2016 — 15 August: Monday
Another overnight bulletin — the gist of which is "I really hate windows" — from Dr Frankenstein's Linux Lab suggests my ditching of Windows (nearly 18 months ago) was no Bad Thing.1 It certainly puts into context my own trivial struggles at the weekend with bits of Linux customisation. But now I need to know exactly what an "MHL" input on the 34" Dell screen does or does not accept. I thought I could plug in a standard HDMI cable, but that doesn't want to fit.
It struck me that if I could hook up the i5 NUC via MHL (which is the Dell's fourth, so far unused, input) then that would free up the conventional HDMI input on the Dell for Skylark's use. And that would mean Skylark could be switched on without first having to set the Dell's input to point directly to it. Clearly there's a better exchange of details via HDMI than there is via DisplayPort (though that may just be the Dell's apparent deficiencies in its DisplayPort gubbins).
Sadly, this suggests I'm on to a loser. (Link.)
Plot? What plot?!
Not just the mantra of over-heated (or over-egged) fan fiction, of course. This was surprisingly interesting. Source and snippet:
Plots are ghostly things in our brains. It can be hard to keep a grasp of them even as you're reading a novel or watching a film or a play. I sometimes fret that I have a better memory of the font
certain novels were printed in than the incidents that riveted me as I was reading them.
But it's plot that keeps us turning pages, even when we feel no sympathy or the opposite of sympathy for a fiction's characters and animating ideas...
I'd have to admit that's certainly true of "Preacher"!
In the first...
... of a series of little experiments this morning — that began pre-breakfast, I might add, though I'm now fixing that before it metamorphoses completely into lunch — my 34" Dell screen is currently exiled to the "naughty step" aka the table in the dining room. A lot of the clutter that had somehow accumulated on my desk is (temporarily) removed, and even the new mini-Dyson has been deployed to useful effect. All this, in the cause of testing an hypothesis (or two) about the behaviour of the i5 NUC, Skylark, and BlackBeast Mk III when they're all hooked up to my 27" Asus screen, rather than to the Dell.
The Asus is a "mere" WQHD, with a native resolution of 2560x1440, but I have proved that:
- All three PCs drive it perfectly at 60Hz and full resolution
- The i5 NUC works via DisplayPort (an impossibility with the Dell) and doesn't have to be switched on with the Asus preset to that input
- Skylark works via DVI-D (untried until today) but does have to be switched on with the Asus preset to that input. Usefully, however, it is able to recover its Linux desktop without intervention once the Asus is selecting it
- BlackBeast works via HDMI
Both the i5 NUC and Skylark also work when I use NoMachine Remote Desktop to run them ("sort of") headless2 from BlackBeast. This is a Good Thing. Though music played from the NAS, via the NUC, is clearly not delivered by "Step 3" of the mechanism I envisaged last Tuesday! There is, after all, no USB3 connection anywhere. All those audio bits are in fact streaming over my LAN.
Time to browse...
... this morning's welcome and very delectable-looking newcomer...
With the Asus, I also now have physical room on my desk to put my Epson scanner within much easier reach. Also a Good Thing.
Grrr!
Once I'm used to the less fiddly display input selection process on the Asus all should be well.
For unfathomable reasons...
... the "Videos" program that Mint 18 has made the default media player decided to throw an error about being unable to play what it mistakenly described as the "video track" with the odd character in it here:
As you see, VLC had no such qualms.
Talk about "slow on the uptake"!
If you pop this...
... into a spare Workspace, what need have you of keeping a Humax mains-powered satellite receiver and PVR humming away at the other end of the living room? Answer me that (while I make a spot of rather late lunch on what's turned into quite a warm day).
The effect on my LAN seems pretty negligible:
No sign of buffering or stuttering, too. Though with some music, that might work to its advantage.
UEFI v Legacy BIOS for my future reference
Having only recently managed to get a new system up and running all by myself (!) this is a depressing read that might, nonetheless, save me pain, time, and a load of trouble at some point. I know, I know, RTFM. But where's the fun in that?
I spoke...
... the magic incantation to Mrs Google: "4K HDMI switching" and have placed an order accordingly. Last time I was poking around, DisplayPort switchers seemed the better route, but I'm no longer convinced of that. As you can see here, it's been over four years since I bought my previous HDMI switcher, and that only "went up to" 1080p. I need more than that, I fear, to satisfy my higher-resolution display screens these days. (The gadget is a LINDY 5 Port HDMI 2.0 4K UHD Switch.)
I also spoke...
... the magic incantation to Mr Amazon Logistics, who handed over both the M2 SSD-to-SATA "carrier" and this TV Show I know nothing about...
... but which seems to have gone down well in some quarters.
By the end of the Beethoven symphony in this evening's Prom, the radio bits that have now streamed past my ears look like this:
Good job I "uncapped" my broadband a while back.
My 34" Dell...
... is off the naughty step and back in the system. Clear the launch area. Let the testing begin...
Test #1: power on BlackBeast (plumbed in via mini DisplayPort input, with the Dell set to that input). Success! It works perfectly.
Test #2: power on Skylark (plumbed in via HDMI, but with the Dell still 'pointing' to BlackBeast) and see if Skylark has a full-res display available when I fire up NoMachine on BlackBeast and login. Success!
Test #3: power on the i5 NUC (plumbed in via MHL, but with the Dell still 'pointing' to BlackBeast) and see if the NUC also has a full-res display available. Success again!
So, to get all three PCs online with full-res displays and all 'driven' by just the one mouse and keyboard, all I have to do is make damn' sure I switch on BlackBeast first, and have the Dell's input (mini DisplayPort) 'pointing' to it. I have earned my next cuppa. [Pause] The Classic Penguin book is superb.