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Japanese market Panasonic SA-PM50MD CD/Minidisc system. Serious cassette futurism vibes.

Jim Lovell, Apollo 13 commander, dies aged 97 https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/aug/08/jim-lovell-astronaut-dies

Just so pure and classic. Makes me think of my vocal teacher from back when. That vibrato is so gentle and subtle and perfect.

Orange glazed, pan seared salmon. Scalloped potatoes and steamed broccoli.

I went to Chicken Alley today to divest myself of a Logitech wireless USB/keyboard combination and a whole stack of Revere Ware pots and pans (which will be missed, modern Revere Ware is not as good as the stuff they made in the 20th century, but I just do NOT have room for it.) I checked their CD stack and picked up two things: Peak 90s trip-pop. I bought it when in '96 when I was stoned out of my gourd it was new. It remains one of my favorite albums of the 1990s. The perfect blend of trip hop beats, dubby basslines, ethereal almost shoegaze vocals and a hint of retro 60s lounge. No skips. (I didn't actually need a second copy, but I have no idea where my original one is, and it was fun to play a CD on the ride home.) Kooky, ethereal Icelandic music that defies description. I had it on CD in 2002 and haven't seen my copy since about ...2003. Weirdly, I still have my 1997 copy of _Von_ which has been on many adventures with me. I played it on the home stereo tonight and my (sainted, octogenarian) mother didn't seem to mind it

Also for anyone interested, Magnum is running a 20% off Summer Course sale right now with some heavyweights. Just picked up... Mark Power: Picturing Place Cristina de Middel: Stranger than Reality Gregory Halpern: Documentary Sur/Realism Matt Black: The Documentary Commitment Jonas Bendiksen: Curiosity in Practice Bieke Depoorter: Chance Encounters Alec Soth: Photographic Storytelling

That was fun. I was belly laughing at one point. HS

James Hoffmann bought one of David Lynch's old coffee makers (an Italian Velox Ferrara Minibar design from the 1960s and 70s):

Hilarious - and yet people are still buying it. I remember checking out one of these things more than 10 years ago (the first RX100 was released in 2012). It was $650 then. The RX1R II was released in 2015 at $3,200 (gasp). They still haven't fixed the ergonomic problems!

[funny accent] This camera is jewelry. [funny accent] $300 thumb grip. [funny accent] It's fun to take photos with it. [funny accent] It's too big to be a compact camera. [funny accent] Chromatic aberration. [funny accent] For north of 5 grand, I want a UD element and CA under control. At that point Sony need to really commit to the Leica price point, give a lens that's much better wide open and charge $7000 for it.

Yesterday was an Isao Tomita kind of day: Today is a Vangelis kind of day:

Tarzan by Various Artists (1999) https://album.link/89gxj8dmg0md6 Example: This soundtrack has no right to be this good for a mediocre Disney movie. Phil and Mark went hard on this one.

More new cassette players - the azimuth adjustment and measurements are surprising:

Woo Audio and Lampazitor in the same system... damn this one is a glutton for punishment

Some good lookin' Corn

Click da link! 🫡

RIP, macOS hard drive icon: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/08/rip-to-the-macintosh-hd-hard-drive-icon-2000-2025/

$280K speakers, $150K in amps, $60K DAC, all stuffed into a room the size of a foyer.

I do not like this one bit.

More from the archives....

I re-addressed the question of drive cloning today - EaseUS seems to be getting some recommendations but the company is based in Chengdu, China and it comes cheap at $20 or less for their home Disk Copy software. I'm somewhat leery of using this kind of tool - I remember when they started showing up at the top of Google search results a few years ago and I was skeptical then, too (i.e., they may be paying reviewers to promote their software). Macrium Reflect X looks like a decent tool - it's not as cheap as EaseUS but they have a long history and a good reputation (Windows only). Acronis True Image may also be good - they add anti-ransomware tools which you may not need and some reviews noted a slower system startup (Windows and macOS). Both offer free trials and they start at about $50/year - subscription only. You can also use Clonezilla, which is free and open source. It was developed by Steven Shiau and the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) in Taiwan and it's been around since 2007 (Windows, Intel macOS, Linux, Unix). The Clonezilla interface is definitely more technical and less beginner-friendly than the other software. In my opinion, Windows is more of a serious candidate for drive cloning. Many tools exist at the enterprise level for backup and data management, but your average home/small business user doesn't do a good job of backup or disaster preparation. You can use these software tools along with an inexpensive drive/NAS to fully backup your system in case of data loss or hardware failure. Apple's macOS has built-in tools for backup (Time Machine), data migration (Migration Assistant), and disk encryption (FileVault 2). I've found that these tools work extremely well for most users - enterprise admins have more expensive and sophisticated MDM (mobile device management) software like Jamf Pro, Kandji, NinjaOne to run their Macs. Backblaze, a large cloud backup company, just released their quarterly drive stats for Q2 2025: https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-drive-stats-for-q2-2025/ It's reassuring to see that most hard drives across the board have lower than 1% failure rates, with a few exceptions. Backblaze uses consumer SATA hard drives rather than more expensive enterprise drives, so your mileage may vary. It's also important to note that these are failures in operation - if Backblaze received a dead-on-arrival drive from their supplier, that's not going to go in their metrics.

Part Two of *mumble* The Wenlock Barracks apparently. It's a dog photo with some background people and vehicles. That's a lot of square trucks. Time for some pointy ears. What we have here is a Corgi 90 and a Corgi 110, though looking now he might even be a Corgi 130. At the time my (sainted, octogenarian) mother commented that the fella in the foreground was "first to the food bowl." There's a case to be made for the parallels between Corgis and Land Rovers. Both originate from the British Isles. Both are expensive and high maintenance for what they are and can be a bit ...temperamental at times. Both also have loyal (and in some cases, royal) fans who swear on their virtues vs other breeds/brands. Also, both are quite photogenic. Woof.