Friday, June 4, 2010

Enable mounting of remote CD/DVDs on any Mac

My old Mac Mini couldn't read certain DVD format, so I decided to try to remotely mount the CD from another computer. MacBook Air has the remote disc integrated, however for other Mac machine, there's a trick to turn it on.

I shared the DVD on my windows 7 computer, which has Apple "DVD or CD Sharing Update" installed.
Download Link

If your Mac has Leopard or above system installed, you should have "DVD or CD Sharing Update" integrated. Otherwise, install it on your mac as well.
Download Link

On both system, go to System Preferences, and enable 'DVD or CD Sharing.

Then, on the Mac that uses the remote disc, go to a Terminal window and enter:

$ defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser EnableODiskBrowsing -bool true
$ defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser ODSSupported -bool true

Reboot this machine, and when the reboot is finished, you'll see the remote CD/DVD under Devices in the Finder's sidebar. Thereafter, you can remotely mount a CD/DVD from another machine.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

A German built a fully functional Sukhoi Su-27 Jet.

You know we all sometimes fix things by our own hands. I also occasionally do some work to my car. But a German, Harald Huf, made his own Sukhoi Su-27 jet.

This isn't a still model, but a fully functioning RC jet. I can't call it crazy. Because being only crazy won't let you finish a project like this. I am not only amazed by his skills but also the support from his family.

Here is a link to the project website

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Glad to see my blog transfer to Blogger went smoothly

I used to host my blogs on my own website. However, I got tired of maintaining all the updates, plugins, and so on. That even made me stopped blogging for a while.

Like what happened to my self-hosted photo gallery (moved to Flickr), I decide to transfer my blogs to Blogger. If you ask why not WordPress? I have to say it's just a decision.

Only one problem in this process is Blogger can officially only import its own backups, while my old blog server uses WordPress. After some reading and testing, I chose a open source tool Blog2Blog, which works like a charm. Very glad to get the whole migration done smoothly.

Friday, May 29, 2009

Replacing the rear mid-range speaker of my 325i.

About a few weeks ago, I notice the imbalanced audio sound in my car. My early thoughts was the loose contact, but it turns out that both mid-range base in the back were broken.

Considering that letting broken speakers connected could damage my amp, I decided to replace them asap. On the other side, the performance of  BMW stock mid-range speakers is really basic, I can also take the chance to do a bit upgrade.

Unfortunately, the speakers have weird size and mounting structure. It thus become hard to find a perfectly replacement. Even there are several aftermarkt or OEM products, they are over-priced to my opinion. WTF???

After some investigatons, I decide to modify some mid level products from branded manufactors and let them to fit in my car. Finally the one I went for is Pioneer TS-A1673R, a 3-way speakers.

Here is a compare picture

(left: stock BMW speaker with paper cone, foam edge and plastic frame, righ: Pioneer speaker with  injection-molded polypropylene woofer, rubber surround, and PET dome tweeter)bmw_stock_pioneer

bmw_stock_pioneer_back

Here is some pictures showing the modification

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Results:
 It's a bit pain when I try to mount the modded speakers, as it became a bit "fat". So I have to trim down the frame a little bit. But they eventually fit in the back of the car, and I can still use the original speaker cover :)The sound is indeed improved and after the work I stayed in the car for 20 mins just listening CDs. Very happy about the cost and the quality :)   

Friday, April 24, 2009

Time to share my car wheel project with you :)

Hello my friends,

As some of you have known that I have been doing my “wheel business” for a while. It took indeed long time on finding rims, collecting tires, selling tires, and so on… I think it’s been 6 or 8 weeks.

Finally it’s all settled, and I think it’s nice to share this experience with you guys. Of course you can use it as a DIY guide if you want J

BUT, I STRONGLY suggest NOT TO DO THIS, unless you have no friends to hang out with during weekends, or really want a challenging “work out” physically and mentally.

Alright, here we go.

1)      The original wheels with dirt and a lot curb rashes :(

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2)      Clean the dirt

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3)      Slightly sand the surface around curb rashes

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4)      Use paint thinner to remove the grease and a bit old clear paint

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5) Use some filler to fill the curb damages. I used epoxy putty, my god this thing stinks and hard to handle, better use something else :(

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6) Remove the extra putty before sanding

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7) Sand the fixed surface until it becomes smooth

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8) Phew…

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9) Ready to sand the whole surface down. I tried wire brush to do a coarse sanding. But later I found it’s not a good idea, as your arms got tired it’s hard to control and I got some deep scratches :(

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10) Start…

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11) Fine sanding and edge sanding with sand paper, MANUALLY… :(

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12) Finally it’s ready for coating.

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13) Tape and mask the area you don’t want to paint

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14) First of first, twice filler primer

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15) Twice color coating…. Still going ….

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16) Twice clear coating… phew… coating finished here.

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17) Another pic with flash on

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18) It’s ready to get them mounted. I decided to do caliper painting and differential oil change along with it. But I dropped the differential oil change later, as I think there’s a leak and I have to get it checked first

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19) Un-mount the wheels and spray some break cleaner to remove the dirt and grease on the caliper

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20) Do a further clean and sand the surface a bit. ( compare to wheel sanding, this is just a piece of cake :) ) Mask the break disc, as I don’t want to paint the disk

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21) Ready to paint :)

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22) Detail painting with brushes.

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23) Another pic

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24) The caliper paint is so so so thin, I had to paint each caliper three times. This becomes time consuming but it gave you better result. Here it is.

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25)  With old wheels

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26)   With “new” wheels and caliper

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27)  Different angle

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28) Close look

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29) Make sure you have all the protection on during the work :)

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Hope you enjoy this :)

Monday, July 14, 2008

Waxed my car, it becomes shinning now :)

Saturday, a good weather we have been waiting for a long time. Since it's dry, I decided to wax my car. A couple of days ago, I have bought a polisher machine, and maguires 3 step wax/cleaning set  from Canadian Tire. The reason that I chose its 3 steps set is my car hasn't been waxed for a year, and there's a lot micro dust on the paints. I need a deep pre-wax cleaning product to remove those micro dust. Although, I have the puffer, it still took me almost 5 hours to go through all the 3 steps: pre-wax cleaning, polishing, wax. Futurnately, the results is conviencing. Nice product and good work out for me.

Waxed Car

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Replaced Drum Brakes at Canada Day

It's Canada Day today, and it's a great chance to see free shows out doors. However, I am tired of being in the crowds and decided to finish the brake work for my car's rear wheels.

The work itself is much easier than I thought, even it's my first time to replace drum brakes. But the mechanism itself is more complex than disc brakes. The material we need are brand new pair of brake drums and pads, the new springs, high temp brake grease, ....., and some tools. There are may articles out there explaining how to do it by yourself, so I decided to save my words here and just post some photos for fun. (click the picture for enlarged version)

Old Drum Brake  The Old Brake Pads On the Wheel

Drum Brake Unmounted Brakes Drum and PadsUnmounted

Old drum and pads Old Brake Drums and Pads ( totally worn off :(  )

New drum brake pads  The New Brake Pads

New drum brake pads mounted New Brake Pads Mounted

New Drum The Brand New Shinning Brake Drum

New Drum Mounted New Brake Drum Mounted. JOB DONE !!!!!!