I bought this retro game console two years ago in a sale for 500 CZK. It came in parts, and the plastic had to be separated into actual parts, but it was quite easy and took about half an hour.
However, the machine is absolutely fantastic. It can run emulators for dozens of devices. Personally, I mainly run Nintendo 64, NES, SNES, Sega Master System, Sega Genesis, Sega MegaDrive, PS1 and PSP.
So what made me take it out of the drawer and play? I read the article about my favourite game, The Neverhood, and there was a mention of the second part of the story of that game. It is called Skullmonkey and it is only for PS1. So I remembered my retrogaming gem, grabbed it and set up the ROM. It is a platform game and I will definitely give it a try.
Anyway, back to the device I will be writing about. It runs OpenElec, which I found to be the best.
It should be able to run at least PSP games, but with some tinkering it could even run PS2 games. Unfortunately, I still have not managed to get a single PS2 game to run smoothly on it, as it ...
Continue reading →
I got a new glass last week. And it is a really nice Tamron 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3. The aperture is not really great, but the lenses are really universal, so it is a compromise.
I've been wanting a lens like this for a while, to carry with me when I don't need anything more important, to be able to take just the camera and not the whole bag of lenses.
It is used but in really good condition. The lenses are clean, just some kind of scratch on the plastic around the lens, which is not really important. Now I have to give it a few tries to get used to it, but I think it would be really good for general photography.
I took it for a walk, so here is a sample photo of a freight locomotive I took.
Continue reading →
As I wrote in a previous article about this notebook, the cover for the hard drive was missing, leaving a hole in the bottom of the case, but that was not the biggest problem. With the cover missing, the HDD was held only by the SATA connector, and when there was plenty of space underneath it, it would swing and possibly slowly destroy the port.
So I decided to make a temporary solution until I could find a replacement cover or 3D print a new one that would fit perfectly. And yes, I am a bit afraid that this temporary solution might be the permanent solution. We know...
However, I have been going through my storage of model railway material, and I still have some plastic sheets in 1mm and 3mm thickness that I got and stored many years ago when I was working in an advertising/printing company during school.
So I used a knife to cut the approximate shape of a 1mm board and tried to fit it over the hole. As it was not just smooth, but a bit rounded, I took a lighter, heated the corners a bit and gently formed the rounded shape.
The end result is not very nice, ...
Continue reading →
I found this piece in storage and thought it is dead. When i tried to measure battery voltage, i got someting around 300mV, and it dropped to clear zero in couple of secconds. So i thought it is dead. Howevere luckily i was able to revive it by gentle pulses from power supply. So it still has some capacity and the phone is able to boot with it.
Unfortunately, although I have two different old wide Samsung chargers, I do not have one that fits this phone. So now that I know the phone works, I need to find the right power supply for it so I can add it to my collections. So if you have a spare charger for the S3110, please contact me.
Continue reading →
First of all, I would like to say that at first I thought it was just some kind of usual HOAX and didn't care too much about it. However, as more and more articles came out, I did some research on the app.
And I have to say that I do not want it. First of all, I really do not like the way it got onto my phone... without asking, even without notification. Definitely a subjective thing, but I hate the behaviour of the process, doing things with my device without asking me.
So. Google doesn't give much information, and even the official Play Store page for this app is... strange? Bizarre? It definitely does not look serious, even though it is made by Google.
The app is said to provide some kind of "mystical" added security, but reverse engineering shows that it scans outgoing and incoming communications and, among other things, sometimes filters "explicit content". First of all, I don't need someone telling me what to see and what not to see, and for the second part, the detection of these things is definitely not done locally, and I don't need another channel that spoils ...
Continue reading →
When my Motorola G32, which I really liked, died in a very strange way, I got the Redmi Note 9 Pro as a replacement from my friend Tom.
It came with LineageOS 21 already installed, which was fine. Today the update to LOS22 (Android 15) arrived, I was a bit nervous about the data and the backup. And here it is... article about how it went... Here is the screen of the freshly updated phone.
So when I got the announcement of the new main release, I was just afraid to back up all my data, because I am still used to the idea that upgrading the custom ROM means wiping the data and rebooting to a clean phone. However, after reading some more info, those days are back! And I am really happy.
To lower expectations, I still had to use my phone to upgrade to the higher version. However, it was really easy and it was just two/three commands and it was done.
So all I had to do was download the latest build and new GApps to be safe, restart the phone from ADB, sideload the new lineage, sideload the gapps and wait for the miracle.
![]()
Continue reading →
When I finished going through all the "new" old hardware, I took some older devices out of the drawer and I found my old Sony Xperia Tipo.
It was my first Android phone, so it has a special place in my collection. When I took it out, I thought about how I could use Android on such a small 3.2" screen. However, after using it for a while, I discovered that it was quite good. The system's GUI was comfortable even on the small screen, the only problem is that the small amount of buttons fit on the screen when the top bar is rolled down.
The device came with Android 4.0. Later i can remember i have changed the ROM to GIMLO, which upgraded the Android to 4.1, but the settings still shows that it runs on 4.0.
The fun part with GIMLO rom i can remember, was that it came absolutely without any other software, even launcher. So after booting to fresh ROM, just black screen appeared and i was not able to do anything.
I spent a lot of time trying to get into some GUI, and I can remember I somehow glitched to camera, and from ...
Continue reading →
I have finished repairs ot the SE W580i, which also came in the box of phones. And it is the last one i can recover. It needed to replace the battery. And instead of buying new one, i have tinkered the generic LiPol to the pins inside. I just needed to find some that fits inside and i found one that is exactly what i need.
When I soldered two power wires from the battery to contact pins. I was wondering about the right resistance value to imitate the battery thermistor and accidentally switched on the phone. And, to my surprise, it started without the "middle" wire connected. So I do not need to worry.
I also 3D printed a frame for the simcard, as I only have a few micro spares, and it fits for the first time, so I can now boot the system. I installed many games I found, but spent most of my time with SVEN, which was very popular when I was young. Probably because it was really an "adult" game. Also installed the must-have in the form of Gravity Defied. And then ...
Continue reading →
Forgotten races of the future. That's probably the best way to describe the Speed Challenge in one sentence. This game appeared in 2002 and was released on PS2 and PC. It promised futuristic racing with realistic physics, unique tracks and contributions from the 1997 F1 World Champion himself. But it ended up being more of a forgotten experiment than a revolution.
Speed Challenge tried to deliver something between Formula 1 and Wipeout, but without the crazy power-ups or weapons. The cars looked like the monoposts of the future, with their low profile and aerodynamic shapes, but they still handled like regular racing specials. No flying, no jumping, just clean steering. And that's where the game scored - the driving model was arcade-like, but it also had hints of simulation. You had to brake in time, corner well, and manage to control the car at over 300 km/h (which is not unusual in formula cars these days either).
As the name suggests, UbiSoft took 1997 Formula 1 World Champion Jacques Villeneuve as a mentor for this game. The game is therefore a kind of a picture of what the F1 series might look like in the not ...
Continue reading →
I finally had some time to get my Lumia 920 up and running. It was in the box of phones I got earlier. It had a dead battery, which I replaced and tinkered with the charging chip to get it working again.
It is a piece coming from 2013, with 8.7 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics. It should also be able to be charged by wireless chargers, but I do not have any, so I have not tried it yet.
The phone came with Windows 8, but to be able to do some sideloading, I had it updated to Windows 10 using a third-party tool (because the original servers are dead).
I tried a few games to see what the hardware could do. I installed NFS Undercover, but it crashes when I start the races.
I also installed Asphalt 5. It runs well and smoothly and is a nice piece of arcade racing.
Asphalt 7 also works, but is a little slower due to the better graphics, but is still comfortable to play.
I also found a mobile version of Mirrors Edge. This is a game I really liked when I saw it many years ago, when ...
Continue reading →
