Fixing Vertical Lines on a Scanner

My Epson Perfection 1640SU scanner recently started behaving slightly less than perfectly… I had a pronounced light vertical line appearing down the length of each scanned image.
Really annoying.
Here’s how I diagnosed and fixed it…

New Marengo GPS Route Planner – Out Now!

After too long a gestation period, the new version of the Marengo GPS Route Planner is out.  This web-based application allows cyclists (amongst other outdoors types) to plot a route on a map and then upload it to their GPS unit to enable it to guide them.
New features include direct upload from the application to [...]

Weird Pauses Ubuntu Jaunty in Compiz / ATI fglrx

I upgraded my laptop to Ubuntu Jaunty the other day. A relatively smooth upgrade, but one thing was really annoying me.
The open source drivers for the machine don’t support compiz effects, which I’ve come to rely on for genuinely useful task switching, inverting the colours of windows, and magnifying. So I used the [...]

Pirates

Speeding up Firefox 3 on the Eee

I’m running ubuntu-eee on my new Asus Eee 901.  And Firefox 3.0 was horrible on it.  You’d load a page, and scrolling up and down would pause frequently with a jittery, jerky motion.  It was so annoying that I experimented with Opera and Epiphany as replacements.  Both fine browsers, but I hated being without add-ins [...]

DRM-Free Music in the UK

(source: http://xkcd.com/488/)
Why is it so hard to legally obtain DRM-free music in the UK?  Amazon, in the US, has offered DRM-free music downloads for a long time now.  However their UK site doesn’t (and they don’t let you order music from the US-based site unless you are a US citizen).  Tesco (www.tescodigital.com) offers some DRM-free [...]

Got to Get Past!

What is it on the roads today?
Everyone seems to have to overtake.
I decided (as I’m tired) to take it easy today, while on my fixie on my ride into work, in London, from Chelsea to the City.  As I wasn’t trying to keep up with traffic as much as possible, I vowed to try and [...]

Garmin Edge 605/705

Firstly, I have to say that I really wanted to like this unit.  I’d put it off for a while because — at £250 (GBP) for the base model (plus street-level maps) — it was two thirds of the cost of my new fixed-wheel bicycle.  I’d had some great usage out of the old Garmin, [...]

New Route Planner Beta

Oh boy, I’m getting excited.  There are loads of new features coming soon for the Marengo GPS Route Planner!  I’ve been so busy over the last few months (with earning a living) that I haven’t been able to devote much time to the Route Planner.  But I’ve been working hard…
Currently still in private test, but [...]

XPS M1330 Ubuntu External Display

I’ve just bought a new laptop.
The Eee had reminded me how much I liked Linux, and I’d had some annoying problems on the Macbook – Apple seem to have really screwed up something on the wireless networking in Leopard.
So I got one of these:

It’s a Dell XPS M1330 – Core 2 Duo at 2.2 GHz, [...]