Exploring Sanyo Digicam Multi Shot ‘movie clips’

Using PaintShop Pro to animate Sanyo Multi Shot images

I unearthed my early Sanyo VPC-G210 photos and discovered a few ‘multi shot’ photos taken at the time (1997-98), so I decided to see what I could make of them today.  Each Sanyo multi shot image contains 16 sequential pictures, tiled 4x4 into a single 640 x 480 pixel JPEG.  So each ‘frame’ is a mere 160 x 120 pixels and movie clips last 1.6 or 3.2 seconds. You can't play the ‘animation’ on the camera screen. I'm not sure if Sanyo’s bundled MGI Photosuite SE software enables them to be viewed on a PC either (I'll try to find out).

[click for full size]

^ Sanyo 'Multi Shot' pictures - 16 frames in a 640 x 480 px image

I thought about making an animated .gif out of them. Remembering the source image is a JPEG, using Paintshop Pro I created a series of macros (see later) that selects each 160 x 120 frame from a row of four images and saves them out individually. So I could save all 16 images manually to disk as .gifs.  (Portrait mode images need rotating and re-ordering. The brilliant File Menu Tools by Lopesoft is great for re-ordering or renaming files, using its Advanced Renamer tool.)

Then by uploading them to my favourite animated .GIF maker (https://gifmaker.me/) an animated .gif could be made, setting the frame rate to the original Sanyo value of 100 milliseconds (or sometimes 200).

^ Animated .gifs made from the Sanyo Multi Shot pictures

The results are small digital animations taken in 1997 at a time when this was a great novelty. I’ve immortalised them above, and here's a never-before-seen breadboard LED experiment for Teach-In 98:

Below, for anyone interested, I’m offering my PSPscripts that slice four images from each row, ready for you to Save As a .gif and upload them to the GIF Maker.

Paintshop Pro Scripts to slice Sanyo Multi Shot images - ie 4 rows into 4 images. The fifth macro I've included, runs the other four - ie slicing and creating all 16 images. Then create a new folder on hard disk, and in PaintShop Pro hit F12 to Save....  each one as a .gif in the correct order. You can then make an animated .gif from them.

Sometimes I found the camera produced an artefact with errant pixels down one edge of each frame, as though the frames had overlapped with the next one. Strange, I guess it's a hardware fault.

See also http://alanwinstanley.squarespace.com/alan-winstanleys-journal/2024/4/18/sanyo-vpc-g210-digicam-the-start-of-something-big.html

Sanyo VPC-G210 digicam – the start of something big

My first foray into digital photography

It’s 1997 and the evolution of digital cameras continues unabated, as manufacturers try to cram more pixels into pictures to produce better quality images. Since the earliest LCD consumer camera first appeared, the 1995 ¼VGA Casio QV-10 that I describe elsewhere, digicams were jostling for position with film cameras and there’d be an insatiable demand for higher resolution, more memory, faster operation, improved battery life and more camera-like features and controls.

Film still had the edge by a long mile, especially amongst purists, and it would be another decade before digital cameras were considered as serious replacements for film SLRs; a decade later in 2007 I eventually invested in a Sony Alpha SLR that I imported from B&H Photo in New York (the best online service I ever had – ordered late one Sunday night, it arrived Wednesday morning).

Originally (say 1992-1997), I relied on film for photographing my electronic projects, websites and magazine articles, using a lovely Minolta X-700 SLR with 50mm macro lens and ring flash, though I briefly used a Minolta Vectis APS film camera in between times. I’d send exposed film to my publishers for developing at their local chemist, and then black and white prints would be scanned in for magazine page composition by the in-house typefit bureau.

This work regime was costly, inflexible and most of all very time consuming. As pressure on my workload increased, it became obvious that ‘digital’ was the way ahead as it would vastly improve productivity all round, giving me lots more flexibility to take shots and view the results instantly.

The magazine would have to get used to me sending loads of JPEGs instead of rolls of 35mm Kodak film, and for my part I’d have to start sending my work ‘down the wire’, using a direct modem-to-modem terminal program (Procomm Plus for Windows) to upload my stuff onto their Amstrad PC in the typefit bureau office. (It would be some years before we adopted Internet-based comms for file transfer using email instead; for one thing, we didn’t trust the Internet’s reliability.)

I’d kept an eye on the nascent digital camera market and eventually I plumbed for one of the next generation VGA models, a Sanyo VPC-G210. At the time, this model was highly regarded for having a better quality LCD screen than its rivals, one that was brighter and faster to react with hardly any ‘lag’. I purchased it from Dixons in July 1997, for a grand total of £550. (I still recall how Dixons tried flogging me an extended warranty because ‘the screens are the same as a laptop’ and when I declined they said ‘Oh, you’re a gambler, then.’)

Smart Media flash memory cards from the 1990s. The cropped corner denoted the voltage. 5V are extremely rare to find these days. The metal foil sticker was for write-protection!The Sanyo VPC-G210 showed how digicams specifications and features were rapidly improving, as it also had a built-in flash and removable media, namely a 3.3V Smart Media slot (making earlier 5V types obsolete in the process). Usefully, it also had an optical viewfinder and a self-timer as well. A slide switch could be set for close-up ‘macro’ photography – classed as being in the range of 20-50cm!

What’s more, the Sanyo could record voice memo sound clips and actually take movies! These ‘multi shot’ sequences were recorded as 1/16th of the normal frame size in either 0.1s or 0.2s intervals, a total of 16 sub-images in all. They could either be ‘played back’ on the camera, or viewed using the bundled PC software (see later). You could even play them back on a TV for presentations, via the A/V lead and SCART adaptor included. This feature was especially appreciated by some users.

Downloading images onto a PC involved a slow serial RS-232 lead or – better - a Smart Media card reader on a USB port instead. Remember that USB in this era was brand new and terribly slow, with USB1.1 offering a paltry 12Mpbs per second, but it was light years ahead of anything we’d seen before then.

Another card-reading option was a so-called ‘Flashpath’ adaptor, which was a coin-cell powered floppy-disk shaped thing; you inserted the memory card into it and slotted the adaptor into a PC’s floppy drive. It worked after a fashion, but was chronically slow, needing Windows 98 drivers to make it work and the contraption still cost me £50, which was typical of the money-sinking pit that this branch of technology would turn into.

Once images were saved to hard disk, they could be manipulated with early imaging programs included JASC Paint Shop Pro (now owned by Corel) or Adobe Photoshop if you could afford it.

Digital fun at the funfair

Digital cameras were still a very rare sight on the streets at that time, and it would be a few months before I ventured out with mine, taking my mum to visit a funfair one evening in December 1997. Your average Joe hadn’t really seen a digital camera before, and the sight of me waving this strange silvery box around was met with a little bemusement. On the downside, the camera was a pretty heavy lump (12 ozs./ 360g) to lug around, but also it had an appetite for batteries, and it scoffed four AA cells for lunch. I’d bought a 16-pack of AA’s from Dixons, which lasted me no time at all.

Here are a few original night-time funfair photos from 1997 (click to see). Down below I’ve uploaded examples of the Sanyo's movie clips as well, seen for the first time since the late 90s.

In time for Teach-In 98

Generally digital camera technology was showing a lot of promise though, and then the magazine commissioned me to co-write Teach-In 98 – An Introduction to Digital Electronics along with Ian Bell, Tony Wilkinson and Rob Miles. Part One of this tutorial series would be appearing in November 1997’s issue, so it was all hands on deck as we started writing the text and the practical ‘Lab Work’ solderless breadboard experiments.

Ian, Tony and Rob drafted the academic parts while I concentrated mainly on the practical lab experiments. It was for Teach-In 98 that my new digital camera came into its own, transforming my productivity and workflow.

We started off badly because the typesetter, the late Terry Farmilowe, was confounded by these new digital images which he claimed had a resolution of ‘only’ 72 dpi and he wouldn’t change the tick-box in Photoshop at his end to accommodate them. Instead I had to change it to 300 dpi – but it was only a number, otherwise still the same image, same pixels and same resolution!

There were some obvious quality differences between these and film, and although it probably took everybody a little time to accept digital images, the benefits outweighed the drawbacks and they were good enough to get things going. There would be no turning back, and my new digital camera was immediately and hugely beneficial, especially when putting together Teach-In 98’s ‘Lab Work’ practical experiments.

At long Iast I could assemble and test out the circuits on a solderless breadboard and photograph them instantly. And of course, if I didn’t like the images I could re-shoot them there and then, a new option that came like a breath of fresh air. Here are a few Teach-In 98 original images for old time's sake (click to see full size original VGA):

^ Some original Teach In 98 images

As busy as a PhizzyB

The PhizzyB ‘Physical Beboputer’ by Clive Maxfield was a work of genius, a computer tutorial that had an accompanying hardware trainer hooked to a PC serial port. The software was also on the magazine’s first ever cover-mounted CD-ROM (I used to design all their cover disks, and never had a single problem).

The Sanyo digicam would be pressed into service once again when I was asked to help with the PhizzyB magazine series – Max and Alvin handling the theory side while I handled out their practical experiments from November 1998’s issue as described here.

Upgrading to a Ricoh 1280 px was needed for the PhizzyB series [click to see]Another higher res 1280 px image of the PhizzyBotThere was terrible pressure on my time as I also had to source some parts, but the Sanyo digicam was of tremendous help in starting the series, though I used my Minolta film camera to shoot the main PhizzyB board, to get the required detail. Digital image quality was proving inadequate enough, though, and it was time to upgrade to a 1280 x 960 px Ricoh to complete the PhizzyB experiments.

The Sanyo VPG-G250 was 25% smaller than the G210 with a higher resolution screen and menusThere’s no doubt the Sanyo digicam played an important role in helping my work to evolve and grow. Sanyo updated this model to the VPC-G250 which was 25% more compact and used just two AA cells. It still used Smart Media cards but was smarter and menu-driven on a higher resolution LCD, a great improvement on its clunky predecessor.

As we entered the 2000s it was evident how indispensable digital photography was becoming, especially in the trendy ‘new media’ market of web design when I could (at last) take instant photos and upload them onto the web, without needing to shoot film and then use a flatbed scanner for the prints. They were very happy, productive and satisfying times, and there was no doubt the ‘digital still camera’ was here to stay.

The Sanyo was also the start of a costly and ceaseless upgrade path, as I would update to a Ricoh megapixel model (RDC-4200, Smart Media, 1280 x 960 px), and then a Ricoh RDC-5300 (1792 x 1200 px), though I still used a tough Minolta Vectis APS film SLR camera for my Pipelines to Pylons project (1999). A Fuji S602 digital ‘bridge’ camera was sourced in the mid 2000s, which has an excellent 1cm macro that I still use today (ideal for some web and magazine work).

I eventually rented a small photostudio but my photography career finally ended with a Sony (was, Minolta) Alpha SLR and macro lens etc, mostly all now dispensed with. These days I use several 7.2MP Sony Cybershot DSC-P200 digicams for snapshots; its Carl Zeiss lens can still produce remarkable results and they're picked up cheaply on eBay.

Exploring Sanyo Multi Shot ‘movie clips’

In a separate blog I've shown how to make these Sanyo mini 16-frame movies into an animated .gif, using a macro for PaintShop Pro to semi-automate it.

• http://alanwinstanley.squarespace.com/alan-winstanleys-journal/2024/4/21/exploring-sanyo-digicam-multi-shot-movie-clips.html

What a great time it was to be alive!

Celebrating the Casio QV-10 – the world’s first consumer digital camera with built-in LCD

‘What to do today?’ was one of my dad’s daily musings, and while pondering the same thing myself, I remembered that I’ve got a vintage digicam that I wanted to re-visit and explore. So this item is dedicated to the Casio QV-10, which nearly 30 years ago heralded a radical change in the way consumers would enjoy photography in the future.

It’s the 1990s and mainstream film photography is reaching its zenith, with many high quality 35mm and medium format film cameras available that were hand-made and of exquisite complexity. I ‘cut my teeth’ on Minolta’s film camera range, mainly because I’d spotted a second-hand 50mm Minolta macro lens on sale in a local camera shop, so I bought a used Minolta X-700 SLR camera body to go with it, to support my electronics project publishing job.

After getting my hands on this quality lens, I learned about photography basics including aperture (f-stops n’ things), shutter speeds and ISO settings. I increased my knowledge on a need-to-know basis, as I embraced exposure values (EV), a macro ring flash, lens filters and extension tubes as well. Using this esoteric equipment was a highly rewarding experience and, with the Internet starting to take off, my resulting close-up photography enabled me to produce the world’s first website dedicated to explaining the techniques of electronics soldering.

In 1996 the Basic Soldering Guide was born! It can still be seen today (click through to the Photo Gallery) at

https://web.archive.org/web/19990225151816/http://www.epemag.wimborne.co.uk/solderfaq.htm

Film cameras had their downside of course. Apart from being cumbersome and heavy, film obviously needed processing, something we entrusted to the local photolab. This was disruptive and time-consuming especially as I had a busy writing and publishing schedule to adhere to, so I was excited when in the mid 1990s the prospect of using instant new ‘digital’ photography started to surface.

Kodak was first to market a digital camera which, due to its high cost and complexity, was aimed fairly and squarely at professional photographers and studios. The Kodak DCS100 comprised an electronic CCD sensor grafted onto an SLR film camera body, so images were captured up-front the traditional way but were written to an internal digital memory instead of a film plane. However, the LCD technology that displayed images on a screen, had yet to materialise. An interesting history of the Kodak Digital Camera System is on Wikipedia here   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodak_DCS

Casio QV-10 - the first digicam with LCD [click to see]In Britain, the idea of digital photography was in its infancy when Casio launched the world’s first consumer digicam with an LCD, the QV-10, in 1995. It would prove to be a seminal milestone in photography as it now enabled users to view their snapshots instantly (nearly, anyway) on the camera’s built-in 1.8” Active Matrix TFT colour screen.

The LCD also doubled as a digital viewfinder, something that had never been possible before. The camera’s specification might seem archaic now, but it was cutting edge in its time and the Casio QV-10 held great appeal for two other emerging 1990s mainstream technologies: the exciting worlds of personal computing and desktop publishing. For the first time, digital photography became easy and affordable - “Now it doesn't take a PhD to use a digital camera” as Casio said of the QV digital camera.

The LCD viewfinder was a world first in this market [click to see]As ‘flash’ removable media had yet to arrive on the scene (never mind USB), the camera hosted its own 16MB internal memory (though the early spec only quotes 2MB), and it took 6-7 seconds for each image to be written to memory. Images could only be downloaded using a dedicated serial lead with a Windows PC or Macintosh. Using Casio’s Connection Kit, you could also copy images from your PC back onto the camera again, which might have been handy for giving presentations or slideshows.

Trendy estate agents (realtors) soon embraced the flashy idea of using the QV-10 digital camera to photograph their client’s houses. It all looked very exciting and high tech. One problem was that image resolution was low (320 x 240 pixels – quarter VGA) and houses and their interiors were often quite blurry.

No doubt the silent 'click' of the Casio's shutter button contrasted heavily with the click and whirr of a film SLR, and users of the time would have been held in awe of this new digital image capture technology.

The DC power supply lead sprouted inconveniently from the top [click to see]A Video Out jack and RCA lead enabled viewing on a TV screen, video ‘still’ thermal printer or a video tape deck, a concept that was a great novelty at the time. Casio’s all-plastic photographic prodigy weighed in at just 170 grammes and it used four AA batteries or a 6V mains adaptor (centre negative!), though the DC lead stuck out of the top and got in the way.

Casio called captured images ‘Pages’ and the camera stored a maximum of 96 of them in its internal memory. The manual often refers to ‘memory pages’ and they could be write-protected if desired.  In Playback mode, multiple thumbnails could be shown, and you could ‘zoom’ in in a primitive way on areas of the image.

The TFT display was backlit using a fluorescent light source, presumably a cold-cathode tube, which had a working life of about six years (at two hours per day). After that, you had to pay Casio to have a new tube put in, if the camera lasted that long and hadn’t become obsolete by then (which was highly likely in this supercharged market). Nor might the TFT have 100% integrity: out of its 61,380 pixels, up to half a dozen of them (0.01%) were allowed to be always-on or failed altogether, as stated in the manufacturer’s norm. A display brightness control was underneath the camera, near the tripod screw thread.

The camera’s spec was actually quite professional-sounding:  the fixed-focus F2/ F8 lens had a ‘macro’ position  and a shutter speed of 1/8^th to 1/4,000^th of a second, auto white balance, -2 to +2EV exposure adjustment and TTL centre weighted metering. A 10-second timer was included.

The spec sheet can still be seen at https://web.archive.org/web/19971114230210/http://www.casio.com/html/products/QV-10Adetail.html

I won’t describe every camera function in detail as the operating manual is still online at Casio.com, I guess for old time’s sake: https://support.casio.com/storage/en/manual/pdf/EN/001/QV10_EN.pdf

The swivel lens could take a selfie! [click to see]As another novelty, the lens could swivel 180 degrees – that’s right, it was also the first digital camera that took selfies! There was of course no built-in flash. I also have a rare lens adaptor kit for the Casio QV-10, the Raynox QV-1000 which contains a 1.5x telephoto and 0.65x wide angle lens. They clamped over the Casio lens using a plastic bracket. The whole thing was weighty and wobbly and the idea was quite laughable really, as it was very easy to knock it off or offset it, but it was the state of the art at the time.

The rare Raynox QV-1000 conversion lens kit for the QV10 (click to see)

The heavy lens was retained on a primitive and wobbly plastic clamp [click to see]The 1.5x telephoto and 0.6x wide angle lens kit by Raynox of Japan [click to see]

Serial Killer

QV-PC Software running in Windows 98Using the separate QV-PC software application and Connection Kit, a QV-10 can be connected to a Windows (95/98) PC or a Macintosh. Remember that this was before the days of removable media, USB ports or flash card readers, etc., so here’s where the fun really began: a serial lead connected the camera to a COM (serial) port on a PC and it was vital that the camera’s power supply was uninterrupted during the image download/ upload process. Failure to maintain power could corrupt the camera’s memory! Apparently, if that happened the camera had to be sent back to Casio to have a factory reset, otherwise the camera was effectively ‘bricked’.

A revision, the QV-10A (in the UK anyway), permitted users to reset the camera themselves. An updated QV-11 followed, but the difference is a mystery as the main specs. were identical.

I happen to have a Windows 98 PC which I keep for old time’s sake – and I also have Casio’s QV-10 demo disk (CD ROM), which doesn’t run on a 64 bit PC so I made some screengrabs from the .AVI files into an animated gif. The colours are spotty but it gives you an idea.

Slides from Casio's QV-10 demo disk (Windows 98)

Casio’s QV-PC Windows software is used to download images from the camera. A clunky but very fragile-looking serial lead hooks it to a COM port. Fetching images is a slow job, starting with the ‘Open Camera’ menu which downloads thumbnails. These are the key to everything and images can then be saved out as .cam  .bmp or .tif format only. No JPGs here! The .cam format (Casio’s native file) is chosen by default. When saved out as a .bmp, the resolution can also be set, 320 x 240 (default) or extrapolated to 640 x 480.

Interestingly, when connected to the COM port the camera can be used to take a snapshot, webcam style. The software also flagged up that the camera battery was getting low, so there is a bit of bi-directional comms going on.

The software organises images thumbnails and albums, and is a reminder of how far we’ve come since the 1990s. It has no right-click and files had to be saved as 8.3 filenames. There was rudimentary drag and drop, with downloaded thumbnails being dragged onto an Album window: the software then fetched the image (again) and saved it as a .cam file.

A sample photo is below, noting that I had to convert them from bitmaps to JPEGs for web use:

320 x 240 pixel native image640 x 480 pixel (extrapolated) native image

As shown above, native images were 320 x 240 px but bitmaps could be saved out as 640 x 480 px VGA.

Summary

The Casio QV-10 opened up the power of digital photography to the mainstream user and was the forerunner of things to come. I would invest in my first digital camera – a Sanyo VPG-C210 – in 1997, a decent-enough quality VGA camera costing £550 which radically transformed my workload later in the 1990s and enabled me to work much more efficiently. It’s something I’ll write about separately.

 I hope you enjoyed this insight into digital photography of the era.

 

Zenith Flashmatic - the first TV remote control

The Zenith Flashmatic was a flashlight-powered opto TV remote controlThe Flashmatic was the first TV set to offer a remote control, and it was operated using a raygun-like device that was basically a torch (flashlight).

Aiming it at one of the four corners of the TV would turn the set on or off, mute the sound (TV commercials were annoying even back then!), or it could change the channel - a photocell circuit operated a motor that turned the channel selector turret tuner clockwise or anti-clockwise, no doubt with a satisfying clunking and clattering sound.

It was a nuts valve (vacuum tube) design that was destined to fail, because it proved all too easy to trigger using false beams of light (eg sunlight or reflections). Next came sonic-operated TVs, that had a mini-chime bar type of remote control. Different frequencies triggered different functions on the TV. A 'clicker' type of remote device was also marketed.

The original Zenith Flashmatic circuit diagrams and manual (PDF 9MB) can be downloaded here.

• A BBC news item in May 2012 reported the passing of the Flashmatic TV remote control inventor, Eugene Polley who died age 96. Learn more...

EMT757 Programmable Digital Timer User Guide

EMT757 programmable TimerAt last, here’s the instruction manual they left out of the box! I've written an easy-to-read and comprehensive guide that explains how to use the popular EMT757 time switch.

The EMT757 timer has been sold for many years, previously in the UK by B&Q under the Everflourish brand, and currently under the ExtraStar brand found on Amazon. Clas Ohlson also sells it under their Cotech label.

It’s a versatile 7-day time switch with 20 individual on-off programmes, a countdown timer that switches on/off after an elapsed period, and a random burglar-deterrent function.

I’ve used them for many years and have got to know them very well. The problem for many users is that the digital display and buttons are pretty small, and the supplied generic instructions take a bit of digesting, hence I’ve written this comprehensive guide to make life easy for those who might be struggling with this popular timer.

• Free download - EMT757 Time Switch User Guide (PDF) here

• You can buy the EMT757 from Amazon [Affiliate link] here

The above Amazon Affiliate link(s) help towards the cost of running this web site.

Add a ‘Charging’ indicator to the Ryobi One+ 18V USB Adaptor

One handy accessory is the Ryobi 18V USB charger (R18USB-0), which clips onto a One+ battery to provide two 5V USB ports rated at 2.1A and 1A. It’s intended to charge eg smartphones on the go but could also power other USB gadgets, LED camping lights or chargers etc, acting like a souped-up powerbank. It could also prove handy during power cuts. The only control it has is a simple ‘start’ button on top. Once you press it, the charger powers up and automatically shuts off again 8 hours later. For some reason there’s no at-a-glance indication of whether the charger is actually working or whether it's finished. I've now figured out how to add an LED Charging indicator to the USB charger to show that it's operating, an upgrade that turned out to be easier than I expected. Anyone with hobby and basic soldering skills should be able to do the same, following my outline guidance below.

Click to read more ...

PURE 'Flow' Internet Radio platform shut down by PURE

PURE Flow radios no longer work with Internet radio stations

Currently a £30/ €30 voucher off a new one is available, see the link below (exp 31.10.2023)

The Lounge no longer works. PURE has quietly shut down the Flow Internet radio platform completely, throwing its band of loyal users onto the scrapheap.

As from May 9th, 2023 you can no longer access Internet radio channels through your PURE Flow radio.

"Only selective older radio models" [their words not mine] are affected, including:

• Avanti Flow
• Contour
• Evoke F4
• Evoke Flow
• Oasis Flow
• One Flow
• Sensia
• Sensia 200D
• Siesta Flow
• Sirocco 550
• Jongo speakers (when using Pure Connect app)

"This change in technology does not affect the majority of Pure customers, nor users of the Pure Select app, which is still available and fully functional", they say. Well, I've seen plenty of interest in keeping these older radios working by replacing the faded OLED displays. Even this week a grateful Avanti Flow owner celebrated replacing his display.

This is what happens today with network-based tech: it's great until they pull the plug and leave you with a load of perfectly-good hardware that is rendered fit only for landfill. 

PURE offers a £30/ €30 discount off certain new products or 30% discount off their next purchase.

What a sad day for us PURE Flow fans.

• More details: https://support.pure-audio.com/en-GB/news/posts/internet-radio-service-flow-announcement-of-shutdown
• Their current range is at https://www.pure-audio.com/en-GB/audio-hifi/radios/internet-radios/c/type_InternetRadios
• Details of the £30/ €30 voucher rebate:  https://support.pure-audio.com/en/kb/articles/flow-shutdown-redemption-voucher

Early days at Watford Electronics

Popular UK hobby magazines like Practical Electronics, Everyday Electronics and Practical Wireless featured a wealth of constructional projects for electronics hobbyists to tackle. For most of us, getting components meant sending away for them by mail order. One supplier was Watford Electronics Ltd. of Cardiff Road, Watford, a supplier that I myself used in the 1970’s and 1980’s, as I’ve described elsewhere*. So I was delighted to hear from a former staff member at Watford Electronics, Ian Nicholls, who wrote to me with his interesting story describing life behind the scenes in the earliest days of Watford Electronics. I’ve précised it in this feature, for electronics enthusiasts who, like me, used to mail in to Watford Electronics in an era when home computing was also gaining popularity.

Click to read more ...

UK National Grid energy production and demand

These useful widgets from gridwatch.co.uk shows current energy demands of the UK. The website has near-live data of demand, production and interconnect flows. Below is a selection of real-time data. Visit gridwatch.co.uk for more data!

Electric air dusters - an alternative to aerosols

If you use aerosol air dusters regularly then you'll know some of the problems they cause, including freezing and condensation, never mind the high cost. An electric air duster offers many advantages over pricey aerosols and can pay for itself over time, as I explain in this article.

Click to read more ...