Author Archives: techhelp

Alpha Syntauri – Mountain Computer Cards

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After I completed my first post about the Alpha Syntauri system, I started reading the Mountain Computer manual. It reminded me that the Mountain sound cards came in pairs and I only have one. The likelihood of restoring my Syntauri to working condition seems remote at this point. There is a possibility that someone will have Mountain Corporation sound cards, but they are becoming very rare.

There are Apple II computers, with language cards, still running so my hope is not quite extinguished.

Here is a blog article with a picture of a working system  

This seems to be from Germany

Here is a You Tube video

I was able to get so much more out of this system because of the years I spent programming it.

 

In the 1990s my keyboard was stolen out of my basement storage. I kept the computer for years, but at one point I had to let it go. I thought I removed all the cards and kept them. Now I open my storage box to find only one Mountain Computer Card.

The photo on the previous post tells the story. 

I hope to be able to pool my resources with someone who has the parts I lack or be able to buy them at a reasonable price. 

I know how to make this work and I have all the software and manuals. I would love to hear my sounds from 1983-1989 again.

 

 

Alpha Syntauri System on Apple II+

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Alpha Syntauri Keyboard System promo

In 1984, my partner and I purchased the Alpha Syntauri keyboard system and an Apple II+ computer. We were thrilled with this pre-MIDI recording system for synthesizer sounds. The Alpha Syntauri was fully programmable with 16 discrete voices. 

It was an expensive system at the time with the computer and cards purchased separately. Our studio in Toronto in late 1984 was the Alpha Syntauri, a Fostex 8 track tape recorder and an EMU Drumulator. We both played guitar and sang.

I used the system until the 1990s when the keyboard was stolen. I took the cards out of the Apple II when I no longer had room for it and recycled it.

Pricing notes from shopping for the Syntauri

Now I want to find a new home for the parts that I still have. The original price sales notes on the promo item show we paid around $3500 for the system. Then we bought the MIDI update card when General MIDI was finalized.

What is it worth now?

I do not have all the pieces because the keyboard and the Apple II+ are gone.

I list below the things that I do have.

It is important for me to find someone who is interested in making this work. 

 

 

Mountain Equipment Card on left, Keyboard card and MIDI update card

Serial cable to attach the Keyboard, audio out cable connects to card and I am not sure . . . but maybe essential cable.

Alphs Syntauri updated software

Additional copies of software

Apple II joystick and mouse 

I purchased the mouse much later for the children’s games listed at the end.

Alpha Syntauri Manual

Detailed manual for the Syntauri system with chapters on set up, operation and  theory. Chapters are: Version, Quick reference, Metatrak (recording section) alphaPlus (synth section) Performance and Appendix. It is a really complete manual.

Alpha Syntauri Manual page 4

Alpha Syntauri Manual page 23

 

Alpha Syntauri packing slip

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alpha Syntauri Users Group Newsletter (multiple pages)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back Page of Leaflet promo

 

 

 

Promo foldout

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After I took the photos, I found the Mountain Equipment Manual that was designed to use the cards for creating synth notation. That is why there is a pen on the card.

I really do not know if this will work after all these years, so I will take offers for this package AS IS.

I also have Children’s games and educational software – I will let these go separately. 

Apple II children’s games and educational software

 

Mickey’s Space Adventure for Apple II and Commodore

Mickey’s Space Adventure for Apple II and Commodore Manual open                                                                                                                      Send me a message using this form

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Send me a message using this form

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Aberthau Performance

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The hedge that I will use as a screen for the projection.

The hedge that I will use as a screen for the projection.

 

I will be showing a work in progress called “Share A Tweet” at Aberthau Community Centre in the Point Grey neighbourhood of Vancouver. More information here.

Share a Tweet: A gesture controlled sound and visual installation.

This installation investigates a variety of bird songs accompanied by music and an array of lighting effects. Participants can control bird shapes flying through the branches of the hedge and active birdsong. By controlling the “lights”, bird shaped projections will “tweet”. Victoria has been a stalwart volunteer for LMA during the Queen Elizabeth show last year and has been invited to present work in natural settings.

121212 Festival of Networked Performance

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This is your invitation to the 121212 Festival of Cyber-performance!

The retrospective section of the program “Walking Backwards into the Future” is already underway.

Schedule for these events here.

The portion that I am involved in is the new experimental works, Testing 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2 .

I am working with “Play the Moment – Shakti”, a group of four women located in different cities.

We will be performing a piece called ‘excavating desire/fouilles pour le désire”

Our stage is located on a website in Australia called Waterwheel and will be viewed through either this link or a link through the festival site Scroll down to find our show.

About the Show

Excavating Desire – Fouilles pour le Désire

Play The Moment Shakti (Canada, USA)

11 December 10.30pm EST / 12 December 4.30pm New Zealand (find your local time)
12 December 1pm EST / 13 December 7.30am New Zealand (find your local time)

Excavating Desire is a free improvised audio and visual work in four movements:

  1. On the Surface – exploring constraints imposed on female desire by society and ourselves
  2. Digging Deep – recognizing our wants and needs
  3. Gathering Courage – risking societal censure, economic loss or emotional pain requires resolve and strength
  4. Flowering of Passion – acceptance and expression of our own inner identity

Four women going through the same risk and hardship of “Excavating Desire”.

Desires are often hidden underneath layers so we do not even recognize them ourselves. It is a risk to reveal our true self, particularly in personal and intimate situations, but also when revealing oneself as an artist. “Excavating Desire” provides a structure to peel away the layers of constraint and grant ourselves permission to express what we choose to see and hear as art.

Schedule and time zones

A handy time zone converter to find your viewing time can be found here.

These converter links can be found already programmed with the correct DST time under the title of the show in the spreadsheet.

For example the second  performance of our show is at 7:30am on Thursday, December 13th DST in New Zealand — the location of the 121212 festival, but it is Wednesday, December 12th at 10:30am PST, in Vancouver, Canada, where I live.

More information about the show can be found by clicking the title of the show.

Facebook Event Page Here

 

 

 

 

 

Photo Hosting Sites Comparison

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My work in video and photography is mainly in post-production as a graphic designer, digital artist and general technology assistant. I was helping a photographer to set up a professional photo site to sell his images, so here is a comparison.

All of these photo sites have the following features:

  • encourage social media sharing and give tools to help users and fans to share photos.
  • gallery and collection options.
  • a certain level of photo security from casual theft and re-use.
  • site customization
  • no infringement on your copyright
  • digital download pricing and print pricing
  • community of photographers and clients

Photoshelter

I have a free account on Photoshelter, vix.photoshelter.com but I think they have stopped providing free long-term accounts. When I signed up, I was able to store a small amount of images without paying, but now, after a short trial period, you must select a hosting plan. This is the largest and most established professional photo hosting and sales site.

The prices for hosting are quite reasonable because they protect your photos with the best anti-theft technology – a transparent layer over each photo. This means that anyone attempting to copy the image will only copy the cover layer. In addition, they provide the option of watermarking the images so a screen capture will be ruined.

One thing I found a bit bothersome, is that a commission is charged on all sales through the site. The commission rate changes depending on the level of hosting and more expensive plans pay less sales fees. This would not be an issue if this was posted on the sign-up page, but I only found out about these charges when I was preparing to price the photos. The photographer I was working for was aware of this practice, but for me it was a surprise.

Adorama, the industry standard in photo printing located in NYC fulfills all print orders directly from the site, or you can arrange to have the prints made yourself.

Smugmug

SmugMug also provides watermarking, and they use Amazon storage, known as one of the most secure clouds in the industry. They offer a “vault” membership option if you only want to use the cloud storage instead of displaying your images.

Three photo printing company options, four paper/print combinations and an expanded selection of merchandise to decorate with photos can be ordered. Once photos are in the shopping cart print quotes from each company can be compared before the order is placed.

I was not able to discover if they charge a commission on sales. A free trial period can be activated, but then, a hosting account must be purchased. They do prominently post their great return policy and full refund if prints or products are unsatisfactory.

500px

The most generous of the top three hosting sites, 500px offers a permanent free account to photographers. However, the pricing structure of photos sold in the market set by the company. All the photos sold in the 500px market are the same price, unlike the other two sites, which allow photographers to set their own prices and sell independently. Click here for a copy of the 500 px pricing guide. If the pricing structure works for you, then this could be a good thing.

Instagram

This Smart Phone app deserves a mention as it is one of the fastest growing photo sharing sites today. If you have an iPhone and are not interested in prints, the price is right – Free.

All of these sites are a great place to look at really excellent photos.

Flash Video on Mac Power PC Chip

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Adobe Flash player no longer supports computers built with the Power PC chip although there are many of these machines in use, still serving their owners reliably. This morning I received a call from a G4 Power book Mac owner running Leopard OSX 5.8, he called because of an error message that insisted he upgrade his flash player. When he tried to upgrade, he found the new version did not support his chip or operating system.

One of the reasons I started writing this blog is that I act as a help desk for many of my friends, so I searched for a solution and found Elmedia Player, a free download on Cnet. Elmedia Player, from Eltima Software, is more than a player, it also helps you organize media files using an iTunes type of interface.  The Pro version also allows you to download and copy internet hosted media files, but there is a cost for this functionality.

Please note — anything after this content is an ad and I do not endorse the product or even know what it is.

My friend reports the free version is working on his notebook for Flash (flv) playback. The website claims El Media Player supports playback of FLV, SWF, XAP (Silverlight), RM and RV (Real), AVI, MOV, MP4, and many other formats.

These older computers are still functional and the push to constantly upgrade by Adobe and other companies can be resisted. Keep your faithful computer out of the landfill as long as possible. I am keeping older computer hardware functional using a combination of these types of helper programs and/or converting to the Ubuntu operating system.

On-Line Agencies — work from home

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This is a shout out to all of my friends with writing, wordpress or other CMS, administration, programming or technical skills.

Please click on the link below so that I can get affiliate credit for inviting you to join oDesk.

Join the On Demand Global Workforce – oDesk

I am now working on oDesk and it has a lot of advantages. oDesk does take a percentage of each payment, but they do a lot of administration and attract a lot of employers to the site. Unlike all those scams, this really does allow you to work from home and earn USD that you can get paid through PayPal or other web based financial services.

I am only working on hourly contracts because payment is guaranteed. The downside is you have to give up a bit of privacy when you are working. oDesk contractors install an app the takes a screenshot of your screen periodically to verify you were actually working on the project. The screenshot is posted on the site so the employer and the contractor can see and verify the hours worked. There are jobs where a flat rate is offered, but oDesk will not chase the employer for payment if the deal goes bad. With the hourly rate, oDesk shows that employers have a verified payment method and some have spent a lot of money hiring people already.

It is kind of like an eBay for contractors and employers because there is a record of the hours you worked, feedback scores and tests you can take to prove your skills. Employees and contractors give feedback, so you can see the reaction other people have before you accept or give a job. Employers may click on the image to hire me for jobs. Here and at the top are the same link.

Another issue for me is that I am competing in a world market, so graphic designers in India and the Philipines can underbid me every time. However, that is already happening in Vancouver. A lot of web and print design is outsourced and that is part of my problem as a freelancer. Vancouver is a very expensive city and I cannot afford to work for $3. per hour, but a designer in Manila or New Delhi can.

Many of the jobs are for very low rates of pay, even as low as $2. USD per hour because this is a global work force and people in other countries will work for that amount.  The jobs I am getting pay more than Canadian minimum wage because they are for writing in English as a native speaker.

I passed several of the tests and because I know wordpress well and SEO marketing, I have already been hired by two employers.

I am also working on eLance, another freelance service. They seem to keep the rates at a more reasonable level and have attracted higher skilled workers as a result. Both of these companies are legitimate ways to work from home.

Vintage Suitcase for Sale

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Vintage McBrine suitcase for sale.

Asking $400. for this suitcase in fine shape.

Label inside says “McBrine Baggage”

I bought this as vintage over 12 years ago.

More photos in gallery below.

Contact me to purchase.

I don’t have any answers to how old it is etc . .

vixmedia (at) gmail (dot) com

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Arduino Sensor Control

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I have a Sharp IR sensor hooked up to my Arduino Duemillanova board in the process of testing the interface for my show, “Bandwidth”. Despite the fact that I had this set-up working one year ago at EMPAC, I am having difficulties now.

Luckily, I live in a city that has a local hackspace with a regular listserv. I put out a call for help and was answered by a robot builder named Dan Royer who has a site called Marginally Clever. I was very impressed by his ability to write and edit sketches and his friendly, helpful attitude in reminding me how to hook up my sensor to the board. His website is a fascinating look into the world of do-it-yourself robotics. You will be able to see him at Burning Man if you are attending.

Now my Arduino is happily blinking, but I still have to develop a sketch that allows me to use two sensors on the same board without an extreme amount of latency. As Dan writes in a post “Robotics is a lot of Trial an Error” — Integrated Art is exactly the same. Build it and see if you can make it work.

Photos coming soon.

 

 

1990 Yamaha FJ1200 Sold

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The last of the true sport+touring bikes located in Vancouver, Canada.

The seat is narrow and the bike has been lowered for a smaller rider, but the shocks can be adjusted to suit any rider quickly.

I love my FJ1200,it is like a flying couch, so smooth and comfortable for rider and passenger.

DSC_0001_01It will be more practical for me to have a bike that I can pick up if it falls over.

If you know about this fine motorcycle, then you are aware that it is one of the last of the air-cooled giants. That makes it a little lighter compared with the water-cooled 4 cylinder bikes. This machine is a daily ride in excellent mechanical shape.

I have added engine guards and a rear rack imported from the UK.

The amazing thing on the bike is the custom luggage — two pelican cases hold a lot of stuff. Waterproof – lifetime warrantee.

One key opens both cases and an extra lock that I keep to lock my helmet to the bike.

Heated grips are an installed custom item with a choice of two heat ranges – switch located near left hand grip.

I am asking $3300. but will consider negotiating a trade – I need a smaller, newer bike with luggage.

Contact me vixmedia (at) gmail (dot) com

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