rwillett

Now that I have your attention, I'm hoping somebody can help me with a technical issue. It's odd, weird and very first world. Background 1. I'm still learning to play bass, some people who have heard me think that is too strong a statement and that I haven't even started 2. I work in IT for a living so have a lot of laptops and other things lying around. My other half would say too much stuff and she's probably right. 3. My immediate solution to a problem is to solve it from an IT point of view. Thats what I do for a living so why wouldn't I? 4. I have a bass guitar lesson wth a bloke in Sedbergh who is an absolute genius when it comes to playing guitar and writing music down. I am in awe of his skills and that rarely happens. As part of my learning to play I have the following workflow setup. 1. My tutor will write something down in tabbed notation (e.g. second string, third fret) during the lesson 2. We practise and he pretends I'm doing well and then I go home and practise some more. 3. I normally transcribe his work into Guitar Pro 8 on my Mac. I have a legit copy and it's easy to do. 4. I then copy the .gp file to my iPad into the Guitar Pro 8 ipad app. 5. I 'play' the file on Guitar Pro 8 iPad app and it displays the tabs and plays back simple notes. I normally slow things down and then slowly get better. 6. I have an iRig HD that connects my bass to the iPad, I run either Amplitube 5 or Bias FX 2 on the iPad (works very well) and I use headphones to listen to the cats being strangled as I play. So whats the issue? 1. The output of Guitar Pro 8 on the ipad is so low, I can't hear it properly. I can hear it in the headphones if nothing is being played, but the moment I play anything the Guitar Pro output is drowned out. 2. I have contacted Guitar Pro owners and raised a ticket. 3. Other people have had a similar issue with low volume. My thoughts 1. I like seeing the tabs and hearing the notes as I practise in Guitar Pro 8 on my iPad. It makes a big difference to my practise. 2. I'm not wedded to Guitar Pro 8 but it's a great system on the Mac and I have paid for it. The iPad version is not that good to be honest. 3. I have a NUX Mighty Pro as well and have connected the iPad up via Bluetooth and have the same issue as with the iRig. 4. I like using the iPad for this and it's dedicated for music. What are my options? 1. At this point Guitar Pro 8 iPad works well visually but is rubbish for sound output. is there an alternative ipad app that shows the tabs and plays something resembling bass sound? It needs to show the tabs, thats critical. 2. Could I put a USB mixer on the headphones of the iPad and the output of iRig and then feed that into headphones? Amazon has some cheap ones. Not keen as this is yet more hardware. 3. Could we use a software mixer on the iPad to increase the volume of Guitar Pro 8 and blend it with the output of Amplitube or Bias FX 2? 4. Some other hardware option such as a Mod Dwarf and use the iPad just for controlling the Mod Dwarf. I know @Smanth loves her Mod Dwarf and it has an awful lot of inputs. Does that take Bluetooth in? 5. Some other clever idea that I know nothing about. Thanks for taking the time to read this. Best wishes Rob

Fair enough.

Some businesses are rubbish at comms to the massive detriment of themselves, I can't imagine why they can't be upfront and explain this (assuming it's legit). I run a 3d printing business as a sideline and I sweat over taking eight hours to respond to new business and queries. My thoughts are that if they are saying 14 days, then given how long you have waited it's a small extension and actually makes no difference in terms of getting your money back (if you can). I'd write back and say that unless you have a posted and tracked delivery date by fourteen days from now, you'll want a full refund. Just my 2p Rob

Ha. I saw that and thought I was going mad. Thanks for saving my sanity. I couldn’t work out why I had bookmarked a box. rob

Ebay should take a more aggressive stance on dodgy goods, but some stuff is difficult to police. Most of their staff wouldn’t have a clue about a Fender bass and couldn’t identify a real one from a fake. Also competitors throw fake fake (sic) accusations out to remove items that compete with their own. Whilst I’m not en eBay fanboy, it’s difficult. I do astrophotography and look on eBay for any bargains, you occasionally get them, but I see a lot of fake auctions for high end telescopes. Questar are common, some Astrophysics scopes as well. These scopes can sell for many thousands. Probably much the same price as a decent Fender bass from early 60s. They use stick photos and sell a non existent item for $2,000 or whatever. When I report them, eBay has been really good at removing them. They go through patches and depends on who reads the submission. I’ve had people try to remove my stuff or rip my photos off for their own. EBay has actually been sensible most of the time. anyway, the new listing is technically accurate, it’s over priced by about £450, but that’s capitalism for you. caveat emptor and all that. rob

We'll see you Dec 2nd in Kendal as 1) Thats the closest to us and 2) its next to my birthday. Thanks Rob

Would love to see one North West. I can offer the local village hall in Clapham, North Yorkshire if it helps.

Hi Roj Welcome to the board officially. Love Thin Lizzy. Can you PM me if you’re playing anywhere NW England this year. Would love to come and see you play. Rob

Now sent and apparently Royal Mail delivered next day. Thanks for all the interest. rob

I have two unopened still in packaging Ender 3 Pro Magnetic Mats. These are the decent mats, not the crap from China that tear after one use. No longer neeed as I sold my Ender 3 Pro. No use to me, free to a good home. I'll post them for a small donation of your choice to the North West Air Ambulance I'd rather split Thanks Rob

But apart from that….

The Serial No doesn’t work either

I'd love to commision a bass version of this, would £75 be enough, I could go to £100 if I push the boat out. I can try and sell one of the kids again, but each time I do this, the buyer comes back and demands a refund. In all seriousness, I'd just hang it on the wall on a rotating peg and just look at it. Some people pay seriously silly money for art. To me, this is just as good. I'm very much in the form follows function camp, Bauhaus and all that stuff. This blows that principle out the water. Rob

Wow, fabulous and utterly stunning. I'm somewhat pleased that I will never be good enough to play such a fabulous guitar, I could never do it justice, so there's absoutely no point in me having it. My mediocrity saves me here. There's nothing else I can say. It's a work of art. Rob

Thanks, I'll send it to PaulThePlug. If he can't use it, I'll ask him to forward it on to somebody else. Rob

I use Linux a lot at home but it's all server based and on an ESXI server. I downsized from a 32GB i7 ESXI to an i5 16GB ESXi server to save electricity. I run 6 or 7 VM's including the main firewall. Very secure and dead easy. I have run Linux desktops but its still not ready for most non-technical uses. I'm a big fan of Linux for the server and we have run very large databases on it with zero effort. Cost to us £0, an Oracle version would have cost circa £1M. I have to look at the mails but I think you are third in the queue. Thanks Rob

Richard, Running Linux on an ipad is an interesting exercise. I can still recall downloading Yyradsill (how do you spell it?) via UUCP onto 5.25" floppies in the early 90's. I suspect that dates me somewhat. The Ipad Air 2 is a later model and whilst it's possible (I suspect) to backport it, my days of rebuilding Linux kernels is a loooooong way behind me. I still have nightmares and therapy about trying to get a symmetrical kernel built in the late 90's, I spent months trying to debug it and failed miserably. Running make -j and trying to guess the number of parallel builds threads I could run. I have better things to do with my life, including learning Money from Pink Floyd. I would be delighted to give it to someone who can use it, but it's an old lady now. It was my first iPad and has sentimental value, but I have an iPad Pro for general use and a dedicated iPad for Bias FX 2. The kids have more recent ones and this is just left on the shelf. I just want someone to use it, I don't really care what for, but is such a waste to throw away. Rob

Paul The iPad is running IOS 5, thats pretty old. It plays videos well but I have no idea if it would support anything like you're looking at. I would be delighted if it did, but you'll need to check IOS versions and software versions. if you can use it, its yours. Rob

Original 1st Gen. 64gb. Pretty much mint condition. Only supports ios5. whilst this is old, I hate to just throw it away. I work in IT and even I can’t find any use for it. I am happy to post it for free so long as you can make use of it. It even comes with a leather case. It’s such a waste to bin it 😒 rob

Money from Pink Floyd. Still struggling around the bridge in the middle. No matter how I play it doesn't sound right

Ander They look spot on, if you ever fancy a colour change, I’ll happily take them off your hands at absolutely no charge to you at all. Can’t say fairer than that. rob

99/100 I would rather poke my eyes out with a sharp stick, stuff honey in them and roll in a ant hill full of fire ants rather than look at a green guitar. This is the 1/00. They look absolutely spot on. I'd put them on and flaunt them in my house. Rob

Thank you, very helpful. Always good to learn something new. Rob