mauhs Ahah, I wish. I'm doing alright, developping a Sokoban game currently with Claude. There's already a released version for PSP, running on my 3ds as well now. It's so cool to see ideas come to life and I just love the psp anyway lol
malmon Nice! How was track day? Did you manage to get your car ready in time?
Dontmindme Bruh we started using Claude at work a few months ago... Made me almost completely lose interest in programming. Just yesteday I ordered a (free!) book that's supposed to be about career guidance in the age of AI.
As fun as it is to be able to "make" something in basically no time, I feel like because I didn't really have to learn or understand whatever the LLM did, there just isn't really any sense of achievement. It's great when you just need to quickly whip up a tool to do some particular task, but when it's taken over your craft, it kinda sucks.
That said, it's cool that you're breathing new life into your PSP! I still have mine in my mum's loft somewhere, and a Vita in the drawer next to me. Would be even cooler if ya managed to make your own UMD!
And the track day was good! So... basically what happened is that I wanted to get the diff oil changed, because the car hit 90k miles and it had never been done. So my mechanic squeezed me in the Saturday before. After some difficulty with loosening the bolts, things were going well, until he screwed the bolts back in. Now, his system said the torque was 70Nm. The BMW TIS I have said 65Nm. Various sources online say 45, 55, or 60Nm. Whatever the correct value is, the diff cover cracked, and it would no longer hold oil. For reference, it's part no. 2 here https://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/showparts?id=CD12-EUR-12-1996-E36-BMW-328i&diagId=33_0371
So I left the car with him - the neighbouring garage does welding, so the idea was to just weld the crack up. Unfortunately, the cover is made of aluminium, and one does not simply weld aluminium. So that didn't work, and instead he attempted to temporarily patch it up with some jb-weld-like stuff. It was okay in the garage - lost about 3 drops of oil overnight. But once on the road, with things warm and shaking about, it was losing about a drop a minute. So that evening turned into me and a couple of colleagues frantically searching and asking online for a replacement cover. The only options I could find that were in stock were in Germany, the US, or Hong Kong. Of course, none of these would arrive in time to be fitted for the track day on Friday (it is Tuesday evening at this point).
The next day, the mech found a listing for an entire diff on eBay in the town just next to my workplace. Now, the diff itself is welded, as it came off a drift car, but the cover was intact, and matched my one. So I bought it that morning (£180), collected it that afternoon, and drove it and my car back to the garage that evening. The mechanic said he'd "probably" be able to get it done by Thursday evening. Unfortunately, other clients' work got in the way, so Thursday evening came and went.
At this point, I'm feeling kinda bad, as what was meant to be a quick 1 hour job squeezed in on a Saturday is now shitting all over my mechanic's schedule, and it seems like all my colleagues who wanted to see me in my E36 on track would be disappointed. Friday morning at 11, I finally get the text saying it's ready. I get down to the garage (~40 minute drive), pick the car up, and make my way straight to the event (another ~40 minute drive). Fortunately, I got there soon after the lunch break started, so even though I missed the morning half, I got something to eat, and I wasn't having to get my safety briefing and unloading-junk-out-of-car (including the "new" diff with the old cover fitted, which is now sitting in my garage 
) done while things were busy.
The track experience itself was just that - an experience. My car isn't suited for the track at all. My front tyres are old and tired, my rear tyres are whatever lingongs I could get right now after a near emergency during a road trip, and the suspension is designed to take an elderly couple to and from Church on Sundays, and the track was wet and made of concrete. Still, I had a blast, and it got me thinking about where I wanna go car-wise. Logic dictates that I should just fix the bad points of my car, but I also felt kinda bad for tracking it. It was a very small, and rather slow track, but my car is still a somewhat unusually clean example of an E36, even though I've been really piling the miles on it. So maybe a dedicated track car isn't the worst idea in the world, just money and space become the issue.
Yes, I ended up in the grass once, span out twice, and on the straights in the wet it was like a mustang at a car meet. And just to clear up any doubt, my car is supposed to be pointing in roughly the same direction as the white Civic.
malmon Made me almost completely lose interest in programming.
Yup I get that, you become more of a product manager/kindergarten employee when using AI, I'm glad I left the field before it happened. For personal projects it's so cool because you get to experiment a lot for basically free since otherwise I couldn't sink enough time for that.
But for the joy of programming... it's gone.
malmon Would be even cooler if ya managed to make your own UMD!
I read that it was not possible since UMD were built specifically for Sony and production stopped. Would have been cool though. Got it running with OFW so there's that.
malmon And the track day was good
Glad to hear that! Thanks for the diagram, very helpful. Torque is always a scary thing, too loose or too tight and you risk failures. Couldn't find the part in a car junkyard?
The way you write about it I can already see the adrenaline and anxiety spike up wondering whether you'd make it on time or not.
Even though it was just an experience, car being unsuited and all it's still cool to bring an E36 to track and as you said it was still a fun time. And you got to meet your fellow enthusiasts.
Car does look very clean, congrats!
You should have no problem getting it to track speed if you want to, in Europe lot's of people still run E36 and a lot of them prepare them.
Dontmindme I read that it was not possible since UMD were built specifically for Sony and production stopped. Would have been cool though. Got it running with OFW so there's that.
Hmm, according to Wikipedia, some publishers released JAVs on UMD, which Sony didn't approve of, so there must've been some way to produce UMDs that was out of Sony's control. Though I was hoping that they were just mini DVDs in a case, but it seems not.
Dontmindme Couldn't find the part in a car junkyard?
I don't think junkyards are as much of a thing here as they are elsewhere. There is one sorta nearby, but they didn't have any E36s. Plenty of E30s and E46s though ^^'
Dontmindme You should have no problem getting it to track speed if you want to, in Europe lot's of people still run E36 and a lot of them prepare them.
True, but then it would become less enjoyable to drive on the UK's terrible roads. Adjustable suspension is a thing, of course, but I imagine the baseline with those is still significantly stiffer than the stock suspension.
Do you drive?
put some changes through to the lewd backend. shouldn't be a lot thats noticeable but there is a few new features :>
malmon I believe there are softwares to write over an existing UMD but not sure how they work. The case breaks if you open it to avoid temper, maybe someone made a 3d print mold since then ?
Ah, that makes sense. Here for such parts you can even get them online scrapyards will compete on prices and some ship veryyyy fast. Or you just go to the local one.
Fair point about daily driving. I have a shitbox, considered tuning it a little but it’s basically illegal on the road then
I'm hungwy
Dontmindme Write over an existing UMD?? I assumed they were ROMs! But yeah, 3D printing has made a lot more of this sort of thing possible. As much as I shit on AI, if someone managed to reverse-engineer the UMD format, then it would be theoretically possible to make your own UMDs with DVD-Rs, and AI could probably help a lot with that.
Also, shitboxes are the best cars~
Can you really not tune stuff?
malmon They truly are !
You can do aesthetics pimps if you follow the rules, so besides stickers not much. For real tuning exhaust mod is illegal in France (pollution, noise), intake is illegal I believe, maybe some that "don’t affect the structure of the car and its handling" are allowed but then insurance is mandatory and few will allow mods. Or against a hefty monthly payment. TBH even cars with more horses were unavailable to me when I started driving, insurance companies either flat out refused or wanted to gouge me. Even today you still pay more. Maybe if you’re rich and follow the rules.
Re UMDs : you are right they are ROM, I misunderstood what UMDgen did. So no way to print UMD today I guess. Apparently all the data is there you just need an optical-disc plant
Dontmindme Damn, that's kinda lame. In the UK you can do just about anything you want, as long as you can get it insured, it doesn't have misleading lights, doesn't make it fail emissions, and doesn't remove the DPF/PPF. How does it work regarding motorsport in France, then? Here for most typical things like track days, the car usually has to be road legal, and even more serious stuff like stage rallying requires the teams to drive their car on public roads between stages.
Are UMDs not just DVDs in an enclosure?
malmon Are UMDs not just DVDs in an enclosure?
Kinda but they are not standard DVDs so you still need to custom make them. The processes are known, just probably no one interested to make them for a batch of copies.
malmon How does it work regarding motorsport in France, then?
I don’t know exactly, I live near a track and you often see the cars on the road but most are like group B cars, factory road legal track ready. For mods during track days maybe the police is more lenient. Someone (Sylvain Lyve) built a 1000tipla (French play on words for a fiat multipla but with « Mille » meaning a thousand ) with 1294hp on bench. He got it temporarily road legal it it was a hassle and involved getting immatriculation in another European country and a legal gray area.
In France, heavily modified cars are difficult to legalize because any significant change to the engine, power output, suspension or structure may require individual approval (RTI), which is expensive and not guaranteed. Insurance can also refuse coverage or challenge a claim if modifications are undeclared or the vehicle is not road-legal. Compared to the UK, the system is much more restrictive.
Dontmindme Kinda but they are not standard DVDs so you still need to custom make them. The processes are known, just probably no one interested to make them for a batch of copies.
But I'm thinking, if we know what data is supposed to go on the disc, could one reverse engineer the firmware on a standard DVD writer to make it write UMDs?
Dontmindme In France, heavily modified cars are difficult to legalize because any significant change to the engine, power output, suspension or structure may require individual approval (RTI), which is expensive and not guaranteed.
Man, what's even the reason for such laws? In the UK, you could literally put a plane engine into a car and it'd still be road-legal assuming it passes emissions for the spec of its era. Also looked up Poland, and it seems like all you need to do the regarding power changes is to notify whichever government body so that they can update the registration.
Dontmindme you've probably heard about the vibe-coded android port to 3ds. I first saw it on gbatemp a few days ago, i was like "damn, homebrew sure is evolving." Developing for old consoles is a pretty opaque concept to me, it's sort of cool to see the crazy software revolution extend into consoles. but yeah it does kind of take away some of the joy as both you and malmon have said
mauhs Perhaps it's a matter of reframing where the joy comes from. Like, is it really the programming that was the interesting part, or seeing your vision come to life? There's definitely a bit of both for me, but I did find that if I had something that I was programming that was taking significantly longer than I had envisioned, I would start to lose interest.
Maybe that's just the never-finishing-a-project-er in me, or maybe programming wasn't actually that fun in the first place ^^' The issue I guess is that I find it difficult to say that I made something, when the AI did most of the work.
malmon yeah I've made a few shitty apps in my time (without ai) and I think the joy there really came from the struggle and effort put in. with AI you can get things done but the reward isn't there unless I can be proud of having put in the work to make it exist. And I definitely agree with you on the last thing, projects need to have clout potential for me to be enthusiastic about them lol
I have so much energy
Nothing is satisfying me
