René Rebe

I updated my ExactImage-based QuickLook plugin to also correctly display 16 bit per channel files, enjoy: 1.7 update with improved 16 bit channel support. As usual: If you have another image format you like to preview on the Mac just let me know!

In late-2010 I already wrote in depth about Apple’s iTunes Connect App review times. As one of our latest Mac App updates kinda rushed a little faster thru the review, I wanted to give a brief update about the current state:

December 14, 2011 08:52 Prepare for Upload
December 14, 2011 08:52 Waiting For Upload
December 15, 2011 08:49 Upload Received
December 15, 2011 08:52 Waiting For Review
December 19, 2011 12:36 In Review
December 19, 2011 14:19 Pending Developer Release
December 20, 2011 00:16 Processing for App Store

While I do not know if that is just due lucky Christmas, at least it looks like the review times are now less than a week.

Update: And another such sprint:

December 18, 2011 06:15 Prepare for Upload
December 18, 2011 06:16 Waiting For Upload
December 18, 2011 07:57 Upload Received
December 18, 2011 08:05 Invalid Binary
December 18, 2011 08:20 Waiting For Upload
December 18, 2011 08:30 Upload Received
December 18, 2011 08:34 Waiting For Review
December 20, 2011 17:52 In Review
December 20, 2011 18:16 Pending Developer Release
December 21, 2011 01:04 Processing for App Store

With all the reviews about Bulldozer performance, I wonder how much is to be attributed to Intel’s compiler not generating latest, greatest, vectorized code for AMD CPUs, …

I still believe that Bulldozer delivers excellent server performance, especially when it comes to hardware assisted virtualization, and that desktop performance would look better with unbiased benchmarks, (and a better “core package” aware Window process scheduler) …

I got quite some CPU cycle requirements. For some time now I’m waiting for AMD to deliver sub 100 Watt (e.g. 95W) CPUs, but unfortunately the 95W editions of the Phenom II X6 1055T and 1065T are nearly impossible to come by (except you are an OEM ordering thousands of them). So I got a test system with the regular, 125W 1055T, and it just keeps running too hot.

While I’m still waiting for the Bulldozer to appear, and in a 95W flavor no less, I decided Sunday is a great day to experiment with undervolting the aging, hot silicon I got at hand. Actually it turned out the beast of a silicon I got can be undervolted by huge margins, from the factory settings:

NbVid NbDid CpuVid CpuDid CpuFid UNb CpuMult UCpu PCore
P-State 0: 32 0 6 0 17 1150.0mV 16.50000 1475.0mV 23305mW
P-State 1: 32 0 14 0 12 1150.0mV 14.00000 1375.0mV 20625mW
P-State 2: 32 0 18 0 6 1150.0mV 11.00000 1325.0mV 15370mW
P-State 3: 32 0 22 1 14 1150.0mV 7.50000 1275.0mV 10838mW
P-State 4: 32 0 26 1 0 1150.0mV 4.00000 1225.0mV 6738mW

Down to so far stable:
(more…)

Some time ago I got a black NEC display which comes with four video inputs: VGA, 2 DVI and even DisplayPort as well as USB hub with two upstream ports. As I found no setting available on the monitor to change the USB upstream port to use, I usually just changed the USB cable when I had another computer for some testing on my desk.

However, today, I found out that there is a NEC MultiProfiler setup utility which allows to permanently assign dedicated USB ports per video input. This way I finally got a full KVM switch inside the monitor, assigning the first USB port to the DisplayPort, and the second USB port to all the other video inputs, used for temporary testing of various stuff.

Oh, cool: one can hack, and restore old SDK (and GCC) support in Xcode 4!

And also install Xcode 3 on Mac OS X 10.7, Lion.

I have not yet checked how well that works, though.

Updated: hack-installed Xcode 3.2.6 appears to (mostly) work on Mac OS X 10.7 (Lion), e.g. Xcode itself and the Interface Builder do work, Dashcode, however, fails to lunch due to some missing Framework symbol (_dispatch_get_concurrent_queue expected in /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib).

We finally got another App for iOS. Actually I had this speedometer around with me for two years or so already for my own use. However, ad-hoc provisioned App certificates expire faster than you can watch after them, so often when I wanted to run it for my own use the provisioning profile was already expired. So I finally polished it for global distribution for all of you, and here are some free promo codes, enjoy:

LH3EKYM7JPXW
YLY7AW3PPJNE
HRAARNM7PMRX
WTNH3FF77E3N
YJLRA9JHLK7P
L49JW3NFHRX4
4JN3MWJMYE4E
7Y34J349PFLE
YMKYM9REKMR9
YKYT49RXKX9L
LM9YP4WEX6FR
NXL7MXNF7PPK
WHRJJXWTRXXK
93E63TFKPYF3
RE7H4APMLXH9
XTALKFX6PMN3

Just gave it a quick spin at a local store. quite nice so far, know and worked with QNX since the mid 1990s. But how the heck to you get out of an App, e.g. back to the home screen? Tried all kind of gestures, touched everywhere - nothing intuitiv worked

Update: Aha - touch sensitive bezel: swipe on the border, …

ioreg -lw0 | grep IODisplayEDID | sed “s/.*= .//” | xxd -p -r | strings -6

B… = AU Optronics
LT… = Samsung
LP… = LG / Philips
N… = ChiMei

So you got an “older” (pre 2011) MacBook Air with read-only USB recovery thumb-drive (stick)? Well, turns out it is only read-only by some firmware lock bit. Just run:

sm32Xtest.exe

On your favorite Windows (virtual-) machine to toggle the read-only bit. You now can use it for your personal data, or writing the Lion installer disk image to it to gain a Lion Recovery USB key, just as you like.