[FX.php List] [OFF-TOPIC] A bug discovery in OS X Server and OS X 10.4 installers

Tue May 22 21:20:14 MDT 2007

I seem to recall a story about the original fuzz-guitar sound being  
an accident due to a loose tube. Johnny Burnette Trio? (Really,  
that's before my time!)

Dale

On May 22, 2007, at 9:39 PM, Bob Patin wrote:

> That reminds me of the early days of analog music synthesizers,  
> Dale. I've been a studio musician all my life, and started using  
> synthesizers back in the 70s when I first got my hands on a  
> Minimoog when I was about 14 years old. I bought my first Moog  
> synth in 1974, then another in 1978; the 2nd was the fabled  
> Minimoog, which is still considered a wonderful device.
>
> Back in those days, to make the pitches on the synth, there was a  
> long metal rod under the keyboard, that stretched from one end of  
> the keyboard to the other; each key had a small gold-plated wire  
> that would touch the rod in a different spot, thus creating the  
> voltage that was fed in to a voltage-controlled oscillator.
>
> So anyway, when the Mini warmed up, it would *usually* start  
> staying in tune, but the same voodoo science applied with this  
> thing; sometimes it would just start drifting out of tune, which is  
> why the Mini had a built-in A-440 switch for tuning it up between  
> songs (which I used to do all the time). Digital oscillators  
> weren't invented yet, or at least weren't in music synthesizers,  
> and it was well-known among keyboard players that heat would play  
> all sorts of tricks on the tuning of a synthesizer.
>
> These days I've sold off most of my synths and use plug-ins on a  
> laptop (little software emulations that are amazingly close to the  
> original synths, including the Minimoog, which I sold a couple of  
> years ago). Guitar players still use tube amps for guitars because  
> they sound so good, and I can fondly recall hitting the top of my  
> amps to get the tubes to quiet down...
>
> I had a friend today call me about installing Vista on his XP Pro  
> machine; I talked to him at 3, when he was trying to figure out how  
> to install Vista without having to initialize his drive... he  
> finally nuked the drive and started installing Vista. After a half- 
> dozen tries, none of which completed, he gave up and decided to put  
> XP back on the machine. I just spoke to him at 9 and XP had  
> apparently locked up in its install too.. :) As a Mac guy, I was  
> gracious and didn't laugh (into the phone at least), but I knew I'd  
> be telling the story... :)
>
> Bob
>
>
>
>
>
> On May 22, 2007, at 9:27 PM, Dale Bengston wrote:
>
>> Well, I'm going to say I'm as crazy, or at very least as voodoo- 
>> cursed as Bob. (See other post in this thread.)
>>
>> Back in the early 80s when I was a student hourly at the  
>> University of Wisconsin, at a research center that did work for  
>> non-vocal disabled people, we had a balky voice synthesizer. Now,  
>> the quality of voice synthesis in that era was pretty bad. This  
>> thing cost about $600 and sounded like the Cylons from the  
>> original Battlestar Galactica.
>>
>> After a couple hours of use, it would start to skip and stutter. I  
>> called the manufacturer's phone number and got some engineer at  
>> the small company that made the thing. He told me this story: when  
>> the synthesizer got warm, due to different rates of expansion,  
>> some of the components on the circuit board would get loose. All I  
>> had to do was unplug it, pick it up, hold it upside down, and slam  
>> it on the table and everything reseat itself.
>>
>> Naturally, I didn't believe him. I was only 20 years old, but I  
>> wasn't going to fall for that one. After while, he (mostly)  
>> convinced me, and I figured I could always claim the "I don't know  
>> what happened" defense if it broke. So I put down the phone and  
>> slammed the thing on the table as directed. Then I plugged the  
>> synthesizer back in, and it worked.
>>
>> After that, fixing the voice synthesizer became something of a  
>> parlor trick around the office. The synthesizer would start to cut  
>> out and break up, and I (or someone I'd freaked out previously  
>> with the trick) would pick the thing up and slam it on the table.  
>> It worked every time. I was at that job for three years after that  
>> and the synthesizer was still going strong when I left. It would  
>> probably still work if you didn't mind digging up an Apple II and  
>> sounding like a Cylon.
>>
>> Dale
>>
>> On May 22, 2007, at 9:08 PM, Jon Montgomery wrote:
>>
>>> On 5/22/07 7:23 PM, "John May" <jmaymailing at pointinspace.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Never tried that specific combination.
>>>>
>>>> I do know there was a screwy install issue with OS X server on  
>>>> the old G4 Xserves where the install disc wouldn't boot if there  
>>>> was more than 512MB ram installed.  Gotta love that black magic...
>>>>
>>>>         - John
>>>
>>> My dad was a radio tech for the state police.  Not long ago a  
>>> retired state trooper told me a story about my dad and this  
>>> trooper’s radio.  My dad had evidently “fixed” it several times  
>>> in a week or two.  He would put it back in the car and the next  
>>> day the trooper would have to come back in and tell him it didn’t  
>>> work.  Finally dad took the radio out of the car, now mind you  
>>> this was just before printed circuits took over so this thing had  
>>> vacuum tubes in it.  He looked at it sitting there for a long  
>>> time.  Picked it up and slammed it down on the work bench.  Then  
>>> he said, “You have got to get a new radio.  This one is broken.”
>>>
>>>     Now Bob, that is NOT my suggestion with your Mac.  That radio  
>>> didn’t cost over 2 grand, but the reference that John made above  
>>> to that “black magic” was around in the 60’s as well.
>>>
>>> Hope this brings a smile.
>>>
>>> Jon Montgomery
>>> -- 
>>> Jon Montgomery
>>> Email           igsmasupport at igsmasouth.org
>>> Email           vicepresident at onecliq.net
>>> Email           jwmontgomery at dqud300.perry.k12.il.us
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