to me and they always send a new camera if and older one is deemed irrepairable or would cost too much to repair, in which case they could easily have informed me about this policy before I sent them my camera in the first place. Or they damaged my camera beyond repair themselves and now silently try to make up for it.
Another hint that the latter suspicion may be true is that the official communiqué by Canon for Belgium in which they state that cameras showing the problem I had would be repaired free of charge is dated 22 July 2008. If they were still able to repaire CCDs then, it must mean that spare parts are still available and that they allocated a budget for repairs.
All of this is moot, however, as the repair people stated that my camera had already been sent to Canon for environmentally-friendly destruction and there was no possibility to get it back.
Accepting my defeat, I went to take a look at the CHDK library to check if it was available for my camera (Canon PowerShot G9 firmware version 1.00G). Unfortunately, it wasn't, but searching a bit further, it became apparent that there was some active development going on. Yesterday, I ended up installing the first nearly completely working version of CHDK on my camera (which was out since the day before).
I also installed a script for time-lapse photography, so now I have the most important functionality of my old camera back.
Monday, 29 September 2008
Furious
Yes, that's what I am!
Today I received a package from the Canon repair centre; me happy at first, until I opened it. Inside was a brand new (at least, it looks brand new) Canon PowerShot G9!
The ETB ASS assholes downgraded me without asking, or even notifying me!
- I can't reuse my AA batteries; I'm stuck with some proprietory lithium thing that costs a fortune if you want a second pack and another fortune if you want an external charger (at least it would all cost more than a set of 4 rechareable AA batteries).
- I can't reuse my CF cards; the G9 uses MMC+ crap, which not only requires me buying new memory cards, but also a new cardreader for my PC
- The LCD screen is fixed, not tiltable; so no photographing under odd angles; something I do when photographing plants or technical stuff (PC innards, bike, etc)
- Downgraded from 10x to 6x optical zoom (from 38-380mm to 35-210mm equivalent)
- The S1 supports time lapse photography, I don't know whether the G9 does
- The viewfinder on the S1 was a mini LCD panel, the G9 has an optical, parallax-prone viewfinder that probably doesn't zoom with the lens
- And last but not least, the S1 has a decent grip while the G9 is flat; of course it fits in an inside pocket, but that's not a concern of mine since I keep as little as possible in my pockets as it only causes extra rib damage in case of a fall.
They haven't seen the end of me, that's for certain!
Today I received a package from the Canon repair centre; me happy at first, until I opened it. Inside was a brand new (at least, it looks brand new) Canon PowerShot G9!
The ETB ASS assholes downgraded me without asking, or even notifying me!
- I can't reuse my AA batteries; I'm stuck with some proprietory lithium thing that costs a fortune if you want a second pack and another fortune if you want an external charger (at least it would all cost more than a set of 4 rechareable AA batteries).
- I can't reuse my CF cards; the G9 uses MMC+ crap, which not only requires me buying new memory cards, but also a new cardreader for my PC
- The LCD screen is fixed, not tiltable; so no photographing under odd angles; something I do when photographing plants or technical stuff (PC innards, bike, etc)
- Downgraded from 10x to 6x optical zoom (from 38-380mm to 35-210mm equivalent)
- The S1 supports time lapse photography, I don't know whether the G9 does
- The viewfinder on the S1 was a mini LCD panel, the G9 has an optical, parallax-prone viewfinder that probably doesn't zoom with the lens
- And last but not least, the S1 has a decent grip while the G9 is flat; of course it fits in an inside pocket, but that's not a concern of mine since I keep as little as possible in my pockets as it only causes extra rib damage in case of a fall.
They haven't seen the end of me, that's for certain!
Thursday, 18 September 2008
Distorted
A while back, my digital camera (a Canon PowerShot S1 IS) started to show some quirks. From time to time, the viewfinder display showed some purplish flashes. At first I thought there was something wrong with the display, but afterwards it became clear the the recorded photos were equally affected:
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Since I bought the camera second-hand a few years back, the warranty period was long over. Besides, the problem only happened occasionally, so I was just hoping it wouldn't crop up too frequently.
Until a friend (the guy in the photo, incidentally) told me it was a known problem that affected some Canon devices equipped with a certain CCD made by Sony. The adhesive used for bonding the glass cover plate on the CCD causes corrosion of some parts of the CCD internals with the result illustrated above. The whole process is accelerated in warm and/or humid environments (it was indeed a very warm day the day that photo was taken).
Apparently, Canon has stated that they would repair affected cameras free of charge (including shipping to a service center). My guess is that they in return will claim their money back from Sony.
Anyway, equipped with this information, I finally reserved a day for a telephone fight with customer services. I first called Canon's Universal International Free Number: +800 22666 767. Either the number is out of commission, or it's not available through my Telenet Mobile subscription. Then I called the number of their Belgian helpdesk: 02 6200 197. After the obligatory language chooser and waiting until the phone support guy got out of his settee, this went very quick (4 min 12 sec): they don't do repairs in Belgium. But they did give me the number for the repair center in the Netherlands (+31 165 850 500).
Then I called the repair center, a phone call that also went very quick (3 min 28 sec). They said I had to start up the repair process through their website (they spelled it, as the name is somewhat unfortunate). I would have to send or bring in the device after which they would give me a quote for the cost and ask whether I would want to have it repaired. To my reply that this was an issue where both repair and shipping was supposed to be free of charge, regardless of warranty status they immediately responded "it's about a faulty CCD then?"
Honestly, I was impressed. I had thought it would be a lot more difficult to get something done for free.
Anyway, I registered on their site, requested pickup and sat back and waited. Next day UPS hostaged me the entire morning until about 1300 (I had to stay home until they picked up the package with my camera).
According to UPS tracking, my package arrived (was signed for) the next day. According to the repair center's status tracking, they received it a week later and sent it immediately to a 'repair location' where they started the repair and ordered parts.
That's the story so far. I've spent €2.76 on phone calls and half a day waiting for UPS. Hopefully, Canon keeps their promise and I won't have any further expenses.
To be continued...
.JPG)
Since I bought the camera second-hand a few years back, the warranty period was long over. Besides, the problem only happened occasionally, so I was just hoping it wouldn't crop up too frequently.
Until a friend (the guy in the photo, incidentally) told me it was a known problem that affected some Canon devices equipped with a certain CCD made by Sony. The adhesive used for bonding the glass cover plate on the CCD causes corrosion of some parts of the CCD internals with the result illustrated above. The whole process is accelerated in warm and/or humid environments (it was indeed a very warm day the day that photo was taken).
Apparently, Canon has stated that they would repair affected cameras free of charge (including shipping to a service center). My guess is that they in return will claim their money back from Sony.
Anyway, equipped with this information, I finally reserved a day for a telephone fight with customer services. I first called Canon's Universal International Free Number: +800 22666 767. Either the number is out of commission, or it's not available through my Telenet Mobile subscription. Then I called the number of their Belgian helpdesk: 02 6200 197. After the obligatory language chooser and waiting until the phone support guy got out of his settee, this went very quick (4 min 12 sec): they don't do repairs in Belgium. But they did give me the number for the repair center in the Netherlands (+31 165 850 500).
Then I called the repair center, a phone call that also went very quick (3 min 28 sec). They said I had to start up the repair process through their website (they spelled it, as the name is somewhat unfortunate). I would have to send or bring in the device after which they would give me a quote for the cost and ask whether I would want to have it repaired. To my reply that this was an issue where both repair and shipping was supposed to be free of charge, regardless of warranty status they immediately responded "it's about a faulty CCD then?"
Honestly, I was impressed. I had thought it would be a lot more difficult to get something done for free.
Anyway, I registered on their site, requested pickup and sat back and waited. Next day UPS hostaged me the entire morning until about 1300 (I had to stay home until they picked up the package with my camera).
According to UPS tracking, my package arrived (was signed for) the next day. According to the repair center's status tracking, they received it a week later and sent it immediately to a 'repair location' where they started the repair and ordered parts.
That's the story so far. I've spent €2.76 on phone calls and half a day waiting for UPS. Hopefully, Canon keeps their promise and I won't have any further expenses.
To be continued...
Monday, 1 September 2008
De vakantie is voorbij...
...weeral.
Op de planning voor dit jaar staan: één verplichte houtverbinding (eigenlijk drie, maar onze leerkracht dit jaar houdt niet zo van regeltjes), iets kast-achtigs (waarschijnlijk ook weer iets verplichts waar een draai aan gegeven wordt), een dag op verplaatsing werken (waarschijnlijk een roostering voor een plafond of plat dak), misschien nog een uitstapje of twee en de rest van de tijd is voor werk naar eigen keuze (eigenlijk theorielessen, maar dat is ook weer een regeltje).
Op de planning voor dit jaar staan: één verplichte houtverbinding (eigenlijk drie, maar onze leerkracht dit jaar houdt niet zo van regeltjes), iets kast-achtigs (waarschijnlijk ook weer iets verplichts waar een draai aan gegeven wordt), een dag op verplaatsing werken (waarschijnlijk een roostering voor een plafond of plat dak), misschien nog een uitstapje of twee en de rest van de tijd is voor werk naar eigen keuze (eigenlijk theorielessen, maar dat is ook weer een regeltje).
Tuesday, 12 August 2008
Zonsondergang
Wolken in het oosten, bijna open hemel in het westen, en dat in combinatie met zonsondergang geeft enkele minuutjes lang onderstaand beeld. De kwaliteit is niet schitterend; waarschijnlijk veel te veel transformaties toegepast om alle foto's min of meer naadloos aaneen te rijgen.
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