• PC LOAD LETTER

    From poindexter FORTRAN@21:4/122 to All on Mon Aug 2 18:54:00 2021
    My inkjet printer has started power cycling every 10 minutes. I hear it
    beep, then the paper tray roller spins to engage the paper, then it makes
    some crunking noises, then goes quiet. For the next 10 minutes.

    I'm going to fix it with a ball-peen hammer if this keeps up.


    ... Simply a matter of work
    --- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Aug 3 21:34:30 2021
    Hello poindexter FORTRAN!

    Oh, what a nice subject line -- If I could count the number of times I saw that message on old HP LaserJet 4s... :-D

    On 02 Aug 2021, poindexter FORTRAN said the following...
    My inkjet printer has started power cycling every 10 minutes. I hear it beep, then the paper tray roller spins to engage the paper, then it
    makes some crunking noises, then goes quiet. For the next 10 minutes.

    I'm going to fix it with a ball-peen hammer if this keeps up.

    :-O

    Speaking of crunking noises... My old HP DeskJet 540 that I had once upon a time sometimes (more and more often) made a *terrible* noise when feeding paper so that one literally jumped off one's chair... Something with the cogs I think. (But actually a very nice printer otherwise.)

    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to inkjets again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual printer, that is, not the cartridges -- they know how to take your money :-D).

    "WARMING UP"

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Al@21:4/106.2 to Zip on Tue Aug 3 12:51:00 2021
    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to inkjets again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual printer, that is, not the cartridges -- they know how to take your money :-D).

    I still have an Epson Stylus PHOTO/RX500 here. It's a pretty good printer as I recall but I haven't put any new cartidges in it for years. It's just too expensive.

    If I can't view something on the web or save a local copy as PDF or so, I just live without it.

    --- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-5
    * Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (21:4/106.2)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Al on Tue Aug 3 23:16:49 2021
    Hello Al!

    On 03 Aug 2021, Al said the following...
    I still have an Epson Stylus PHOTO/RX500 here. It's a pretty good
    printer as I recall but I haven't put any new cartidges in it for years. It's just too expensive.

    Yep... I think 3 sets of XL (= decently sized) cartridges, 3 color + 1 black, equal the price of the printer for me. :-O

    But -- it's got duplex, a document feeder with one-pass duplex scanning, fax (yay! :-D), wired and Wi-Fi network etc. etc. so I'm still happy even though they rob me each time I need to buy a set of cartridges.

    IPv4, IPv6, web admin GUI, JetDirect support, PCL, PS and PDF compatibility...

    The list goes on forever. :-D

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Ogg@21:4/106.21 to Al on Tue Aug 3 19:05:00 2021
    Hello Al!

    ** On Tuesday 03.08.21 - 12:51, Al wrote to Zip:

    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to
    inkjets again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual
    printer, that is, not the cartridges -- they know how to
    take your money :-D).

    I still have an Epson Stylus PHOTO/RX500 here. It's a
    pretty good printer as I recall but I haven't put any new
    cartidges in it for years. It's just too expensive.

    If I can't view something on the web or save a local copy
    as PDF or so, I just live without it.

    You should be able to find a nice monochrome (ie. black only)
    laser printer that you could use for things like that.

    I have an HP P1005 that I purchased around 2008. Never a
    problem. I'm only on my 2nd toner - and I think I've printed a
    lot over the years.

    I have an HP CP2020 (colour) at my shop, purchased around 2006.
    It's still operating like a charm. Quality is superb.

    I think laser printers provide less mechanical/ink issues and
    offer the best value.

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: (} Pointy McPointFace (21:4/106.21)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Aug 3 18:16:54 2021
    Re: PC LOAD LETTER
    By: poindexter FORTRAN to All on Mon Aug 02 2021 06:54 pm

    My inkjet printer has started power cycling every 10 minutes. I hear it beep, then the paper tray roller spins to engage the paper, then it makes some crunking noises, then goes quiet. For the next 10 minutes.

    I'm going to fix it with a ball-peen hammer if this keeps up.


    ... Simply a matter of work

    I had a laser printer here try to take 20 sheets at once and choke on them this very morning. The header got dislodged and everything and the model is not made to be easy to open up for fixing.

    Fortunately, my Engineering Degree confers me the ability to disassemble printers and reassemble them into a working state. In fact, my Engineering Degree is awesome because it also gives me the power determinate if a barn is going to collapse due to a structural pathology, to fix the electronics of swimming pools and harvest watering systems, and to kick a night
    party's illumination into functioning after half of it burns*. Now, if it confered me the power of getting an Engineering job better than selling bars of soap online, the Degree would actually rock.

    * Too bad there were no girls at that party. As things stand, I became the
    hero for a bunch of beer soaked IT dudes, which is better than nothing, but still suboptimal.


    --
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  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Zip on Tue Aug 3 18:18:43 2021
    Re: Re: PC LOAD LETTER
    By: Zip to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Aug 03 2021 09:34 pm

    Hello poindexter FORTRAN!

    Oh, what a nice subject line -- If I could count the number of times I saw t message on old HP LaserJet 4s... :-D

    On 02 Aug 2021, poindexter FORTRAN said the following...
    My inkjet printer has started power cycling every 10 minutes. I hear it beep, then the paper tray roller spins to engage the paper, then it makes some crunking noises, then goes quiet. For the next 10 minutes.

    I'm going to fix it with a ball-peen hammer if this keeps up.

    :-O

    Speaking of crunking noises... My old HP DeskJet 540 that I had once upon a time sometimes (more and more often) made a *terrible* noise when feeding pa so that one literally jumped off one's chair... Something with the cogs I think. (But actually a very nice printer otherwise.)

    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to inkjets again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual printer, that is, not the cartridges - they know how to take your money :-D).

    "WARMING UP"

    Best regards
    Zip

    I don't think I am going back to inkjets anymore. If you do anything beyond trivial printing, the ink costs add up so badly that by the end of the year you could buy a laser printer for the price of all the ink you purchase.

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
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  • From Warpslide@21:3/110 to Zip on Tue Aug 3 20:27:24 2021
    On 03 Aug 2021, Zip said the following...

    Speaking of crunking noises... My old HP DeskJet 540 that I had once
    upon a time sometimes (more and more often) made a *terrible* noise when feeding paper so that one literally jumped off one's chair... Something with the cogs I think. (But actually a very nice printer otherwise.)

    Back when I still lived at home, I had the computer I ran the BBS off of in my room and the "family" computer was on the other side of the wall in the kitchen. We had 10base2 network cards in each (mostly so I could play age of empires with either my Mom or Sister) over the network, but it also allowed me use the dot matrix printer that was attached to the family computer.

    One day I was doing something on my computer that I wanted to print, so I sent the job and as expected the printer sprang to life and started printing, as soon as it did my Mom let out a scream and jumped out of the chair.

    Teenage Jay thought that was hilarious, but my Mom less so... lol


    Jay

    ... No good deed goes unpunished.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Raspberry Pi/32)
    * Origin: Northern Realms (21:3/110)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Arelor on Wed Aug 4 09:27:56 2021
    Hello Arelor!

    On 03 Aug 2021, Arelor said the following...

    *LOL*

    half of it burns*. Now, if it confered me the power of getting an Engineering job better than selling bars of soap online, the Degree
    would actually rock.

    Better than nothing, for sure!
    Everyone needs soap!

    * Too bad there were no girls at that party. As things stand, I became
    the hero for a bunch of beer soaked IT dudes, which is better than nothing, but still suboptimal.

    :-D

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Arelor on Wed Aug 4 09:30:47 2021
    Hello Arelor!

    On 03 Aug 2021, Arelor said the following...
    I don't think I am going back to inkjets anymore. If you do anything beyond trivial printing, the ink costs add up so badly that by the end
    of the year you could buy a laser printer for the price of all the ink
    you purchase.

    That's true... But at the time of purchase, it feels like a bargain. :-)

    Actually, some other aspects influenced my purchase, too. The ability to place it on a pre-existing :) small dresser that the old printer was on, as
    this apartment isn't very large... The color lasers were rather bulky, at least back then.

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Warpslide on Wed Aug 4 09:46:42 2021
    Hello Warpslide!

    On 03 Aug 2021, Warpslide said the following...
    One day I was doing something on my computer that I wanted to print, so
    I sent the job and as expected the printer sprang to life and started printing, as soon as it did my Mom let out a scream and jumped out of
    the chair.

    *lol*

    I once had an OKI Microline 93 dot matrix printer which was so fast that when paper jammed, you had to run (kind of). It also made a lot of noise, especially when jamming. :)

    But, great printers... And I see that dot matrix printers are still on the market. That's cool. :)

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From acn@21:3/127.1 to Zip on Wed Aug 4 14:57:00 2021
    Am 03.08.21 schrieb Zip@21:1/202 in FSX_GEN:

    Hallo Zip,

    Oh, what a nice subject line -- If I could count the number of times I saw that message on old HP LaserJet 4s... :-D

    Oh yes, those were great printers!

    When reading this thread, I remembered that I never bought a new printer
    in my life, I always got second-hand ones - except my very first one.

    My "printer history" is:

    - Epson LX-400, which I got new in the early 90s. Nice standard 9-pin dot- matrix printer. With good drivers (ie. not Windows), it even had a really good print quality - although very slow.

    - A wide Fujitsu DL...something 24-pin dot matrix printer. I don't
    remember what happened to this one. I remember that I once printed the manpage of "AfterStep" and the manuals of CrossPoint (XP) and
    CrossSecretary (a tool for XP) on it. It was placed on a small table which began shaking when the printer was printing :)

    - LaserJet IIID which I've added a TokenRing print server to. :)
    I've used this one quite some time, but then it broke and I as well as a repair shop couldn't repair it. So I replaced it with a...

    - LaserJet 5M. A great machine, built like a tank :) I've maxed it out
    with a second paper feeder, memory, (ethernet) print server ... :)
    And it understood PostScript :)

    But then we needed a color printer, and as we did not need so many
    printers, we sold it and bought a second hand...

    - Lexmark X736de. It also has a print server, but is a "all-in-one" device with a scanner (incl. paper feeder). The scanner part will send PDFs as emails or puts them on a FTP server :)
    And the print server even still understands IPX and can be connected to my NetWare server :)

    Regards,
    Anna

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: Imzadi Box Point (21:3/127.1)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to acn on Wed Aug 4 15:47:29 2021
    Hello Anna!

    On 04 Aug 2021, acn said the following...
    - A wide Fujitsu DL...something 24-pin dot matrix printer. I don't remember what happened to this one. I remember that I once printed the manpage of "AfterStep" and the manuals of CrossPoint (XP) and CrossSecretary (a tool for XP) on it. It was placed on a small table
    which began shaking when the printer was printing :)

    Ah, yes -- my inkjet actually rocks the table quite badly if I don't put it in "quiet" mode (which I have done, to keep the table/dresser from falling apart). :-D

    - LaserJet IIID which I've added a TokenRing print server to. :)

    Never had the chance of experimenting with Token Ring but heard it was pretty nice...

    - LaserJet 5M. A great machine, built like a tank :) I've maxed it out with a second paper feeder, memory, (ethernet) print server ... :)
    And it understood PostScript :)

    Yes, those were very nice -- we had a bunch of those at the university where I studied. Although in my experience the duplex units had a habit of double-feeding paper a little now and then. Might have been the paper, or humidity, of course...

    - Lexmark X736de. It also has a print server, but is a "all-in-one"
    device with a scanner (incl. paper feeder). The scanner part will send PDFs as emails or puts them on a FTP server :)

    That's nice! My MFP (a Canon MAXIFY Business MB5150) can e-mail or store scans and faxes as PDFs on an SMB share -- although they only implement SMBv1. :-O

    And the print server even still understands IPX and can be connected to
    my NetWare server :)

    That's an added bonus. :)

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From acn@21:3/127.1 to Zip on Thu Aug 5 16:32:00 2021
    Am 04.08.21 schrieb Zip@21:1/202 in FSX_GEN:

    Hallo Zip,

    Ah, yes -- my inkjet actually rocks the table quite badly if I don't put it in "quiet" mode (which I have done, to keep the table/dresser from falling apart). :-D

    Oh wow, I haven't seen this with inkjet printers.

    Never had the chance of experimenting with Token Ring but heard it was pretty nice...

    Yes, it's a nice networking system. But as with so many technologies: the winner isn't always the best, but the cheapest or the one with best marketing.
    And as of today, with intelligent switches in ethernet, ethernet doesn't
    lag behind any longer :)

    [LaserJet 5M]
    Yes, those were very nice -- we had a bunch of those at the university
    where I studied. Although in my experience the duplex units had a habit of double-feeding paper a little now and then. Might have been the paper, or humidity, of course...

    I don't remember it exactly, but I think I also had some problems there,
    too. And I think I've also replaced some rollers once. But I don't
    remember if they were in the duplex unit or in the main paper feeder...

    - Lexmark X736de. It also has a print server, but is a "all-in-one"
    device with a scanner (incl. paper feeder). The scanner part will send ac>> PDFs as emails or puts them on a FTP server :)

    That's nice! My MFP (a Canon MAXIFY Business MB5150) can e-mail or store scans and faxes as PDFs on an SMB share -- although they only implement SMBv1. :-O

    I guess SMB would also be possible here. The Lexmark can also handle
    faxes, but I only use it for sending faxes, but not very often :)
    For receiving faxes, my DSL router (AVM FritzBox) has one phone number configured and the faxes get sent to me as PDFs via email.

    And the print server even still understands IPX and can be connected to ac>> my NetWare server :)

    That's an added bonus. :)

    Yep :) It was quite nice to get a Windows 98 printer test page which was printed in a VM which was connected to my NetWare server via IPX which in turn sent the printout via IPX to the printer :)

    Regards,
    Anna

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: Imzadi Box Point (21:3/127.1)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to acn on Thu Aug 5 16:53:29 2021
    Hello Anna!

    On 05 Aug 2021, acn said the following...
    I guess SMB would also be possible here. The Lexmark can also handle faxes, but I only use it for sending faxes, but not very often :)

    :-D

    For receiving faxes, my DSL router (AVM FritzBox) has one phone number configured and the faxes get sent to me as PDFs via email.

    Hmm, is that a built-in feature of the FritzBox or have you loaded some custom firmware into it? Sounds nice!

    Yep :) It was quite nice to get a Windows 98 printer test page which was printed in a VM which was connected to my NetWare server via IPX which
    in turn sent the printout via IPX to the printer :)

    Ahh, the daisy-chains of communication. :)

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From poindexter FORTRAN@21:4/122 to Zip on Wed Aug 4 07:02:00 2021
    Zip wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to inkjets
    again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual printer, that is, not
    the cartridges -- they know how to take your money :-D).

    I want to keep this printer around, because a) it was free, and b) I can buy
    a 4-pack of ink (CYMB + a big pigment ink tank for black and white) for
    around $11 on Amazon.


    ... Abandon desire
    --- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to poindexter FORTRAN on Thu Aug 5 20:05:45 2021
    Hello poindexter FORTRAN!

    On 04 Aug 2021, poindexter FORTRAN said the following...
    I want to keep this printer around, because a) it was free, and b) I can buy a 4-pack of ink (CYMB + a big pigment ink tank for black and white) for around $11 on Amazon.

    Oh yes -- that's *very* nice!

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/07/31 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Zip on Thu Aug 5 18:55:11 2021
    Later on I switched to laser printers, but I'm now back to inkjets again (it was too cheap to resist -- the actual printer, that is, not the cartridges -- they know how to take your money :-D).

    My experience with inkjet printers was that it cost about $10/page, because reliably the cartridge would be unusable by the time I needed to print again.

    Now I can't really imagine buying an ink jet printer. I think I'd be more likely to go looking for a dot matrix or even daisy-wheel printer.

    (other than a photo printer, which is kind of a different creature. Though
    I'd probably just continue to print those out at some commercial place.)

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Arelor on Thu Aug 5 18:58:15 2021
    I don't think I am going back to inkjets anymore. If you do anything beyond trivial printing, the ink costs add up so badly that by the end
    of the year you could buy a laser printer for the price of all the ink
    you purchase.

    And if you _do_ trivial printing, the cartridges are bad or empty by the time you use them again.

    I'm not really sure on the use case for ink jet printers, other than, "give
    'em the first taste for cheap, and after that they're hooked.".

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Adept on Thu Aug 5 18:08:52 2021
    Re: Re: PC LOAD LETTER
    By: Adept to Arelor on Thu Aug 05 2021 06:58 pm

    I don't think I am going back to inkjets anymore. If you do anything beyond trivial printing, the ink costs add up so badly that by the end of the year you could buy a laser printer for the price of all the ink you purchase.

    And if you _do_ trivial printing, the cartridges are bad or empty by the tim you use them again.

    I'm not really sure on the use case for ink jet printers, other than, "give 'em the first taste for cheap, and after that they're hooked.".

    Something I have observed in my store is that consumers will most often take suboptimal order choices if the upfront costs are smaller. They'd rather buy a small flask of cream that costs 1 buck and lasts a week than a big one that costs 4 and lasts 2 months. And they will do even if they are regular consumers of it, therefore spending much more in the long run.

    --
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  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Arelor on Thu Aug 5 23:28:40 2021
    Something I have observed in my store is that consumers will most often take suboptimal order choices if the upfront costs are smaller. They'd

    I know there are various issues with being poor, where you don't have the
    means to get the more expensive item, but need some version of the product.

    Certainly, there have been times with subscriptions or something where I
    didn't have the income at that point in time, or I would've gone for a longer version.

    But honestly, with buying a printer, if you can't afford the laser printer,
    I'd be inclined to just use a local print shop or something, and minimize printer usage anyway.

    rather buy a small flask of cream that costs 1 buck and lasts a week
    than a big one that costs 4 and lasts 2 months. And they will do even if

    That one does seem odd to me, unless that 3 EUR is a hardship, or they
    actively like the smaller version, for some reason.

    And you're talking about a cream you'd apply topically, rather than something you'd ingest, correct? Or, more what I'm getting at, that something will be just at good at 2 months.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Adept on Fri Aug 6 06:53:47 2021
    Re: Re: PC LOAD LETTER
    By: Adept to Arelor on Thu Aug 05 2021 11:28 pm

    rather buy a small flask of cream that costs 1 buck and lasts a week than a big one that costs 4 and lasts 2 months. And they will do even i

    That one does seem odd to me, unless that 3 EUR is a hardship, or they actively like the smaller version, for some reason.

    And you're talking about a cream you'd apply topically, rather than somethin you'd ingest, correct? Or, more what I'm getting at, that something will be just at good at 2 months.

    Exactly, I am talking about goods with no expiration date.

    Stuff most people can afford, really. I am not talking about things for which you cannot afford the cost-effective version.

    The salesmen from the labs completely agree with my appreciation. They sell much more of the small stuff than the big, cost-efficient versions, with differences meassured in orders of magniture in sale numbers.

    Maybe it is a Spanish thing and we are just stupid :-)

    --
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  • From Ogg@21:4/106.21 to Arelor on Fri Aug 6 08:43:00 2021
    Hello Arelor!

    ** On Friday 06.08.21 - 06:53, Arelor wrote to Adept:

    And you're talking about a cream you'd apply topically, [...]

    Exactly, I am talking about goods with no expiration date.
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
    Loaded with formeldahyde? <g>


    The salesmen from the labs completely agree with my
    appreciation. They sell much more of the small stuff than
    the big, cost-efficient versions, withdifferences meassured
    in orders of magniture in sale numbers.

    Maybe people are using the stuff at much less frequent
    intervals than the typical expected usage, or using less of the
    product per application than you would expect?


    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: (} Pointy McPointFace (21:4/106.21)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Arelor on Fri Aug 6 22:35:35 2021
    The salesmen from the labs completely agree with my appreciation. They sell much more of the small stuff than the big, cost-efficient versions, with differences meassured in orders of magniture in sale numbers.

    Maybe it is a Spanish thing and we are just stupid :-)

    Possibly, but it's super easy to be stupid in the other direction, too.

    E.g., if I buy a large bottle of something, but only ever end up using a bit
    of it, I'm wasting money, even if the smaller version was almost as expensive.

    And if I pay a teensy bit more to get a larger-sized item at a restaurant,
    I'm probably just fattening myself up when the smaller size would've been
    fine.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Ogg on Sat Aug 7 05:08:53 2021
    Re: PC LOAD LETTER
    By: Ogg to Arelor on Fri Aug 06 2021 08:43 am

    Maybe people are using the stuff at much less frequent
    intervals than the typical expected usage, or using less of the
    product per application than you would expect?

    Thare are some products that last much more than what you would think. For example, my bars of soap are so dense that you can use one for months and still be no close to run out of it.

    Not bad for soap worth 4 bucks the bar :-)

    However, I am not talking about it. I am talking about high rotation products such as edulcorants. People who likes their coffee with artificial sweeteners eat through saccarine and stevia blazzing fast. Yet they buy the small jar instead of the big, cost-efficient one, for example.

    --
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    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From Ogg@21:4/106.21 to Arelor on Tue Aug 10 21:28:00 2021
    Hello Arelor!

    ** On Saturday 07.08.21 - 05:08, Arelor wrote to Ogg:

    Maybe people are using the stuff at much less frequent
    intervals than the typical expected usage, or using less of
    the product per application than you would expect?

    Thare are some products that last much more than what you
    would think. For example, my bars of soap are so dense that
    you can use one for months and still be no close to run out
    of it.

    Not bad for soap worth 4 bucks the bar :-)

    Not bad. I think most people in North America use the soft
    soaps that come in bottles.


    However, I am not talking about it. I am talking about high
    rotation products such as edulcorants. People who likes
    their coffee with artificial sweeteners eat through
    saccarine and stevia blazzing fast. Yet they buy the small
    jar instead of the big, cost-efficient one, for example.

    Maybe people are promising themselves to reduce sugar/sweetener
    intake and buying smaller portions is the way to do it?


    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: (} Pointy McPointFace (21:4/106.21)
  • From poindexter FORTRAN@21:4/122 to Ogg on Wed Aug 11 08:29:00 2021
    Ogg wrote to Arelor <=-

    Not bad. I think most people in North America use the soft
    soaps that come in bottles.

    Mass-market soaps are made with so much air that they barely last a month. I put a bar of hand-milled soap in my upstairs bathroom and it lasted a year.

    We do a lot of hand-washing in my house, even before the pandemic. I'm a big fan of non anti-bacterial, hand-milled soap for hand washing.

    I went through a couple of years at a start-up company doing everything from IT management to desktop support, and one winter, *everyone* in the office
    got a cold or a flu. Working long hours, eating office food and stress all lowered everyone's immune system, combined with the "hero mentality" of
    coming in to work even when you're sick.

    My team and I took echinachea, vitamin C and washed our hands religiously after fixing other people's computers, and we didn't get sick. Once.




    ... A closed system lacks the ability to renew itself.
    --- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to poindexter FORTRAN on Thu Aug 12 21:56:15 2021
    My team and I took echinachea, vitamin C and washed our hands
    religiously after fixing other people's computers, and we didn't get
    sick. Once.

    Isn't echinachea the one that had lots of government-funded studies on its efficacy, in the hopes that it'd help with colds, and the results always came back as, "Nope. No evidence that it'd help."

    Of course, boosters of it would always say the studies didn't study the right thing, but I thought that's one herbal remedy that has been at least fairly-well tested.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Adept on Thu Aug 12 17:37:09 2021
    Re: Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: Adept to poindexter FORTRAN on Thu Aug 12 2021 09:56 pm

    My team and I took echinachea, vitamin C and washed our hands religiously after fixing other people's computers, and we didn't get sick. Once.

    Isn't echinachea the one that had lots of government-funded studies on its efficacy, in the hope
    that it'd help with colds, and the results always came back as, "Nope. No evidence that it'd hel

    Of course, boosters of it would always say the studies didn't study the right thing, but I thoug
    that's one herbal remedy that has been at least fairly-well tested.

    I am regularly offered echinachea based products by laboratories every winter. I don't think they
    would sell well here so I don't carry them in my store. This makes it hard for me to comment on
    perceived effectiveness.

    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From acn@21:3/127.1 to Zip on Fri Aug 13 10:15:00 2021
    Am 05.08.21 schrieb Zip@21:1/202 in FSX_GEN:

    Hallo Zip,

    For receiving faxes, my DSL router (AVM FritzBox) has one phone number ac>> configured and the faxes get sent to me as PDFs via email.

    Hmm, is that a built-in feature of the FritzBox or have you loaded some custom firmware into it? Sounds nice!

    No, that's a standard option. You have to assign a phone number to it and enter an email address where the faxes have to go. That's it, basically.
    It's similar to adding an 'answering machine'.

    Sending faxes is also possible, via the web UI (I don't know if it accepts PDF files, as I don't use it for sending faxes) and it's also possible via
    a virtual fax printer. "Roger Router" is a linux program that includes a virtual CUPS printer :)

    Yep :) It was quite nice to get a Windows 98 printer test page which was ac>> printed in a VM which was connected to my NetWare server via IPX which ac>> in turn sent the printout via IPX to the printer :)

    Ahh, the daisy-chains of communication. :)

    Yep :)

    Regards,
    Anna

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: Imzadi Box Point (21:3/127.1)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to acn on Fri Aug 13 10:38:04 2021
    Hello Anna!

    On 13 Aug 2021, acn said the following...
    No, that's a standard option. You have to assign a phone number to it
    and enter an email address where the faxes have to go. That's it, basically. It's similar to adding an 'answering machine'.

    That's nice! And user-friendly. (Aren't the Fritz! appliances among the most popular in Germany and its surroundings? I see they have routers, wireless extenders, DECT phones and more...)

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/08/08 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Oli@21:3/102 to Zip on Fri Aug 13 13:37:47 2021
    Zip wrote (2021-08-13):

    Hello Anna!

    On 13 Aug 2021, acn said the following...
    No, that's a standard option. You have to assign a phone number to
    it and enter an email address where the faxes have to go. That's
    it, basically. It's similar to adding an 'answering machine'.

    That's nice! And user-friendly. (Aren't the Fritz! appliances among the most popular in Germany and its surroundings? I see they have routers, wireless extenders, DECT phones and more...)

    I believe they are THE most used and popular broadband / Wifi / VoIP routers in Germany. If you buy them new they are way too expensive, but most broadband providers give you one for free (or cheap) with a new contract. Best thing is the support. AVM usually fix security relevant bugs not only for the recent product line, but for old devices too.

    Btw, there was a time when you could receive Voice, Data (BBS) and Fax calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder why we do have phone numbers at all. It's SIP anyway.

    ---
    * Origin: . (21:3/102)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Oli on Fri Aug 13 15:40:36 2021
    Hello Oli!

    On 13 Aug 2021, Oli said the following...
    contract. Best thing is the support. AVM usually fix security relevant bugs not only for the recent product line, but for old devices too.

    Sounds like a good vendor!

    Btw, there was a time when you could receive Voice, Data (BBS) and Fax calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder why we do

    Yes, ISDN was ahead of its time... Very nice technology. Although I never had it here.

    calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder why we do have phone numbers at all. It's SIP anyway.

    Yep... And many ISPs here refuse to provide the SIP details, should one want to replace their routers with other equipment... :-/

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/08/08 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Arelor on Fri Aug 13 21:35:52 2021
    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    All the same, I've actively taken vitamin C stuff to fend off / avoid having
    a cold, and literally refer to it as a placebo.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Adept on Fri Aug 13 17:59:58 2021
    Re: Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: Adept to Arelor on Fri Aug 13 2021 09:35 pm

    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    All the same, I've actively taken vitamin C stuff to fend off / avoid having a cold, and literally refer to it as a placebo.

    I am not a fan of general multivitamins, and actually don't have them in my store.

    I have specific products for specific needs. This means I have specific combinations of vitamins and minerals for specific problems (such as Iron + Vitamin C for anemia, or Vitamin D3 + K2 for Osteogenesis issues).

    Multivitamins that have a bit of everything but in low doses and promise you to improve your well being sound a lot like snake oil to me. I have heard these are in high demand in regular stores. Thankfully my customers come instructed by their doctors to get stuff specific to their problems so I don't have to deal with such things.

    Vitamin C is nice, but it is so _easy_ to get from food that I would not recommend to take specific Vitamin C pills unless you have actual issues. Many of my products include Vitamin C because it is a nice support vitamin to include in low doses - for example, quality ccollagen supplements usually have some vitamin C because vitamin C is very good for your organism to generate
    its own collagen.

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Arelor on Fri Aug 13 23:25:00 2021
    Vitamin C is nice, but it is so _easy_ to get from food that I would not recommend to take specific Vitamin C pills unless you have actual

    Yeah. Thus placebo.

    But it's also a water-soluble vitamin, so won't build up in the body, and
    thus seems to be generally safe, even at super high doses.

    So no real harm - just likely no real benefit.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Gamgee@21:2/138 to Adept on Fri Aug 13 22:03:00 2021
    Adept wrote to Arelor <=-

    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative
    impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Really? Where'd you get that idea?


    ... If it weren't for Edison we'd be using computers by candlelight
    === MultiMail/Linux v0.52
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From Oli@21:3/102 to Zip on Sat Aug 14 08:49:29 2021
    Zip wrote (2021-08-13):

    calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder why we
    do have phone numbers at all. It's SIP anyway.

    Yep... And many ISPs here refuse to provide the SIP details, should one want to replace their routers with other equipment... :-/

    Fortunately in the EU we have the right to use other equipment. So providers should be forced by law to give you the connection and SIP details. AFAIK this doesn't mean you can directly use your SIP account from another location, but running Asterisk or another SIP router is possible.

    Just ask your provider for the details, maybe they changed their policy recently.

    Btw, what happened in the US regarding net neutrality after the new administration? I guess Ajit Pai is not in charge of the FCC anymore:
    https://metro.co.uk/2017/12/14/fcc-chairman-drinks-ridiculously-oversized-mug-ends-net-neutrality-7161066/

    (Let's not start a political discussion. More interested in the technical / practical side.)

    But back to my original question. As users we could start to use federated SIP and call user@example.com
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federated_VoIP

    Instead we love to give providers full control.


    * Origin: . (21:3/102)
  • From Zip@21:1/202 to Oli on Sat Aug 14 10:30:17 2021
    Hello Oli!

    Thank you for your reply!

    On 14 Aug 2021, Oli said the following...
    Fortunately in the EU we have the right to use other equipment. So providers should be forced by law to give you the connection and SIP details. AFAIK this doesn't mean you can directly use your SIP account from another location, but running Asterisk or another SIP router is possible.

    Thanks, I'll have to check with them!

    Best regards
    Zip

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/08/08 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Star Collision BBS, Uppsala, Sweden (21:1/202)
  • From Oli@21:3/102 to Gamgee on Sat Aug 14 10:43:13 2021
    Gamgee wrote (2021-08-13):

    Adept wrote to Arelor <=-

    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative
    impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Really? Where'd you get that idea?

    - there is a press release of some scientific study
    - turned into click bait by internet news site: "multivitamin supplements might shorten your life"
    - people tell other people that multivitamin pills don't help and might be harmful
    - people believe that until some other scientific study click-bait tells us the opposite is true
    - cycle repeats

    meanwhile in alternative facts land:
    cheap multivitamin supplements are relabeled and sold much more expensive as the cure for everything. From cancer to so called 'mental illnesses' to deadly viruses.



    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/multivitamin/

    ---
    * Origin: . (21:3/102)
  • From Gamgee@21:2/138 to Oli on Sat Aug 14 07:45:00 2021
    Oli wrote to Gamgee <=-

    Having adecuate vitamin levels seems to help quite a bit, though.

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative
    impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Really? Where'd you get that idea?

    - there is a press release of some scientific study
    - turned into click bait by internet news site: "multivitamin
    supplements might shorten your life"
    - people tell other people that multivitamin pills don't help and
    might be harmful
    - people believe that until some other scientific study click-bait
    tells us the opposite is true
    - cycle repeats

    This is probably very accurate.

    meanwhile in alternative facts land:
    cheap multivitamin supplements are relabeled and sold much more
    expensive as the cure for everything. From cancer to so called
    'mental illnesses' to deadly viruses.

    Definitely true.

    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/multivitamin/

    A good read.



    ... I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain just to eat vegetables! === MultiMail/Linux v0.52
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From N1uro@21:4/107 to Oli on Sat Aug 14 09:29:00 2021
    Hello Oli;

    Oli wrote to Zip <=-

    Fortunately in the EU we have the right to use other equipment. So providers should be forced by law to give you the connection and SIP details. AFAIK this doesn't mean you can directly use your SIP account from another location, but running Asterisk or another SIP router is possible.

    Here in the states, I run an Asterisk server with many custom modules in it.
    I have a provider that grants me a SIP trunk with 2 lines on it and I have
    free international unlimited dialing to something like 74 countries. Comes in handy for talking to my friends in the U.K. and Czech Republic.

    Just ask your provider for the details, maybe they changed their policy recently.

    With monitoring the logs in extreme detail logging, I can pretty much figure out what they're running at their end. If I were to use just a SIP phone
    or software like Zoiper it may be more difficult. I'd prefer they use AIX
    on TCP but my jitter is quite low so it's not much of an issue.

    Btw, what happened in the US regarding net neutrality after the new administration? I guess Ajit Pai is not in charge of the FCC anymore: https://metro.co.uk/2017/12/14/fcc-chairman-drinks-ridiculously-oversize d-mug-ends-net-neutrality-7161066/

    (Let's not start a political discussion. More interested in the
    technical / practical side.)

    Pai did resign at the change of our elections.

    ... Kirk:"I've saved the earth, twice, what have you done?"
    --- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
    * Origin: Carnage - risen from the dead now on SBBS (21:4/107)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Oli on Sat Aug 14 08:56:07 2021
    Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: Oli to Gamgee on Sat Aug 14 2021 10:43 am

    meanwhile in alternative facts land:
    cheap multivitamin supplements are relabeled and sold much more expensive as the cure for everything. From cancer to so called 'mental illnesses' to dead viruses.



    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/multivitamin/

    From the article:

    << Reasons that may not need a multivitamin:

    [...]

    I have osteoporosis and need more calcium, or I have iron-deficiency anemia and need more iron (in both scenarios, you may only need to take those individual nutrients rather than a comprehensive multivitamin).



    JACKPOT

    A case the article misses, though, is people who has conditions that cause an increased need for specific micronutrients. For example, certain cases of neurological suffering or damage may require you to increase your intake
    of vitamins of group B. Those are corner situations though.

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From poindexter FORTRAN@21:4/122 to Adept on Fri Aug 13 07:16:00 2021
    Adept wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

    My team and I took echinachea, vitamin C and washed our hands
    religiously after fixing other people's computers, and we didn't get
    sick. Once.

    Isn't echinachea the one that had lots of government-funded studies on
    its efficacy, in the hopes that it'd help with colds, and the results always came back as, "Nope. No evidence that it'd help."

    It's been around for years, but it's possible that placebos and a positive mental attitude could have contributed. Whatever it was, it worked!


    ... Destroy nothing; Destroy the most important thing
    --- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)
  • From poindexter FORTRAN@21:4/122 to N1uro on Sat Aug 14 07:51:00 2021
    N1uro wrote to Oli <=-

    Here in the states, I run an Asterisk server with many custom modules
    in it. I have a provider that grants me a SIP trunk with 2 lines on it
    and I have free international unlimited dialing to something like 74 countries. Comes in handy for talking to my friends in the U.K. and
    Czech Republic.

    Who's your provider? I'm tempted to set up Asterisk now that I have a
    homelab running. Saw some interesting SIP phones at my local electronics
    junk store - Grandstream GXP 1405s.




    ... Always the first steps
    --- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Gamgee on Sat Aug 14 16:01:49 2021
    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Really? Where'd you get that idea?

    Various things that have appeared in news reports.

    E.g., something like: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/is- there-really-any-benefit-to-multivitamins

    "The researchers concluded that multivitamins don't reduce the risk for
    heart disease, cancer, cognitive decline (such as memory loss and slowed-down thinking) or an early death. They also noted that in prior studies, vitamin E and beta-carotene supplements appear to be harmful, especially at high doses."

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Warpslide@21:3/110 to poindexter FORTRAN on Sat Aug 14 12:00:29 2021
    On 14 Aug 2021, poindexter FORTRAN said the following...

    Who's your provider? I'm tempted to set up Asterisk now that I have a homelab running. Saw some interesting SIP phones at my local electronics junk store - Grandstream GXP 1405s.

    I use voip.ms, use my link for a free $10 credit if you'd like to try them out:

    https://voip.ms/en/invite/MTI0NDc1

    They have phone numbers (DIDs) from many countries and a lot of their US and Canadian numbers also support SMS & MMS. I have a couple of DIDs and pay $0.85 /mo each for the numbers and less than 1 cent per minute for any usage.

    I've used them with an Asterisk server, but currently I just have a Cisco ATA connected up via SIP and then plugged in my cordless phone to that.


    Jay

    ... It requires a very unusual mind to make an analysis of the obvious.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/08/10 (Raspberry Pi/32)
    * Origin: Northern Realms (21:3/110)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Oli on Sat Aug 14 16:11:56 2021
    - people tell other people that multivitamin pills don't help and might
    be harmful
    - people believe that until some other scientific study click-bait tells us the opposite is true
    - cycle repeats

    I think that's oversimplifying/dismissing what the research has been showing.

    From what we've seen, is that vitamin supplements help if someone has a deficiency.

    But a multivitamin is a, "Hey, just in case you're deficient in anything,
    here ya go!", and can wind up giving people too much of something that's fat soluble and sticks around forever.

    But for most people it'll basically make no difference, and just cost money.

    Anyway, I'm mostly responding because I'm not fond of, "the cycle repeats"
    when we're talking about solid, non-political,
    just-trying-to-figure-things-out research.

    People are still fallible, and it's _hard_ to research something like this,
    but it's all the data we have. I'd prefer it if people gave it proper weight
    -- both enough credit and enough, "...but the world is complicated, and we're learning"

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Gamgee@21:2/138 to Adept on Sat Aug 14 15:38:00 2021
    Adept wrote to Gamgee <=-

    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Really? Where'd you get that idea?

    Various things that have appeared in news reports.

    E.g., something like: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/is- there-really-any-benefit-to-multivitamins

    Okay...

    "The researchers concluded that multivitamins don't reduce the
    risk for heart disease, cancer, cognitive decline (such as memory
    loss and slowed-down thinking) or an early death. They also noted
    that in prior studies, vitamin E and beta-carotene supplements
    appear to be harmful, especially at high doses."

    I don't think most people, including myself, take a multivitamin to
    prevent themselves from getting heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, or
    an early death. I take it to ensure I have enough/balanced vitamin
    intake to help with feeling good/energetic/focused. I take it to
    "cover" me if I'm too busy to eat lunch. I take it to help prevent me
    from getting the common cold. Just daily common sense stuff, not to
    prevent catastrophic diseases from happening.

    Also, *ANY* supplement, including multivitamins, are likely to be
    harmful when taken in "high doses". Nobody's talking about doing that.
    Most everything is harmful if over-done.

    Bottom line (at least to me), is that I don't think it will *hurt*
    anything to take a multivitamin every day.



    ... Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.
    === MultiMail/Linux v0.52
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From Pat Jensen@21:4/163 to Warpslide on Sat Aug 14 14:55:01 2021
    Who's your provider? I'm tempted to set up Asterisk now that I have a homelab running. Saw some interesting SIP phones at my local electronics junk store - Grandstream GXP 1405s.

    I'll throw a recommendation out for Flowroute. I used them extensively in my voice lab at Cisco.

    Notables: low price point (similar to voip.ms), great web interface, solid NAT traversal, support for endpoints or SBCs that can't authenticate, and great toll fraud tools.

    When you are hunting down a SIP provider, spent some time pinging their SBCs and looking at your overall delay, jitter and packet loss. (I use mtr on Linux for this)

    Pat
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Win32
    * Origin: Jensencloud - Fresno, CA (21:4/163)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Gamgee on Sat Aug 14 19:02:09 2021
    Re: Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: Gamgee to Adept on Sat Aug 14 2021 03:38 pm

    Also, *ANY* supplement, including multivitamins, are likely to be
    harmful when taken in "high doses". Nobody's talking about doing that.
    Most everything is harmful if over-done.


    I think most multivitamins are relatively low dossage, so taking toxic levels of a given vitamin
    from them is something you could only do if you took all the jar at once on purpose :-)

    Still, some vitamin supplements, usually the most therapeutic ones, have brutal levels of vitamins
    in them. They are called megadoses. They may have up to 9000 % of the daily recommended dose of
    whatever is in them and are tailored to people who is badly screwed up (cancer, severe neurological
    damage, you name it).

    They are what I sell the most after collagen supplements. They make people pee in funny colors and
    they are awesome for returning low vitamin levels back to normal. Still, I suspect it is not that
    hard to take dangerous levels of vitamins from these ones and in fact they usually come with
    warnings.

    On the other hand, I am still to see somebody get complications from vitamin overdose even from
    megadosers. Maybe it is because people who is prescribed megadosers is always advised to use them
    with care :-)

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to Adept on Sun Aug 15 11:02:00 2021
    Isn't echinachea the one that had lots of government-funded studies on its

    It puts a whole new spin on taking the eckies.... :P I used to know a few ìpeople that swore by it... But I don't know that it ever did me any good. Vit ìC is an interesting one.. it might work, it seems to help, but there are some ìsurprising sources of Vit C. I used to think being citrus light, I may not ìget a great deal of it. Turns out things like capsicums, bell peppers for ìthe plebs ;) have a truckload in them, and they tend to feature in my diet. ìThe flip side being if you have sufficient Vit C in your diet taking extra is ìjust going down the toilet, quite literally.

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
    --- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to Zip on Sun Aug 15 11:10:00 2021
    Btw, there was a time when you could receive Voice, Data (BBS) and Fax calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder why we do

    Yes, ISDN was ahead of its time... Very nice technology. Although I never had it here.

    ISDN was hiddeously expensive here.. Telescum (Telecom Australia, Govt run) ìwas more interested in selling phone lines than data to residents. There was ìa couple of places I worked that had ISDN from site to site which was nice. ìThey didn't do anything with it at all until after ADSL/DSL became a thing ìand by then it was obsolete.

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
    --- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to Adept on Sun Aug 15 11:11:00 2021
    ...though multivitamins are either ineffective or have a negative impact on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Chuckle, is that because of the nature of the people taking them? :) The ill, ìsick and dying?

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
    --- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to poindexter FORTRAN on Sun Aug 15 11:32:00 2021
    It's been around for years, but it's possible that placebos and a positive mental attitude could have contributed. Whatever it was, it worked!

    Chuckle, maybe it was all the echi and Vit C on your finger tips that kept ìthe Ph on your skin far enough off kilter to kill everything coming your way, ìthereby stopping you getting it into your mouth or eyes. :)

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
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    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to Gamgee on Sun Aug 15 11:44:00 2021
    "The researchers concluded that multivitamins don't reduce the risk for heart disease, cancer, cognitive decline (such as memory loss
    and slowed-down thinking) or an early death. They also noted that
    in prior studies, vitamin E and beta-carotene supplements appear
    to be harmful, especially at high doses."

    I don't think most people, including myself, take a multivitamin to prevent themselves from getting heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, or
    an early death. I take it to ensure I have enough/balanced vitamin
    intake to help with feeling good/energetic/focused. I take it to
    "cover" me if I'm too busy to eat lunch. I take it to help prevent me from getting the common cold. Just daily common sense stuff, not to prevent catastrophic diseases from happening.

    The gist I have taken away from a number of "articles" on Multi's is that if ìyou need a specific Vit or Mineral then you should take it. But Multi's ìdon't give you enough of anything to overcome any kind of deficiency, and are ìessentially a waste of time/space/money. I can't quote any particular ìarticle/site for these conclusions. I think one appeared on a govt website ìhere... not sure about others. Not something I pay a lot of attention to.

    The bottom line was improve your diet before reaching to Vitamins...

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
    --- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Oli@21:3/102 to Adept on Sun Aug 15 09:13:30 2021
    Adept wrote (2021-08-14):

    - people tell other people that multivitamin pills don't help and
    might be harmful
    - people believe that until some other scientific study click-bait
    tells us the opposite is true
    - cycle repeats

    I think that's oversimplifying/dismissing what the research has been showing.

    I'm not talking about the research itself, but the way how a cherry picked 10+ page paper gets condensed into some headline and then transforms into a believe.

    From what we've seen, is that vitamin supplements help if someone has a deficiency.

    But a multivitamin is a, "Hey, just in case you're deficient in anything, here ya go!", and can wind up giving people too much of something that's fat soluble and sticks around forever.

    What is the alternative? Most health insurances don't pay a full screening for deficiencies. Most physicians don't screen for deficiencies. They treat your symptoms.

    A standard multivitamin tablet cost 2 or 3 cents. That's affordable for a placebo effect and a daily intake that is most likely harmless. ;-)

    With my limited knowledge I would say if you it some vegetables and fruits, you should have enough vitamin C. Be careful with the many vitamins that are harmful if you overdose. Some Vitamins you get in a tablet are not in their natural form, like folic acid or B12. There is not much you can do wrong with vitamin D, if you are not taking crazy amounts (but you can get it for free in summer, if you are not afraid of sun exposure without sun screen.. 15 minutes at noon is often enough – depending on your location).

    Anyway, I'm mostly responding because I'm not fond of, "the cycle repeats" when we're talking about solid, non-political, just-trying-to-figure-things-out research.

    I have the impression the reputation of science and researches is often black or white. Either we have "listen to the science" or we cannot trust science. I think there is some high-quality, brilliant and useful research, then there is bullshit science (psychiatric theories are full of it) and a bunch of mediocre stuff. For some people it's just their daily work. Some research is done, because it was the research you can get money for or other reasons than quality or relevance (or passion). The quality and relevance is all over the map. But we also shouldn't dismiss research that cannot find any clear results. It's still a result and data.

    People are still fallible, and it's _hard_ to research something like
    this, but it's all the data we have. I'd prefer it if people gave it
    proper weight -- both enough credit and enough, "...but the world is complicated, and we're learning"

    I agree that biology, biochemistry, nutrition and micro-nutrients are hard and even harder to research. Contradictory results are to be expected. I only criticize what we do with the results of single studies. Like "coffee is unhealthy" => (a moderate amount of) "coffee is healthy".

    ---
    * Origin: . (21:3/102)
  • From Oli@21:3/102 to Spectre on Sun Aug 15 09:35:47 2021
    Spectre wrote (2021-08-15):

    Btw, there was a time when you could receive Voice, Data (BBS) and
    Fax calls on the same phone number (with ISDN). Nowadays I wonder
    why we do

    Yes, ISDN was ahead of its time... Very nice technology. Although I
    never had it here.

    ISDN was hiddeously expensive here.. Telescum (Telecom Australia, Govt
    run) was more interested in selling phone lines than data to residents. There was a couple of places I worked that had ISDN from site to site
    which was nice. They didn't do anything with it at all until after
    ADSL/DSL became a thing and by then it was obsolete.

    It was only cheap in Germany, because there was the believe (at Deutsche Bundespost / Telekom) that ATM networks and Broadband ISDN were the future:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadband_Integrated_Services_Digital_Network https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode

    Maybe others already knew that TCP/IP will make it obsolete.

    ---
    * Origin: . (21:3/102)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to Oli on Sun Aug 15 03:55:44 2021
    Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: Oli to Adept on Sun Aug 15 2021 09:13 am

    What is the alternative? Most health insurances don't pay a full screening f deficiencies. Most physicians don't screen for deficiencies. They treat your symptoms.


    For the record, something I have detected is that many doctors actually prescribe vitamin supplements quite freely if they are reasonably confident the patient's problems come from a deficency.

    This is, if somebody has issues that are typically associated with a defficency in this or that, they usually tell the patient to take a megadosing supplement for it for a short ammount of time and then phone in with the results. The reason is that I can deliver a flask with a megadoser much faster and much cheaper than an hospital can deliver an analysis for a defficency. Id Est. an analysis may cost more than 30 bucks and take a some days to be done, whereas a supplement I can deliver in 24 hours for half the price... if the supplement works within a given time frame you can be sure the problem was a defficit. If it didn't, then chances are the problem was not whatever vitamin or mineral was involved.

    They only do this with certain minerals and vitamins, though. Probably because not all of them can be corrected into fine levels in an ammount of time so short as to beat a lab analysis :-)

    --
    gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken
    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
    * Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (21:2/138)
  • From N1uro@21:4/107 to poindexter FORTRAN on Sun Aug 15 20:35:00 2021
    Hello poindexter;

    poindexter FORTRAN wrote to N1uro <=-

    Who's your provider? I'm tempted to set up Asterisk now that I have a homelab running. Saw some interesting SIP phones at my local
    electronics junk store - Grandstream GXP 1405s.

    I'm using PhonePower with their 24.95/mo international dialing plan.
    I have a good friend who lived near me that now lives in the U.K. I talk to about weekly, and a gal pal in the Czech Republic I speak with. I've had this plan with them for 20 years when they were BroadVoice.

    Grandstream is pretty good. I have a half dozen of those that have worked flawlessly for again 20 years however I use those as backups. What I've been using for 18 or so years is a Digium Wildcard with a Uniden 900Mhz system. Since it can't read whether voicemail exists on Asterisk, that's one of the modules I made: It scans the users voicemail directory every 30 minutes and if new mail exists it will ring the local extension with a CID of *97 once and hangs up so the user only needs to call back what was on the screen to retrieve their mail.

    My wildcard has 2 FXS and 2 FXO modules but they're mix n match. You can find them pretty reasonable on eBay.

    ... Microsoft is in Fear, Uncertain and Doubtful
    --- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
    * Origin: Carnage - risen from the dead now on SBBS (21:4/107)
  • From MATT MUNSON@21:4/108 to Spectre on Mon Aug 16 16:37:23 2021
    The bottom line was improve your diet before reaching to Vitamins...

    Im hoping to get my statistics from my blood and figure out what I am
    lacking. Yes, its preferable to get your stuff from food sources. I just have magnisium and vitamium C as my sole deadicated vitamin/minerals aside from
    the Multivitamin.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Windows/32)
    * Origin: Inland Utopia Mail Center (21:4/108)
  • From acn@21:3/127.1 to Zip on Tue Aug 17 11:25:00 2021
    Am 13.08.21 schrieb Zip@21:1/202 in FSX_GEN:

    Hallo Zip,

    No, that's a standard option. You have to assign a phone number to it
    and enter an email address where the faxes have to go. That's it,
    basically. It's similar to adding an 'answering machine'.

    That's nice! And user-friendly. (Aren't the Fritz! appliances among the
    most popular in Germany and its surroundings? I see they have routers, wireless extenders, DECT phones and more...)

    Yes, they are. They have a pretty good reputation for being reliable and
    do work quite well here.
    It's also nice that using my FritzBox for telephony, I have a VoIP
    connection to my ISP/telephone provider and the FritzBox is my base
    station for DECT phones, analog phones (eg. the Lexmark printer as a fax machine) and even ISDN devices (eg. an old ISDN phone that I can use with different phone numbers for dial-in/dial-out here on my desk).

    Regards,
    Anna

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: Imzadi Box Point (21:3/127.1)
  • From acn@21:3/127.1 to Oli on Tue Aug 17 11:28:00 2021
    Am 13.08.21 schrieb Oli@21:3/102 in FSX_GEN:

    Hallo Oli,

    I believe they are THE most used and popular broadband / Wifi / VoIP
    routers in Germany. If you buy them new they are way too expensive, but
    most broadband providers give you one for free (or cheap) with a new contract.

    The only problem is that some providers enforce their 'branding' on the devices which disable some functions or only enable them if you are
    willing to pay extra money.
    Also, updates for branded boxes often arrive later than for the standard devices.
    That's why I bought my 7590 new and hope that it will last for a while :)

    Best thing is the support. AVM usually fix security relevant bugs
    not only for the recent product line, but for old devices too.

    Yes, that's true :)

    Anna

    --- OpenXP 5.0.50
    * Origin: Imzadi Box Point (21:3/127.1)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Spectre on Wed Aug 18 03:46:28 2021
    on lifespan. That one still seems odd.

    Chuckle, is that because of the nature of the people taking them? :) The ill, ìsick and dying?

    Always possible, though it does seem like a terrible study if they didn't at least _try_ to control for it.

    And we _are_ talking about multivitamins, which are not exactly a niche
    thing. And who doesn't want to be a Flintstones kid?

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From Adept@21:2/108 to Oli on Wed Aug 18 04:36:10 2021
    I'm not talking about the research itself, but the way how a cherry
    picked 10+ page paper gets condensed into some headline and then transforms into a believe.

    Yeah, I do get irritated with misuse of research, too, whether by media or scientists themselves.

    What is the alternative?

    ...not spending money on something that's moderately expensive and has no obvious benefits?

    I'd care about alternatives if the product were doing something of value that needs replacing.

    A standard multivitamin tablet cost 2 or 3 cents. That's affordable for a placebo effect and a daily intake that is most likely harmless. ;-)

    Yeah, I'll admit you have me on the placebo effect. I do think they're
    harmless enough that if people want to try a placebo, eh, whatever. I'll take one occasionally myself under that rubrik.

    I have the impression the reputation of science and researches is often black or white.

    Yeah, I dislike that, too. My ethos tends to be, "it's more complicated than that". Anyone who is stating black-and-white things with science is not expressing enough caveats.

    Even if expressing all those caveats undermines the usefulness of the
    research, at times.

    expected. I only criticize what we do with the results of single
    studies. Like "coffee is unhealthy" => (a moderate amount of) "coffee is healthy".

    Yeah, definitely. Oftentimes studies seem to contradict each other, but then when you look into them you realize they were studying different things.

    Nuances are really important, especially with science.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Storm BBS (21:2/108)
  • From MATT MUNSON@21:4/108 to Adept on Tue Aug 17 21:44:01 2021
    And we _are_ talking about multivitamins, which are not exactly a niche thing. And who doesn't want to be a Flintstones kid?

    I think I used to OD on them because they tasted sooooo good when I was younger.

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Windows/32)
    * Origin: Inland Utopia Mail Center (21:4/108)
  • From Spectre@21:3/101 to Adept on Wed Aug 18 14:52:00 2021
    thing. And who doesn't want to be a Flintstones kid?

    Flintstones kid? BamBam?

    You reminded me there was a story kicking around online not so long ago about ìa child that was popping vitamin gummies like candy/lollies. Non-English ìspeaking family, didn't figure out what they were.

    It somehow led to calcium depletion.. I can't find the story now.. but I did ìcome across...


    Nausea, vomiting and stomach pain (iron)
    Vision problem and clumsiness (vitamin A)
    Constipation and muscle weakness (vitamin D)
    Bleeding problems (vitamin E and K)
    Skin flushing (vitamin B3)
    Nerve damage, numbness and difficulty walking (vitamin B6)

    As "common" symptoms for overdosing.

    Spec


    *** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
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    * Origin: We know where you live, we're coming round to get you (21:3/101)
  • From Arelor@21:2/138 to MATT MUNSON on Wed Aug 18 08:46:22 2021
    Re: Re: I am talking about high rotation products
    By: MATT MUNSON to Adept on Tue Aug 17 2021 09:44 pm

    And we _are_ talking about multivitamins, which are not exactly a niche thing.
    And who doesn't want to be a Flintstones kid?

    I think I used to OD on them because they tasted sooooo good when I was younger.

    Really?

    Nowadays, they try to make them with a neutral taste because it is so hard to make it
    likeable for a big chunk of the population. You make a suppllement tast a certain way,
    and half the people will hate it.

    I have the same problem with my horse's dewormers. One of them loves Equimax, and the
    other hates it. Switch brand, and you get the roles reversed. Give each horse the
    dewormer she likes, and people will mook you for spoiling your horses hahahaha.

    --
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    --- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
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  • From gcubebuddy@21:4/129 to Spectre on Wed Aug 18 09:07:42 2021
    Flintstones kid? BamBam?

    We're 10 millon strong - and growning....

    Thanks
    - Gamecube Buddy

    telnet --<{bbs.hive32.com:23333}>--

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: Hive32 (21:4/129)