I’m slack
by Iain on Aug.25, 2010, under Miscellaneous
I just realised I haven’t posted in months. I’m slack.
Speedliting
by Iain on Jun.01, 2010, under Photography
So, I’m in the process of planning a trip to NZ – some of the places we’re considering visiting, I decided I needed a flash for my camera – I’ve been wanting one for a while anyhow. So, yesterday I grabbed myself a Canon Speedlite 580EX-II.
This shot was taken with a mixture of lighting – tungsten from one of the dichroic down-lights in the room, LED from the other down-light which is above the couch and my Speedlite in E-TTL, but pointed away from the subject.
HOWTO: Aftermarket ROM on HTC Magic – (Vodafone AU version 32B)
by Iain on May.20, 2010, under Android
So, as the story goes – I recently sold my iPhone 3G, before the value drops too far. Work had supplied me with a Nokia handset, but I tired of that pretty quickly.
Stumbled across an HTC Magic handset going fairly cheap.. and figured why not – good for some Android shits and giggles.
So, here is a guide to flashing a 3rd party ROM onto this handset – in this case, CyanogenMod 4.x Stable, which is based on Android 1.6 (Donut) with some goodies from Eclair (2.0/2.1) [Android makes me hungry, with these food based version names] – the bulk of this guide was ripped off from is based upon information found on the CyanogenMod Wiki, I’m merely tidying it up and putting it here for reference.
The usual statements should be made here about it not being my fault if this breaks your fancy new phone or rapes your dog. I don’t forsee any issues with it killing your wife – it might be Linux based, but ReiserFS isn’t involved that I know of. However your wife might not be too impressed if she finds out you’re flashing firmware onto your new phone within a couple of hours of receiving it.. this WILL void your warranty.
You’ll require a couple of tools to do the job, unfortunately Zebra and Caelum were busy so I had to do this with the aid of some software instead.
Prerequisite files:
Get the Android SDK applicable for your platform from here:
http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html
Extract this to a convenient folder – unless you’re planning on developing apps, you shouldn’t need any of the other pre-requisites mentioned on the above page.
If required – if it’s not in the tools folder of the above SDK – get the fastboot binary applicable for your platform from here and then copy to the tools folder of the SDK:
http://developer.htc.com/adp.html#s2
Get the latest AMON_RA recovery from here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=530492
For the 32B version of the Magic, you need to get the “G” version of the recovery, NOT the “H” version (G = Google, H = HTC). – The file I used was called recovery-RA-sapphire-v1.7.0G.img
This guide will assume that you’ve saved the file to your desktop.
Download this “Defanged” HTC Android 1.6 base image – this is basically just the Google apps and stuff that Cyanogen isn’t allowed to distribute in his ROMs, and don’t unzip the file.
http://dx.infernix.net/DRC83_base_defanged.zip - md5sum: 081379e9b525484bcd1ee42bd0031a4c
Download the latest CyanogenMod ROM for your device, and again, don’t unzip the file:
http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.php/Latest_version
Put the Defanged base and the newest CyanogenMod ROM zip files in the root of your SD card
Installation:
Turn your phone off.
Connect the handset to your computer by the USB cable.
Boot the handset into fastboot by holding Back + Power (you should see three Androids on skateboards) and the words ‘fastboot USB’ in red.
On the computer, open a command prompt/terminal/whatchamacallit
Navigate to the SDK tools directory (in my case, this is located in ~/android-sdk/tools and the recovery file is in the home directory) and type:
fastboot-mac boot ~\recovery-RA-sapphire-v1.7.0G.img
You should see the following message on the computer:
downloading ‘boot.img’… OKAY
booting… OKAY
The phone should then reboot into Amon_RA’s recovery
Take this opportunity to make a nandroid backup of your current NAND so you can easily restore to an unrooted state – to do this go to:
Backup/Restore menu entry and select Nand backup. This will backup your handset to a folder on the SD card. Pretty damn awesome – if you don’t like CyanogenMod, or if you balls it up, you can just restore your backup and you’re backup and running.
On your computer, type in the following command:
adb devices
A device name and ‘recovery’ should be returned
adb push ~\recovery-RA-sapphire-v1.7.0G.img /sdcard/RA170G.img
adb shell flash_image recovery /sdcard/RA170G.img
This permanently flashes the recovery image to your phone, your warranty is now void.
Perform a wipe/factory reset on the handset. Go back to the main menu from doing your backup, and choose the Wipe entry. In the submenu, choose Wipe data/factory reset.
Go back to the main menu on the phone, and select the Flash zip from sdcard option.
First flash the Defanged base and then apply the CyanogenMod ROM. IN THAT ORDER
Return to the main menu, and select Reboot system now
The first boot will be a bit slow.
If you’ve managed to follow all these instructions correctly, your paranoid Android will be fitter, happier.
If the phone doesn’t boot past the Vodafone screen after 10min, press and hold Send+End+Menu, as soon as the screen goes black hold Home to boot into recovery.
Confirm the md5sums of the defanged base and the CyanogenMod ROM. Then rewipe, and reflash the base and ROM.
To boot into the recovery mode at any time, turn your handset off, and then hold down Home and turn the handset on.
Firstly, instead of using the Defanged file mentioned above, you’ll need this file:
http://kanged.net/mirror/download.php?file=gapps-ds-ERE36B-signed.zip
Secondly, instead of the Stable ROM mentioned above, you’ll be wanting to grab the Experimental ROM:
http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.php/Latest_version#Current_Experimental_Version_2
Thirdly, BEFORE YOU FLASH THEM, you actually flash these files in the reverse order – ROM first, Google-y bits second.
Don’t flash your Google-y bits in public, there are laws against that.
It’s good practice to do a nandroid backup and then a full wipe per the above instructions before flashing the new ROM. Yes, you’ll lose data. HTFU.
PS – the Experimental tree is named that for a reason. Don’t rely on it – it’ll probably eat your children
Time for a change.
by Iain on May.18, 2010, under Android, iPhone
You’ll likely be aware that I’ve been pretty keen on the Apple iPhone smartphones over the past couple of years. Well I have changed camps recently – I sold my iPhone on ebay and have bought what I deemed to be a cheap toe in the waters of Android world – I picked up a new HTC Magic for a quite low price.. figuring that if it doesn’t work out, I can always sell it again. Only early days yet, but I’m quite liking the platform. Time will tell.
I’ve already experimented with some aftermarket ROMs – part of the appeal of the Android platform is the fact that it’s a bit more hackable than the iPhone.
Another vintage 135mm f/3.5 acquisition
by Iain on Mar.31, 2010, under Photography
So, after my recent short-lived vintage glass acquisition didn’t quite go according to plan (I’m considering getting the lens repaired. It’s quite a nice sharp lens) I couldn’t help myself but go back to eBay and purchase another.
This one is a Hanimex, made in Japan. I guesstimate it as late 70s, but am not quite sure.
Anyhow, here’s a shot I took with it this morning – I’m loving this focal length.
New toys for Tracey..
by Iain on Mar.23, 2010, under Miscellaneous, Photography
I recently got paid a quite nice bonus from work.. so I decided to spoil my beloved.
First toy – Amazon Kindle e-book reader. This thing is damn nice. The screen is e-ink, which basically uses tiny balls of ink to form the text/images on the screen. No backlight used, it’s a reflective screen – so just like reading a paperback, if it’s dark you need a light, same thing with the Kindle. One advantage of not having a backlight is that the screen is very easy on the eyes for reading. The e-ink display is also very sharp and pleasant to read.
Being able to load the device up with a library of books is also pretty cool. Not to mention, turn the 3G wireless connection off and the battery life is measured in weeks.
Second toy – Tracey recently expressed an interest in getting a DSLR for herself, however I was a little bit gunshy about dropping another grand on a camera that isn’t going to be used as often as mine. I let the idea settle for a while, and then spotted an opportunity. On a forum that I browse, a member was selling their Canon EOS 350D and 18-55mm lens quite cheaply. It appeared to be in good condition and so I grabbed it as a surprise for Tracey. From what I can tell, this DSLR has only had around 7500 shots taken. I’ve clocked up nearly a third of that in 6 months, so it’s barely been used, given the age. This camera is still quite capable, and definitely suitable for a beginner. Also, means we can share lenses between our cameras.
A happy wife means a happy life 
Old-school glass – Tasman 135MM f/3.5
by Iain on Mar.23, 2010, under Photography
Unfortunately, shortly after taking these shots, the aperture blades jammed closed.
I guess that’s why the lens was $15 on eBay 
A couple of shots taken in Launceston recently..
by Iain on Feb.27, 2010, under Photography
1 Comment more...
New toy
by Iain on Feb.17, 2010, under Photography
My el cheapo battery grip arrived today. $60 shipped. Feels good quality, strong enough for me, anyway.
Drastic improvement to the weighting, feel and usability of my 500D.
Long time, no see.
by Iain on Feb.03, 2010, under Miscellaneous
Been a while since I posted anything of note here, some might say that I’m yet to actually do so – and that’s a fair comment. Unfortunately, life tends to get in the way – and life tends to be a bit humdrum – work, eat, sleep, rinse, repeat. I’ve got a couple of ideas on the back burner though, if they come to fruition, you’ll be among the first to know.
