Turn your scanner into a boomin' system
By Evan Blass 
posted January 11th 2006 6:05AM
posted January 11th 2006 6:05AM
posted January 11th 2006 6:05AM
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The ScanJet 5P SCSI used to play "Ode To Joy" (European Anthem) if you reset it to SCSI ID 0 and pressed the Scan button whilst powering it on.
1. Paul's Boutique!!
2. I'm surprised if you really have 0 readers from Estonia.
and what's wrong with estonia? they're in the EU, pretty civilised country. i'm not from estonia, but from romania. anybody surprised? and yes, i've been following engadget for well over a year now.
this was not a PC statement from your part! :P
I liked this post better the first time I saw it on Hackaday.
So - I can use my mouse as a scanner and I can use my scanner as speakers. If you can find a way for me to use my speakers as a mouse, I'll be all set.
This reminds me of the old "musical floppy" things for the Commodore 64 back in the day, and is as likely to ruin the scanner as that stuff did the floppy.
Back in those days, the floppy was a few hundred dollars, not fun to ruin one with such silliness.
http://c64music.blogspot.com/2005/10/you-can-be-floppy-music-star-too.html (don't forget to fix the Url since Engadget fsck it up!)
Political correctness sucks. I'm pretty sure they meant to pull a Dilbert there though and use Elbonia. But hey, I wouldn't be complaining about free press for Estonia if I lived there. Plus you're the only country who can capitalize on a super-special prize, so what's to be offended about? :p
1. Gain sense of humor.
2. ...
3. Profit!
Oh, and on topic... I'll be looking to try this with an old scanner at work today. Freebird here I come! ;)
I'm from Estonia. ;)
So, half of staff over at Skype, can enter the competition, seeing as they're based there ? Estonia, you may be surprised, is actually more civilised then USA in certain hi-tech aspects, like broadband or cellphone use and coverage. I'm pretty sure you have quite a few readers there. Yours,
I thought the same thing- that poor Commodore drive ratting itself out of alignment. Think it was 'Daisy'.
FYI, Estonia is a pioneering country in the following areas: e-government, e-elections, e-police, mobile parking, mobile payments, mobile banking etc. Also, the density of mobile phones per 100 people is one of the highest in the world.
not to mention R&D of Skype is in Estonia and Kazaa was developed here too.
yes, Im from Estonia.
Quod erat demonstrandum... you estonians gotta start pimpin those scanners pretty fast. yeah, sure the PC stuff is stupid. it was meant to be a joke.
Quod erat demonstrandum... you estonians gotta start pimpin those scanners pretty fast. yeah, sure the PC stuff is stupid. it was meant to be a joke.
Quod erat demonstrandum... you estonians gotta start pimpin those scanners pretty fast. yeah, sure the PC stuff is stupid. it was meant to be a joke.
i have a 4c handy but just checked the readme and umm hehe, forget it :P and what's that 'paul's boutique album' anyway?
Please note: I meant no disrespect to the people of Estonia; it was just the first small country that came to mind. So please, Estonians, start dropping those B-boy beats and make me put my money where my big mouth is.
John Cage would love this.
Damn... I used to have a scanjet 4c many moons ago. It broke and HP wanted an arm and a leg for parts... more than the price of an entirely new unit.
In disgust, I took the bitch out and shot 100 rounds from my pals glock into it. It was my first time shooting a pistol and boy was it satisfying.
That's a nice entry, though this is old news, I'd be happy to win that prize. What would the prize be? Thousands of dollars? Couple of horny ladies from Jenna's Sex Star?
With the best wishes,
an Estonian
Yeah, Timbo.. I remember back in the day when my 5p broke and HP support had me go through resetting it.. I thought the Ode To Joy self-test was a great little easter egg. I used to show it off all the time. Ultimately we had to get it repaired, but the refurbished unit they sent still works to this day.
Wow it's great to see people still using this stuff. The song download will work in at least the SJ3c, SJ5P, SJ5100c. It might work in other later scanners, but I don't know becuase I left. Some have bult in songs, For example the SJ5100 (if you hold the front button down when you turn it on it will play Obe-to-joy).
Steven L. Webb (ex-HP firmware eng)
Damn, im not sure we estonians have such old things :P
On a related note, the Computer History Museum has some recordings of the IBM 1403 Printer playing music based on what characters were being printed. They can be found at: http://www.computerhistory.org/exhibits/highlights/