Monday 30 April 2012

Dishwasher Blues



Well our trusty Miele G572 dishwasher packed up the other day, it's an old mechanical one in that it has the tick tick ticking of the rotary dial which times all the events....

The first thing we noticed was that we put a load in the dishwasher and four hours later it was still on the same portion of the clean cycle... stuck forever..... endlessly rinsing....which wasn't really a problem because all we had to do was come in and click it over after about 15 minutes and it carried on....However......

Then we noticed that the element blew quite silently and it no longer heated the water.... so we gracefully retired it, the cost of parts exceeded what it was worth...... sadly.

We then proceeded to wash manually in the sink again.... we soon lost interest

I had a look at the timer unit in a last ditch attempt to bring it back to life.... but it is a completely sealed unit,  in that I'd have to destroy the case to get into it, because of the pop rivets holding it together .....I did the usual drenched it in circuit cleaner but I think it's work was done and having washed dishes since 1988 until 2012 which is 24 years .....  it had shuffled off to the retro dishwasher showroom of the sky when it was shiny and new and full of promise.......24 years really  isn't bad going for a dish washer......

So we've splashed out on a new one, well new ish.... I refuse to pay for brand new, it simply isn't worth it.... So we have Ebay'ed a rather nice Indesit model which is only a year or two old and looks to be in extremely good nick......and a bargain for £40 !!! we will run that one into the ground....Although I doubt it will last 24 years.... they don't make them like that any more I'm afraid......

either way a result !!!









Monday 16 April 2012

Ubuntu vs Debian


I've deserted the Ubuntu flavoured fold of Linux for Debian.... Now as you may know Ubuntu is based on Debian, so the learning curve for me is a very shallow one, and it's true that Debian is less friendly than Ubuntu... But I simply didn't like the direction Ubuntu was taking their distro... I'm not a fan of the Unity desktop, it's too simplistic and for me isn't customisable enough to make the transition. Neither do I like Gnome 3......Call me a stick in the mud but I happen to like Gnome 2.xx I can make it do what I want it to with very little effort.... I understand the changes Ubuntu are making, they want to tap into the mobile market, but for me it's a step too far....

So I have installed Debian 6.0.4 (Squeeze) and I'm very happy with it, it does have its quirks but fortunately I've been using Linux for so long now the fixes are minor and easy to implement, the end result is a desktop which is very similar to Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick) but with all the bells and whistles of Compiz.....So I'm a happy bunny again :)

But that is the beauty of Linux, if a distribution brings out an "upgrade/release" you don't like, you can stick to your old version until they stop supporting it, then jump ship..... Like I have..... I tried Mint but it's nowhere near as polished as Ubuntu or Debian....

Of course as development continues I will eventually be forced out of Gnome 2.xx but I'd like to put that moment off for as long as possible :)