[Coco] Using a NTSC Coco in the UK - my findings

[Jeff Teunissen]

Torsten Dittel wrote:
>> I have always used alcohol and a Q tip. Pencil erasers leave residue that has oils
>> in them. I use alcolhol from Walgreens that is 90%. SOme outlets you can find up
>> to 95%. Th at is even better.
> 
> I guess you'll find even 100% isopropanol (ispropyl alcohol) at your
> local pharmacy. At least in Germany you do, about 2EUR/liter.

Not once you've opened the bottle. You just can't get pure alcohol in any open
container. Alcohol is aggressively hygroscopic, meaning it will suck water
right out of the air until water becomes about 5% of its weight by volume (but
the volume doesn't actually increase).

Literally -- 100% alcohol, when opened, gets heavier by absorbing water from
the air (until the rate of evaporation of the alcohol equals the rate of water
gain). It's pretty cool, actually, but that's why "190 proof" is the highest
grain alcohol you'll ever see in any store -- it's 95% alcohol, and thus you
can't get rid of the remaining water except through exotic means. :)

-- 
| Jeff Teunissen -=- Pres., Dusk To Dawn Computing -=- deek at d2dc.net
| GPG: 1024D/9840105A 7102 808A 7733 C2F3 097B 161B 9222 DAB8 9840 105A
| Core developer, The QuakeForge Project     http://www.quakeforge.net/
| Specializing in Debian GNU/Linux           http://www.d2dc.net/~deek/