Yongnuo YN600EX-RT II E-TTL HSS Master/Slave Flash Speedlite

Firmware version 1.17
This speedlite supports every off-camera mode one might want:

1. Optical Master (note the Canon 430EX-iii RT does not)
2. Optical Slave
3. Radio Master
4. Radio Slave

as well as on-camera E-TTL.

As Optical Master, the MODE button selects ETTL, M, and MULTI mode

As Optical Master, group sets ALL, A:B, or A:B, C via the RATIO soft button.

As Optical Slave it is configured for group A, B, or C via the Gr soft button.

As Radio Master, the MODE button selects ETTL, M, MULTI, and Gr mode

In E-TTL mode, it controls ALL, A:B, or A:B, C via the RATIO soft button.

In M or MULTI mode, 3 groups (A, B, C) can have power independently set..

In Gr mode, 5 groups (A,B,C,D,E) can have power independently set.

As Radio Slave it is configured for group A, B, C, D, or E via the Gr soft button.

On a Canon T3i, only 2 off-camera modes are supported: ETTL, Radio Master, Optical Master, as well as on-camera E-TTL.

On a Canon T3i, in Gr mode, the 5 groups are always in Manual mode.

The T3i can not set feet/meters but the Speedlite can.

On a Canon 80D, only 2 off-camera modes are supported: Radio Master, Optical Master, as well as on-camera E-TTL.

On a Canon 80D, in Gr mode, the 5 groups can be set for Manual or ETTL mode.

The 80D can not set feet/meters but the Speedlite can.

-------
Update on 2018 March 5
Using the latest firmware, 1.29.
I have a Canon 430EX-iii RT on my left and the Yongnuo YN600EX-RT II on my right firing at a cylinder. This allows me to see the shadows cast by the two speedlites and compare their power output. The radio master has configured Gr mode with the Canon as A and the Yongnuo as B.

I ran tests with my Canon 80D in manual mode. I varied the ISO and F-stop to see how well the two speedlites did. The Yongnuo can generate a little more power than the Canon, but at lower output levels (ISO 6400), the Yongnuo's lower limit is higher than the Canon and can result in an over exposed image.

This is easy to deal with by setting a lower ISO (for example, 800), but you have to know this problem exists to workaround it.

What can you do with a Yubikey Neo

This is the best overview I have seen. If only marketing people would write things like this. As it is, I only found it buried deep in a user forum.
---
Think of the slot configs and the smart card applet space as two completely orthogonal functions crammed into one tiny piece of hardware.

Before the NEO, you had your standard Yubikey that could transmit slot 1 or slot 2 via USB triggered by the appropriate keypress.

If you wanted to manage PGP keys for signing and encryption, or if you had some RSA style authentication mechanism that you wanted to use, you would purchase a smart card device that could be carried around and inserted into the port on a computer when it was needed. Windows would have the drivers to support said smart card device.

Now, let's jump back to the NEO. Out of the box (bag), the NEO's smart card capabilities are completely dormant. When you insert the device into a USB port, the computer *only* sees it as a keyboard device, and only the slot 1 and 2 configuration data is available.

But, when you run the ykpersonalize app and set the mode to 82, that activates the smart card functionality. The next time you insert the Yubikey into the USB port, Windows will see the USB keyboard, but it will also see a smart card and start loading the driver for that. Similar to how it would react if you had an original Yubikey and a USB compatible Smart Card device plugged into a USB hub and then you plugged the hub into your computer.

When you touch the contact on the Yubikey, that causes the Yubikey to use the Slot 1 or 2 configuration to output keystrokes. However, if you have an application that uses the smart card API to interact with the Yubikey, it can run whatever applets are installed in the Yubikey and those applets can use the data that is associated with them. It is important to realize though, it is the host system application that drives that interaction. There is nothing the Yubikey can do to initiate a smart card applet transaction when you touch the contact. I suppose that could change one day in the future, but the current Yubikey Personalization Tool doesn't have any options to that effect.

Jumping over to the NFC and Android world now. Android has something called Intents in its event system. When an application wants to be able to handle some particular event such as an SMS being sent or received or a web link being clicked, it registers an intent for that event. When the event happens, Android offers the event up to one or all of the applications that registered intents. (I don't know exactly how it handles multiple apps in this case, but it doesn't really matter for our purposes here.)

I believe if you have no special applications (such as LastPass) installed on an Android device and you touch a yubikey to the NFC target, the event that gets spawned is a URL to the Yubikey website. However, that particular event must have enough information in it that will allow specific applications to register an intent handle the event differently. When you have an app like LastPass installed, it will become an option to handle the event when you hold the Yubikey up to the NFC target. If you have the Yubico Authenticator app installed, it will also register an intent for this event, but it appears it only registers the intent when the app is actively running (i.e. it doesn't pop up as a choice of app to run when you hold the Yubikey up to the NFC target normally).

The Yubico Authenticator does something very different when it interacts with the Yubikey NFC data though. Unfortunately, here is where my explanation breaks down because I haven't read the code and I haven't seen any tech documentation from Yubico on how they do it. But what I infer is that the Authenticator app make a different call through the NFC API to the Yubikey, passing in the current clock time, and asking it to run the Authenticator applet that is installed on the Yubikey. When that applet is run, it uses the clock time and each site key that has been stored in the applet data to generate the 2FA codes that are then returned to the Authenticator app to be displayed on the screen.

http://forum.yubico.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1159&sid=e239193acdbbcd624ee28d2f9ef5530b&start=30#p4751

Triopo TR-870 E-TTL HSS Master/Slave Flash Speedlite

The TR-870 comes with a manual which is hard to understand. I discovered a few useful procedures through trial and error which I will document here. Note that off-camera wireless links are optical only, this speedlite does not support radio links.

There are 5 buttons which I will label starting from the bottom left:

• Mode
• LED
• Left Clear
• HSS
• Zoom

When you turn on the TR-870, it is in TTL mode. Pushing the MODE button will cycle through:

• M - manual
• Multi
• TTL

If you long-press MODE in Multi mode, you will cycle through:

E-TTL c (Canon) slave mode
I-TTL n (Nikon) slave mode
M/S1
M/S2

In E-TTL c (Canon) slave mode, if you long-press Left Clear, you will enter E-TTL master mode.

In E-TTL master mode, you can press ZOOM and cycle through:

Zoom
CH
RATIO
Flash enable

You can also long-press MODE to go back to slave mode.

When the TR-870 is in Master mode and mounted on my Canon T3i, the camera can see the flash and its configuration but no programming actually works.

When the TR-870 is in Master mode and mounted on my Canon 80D, the camera can see the flash and its configuration but no programming actually works.

When the TR-870 is on-camera in Master mode it doesn't actually work as a master.

As an off-camera E-TTL Slave, the TR-870 works fine.

I also tested it mounted on a Yongnuo YNE3-RX RF slave controlled by a Yongnuo 600EX-RT II and it works fine in this mode as well. You must put it in TTL mode, not E-TTL mode, for it to listen to the YNE3-RX instead of a optical control.

paypal info

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/pdn/howto_checkout-outside

Ivy Bridge CPUs

Consumer grade IB CPUs include the i5 and i7 series.

The i5 series is quad core with hyper-threading disabled.
HT is a feature reserved for the i7 series with a premium of around $100 over the closest i5 CPU.
i5 CPUs cluster around $200 so the HT premium is about 50%.

Server grade (Xeon) IB CPUs are given a product number of the type E3-12XX V2.
I expected such products to have a large price premium over the i5/i7 products with similar clock frequencies.

Curiously enough, this is not always true. The lowest 4 Xeon E3s are in the low $200 price range but everything above the lowest 2 include HT. Examples:

E3-1230 V2 3.3/3.7 GHz with HT costs $235.
i7-3770       3.4/3.9 GHz with HT costs $290.

There is only one chipset optimized for the E3-12XX V2 Xeons, the C216, which adds USB 3.0 and Smart Response Technology to the C206. Compared to the Z77 chipset, C216 adds vPro and AMT support, but note that full vPro is only possible with a CPU that has graphics and there are other costs associated with vPro. Regular IPMI seems like a better deal at this point.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/xeon-e3-benchmark-review,3258-3.html

Currently only Asus and Supermicro make workstation class motherboards with the C216.

Asus P8C WS
http://www.servethehome.com/Workstation-detail/asus-p8c-ws-review-c216-based-workstation-motherboard/

Expansion: 4 x16 (physical) PCIe slots, x8/x8/x4/x4 electrically plus 1 x1 and 1 PCI slot.

Pro: 3 yr warranty (but there have been complaints about the RMA process...)
Firewire (who cares)

Con: No Intel AMT/vPro. Only video out is 1 DVI (single link).
Lots of unhappy Newegg customers:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131849


There are two Supermicro MB: X9SAE and X9SAE-V.
X9SAE-V Expansion:
2 physical x16 (electrically PCI-E 3.0 x8),
1 physical  x8 (electrically PCI-E 2.0 x4),
2 physical  x4 (electrically PCI-E 2.0 x4),
1 physical  x1 PCIe 2.0 and
1 PCI slot

Pro: Intel AMT/vPro.
Onboard video support: VGA plus 2 HDMI outputs (but you need a more expensive E3-12X5 series Xeon to use the MB onboard video).
About $30 less than P8C WS. One LAN port is a higher grade chip.
Con: 1 yr warranty

Comparison of Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge Xeon:
http://www.servethehome.com/intel-xeon-e31230-v2-ivy-bridge-xeon-review-4c8t-33ghz/

the history of San Jose and broadband service

This has been going on a long time.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/San+Jose+First+California+City+to+Get+Cable+TV+Competition+From...-a018420787
June 1996:
The San Jose City Council voted unanimously to award a cable television franchise to Pacific Bell Video Services (PBVS) at its meeting today. San Jose residents will be the first to benefit from cable tv competition between Pacific Bell Video Services and an incumbent cable service provider in California.

Pacific Bell Video Services plans to launch commercial service over its advanced communication network in San Jose later this summer. "San Jose residents have been demanding an alternative to their existing provider and Pacific Bell Video Services will offer San Jose top-notch service," said Steve Harris, vice president of external affairs for PBVS. "We would like to bring the same high-quality service to other California cities through our wireline and wireless networks."

Pacific Bell is currently building an advanced communications network in San Diego and has plans to launch wireless cable television in Los Angeles, Orange County and the San Francisco Bay Area in 1997.


http://www3.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/Agenda/01_30_01docs/1_30_01_2.12.htm
January, 2001:
AT&T Rebuild of Pacific Bell Cable Facility – Negotiations have been ongoing since September of 1999, and were complicated by a significant related issue – Heritage Cablevision of California's (now AT&T Broadband) desire to begin rebuilding the old Pacific Bell cable system. In 1997, PacBell decided to abandon its cable television effort in San José. Under terms of the City’s settlement agreement with Pacific Bell, the system could be sold only to the holder of a valid cable franchise in San José. Subsequent to this, Heritage purchased some of Pacific Bell’s abandoned cable plant.

However, the City does not believe Heritage currently holds a valid franchise, since control of Heritage’s cable system has been transferred on several occasions without seeking City approval – first from Gill Industries, Inc. to Heritage Cablevision of California, then to TCI and then to AT&T Broadband. Efforts to find a mutually acceptable solution that would allow AT&T to begin rebuilding the PacBell System while protecting the City, led to a settlement agreement that was approved by the City Council last December.

Resolution of this issue consumed some five months of negotiations, however the resulting settlement agreement obligates Heritage to rebuild not only the area where Pacific Bell was building its system, but nearly all other areas of the City of San José, as well.

The rebuilt system will eliminate the antiquated A/B switches, and will provide advanced cable subscriber services to all of the City’s residents. Phase One of the rebuild, which includes the same sections of the City covered by the old PacBell system, will be rebuilt within 18 months. The rest of the City will be rebuilt within 5.5 years. AT&T has represented that the new system will meet the Mayor and City Council’s goal of having a “state of the art” cable subscriber system in that the system will be capable of providing any new analog or digital cable services that enter the market.

Remaining Negotiations – Despite the issues resolved in the Settlement Agreement, a number of other issues of significant benefit to the City and the community remain unresolved. Among these is support for Public, Education, and Government (PEG) Access and for the creation of an Institutional Network (INET).

The INET, a fiber optic system designed to carry voice, video and data, would connect government buildings and would also link together the City’s 19 school districts and roughly 200 school sites. The franchise extension action before the City Council on January 30, 2001, will allow the renewal discussions to continue in a manner consistent with federal law.

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2002/06/17/story5.html
Jun 16, 2002, 9:00pm PDT

San Jose has approved a list of requirements that AT&T Broadband must meet to have its cable franchise renewed, threatening that the three-year battle between the city and its cable operator will drag out for another four to six months unless the company negotiates a settlement this month.

The newest delay in a long-promised upgrade to San Jose's antiquated cable TV system leaves two-thirds of city residents, or about 100,000 homes, still without high-speed cable modem access -- an ironic problem for a city that presents itself as the world's high-tech capital. AT&T Broadband says it doesn't want to spend up to $150 million to wire the rest of the city for high-speed Internet access until it has its franchise renewal.

http://articles.latimes.com/2003/may/31/business/fi-rup31.7
May 2003:
Comcast Corp. is suing San Jose, alleging city officials are seeking to have the No. 1 U.S. cable television service provider build a local telecom network in exchange for operating rights for Silicon Valley's biggest city.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in San Jose, claims the city has illegally used franchise renewal talks to force the cable provider to construct a voice, data and video network free of charge for the city's use.

The cable provider claimed in its lawsuit that San Jose was violating federal law governing cable franchise renewals and that the cost of its desired network would be passed on to local Comcast subscribers, which in California would be considered an unlawful tax.

http://www3.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/Agenda/051106/051106_02b.pdf

April 2006:
RECOMMENDATION
Adoption of a resolution opposing AB 2987 (Nunez, Levine), The Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition Act of 2006.

http://sanjose.granicus.com/MetaViewer.php?view_id&event_id=1475&meta_id=544455

Nov 2015:
Approve a Master Encroachment Permit between the City of San Jose and Google Fiber, Inc. (Google Fiber) for the installation of a community-wide, residential high-speed fiber network service.

http://www.govtech.com/network/Google-Fiber-Delays-San-Jose-Rollout.html

Aug 2016:

San Jose leaders said Monday that they're hopeful Google's future plans -- even if services take a different shape or form -- will involve the city, especially after nearly two years of discussions over how to give residents faster connections.

"The fiber ball is entirely in Google's court," said city spokesman David Vossbrink. "We're very optimistic that their plans for extending their high speed broadband system will include San Jose, even if their original schedule gets modified so they can take advantage of technology advances that might be potentially less disruptive."

"Google indicated that they are exploring more innovative ways of deployment that overcome some of the challenges they are facing in their current builds," the report said.

Officials in Sunnyvale said Google has told the city it remains committed to their project.

GE water filters

Documenting the options in GE drinking water filters. There are three main functions:

• Taste and Odor
• Lead and Cysts
• VOC

There are three physical systems: single and dual stage sump systems and dual stage "twist and lock".

This should result in 3x3 = 9 filters but not all combinations exist. Here are the systems:

• FXU: 500 gallon single stage sump
• FXS: 600 gallon dual stage sump
• FQS: 160 gallon dual stage T&L

FXU has three filter types:

• TC: Taste and Odor
• LC: Lead and Cysts
• VC: VOC

Thus the three models: FXUTC, FXULC, FXUVC

FXS has only two filter types:

• LC
• VC

Thus these two models: FXSLC, FXSVC

FQS has two filter types:

• L: Lead and Cysts
• V: VOC
  

The two models are: FQSLF, FQSVF. The F seems to stand for faucet, as there is also a refrigerator/icemaker filter line.

microsoft outlook network password

A newly installed outlook on windows 2000 keeps asking for a network password. I found a solution on ms.com but it involved using regedit which does not work on w2000. Here is the correct solution: http://www.newmediamusings.com/blog/2003/05/solution_to_ent.html Click Start, click Run, type regedt32 in the Open box, and then click OK. Locate and click the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Protected Storage System Provider and delete the subkey folder which looks like the following: 

S-1-5-21-124525095-708259637-1543119021-16701 

So user friendly!