Category: Hardware

Fn Sound Volume Keys Quit Working on Dell Inspiron Running Arch Linux

Posted on by John D

I recently had a problem where my Arch Linux Fn sound volume keys quit working. I looked high and low and could not find a solution.

head space and timing

This is a military term related to ensuring the bolt and head space for the M2 .50 caliber machine gun are in alignment. This must be done correctly, or the weapon can explode during operation. It also means a person who’s screwed something up because they failed to check what they were doing before they did it.

~ head space and timing, Urban Dictionary

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Review: Tripp-Lite USB to SATA Dock/Cloning Station

Posted on by John D

Unimpressed by the spaghetti cabling of cheap USB to SATA adapters on eBay? Check this one out!

I had one of those kludgy USB to SATA and IDE adapters. I used it so much that some hard drives would no longer spin up on it, and finally no 3.5″ drives would at all. So, I decided to get something a bit beefier and less clunky to deal with. So, I read various reviews and settled on a Tripp-Lite U339-002 USB to SATA Dock/Cloning Station. Continue reading “Review: Tripp-Lite USB to SATA Dock/Cloning Station” →

Find Dell Service Tag Info Remotely from BIOS

Posted on by John D

You need the Dell service tag number for a computer, but the machine is not currently in tech’s possession. However, it is up and on the domain.

From a command prompt (does not need to be admin), type:

wmic /user:\administrator /node: bios get serialnumber

Substitute the remote computer’s name for <domain> if logging in as local administrator.
It will prompt for the administrator’s password for the remote computer, and, hopefully, spit out the info you need.

Network issues can interfere with this, though, so if you don’t succeed at first, try again at a later time.