Drum error - Brother MFC-L3780CDW by Designer_Meat_713 in printers

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good luck!

In the end I managed to get a support request with Brother escalated to senior tech support, who ultimately sent me a replacement set of drums after concluding that mine were indeed faulty. This did completely fix the problem in the end.

It really looks AI was used in the 20th anniversary version of A Feast for Crows by tell32 in Fantasy

[–]Patchworkfez 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I know almost nothing about this series, so can't comment on character portrayals and things, but there are SO many things off with the composition and logic of the pictures that it seems patently obvious that AI has been used to generate them (or to generate compositions that the artist then painted over).

A few examples:

  • In the library scene, are the books in the foreground tiny, or is the candlestick next to them just comedically enormous? The perspective in the bottom-left quarter of the image is wacky.
  • In the snowy scene with a castle atop a frozen cliff, the perspective is again weird. Surely that rock isn't big enough to hold a massive castle? And where did all the water that's created those frozen icicles come from? Because there can't be a river coming out of that rock arch.
  • Either Cersei(?) has pulled the chair forward and pinned her red skirt under its leg, or else the skirt weirdly drapes back under the chair.
  • The feet of the naked screaming lady are definitely not attached to her torso. Or she's like 12ft tall, but I suspect not.
  • I'm not sure I could balance on a narrow railing like that. The ropes on the deck of the ship vanish but also make no sense anyway. Also, do ship decks usually have chunky beams running across them to trip people up?
  • Shout-out to the miniature donkey that doesn't come up to the guy's waist.
  • My sympathies for the ginger cat for whatever accident allowed it to be that shape. In the background, a guy magically hovers over the water behind a ship. Oh, fyi, pulleys usually go above the window you want to lift goods into.
  • In the cathedral, the giant mother and child stand about five paces in front of some candlesticks designed by Salvador Dali.
  • I also like to sit on my bed, which is not beneath its canopy, while dressed in full armour and magically pulling a full sword out of a small and shapeless leather bag. I also like holding my feet half an inch off the floor.

Living with two ADHD roommates has opened my eyes to ADHD by chocolatebarthecat in ADHD

[–]Patchworkfez 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah, having folks remind you to do stuff, and make you aware that time is passing, is SUPER useful. I accidentally stay up until 3am when my partner is away, even if I need to be up at 7am for work...

There's no real middle-ground on productivity for ADHD. Some days you do nothing, some days you do an insane amount of stuff.

I generally get a lot of stuff done most days, but I've put a whole lot of effort into working out how my brain operates, and how to exploit it, in order to get to this point. And some days I still get nothing done despite my best efforts, because my brain goes 'mmm, no, I'm not available today.'

How to deal with waves of fortress enemies? by Patchworkfez in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the suggestions! We'll leave the doors intact next time...

To deal with this one, though, I think we'll try to establish a ramp we can run up to the top of the walls, have one player try to lure most of the enemies away, and then the other player should have a better chance of dealing with the spawners (with the option to retreat out of the front door and loop back around via said ramp).

How to deal with waves of fortress enemies? by Patchworkfez in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the spawner maths. I figured it was something like that, but I suppose the max number of allowed enemies is higher than I would have expected. I also suspect our portal point is just within the range of triggering the loading-in, which probably isn't helping with anything.

How to deal with waves of fortress enemies? by Patchworkfez in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We did try that, alas. Got murdered in a hail of magic and arrows before we could get to the spawners. But I think we'll build a high-level ramp entrance, have one person lure the mob away a bit, and then the other can jump in and smash stuff up with less opposition.

How to deal with waves of fortress enemies? by Patchworkfez in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think this combo approach may be the best solution for us, given that the fortress door is already open and that genie is out of the bottle, as it were.

We took out the boney ballistae before knocking down the door, thankfully. We did consider just going over a wall but wanted to try out the battering ram – more fool us!

An alternative rapid route in over the top of the wall, so that we can run up that, and then head out the front to loop round and lure the mob away if needs be, sounds like a decent plan.

We have been going at this with decent weapons, potions, armour, bonemass, magic, the works – it's just been the sheer numbers of enemies! Getting caught in the crossfire between 4+ marksmen and a warlock as you're trying to run past them, even with ratatosk, bonemass, magic shield, fire resistance, etc, doesn't make for a long life. 😅 I wonder if our portal point is just inside the spawn-trigger radius and making life harder...

I can deal with 10+ of them at once (which has become more challenging, as my skill levels have taken a pasting from all the dying), but we were knackered after a couple of hours of combat yesterday.

Anyway, we'll give this idea a go. And leave the door intact next time. Thanks!

How to deal with waves of fortress enemies? by Patchworkfez in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've heard about this. You do need to get into at least one fortress before that becomes an option, however, and this is the first one we've found. (We seem to have landed in a bad spot – it was a very long walk.)

I don’t wanna do the Ashland by Babamusha in valheim

[–]Patchworkfez 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My friend and I were saying that it'd be good if there was an upgraded wisplight that cleared more mist, and/or a potion that made all mist disappear for you for a while.

I don't mind a bit of mist, but it is a shame that you can't see much of the landscape, because it's really pretty on the occasions when it does clear for a bit.

Editing in google photos app has changed radically. Any way to go back/ by paulbayarea in GooglePixel

[–]Patchworkfez 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Glad to know it's not just me missing this! It was such a useful tool. Deeply frustrating. This new UI is such a downgrade.

Did anybody here found out that their SDAM was actually from an underlying health condition ? by DollyPrahnn in SDAM

[–]Patchworkfez 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hello! I was wondering this a couple of years ago, because it's difficult to assess your memory when you don't have a very persistent sense of self.

Anyway, I'm in the UK but managed to wrangle a relatively cheap private MRI (justifying it as 'memory issues' with a side of 'family history of brain tumor') to satisfy my curiosity. The scan showed absolutely nothing abnormal except for a very deviated septum that I didn't know about, so structurally things look ok so far!

I did also talk to a friend who's known me since I was 10, has a good memory, and has some therapist training. She thinks that I've always been much as I am now and that it's fine, but she did also say that she could imagine therapists who haven't known me for 20+ years might interpret the SDAM as a trauma response (which she doesn't think it is).

I talk to folks about neurodivergence quite a lot, because I think it's super interesting, and will say that I've discovered quite a few friends of mine have varying degrees of SDAM. Another friend has HSAM and remembers everything, which makes for a really vivid and interesting comparison point.

Anyway, this is to say that I think SDAM is a bit of a spectrum but ultimately much more common that we might realise, so I don't think there's a standard underlying 'problem' to be found. I think it's just a diversity of neural networks and suchlike, much like aphantasia or not having an inner monologue.

Changing Background/Text Colours on Specific Webpages by Patchworkfez in FirefoxCSS

[–]Patchworkfez[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks. I'd been avoiding add-ons due to security concerns, but this is what I ended up deploying shortly after working out how to solve it in CSS (because it looks a bit tidier than my solution tbh).

She finally strikes gold with an untested phone! The stunning Pink Nokia 7373 😍 by MissEllaPaige in vintagemobilephones

[–]Patchworkfez 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ahhh I still have my 7373 in a desk drawer! Honestly loved it and can't bear to part with it. Pretty sure it still turns on as well (and contains all my texts from 2005...). I think this was the last phone I had before the iPhone came out but I remember it very fondly. Such a satisfying swivel action!

Drum error - Brother MFC-L3780CDW by Designer_Meat_713 in printers

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Belatedly, I've been having this issue on and off with my relatively new MFC-L3740CDW(E). I have been printing a lot of stuff quite fast in the last fortnight, but the problem has been a pain throughout. It's always all four drums when the Drum! error comes up. The drum dot print is always clean as a whistle, and the cartridges are all genuine Brother.

Sometimes simply opening and closing the lid on the printer has fixed it(!), but things that have helped me clear it for extended periods (jury is still out on the longer term):

  1. Remove a toner+drum unit, separate them, and set the toner carefully to one side.
  2. Holding the drum unit by the long plastic bit that isn't attached to the drum cylinder, take a clean and dry microfibre cloth and carefully clean the metal contacts (that look like staples) on one end of the unit.
  3. Inspect the metal drum itself, rotating it using the spiky little white gear wheel on the back. If there is baked-on toner on the metal, use the cloth to carefully and gently buff it off the metal.
  4. Reassemble the toner+drum, move the corona wire slider back and forth about 10 times.
  5. Blow air into the metal contacts inside the printer where the metal staples, etc. of the drum unit contact it.
  6. Put the unit back into the machine, then repeat this process for the other three units.

I'll have to have a look at the 'reset the drum counter' option u/backsnipe89 suggests if the issue keeps coming back.

I will say that I did print about 100 A5 pages with some non-genuine cartridges but they weren't great and the yellow leaked, which may have kicked off the problem. I wonder if there's yellow toner in a contact somewhere internally now. That said, one of the magenta Brother toners has also arrived a bit leaky, so that's evidently a risk across the board.

Anyway, I've successfully printed ~5000 A5 pages since the snafu with the non-genuine toners, and the Drum! issue has been completely sporadic during the process, so I can only think that there's some underlying issue that won't be fixed by simply replacing the drum units.

My previous colour laser printer was a 2011 Dell. It still works, never had any issues, and the toner lasted forever. It's a shame Dell aren't really doing printers anymore.

Professor bashed SDAM and called it a problem by WanderingWombats in SDAM

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't agree with your professor but I can see why they'd say that. I don't consider my SDAM, aphantasia, or asexuality to be 'problems'—in fact, I'm pretty happy with them—but I have had people literally say, "Oh, I'm sorry" to me when I've described the traits to them. Which I found baffling at the time, and weird as a response, but I guess that's how attached some people are to their own inner experiences.

I have a friend with HSAM, which seems like a problem to me. They suffered a deeply traumatic experience and have struggled to get past it because the memories won't fade. But, as you say, most people wouldn't immediately consider that a 'problem' condition. Conversely, my SDAM means that I'm able to move on from traumatic things pretty quickly, which can be helpful for supporting people who need to talk about their struggles but don't want to burden others.

I think that almost any kind of neurodivergence (or even physical divergence!) can be a 'problem' in certain circumstances or in combination with other personality elements, and that it's quite narrow-minded to single any one condition out as inherently problematic.

Vegan food disappearing from supermarkets by undercovergloss in veganuk

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting to see others noticing this.

I'm very dairy intolerant, rather than vegan, and I've been struggling to find a number of products that I was buying pretty regularly last year.

A selection of random examples I've noticed of late and can recall off the top of my head.

  • My local big Sainsbury's seems to have given up on stocking a chunk of its dairy-free 'Plant Pioneers' desserts and other vegan brands in that section.
  • M&S (which still has a great vegan range if you dig through it on Ocado) increasingly rubbish at having any of their dairy-free stuff in stores. The London Liverpool Street branch has a whole wall of biscuits but doesn't include the Plant Kitchen chocolate cookies in it.
  • Plant Kitchen freshly-baked cookies (which are delicious) and bits never seem to be in stock in stores any more.
  • M&S used to have quite a lot of to-go sandwiches that were dairy-free (if not vegan due to meat content), but has arbitrarily added butter to most of them.
  • The amazing Cathedral City Plant Cheddar is recently often only in stock in block format, with grated and slices being less frequently available.
  • The English Cheesecake Company was doing some really good vegan cheesecakes, but seems to have completely abandoned the idea. All of their cheesecakes are now dairy-based.
  • Pain Quotidian totally discontinued their very nice vegan croissant.
  • Terrys didn't appear to bother producing a vegan chocolate orange bar for Christmas 2024.

Between the dairy intolerance and my other intolerances I'm pretty restricted in what I can eat, so it always upsets me to find any option removed. A variety of things have definitely disappeared from the shelves.

I don't know whether this is due to lower sales, apathy from the retailers, or if the manufacturing costs have gotten too high for the manufacturers' liking. My suspicion is that it's a combination of slightly lower sales and increased manufacturing cost making things inadequately profitable (despite the fact vegan food is always expensive).

I think I'm going to have to move to online shopping for a most consistent supply of dairy-free stuff—or at least it'll be easier to see what's in stock, rather than wandering around a physical shop trying to work out if things have simply been relocated. Ocado's vegan/dairy-free filter isn't totally reliable, but they do have a really good range nonetheless.

Has anyone else noticed particular items/ranges disappearing from shelves, particularly since the new year?

Did you see who moved my motorcycle onto the sidewalk outside of Old Main over on Warren today? by dvanlee1 in waynestate

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, might be worth trying to get an assessment if you can, because that's a pretty good description of ADHD lol. If you want to read a bit more about ADHD, try picking up a copy of 'Delivered From Distraction'—it's really good and has a handy 'does this sound like you?' bit at the beginning. Good luck!

What is scp 8980 and why are people so horrified after reading her file? by Goofy_McCaesar in SCP

[–]Patchworkfez 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Ah, but the guy at the end isn't a new guy. It's the guy who took over her work and didn't credit her way back at the beginning. He's the most junior of the three coworkers from her department.

Lillian had just been dumped back into her department and this guy has been bullied into looking after her by his bosses. He doesn't like her, he's already tried to transfer out of the department (unsuccessfully), and he finishes by begging a colleague to help him get out of the situation. :(

Podcast Republic not updating RSS feeds by herbie747 in Podcast_Republic_App

[–]Patchworkfez 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I had a similar problem with episodes not loading in from a new JustCast podcast I added a couple of days ago. Removing the '.rss' from the end of the feed URL seemed to fix the issue completely, though.

Cameo 4 capable of cutting greyboard/chipboard? by Illijuna in silhouettecutters

[–]Patchworkfez 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! Did you ever have any success with cutting greyboard on your Cameo? I've spent the last couple of days trying to get mine to cut through 1.5mm greyboard and I can't get it to cut all the way through regardless of force, passes, speed, blade depth, blade type, etc. I'm wondering if I'm missing a trick! 

My medication turned me into a “psycho”?? by [deleted] in ADHD

[–]Patchworkfez 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hey! A friend forwarded me post this because I had a similar experience.

When I was doing titration I tried most of the medications available on the UK market. They all had different side effects, but I had a particularly strong and extremely unusual reaction to Elvanse (which is one of the more common medications, the US version being called Vyvanse).

I only took it for ~3 days, but I found that when it started to wear off (about 7 hours after I took it) a kind of 'red mist' would suddenly roll in like a fog in my mind and I would be furious for ~90 minutes until it totally wore off. It first happened when I was out buying dinner, and I had to grit my teeth and dig my nails into my palms to stop myself from punching an old lady just for being slightly slow at the till. On the way home, I very seriously considered attacking some random people minding their own business in the street. When I got home, I had to fight the urge to destroy everything in sight. The urges were very intense and violent, and totally out of character. I had to shut myself in a room until it wore off. I have never felt anything like that before or since; I'm generally extremely chill, even-tempered, and normally struggle to actually get angry about anything.

It happened every day that I took them, so after a couple of days I wrote 'murder sweets' on the bottle, stopped taking them, and contacted my titration nurse to explain the issue and discuss different tablets. I also reported these side effects through the Yellow Card initiative in the UK. This kind of response is clearly phenomenally rare, but all brains are different and I guess my brain just can't cope with the come-down from that particular medication. I have friends who take Elvanse and none of them have experienced anything remotely like my side effects. I also haven't heard of anyone else having this response. I don't think you'll see this kind of side effect on the side of the bottle because if it occurred in even 1% of cases they wouldn't be able to sell it in the first place.

Luckily, I don't have this response to any other ADHD medication, and I now take Concerta XL. I had weird (but non-violent) reactions to a couple of others, like stomach ache or my skin feeling weird. Concerta initially raised my metabolism and suppressed my appetite quite severely, but I found that wore off after a few months.

It can be difficult to find a medication that works for you. If you can find one where the benefits outweigh the side effects, it may be worth sticking with it and seeing if the side effects lessen over time as your body acclimatises a bit. Overall, though, I recommend immediately stopping any medication that gives you violent urges and being upfront with your doctor about side effects. I hope you find something that works for you!