Mission Statement
This site is dedicated to sharing my research and knowledge about technology and whatever else I've been into for some time.
Robert Heinlein has pretty-much explained my credo in the two below quotes:
"There is an old song which asserts 'the best things in life are free.' Not true! Utterly false! This was the tragic fallacy which brought on the decadence and collapse of the democracies of the twentieth century; those noble experiments failed because the people had been led to believe that they could simply vote for whatever they wanted … and get it, without toil, without sweat, without tears." - Robert A. Heinlein, Starship Troopers
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." - Robert A. Heinlein
WARNING about Western New Mexico Telephone Company (WNM)
2024-12-13 Western New Mexico Telephone Company is the worst telecom company I have ever experienced. I have been around the world and all over the USA and I have never seen anything worse. We just went through a 5-day phone and internet service (DSL) outage stemming from a planned power outage by another worthless company (Socorro Electric Co-Op.)
Western New Mexico Telephone Company (WNM) knew there was a planned power outage yet did not think highly enough of the Alamo Community to see that they were well prepared for loss of power on their POP here at Alamo Navajo Reservation. The least they could have done was to have made sure they had someone at the POP to bring it back up afterwards but they did not bother to do so. They don't seem to have spare parts or spare equipment in case of failures either. I speak from direct experience, I have been a customer for over 15-years.
We have seen so many problems from this company over the last 10-years here at Alamo, problems that never get handled and never resolved. The same problems repeat themselves. Each time the same scenario unfolds. Every time there is a power outage their equipment goes offline because they don't have adequate battery backup or generation. Almost every time in the last decade when power is removed from their equipment, the DSL resets back to the slowest level of speed even though we pay for the highest. Then I have to call them and prove it is too slow. It seems their equipment configuration is never saved or their NVRAM in the router is broken. Maybe their people don't know how to save it. We lost both voice and internet service for 5-days. Since the local cell tower is also connected to WNM's network we lost wireless service as well as wired phone service.For those with serious health problems (like me) we lost access to 911 emergency services for 5-days. That should be illegal and I hope someone punished them for it… Maybe they will hire some competenet people. We were cut off literally. The only way to reach the world was via Ham Radio. I doubt if I could have called an ambulance on 40-meters. I am so sick of living here in third world conditions here. It has been going on longer than a decade but I have only the last 15-years experience.
As for Socorro Electric we regularly have 5-6 day power outages because they cannot bother to engineer power infrastructure that can handle winds, ice and the harsh conditions we have in this area including flash floods. Their management and board have in the past been caught embezzling the funds that are needed to keep the infrastructure online. I had to buy a generator just to avoid losing the food in the freezer and refrigerator.
If you plan on living in their service area and do not live in Socorro they are not reliable and cannot be depended on. If I sill worked from home (I am on medical retirement) I would have been in big trouble. Unlike most cases the wireless infrastructure is powered by their joke network and also dies when WNM dies. Keep this in mind when considering if this place is a good place to live. Some of us have no choice though, my wife's career requires her to be here but not forever. Just be prepared. Perhaps get your Amateur Radio license and hope for the best. A generator won't help with phone or internet because the phone company doesn't own one for their own pop.
WARNING ABOUT ALIEXPRESS
2024-11-27 I have been a longtime AliExpress customer buying thousands of dollars of stuff every year. This year I made the mistake of buying during their Black Friday sales event. I bought a lot of stuff but among that were 2 really nice led flashlights from Truefire, about $16 each. I bought a dozen other things in as many orders that were also shipped at the same time in the same package. When it arrived yesterday it was missing one of the flash lights.
I contacted their customer service and tried to tell them what happened but they rejected my claim that one was missing. They said I did not provide proof. How does one provide proof something was missing? I have contacted them again and they said I need to contact the "logistics company" about the missing TrueFire flashlight. Folks, do NOT buy from AliExpress. You are better off purchasing from an American company because if something is wrong or missing from your order you are going to be out of luck.
This is not the first time I got ripped off via AliExpress.A few years ago I ordered 100 Harris 1802 CPU and what I received was half 50+ year old (actual) RCA CDP1802 ACE. They could even have been "pulls". I sent pictures of some of the chips (it is hard to take a very close macro image of such chips) and they still rejected my claim. Honestly the vendors ion AliExpress are often dishonest and AliExpress enables them to rip you off. Even though you pay more, you are safer purchasing from Amazon. Amazon sucks nowadays, Prime is SLOW.
In this most recent case, the theft of the flashlight took place within AliExpress packaging center as the bag containing 8 or 9 orders was handled inside AliExpress where it is shipped within one package. The package arrived and there were no holes or repaired areas so the flash light was stolen before it was shipped. I deleted my AliEx[ress account. You rob me, then call me a liar when I report it. It was not the lousy $16 US it was the sheer insult for the last time. FOAD.
2023-03-07 I am almost blind so very hard to update or create any content. Goodbye.
2022-07-22 If you are wondering where all the content is… It is all here at the same paths that it was before but I have merely removed all the references to it on the left menu panel. You can find it all by using the "List all pages" selection which I left in place. All that content should be considered "retired". I don/t really want to maintain all that since my sight is failing. Unfortunately the Wikidot search engine is still offline so all you can do is use that "List All Pages" selection for now. Wikidot search feature has not been working for a long time as you will discover if you try. I still really love the platform and maybe someday it can be restored. I still recommend Wikidot, it rocks.