Make your own energy, Grow your own food – plus science and tech stuff
I am in the process of cleaning out programs from my computer that have been accessing the internet without my knowledge.
Google has installed its code in many places on my computer and I don’t want it. Continue reading ‘Uninstall Google Add-on from Firefox’ »
On my Vista machine, I checked out my task scheduler and was surprised by all the Google activity. Why is Google so active on my computer?
Continue reading ‘Google is Clogging Up My Task Scheduler’ »
Google is Clogging Up My Task Scheduler
I have been watching my computer lately to see what it’s doing on the internet. I want to make sure I haven’t been hacked. I’m surprised how many different IP addresses my computer connects to without my consent. GoogleToolbarNotifier.exe is one of them.
Continue reading ‘Why is GoogleToolbarNotifier.exe on my computer?’ »
What is this IP that always appears connected to my computer?
Continue reading ‘What is IP 198.63.194.98? (Sun’s Java Automatic Updater)’ »
I’ve been relying on Microsoft’s Live website to function as my RSS reader. It worked fairly well and I was happy with it, but Microsoft announced that they are shutting it down. So I was forced to find a new way to keep track of my RSS feeds.
Why would you want to know your latitude? If you have solar panels, you can use your latitude to know how much to tilt your solar panel to absorb the most direct sunlight.
Lock up your solar panels to prevent theft
Made a quick rocket stove with bricks. Put a Peltier cooler on the back and got a fire going. Measured the current, volts, and watts produced from a single Peltier cooler. A cooling fan and aluminum heatsink with a 12V portable battery helped.
Peltier Cooler (also called TEC or Thermo Electric Cooler) - resting against a hot brick
Video of experiment…
A 12V battery is getting low and needs some wind to charge up. The wind turbine outside faithfully stands watch high above the ground, waiting for a chance to spin in the wind.
Review of a 12V splitter. This is also called a 3-way cigarette lighter adapter .
12V adapter-splitter review
This adapter plugs into a single 12V battery outlet and splits it into three outlets. Could be used to power three gadgets from your car or from wherever else you have a 12V outlet. I have one in my house for off-the-grid backup power.
Video review…