Dan Fixes Coin-Ops

Hello! I fix #pinball machines and #arcade games, and tell you all about it! I fix lots of other things too, and occasionally tell you about that. I also run one of the web's longest-surviving #textAdventure games, called Improbable Island, and I often write here on Fedi about decade-scale online community management stuff. Husband, dad, professional Thing Fixer and amateur woodworker in my early 40's, an #immigrant from the UK to the USA. Gun enthusiasts pls do not follow/interact.

old account 2017-2022: Dan moved, see pinned toot (npub1ec9…lear)
old account 2022-2023: Dan Moved to Retro.social (npub1h0y…rf6q)
My big old text adventure: https://www.improbableisland.com

Public Key

npub1z7v4ppzghd4fj5cr0r30n8zryengdzfrz8c77zqdm2sy8d0hx5dqzvfnxu

NIP-05 Address

ifixcoinops_at_retro.social@momostr.pink

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsp0x2ss3ytk65e2vph3chen3pjve5x3y33ru00pqxa4gzrkhmn2xspz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0ds4gg05x

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relay.damus.io

nos.lol

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npub1z7v4ppzghd4fj5cr0r30n8zryengdzfrz8c77zqdm2sy8d0hx5dqzvfnxu

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Published at

2024-08-09T10:47:38Z

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Last Notes

2024-07-29 05:00:06

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generally if there's no HV I'd be looking at fuses, HOT and flyback, although I can't say I've ever worked on this particular monitor

2024-07-23 14:29:59

If you can't tell the difference between Weird Al art and Weird AI art I implore you to tell your app/website developer to use a less shit font
Like, there are literally over a hundred fonts now

2024-07-21 13:55:49

@npub145g…mrpm heatwave bot was WAY better without the emojis. On my device they render as cute cartoon skulls and hot faces, the contrast with real people dying feels like a horrifying satire of phone tech, like a black mirror episode or something

2024-07-19 15:28:57

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🐴 captain, she cannae take it! The smug tank is popping its rivets, ye HAVE tae STOP!
🦝 *folding my Linux laptop like a boat and sailing it down a river of screaming faces* Full smug ahead!

2024-07-19 15:19:37

Linux users panicking because there's not enough smug to go round
Pouring another bucket of smug over my laptop, shouting down the bucket chain FASTER LADS, IT'S STILL WORKING, tooting as the fires rage around us

2024-07-12 04:33:55

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through-hole on USB-C? Well I mean on the one hand that's kind of a relief, I guess that makes structural sense for a connector, but I'm gonna need a muuuuch smaller nozzle on my desoldering pistol

2024-07-12 04:27:44

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I strongly suspect that these USB-C OmniHoles are gonna be surface mounted on weak little tiny pitch joints that I'll need my bloody microscope to even see never mind solder

2024-07-12 04:23:03

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I did fix laptops too back in the day, and there were basically two things that went wrong
1) the bit between the motherboard and the screen was often a crappy little flexi ribbon cable coiled around the hinge like a mainspring, it wears out as you open and close the lappy and a wire eventually cracks, your screen would only work at certain angles and then it'd die completely
2) the charging hole wears out and you have to hold the wire just right
Aye there was sometimes other stuff, but those were 90% of the problems.
The best laptops - my beloved Toshiba Tecra M4 - had the charging hole as its own whole separate little assembly that plugged onto the motherboard on an internal connector like a JST or something
So you'd cycle the barrel jack connector a thousand times, and then you'd throw away the barrel jack hole and cycle the JST connector once, like the hour hand on the life clock of your motherboard
(the crap ones had the power socket soldered to the board and it was always a right bastard to desolder 'cause of the big ground plane sucking up all your heat)

2024-07-12 04:10:41

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I have to use the backs of my knuckles now because my fingertips don't feel heat anymore because I've been a dumbass too long, but now I can pluck the packet-curry packets straight out of the boiling pot when the timer honks so y'know swings and roundabouts I spose

2024-07-12 04:08:32

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One easy troubleshooting step in any electronics thing is turning the thing off and then poking your finger on all the connectors in turn until one of them gives you a scar, I look forward to doing this with your laptops in the near future

2024-07-12 04:01:51

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Five amps is about 31.25 quintillion (31,250,000,000,000,000,000) free electrons tryna squeeze through your hole in one second
They rub up against each other and that's why things get hot. A significant part of my job is replacing connectors that have burned to a crisp and gotten so angry that they've gone "Right, hell with this" and started to desolder themselves from the board
Electrons are real and they have mass, the more current you draw the more Physically Big the connector has to be, you cannot fix this with software or investment

2024-07-12 03:52:56

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🐁 We made a new invention where your monitors, network, controls and sound all go through one hole
🦝 so when that hole wears out, as all electric holes eventually do, the plan is...?
🐁 we're gonna make it wear out FASTER by pulling FIVE
🐁 SMEGGING
🐁 AMPS
🐁 through your one (1) Omni-Hole™

2024-07-12 03:45:01

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🐰 Dan I've been pulling five amps through this connector for five years now and it's fine
🦝 FIVE YEARS *IS* BRAND NEW GET OFF MY LAWN

2024-07-12 03:41:23

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Two notes, first the choke thing yes really did happen ("But what about if your throttle cable snaps?" I said), second even though it's impressive that you can squeeze all that fun through one tiny hole I still have Feelings about USB-C that run the gamut from Reservations through Concern through Vicious Mockery, oh you think you can pull FIVE SMEGGING AMPS through that tiny little thing do you, alright fine maybe??? for a little while??? when the connector's brand-new???

2024-07-12 03:36:30

One downside of running linux is that I have NO CLUE AT ALL about modern technology.
Like, I didn't know about USB-C laptop docks? I can run two monitors, ethernet, sound and a bunch of USB ports out of a box plugged into ONE hole on my laptop? And I don't have to buy a dock specifically for my specific make and model of laptop? And this is real?
The flipside of your software being so light it can run on a toaster is that you'll spend years quite happily running it on a toaster and then have no idea what's going on in the world outside, and this is like when I borrowed someone's truck and went to start it and looked all around the steering wheel and they said what's up and I said where's the bloody choke on this thing

2024-07-10 14:39:02

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Like, come on, we're clever, we can figure this out.
Running pipes and hoses all through our walls to each appliance so it can send its waste heat back to the water tank? Sounds like a PITA but what with the new plumbing ways, home-run pex and all, no 90-degree joints to fail, it's more do-able now than before.
What about those fridge coils next to the oven? They're probably the easiest, they're right there

2024-07-10 14:29:41

I go into my kitchen and I look at my fridge, whose job is to move heat outside of itself into the room. Centimetres to the right of it is the oven, whose job is to make heat, and we don't like using it in the summer because its whole thing is making heat. Further right is the AC vent, which is connected to a furnace downstairs, which is connected to a big fan outside which blows my heat into the neighbourhood for a few minutes each morning to dry out the air and make it tolerable with a fan. Right next to the furnace, within a metre of it, is the hot water tank, which is another inside-out fridge that takes heat from the basement and puts it into my shower water.
None of these machines are connected together in any way at all
Like, what are we doing here. What are we doing as a species.

2024-06-20 20:37:14

Fedi, I want a site like gsmarena but for laptops. Does such a site exist? I want to input my required features and get a list of every laptop that has those things. Thanks!
EDIT: the ideal site would let me specify a screen aspect ratio, that's my most important input. I'm never working on a 16:9 monitor again if I can help it.

2024-06-20 01:16:07

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this is why I'm hoarding the 500 series, I'm not running no stinkin' app

2024-06-20 01:07:05

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Well Fedi I hope you're satisfied
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/646/264/816/942/888/original/da41693ff1663f74.webp

2024-06-20 00:08:56

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Well the replacement 550 Roomba showed up and it was pretty tidy, passed all tests, fired right up. Took some of the best bits from my roomba and put it in the new one, cleared out the hair (these people have birds and a big white dog I think) and there's an hour left on the two-Roomba auction and I'm still the high bidder 😅

2024-06-16 16:09:54

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dang this is gonna kill a LOT of people

2024-06-16 16:06:08

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alright yeah that's good enough, I'll get some more coil cleaning spray after the incoming heatwave of... 38 degrees, yyyyyikes

2024-06-16 15:55:34

Shoulda cleaned out and tested this air conditioner WAY sooner than the day before we get hit by an emergency-scale heatwave
It seems to be running, but if I'm gonna run the AC I want it to run efficiently y'know

2024-06-11 04:32:37

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Looks like the 550 will turn up a day before the auction on the 557 and 531.
Prediction: the 550 will turn up, I'll pop a new battery in and it'll be fine. I'll spend the remainder of the day hoping someone outbids me on the 2-stack, they won't, and I'll have bought 3 Roombas in one week

2024-06-11 04:06:32

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I'm gonna end up repairing these motherboards aren't I
thought I could spend thirty bucks and avoid having to grab meter and iron
not that I mind meter and iron, meter and iron is kind of My Thing, it's just I've got other things occurring right now y'know

2024-06-11 03:56:23

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(there are no diodes in our brains. Treating machines like they're alive opens the door to treating alive things like machines. Anthropomorphization of machines sickens me to such a degree that I don't even like using realistic voices on my GPS. My Roomba isn't my friend, it's a damn hoover and it'll do as it's told)

2024-06-11 03:51:17

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(note: machines are not people and people are not machines and machines should never pretend to be people and no person should ever be compelled or encouraged to behave like a machine. There's a very bright and bold and important dividing line between things and people, or even things that are alive and things that aren't. Just thought I'd throw that out there in case anyone thought I was as much of an arsehole to people as I am to machines)

2024-06-11 03:48:13

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Turn-of-the-century robot hoovers are like 90's pinball machines. A Williams pinball game can detect that half its playfield switches haven't been hit all week and one flipper is just dead, but does it stop taking coins and starting games? Does it bollocks! Taking money is its job! And when the tech comes along to empty the cash box, when he opens the coin door it goes bong-bong-bong-bong-bong and then presents a list of everything that it thinks is wrong with it. But if you go "That's nice, back to earning money" and close the coin door, it says "Right you are boss" and gives you a snappy salute with a hand with one and a half remaining fingers.
This is why I treasure my old 500-series roombas, they keep going until they Literally Can't. Compare that with, say, inkjet printers that refuse to print if they think the ink might be getting low even if it isn't.
Some machines are made to do the job and keep doing it until it's absolutely impossible to even attempt. Some machines just look for excuses.

2024-06-11 03:37:44

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Two things I won't do:
1) hoover the carpet with a vacuum cleaner
2) install an app to control a smegging hoover

2024-06-11 03:36:29

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Am I buying a new Roomba? No, I'm hoarding stacks of discarded 500-series carcasses so that I can Frankenstein one working one and have a stack of spare parts to keep it grumbling along until it outlives me.
I mean it. I've ran the damn tyres bald on two of these things.

2024-06-11 03:32:19

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My 17-year-old 500-series Roomba functions just fine with a majority of its sensors disabled. Like, all of its front-facing optos, the castor opto, the dirt detect piezo, all those can get choked up with hair and fail and it'll still clean the floor, it'll just be funnier to watch. The modern ones it seems can quit working completely because of SOFTWARE FFS

2024-06-11 03:28:29

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While thinking about the possibility of getting a Roomba that's younger than 2007, I had a quick look on the Roomba subreddit, saw a post with a title like "Unlocking a license-locked motherboard" and noped back ten years to my nice comfy scrap pile to raccoon myself something that wants to work rather than something that looks for any excuse not to

2024-06-11 03:25:49

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Okay fine, Fedi clearly wants me to have a stack of Roombas.
I have compromised by doing a Buy It Now on one that looks like it works, and I also placed a bid on a pair that look like they work but need new batteries, but there's eight days left on that and I'll probably get outbid.

2024-06-10 22:36:49

ughhhhh there are no RF-compatible 500 series Roomba motherboards on ebay
but there is a 550 going for $50 that the seller claims to work but needs a new battery
(then why don't they put a new battery in it and sell it for more money)
There's also a lot of 5 untested 500-series bots for $125 including shipping
What do
(note, buying a newer roomba that goes on the wifi is right off the table for obvious reasons)

2024-06-07 00:37:29

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the problem with instant messaging is that it's a solved problem, but every five minutes some techbro turns up and tries to solve it Better

2024-06-07 00:36:46

Seeing the furries moving their IMs to a different IM thing and I'm at once nostalgic for Trillian over dial-up and also quietly astonished that we still basically need Trillian, the basic problem of instant messaging being that all your friends are on different services is still the same problem here in 2024

2024-06-05 14:41:14

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Hahaha, the pictures are still online!
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/564/530/077/463/028/original/d1f18e7af7ede860.jpg

2024-06-05 14:32:08

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When I was sixteen years old I took one of these drawer-style cassette racks and drilled holes in the top to accommodate an arcade joystick and ten buttons.
I took apart a PlayStation controller, sanded off the solder mask, and soldered wires directly to the copper traces, running from the PlayStation pad to my arcade stick's microswitches. Then I went to a computer market and bought a PlayStation to parallel adaptor and plugged this abomination into my printer port because I was still waiting for someone to invent USB, then spent a merry afternoon figuring out how to get DOS to see it, then get MAME to see it, then I enjoyed me some Sunset Riders.
THAT
was an EASIER CONTROLLER SETUP
than FUCKING RETROARCH
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/564/475/163/280/272/original/c2945ba2c14d2dce.webp

2024-06-05 14:14:02

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I work in coin-ops, I want my controls to break because a rat chewed through a wire or someone puked on it, I don't want it to break because the software got too complicated and tripped over its own arse
Like how is this hard it's 2024 for heck's sake, I thought we had joysticks pretty much sorted out in the 70's

2024-06-05 14:10:34

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Me, playing Raiden 2 quite happily until the MAME devs put more effort into emulating the copy protection, more perfectly emulating its ability to know it's a bootleg and crash, killing the game for years: 🦝 This is a retro-gaming elitism thing isn't it
Me, two decades later, trying to connect a controller: 🦝 This is a retro-gaming elitism thing isn't it

2024-06-05 14:05:50

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oh my god retroarch is just THE WORST
it was easier to set up multiple controllers for an emulator twenty years ago
when you got your ROMs on a CD-R off a tarpaulin on the pavement outside a bowling club in Manchester, because when the internet screamed EEEE-EEEE-EEEE-EEEE-BRLGHBLRRBGHLEGHREE for forty seconds it'd still take half an hour to download Ghouls and Ghosts, when you had to start MAME from DOS, using multiple controllers was easier because at least you didn't have to deal with the emulator trying to help
two decades later these retroarch lads have put Clippy in your controller and I've spent literally five hours trying to figure out what the hell retroarch is trying to do, but I'm no closer to figuring out how to tell it to stop

2024-06-04 19:45:53

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ooh, is this a recent milkshaking or one from the archives?

2024-06-02 23:38:08

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It's the Game Dad!
This whole thing was secretly a #gameDad project!
Now I got video, I got sound, and if y'all will kindly recommend a decent Linux-compatible Bluetooth controller from your own personal firsthand experience, Project Big Dad will be complete :D
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/549/644/138/679/729/original/9b5b855e52fabe9a.webp

2024-06-02 23:34:12

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Resi 2 time! But where's the PlayStation? And what's that lurking under there next to the amp?
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/549/638/837/822/520/original/a78e48df390f556f.webp

2024-06-02 23:32:53

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Upstairs CRT gaming is going on!
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/549/633/466/692/041/original/235ecc14ac696ca4.webp

2024-06-02 23:30:35

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*big Dad Wiring sigh*
Right, one component input on the telly, 3 HDMI's on the amp, one HDMI to component switcher, wanna split the sound off through the amp of course...

2024-06-02 14:16:36

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Here's the wax, for those asking. Made in Kent so imported here, so back home it's probably cheap as chips lol
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/547/449/723/528/229/original/970294e447303273.webp

2024-06-02 04:06:45

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(to be fair to it though, I used maybe a twentieth of the can for the whole TV stand, so this'll last me bloody years)

2024-06-02 04:05:27

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Folk are liking how good home depot plywood can look after rubbing with this wax, and I agree. That's what my wood normally looks like after three coats of poly, three hours apart. I'm liking this wax.
I bloody well should be, considering it costs FORTY FIVE DOLLARS A CAN

2024-06-02 02:24:44

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Put a nice sheen on the top and all
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/544/648/770/472/075/original/79520c1c9a582df6.webp

2024-06-02 02:23:07

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I've waxed furniture before, but I've never used wax as a finish, as in literally just rub it into freshly sanded wood.
Ain't no finish in the world that's gonna be fine with having a CRT TV rubbed all over it within a couple hours, it's gonna scratch up either way under the telly, so I went with wax because it's quick and not too fumey and I hadn't used it before so I was curious. Plus robins.
You literally just wax-on-wax-off, two coats because the wood just swallowed up the first one. It turned out pretty nice! Look how well it filled in this end grain!
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/544/642/826/038/415/original/9e6243cc64428e8b.webp

2024-05-31 23:08:31

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So last time the fawn visited, it was gone by they time I picked the kid up. So I didn't tell her about it, didn't want her disappointed that she'd missed it.
This time, I clocked it were still there from the road, told her it was a special day and she had to be quiet and smooth and slow and not go any closer than me, and we went and saw the fawn.
THEN, we went and saw the baby robins.
THEN, while we were watching the robins, we heard movement, and there was the mum, up the hill, with the fawn around her feet.
"Wow," I whispered to her, "Quiet fawn, didn't hear him going up the hill."
So then we got our bikes down and took them past the original fawn FEDI THERE ARE TWO FAWNS

2024-05-31 19:47:00

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"Remembering when it's faun or fawn" is right up there with "How to spell parallel (or rather how to stop spelling it)" on my list of Language Things That Dan Has Made His Peace With Never Quite Grasping

2024-05-31 19:39:11

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Also this lad's back again
Bit of a special day today innit, hatchy robins, visiting fawn, it's all go in my yard today
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/537/387/194/650/091/original/64b09f80ea4d054b.webp

2024-05-31 18:41:22

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I bought a new HVLP sprayer in like February when it was on sale and I had a lucky coupon, I said to the guy "Boy I can't wait til I can try this thing out in like May," bloody robins wait to hatch until I'm just about ready to spray some lacquer
🐣 Whatcha got there Dan?
🦝 Something that'll kill you dead as heck if you get so much as a whiff so instead of firing it up and trying it out I'm just gonna grumble about it on the internet

2024-05-31 18:32:56

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wax in situ maybe?

2024-05-31 18:32:31

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ugh nope can't lacquer it outside because of the baby robins
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/537/129/794/965/643/original/74a449f4e0c409d4.webp

2024-05-31 18:08:31

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Might just run it outside and lacquer it

2024-05-31 18:08:05

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I don't wanna take it downstairs again FFS this thing has barely existed five minutes and I already resent the idea of moving it

2024-05-31 17:32:26

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Q: Why do the sides of the stand extend up along the sides of the telly, why not just stop when the telly's supported?
A: So I can have a shelf atop the telly to fill up with Various Junk

2024-05-31 17:30:35

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🦊 Nice TV stand, by the way do you happen to work in the coin-op industry
🦝 How did you know that
🦊 *eyeing up the shoe rack in the background also using 3/4" plywood to hold 2kg of shoes at a time* Lucky guess
Telly's in, no noticeable deflection on the telly shelf so we're good!
Now I guess I'll take the telly out again and sand this down and Polycrylic it
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/536/874/914/782/896/original/0605ab30f77d29f6.webp

2024-05-31 17:26:31

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Doing a test fit before I sand and finish, brought the stand outta the workshop upstairs to the telly 'cause I thought since the stand is lighter, it'd make more sense than taking the telly downstairs.
Aye the stand's lighter all right but damn is it awkward to move around

2024-05-31 17:24:40

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Here's how much deflection we get with no additional strips and only two sides on (no back). This is already acceptable considering that I'm not as wide as the telly and I'm sitting in the middle rather than spreading the load the whole width of the shelf; the telly's 22kg lighter also, so there would be pretty much no sag at all. Nonetheless I'm still gonna add some 2cm thick strips below this shelf for extra stability when the cats jump on top of it.
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/536/843/747/009/452/original/4f232cc1c49f5007.webp

2024-05-31 17:18:58

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The telly weighs 55kg, I weigh 77kg, to test whether my new CRT stand can handle this telly I'm gonna set this so-called square (actually a triangle, scam) here, sit on the shelf and see how much deflection I get.
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/536/833/707/769/041/original/8dd0eb9f5f9a84f0.webp

2024-05-31 17:15:37

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Alright here we gooooo
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/536/826/890/237/717/original/a4259c5d3e7c3cf9.webp

2024-05-30 04:45:36

Arachnophobes, try this, it bloody works.
I'm not afraid of spiders the way that some folk are - like, I'll tolerate them, I'm sort of a middling-relationship-with-spiders sort of bloke, I'll have one or two in the house but more than that get gently moved outside, I won't freak out at them or try to kill them but I don't wanna empty a bucket of them over my head.
Anyway I found out last month that the Old English word for spider is "wæfer-ganges," meaning Walker-Weaver. Since then, my seven-year-old reminds us periodically (like, whenever she sees a walker-weaver) to call them walker-weavers and damn, yeah, that works.
I opened my mailbox and this massive fluffy black walker-weaver stared back at me, like it was big enough that I could see its two biggest eyes, and it just kinda looked up at me and then turned jerkily away 180 degrees, then turned back again all "is he still there" and turned away again and instead of going "UNEXPECTED SPIDER FFS" and jumping back, my head went "Walker-weaver" and, like... yup, it's walking, it's weaving, that's the walker-weaver's whole deal. Weave on, little walker-weaver.
"Spider" is legit a scary word, it sounds like something that'll spide you if you're not careful and I dunno what that is but I don't want it, "Walker-Weaver" is just, like, a job description

2024-05-25 23:22:19

Wanna guess what I'm making?
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/504/295/714/756/942/original/6c1c248b2cfe343a.webp

2024-05-24 15:39:20

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One more post about Linux and then I'll shut up about it.
(I can do that, because I outgrew the evangelical "Oh my god you have to try this it's so much easier" stage like ten years ago, it's possible for me to shut up about Linux now, which is nicer for everyone involved)
If you have to choose between something that used to be crap but is slowly getting better, and something that used to be alright but is getting inexorably worse, the best time to jump is gonna be when you get to see and take joy in the getting-better bit.
If you leave it too long and the thing you're jumping from has gotten intolerably, unusably bad, you'll be in a hell of a panic and it'll probably be at a super-inconvenient time. Give the New Thing a good sniff ahead of time and play around with it a bit in a non-vital setting, so that you're not moving in a horrible panicked rush.

2024-05-22 03:07:10

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(that's why when you look up a tutorial on how to do a Linux thing it'll involve the terminal, it's because everybody's made their computer look completely different according to their own personal tastes and the terminal's the only thing anyone's got in common anymore)

2024-05-22 02:56:57

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Here's a theme I ended up using for a while, until the default one got so good I didn't want to change anymore: https://www.mate-look.org/p/1080261
This ability to retheme the whole OS reminded me of stuff like RainMeter or WinAmp, but for the Whole Computer, it was and remains Absolutely Banging

2024-05-22 02:41:26

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Anyway yeah you can choose whatever interface you like, when I say "Interface" I'm talking like the start menu, all the various settings menus, the borders and controls around each window, you can make it look and act like however you want, and oof, you can make it So. Damn. Pretty.
That's what I did, the first month of running Linux. Just fiddled with the skins and interfaces. Made it look *gorgeous.*

2024-05-22 02:30:22

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I've heard good things about Linux Mint also, and I think you can choose to have Mate as the interface to that as well.
The Thing: you can choose an interface. That's a thing that makes Linux both brilliant AND shit, because first thing going in you've got to make a decision with basically no information or context. JUST LIKE YOU DID WHEN YOU JOINED YOUR FEDI SERVER, HAHA! And you wondered why there were so many Linux weirdos here, didn'tcha!
There are three ways you can deal with this decision:
1) Spend hours meticulously researching each one because you like spending hours meticulously researching things (this explains why half of Fedi is The Way It Is)
2) Blunder on YOLO style with one that has a cool name and see whether or not you regret it later (this explains the other half of Fedi)
3) Bounce off the decision entirely because it's self-evidently an unreasonable thing to ask (this explains the world outside Fedi)

2024-05-22 01:14:07

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If you want my *specific* linux recommendation, I've been happy with Ubuntu Mate because it's been the same old familiar shit for like fourteen years now
Specifically, it came about because Ubuntu changed from having a slightly shit interface to having a REALLY shit interface back in 2010, and so Mate came along as a continuation of the old GUI that was only a bit shit. It's been getting updates twice a year since then and instead of RADICALLY OVERHAULING THE INTERFACE they've just made it... slightly less shit
Like... if you look at Ubuntu Mate from 2010 and Ubuntu Mate from today, it uses a slightly easier-to-read font now? The colours are a bit nicer? The icons are better? But everything's still in the same place, I haven't had to re-learn anything.
Instead of spending ten years falling over themselves trying to Innovate and Revolutionize and Reinvent, they've just been slowly and carefully sanding off the rough bits, and hoo boy, you spend ten years sanding the same wood, it gets niiiiiice

2024-05-22 00:54:31

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Your computer's always gonna be a bit shit, but if you'll just take my paw, I can 🎶show you how it can be 🎵shiiit in a different waayyyyy🎶

2024-05-22 00:41:01

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Linux is a bit shit sometimes,
There's your headline. I don't care whether you use linux or not; ten years ago that might have mattered, I might be trying to get more people to use it so that adobe or whoever would put more effort into supporting it, but that doesn't really matter anymore, these days everything either Just Works or there's a native equivalent that's better and I've no selfish reason to recommend linux anymore, so if you're happy with windows stick with windows.
If you're *not* happy with windows, here's the other half of that sentence at the top of this post:
Linux is a bit shit sometimes - but when it's a bit shit, it's a bit shit in the way of a cat who watches the mouse run across the living room floor, not in the way of a cat who suddenly decides to bite you for no reason. It's not *actively malicious,* it's just a bit shit sometimes, which these days is tbh pretty damn good compared with a lot of stuff.
Like, it's not bad because it's being hollowed out for investors, it's not bad because it's spying on you to make more money, it's not bad because its makers know you've gotta take it anyway, it's not bad because it knows it can get a lot worse before you look elsewhere, it's just... bad. But bad in like a normal way, like a bike with a wonky gear shifter and tyres that keep going soft, not like a bike that shows you adverts.
There's my linux recommendation.
LINUX: It's A Bit Shit Sometimes™

2024-05-22 00:20:12

Ooooh should Pinball Dad stick his toe in the Linux Discourse
I've been on it since 2010, I guess I should maybe?
How about I stick my whole entire foot in, maybe if I poison it with my footstink then it'll die down a bit

2024-05-20 03:10:58

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"Sucking cold air into your house rather than paying for air conditioning," the post that confuses and enrages Americans every year!
Prerequisites: no nearby wildfires, temperatures lower at night, one fan.
Bonus nice-to-have: indoor/outdoor thermometer/hygrometer. Incense (or vapor or a friend who vapes) to visualize airflow.
Method: at night, open two windows; one in the lowest part of the house (unless you have a basement colder than the outside, in which case find the coldest window that's not colder than the outside), one in the highest. Single-storey places, open a window in the coolest room and another in the hottest. Houses with cats, check window screens, replace screen fabric where necessary.
Orient fan in hottest room, one to two metres away from the open window, with airflow facing OUTWARDS. Put the fan on full blast. As the hot air is forcibly exhausted through the open hot-side window, cool night air is drawn in from the open cold-side window.
It might make more intuitive sense to place the fan facing inward in the cold side window, but try it both ways and you'll see how much easier it is to blow hot air out than blow cool air in. The hot air already wants to leave, it wants to expand into the cold night, adding the exhaust fan encourages it.
The optimal placement of the exhaust fan will be different from room to room; it'll always be facing the window and blowing outwards, but you can make a big difference to efficiency by moving it closer to the window or further away. Experiment, using incense or vapor to make airflow visible.
In the morning, close both windows and turn off the fan.
Advanced: check overnight air temp forecast on your weather app, set timer to pull cold air in until just before sunrise or whenever air is coldest.
Edit: this never occurred to me because I don't have an upstairs bathroom; if you have a bathroom upstairs with an extractor fan, experiment to see if that works well enough in place of the fan I've been talking about this whole time

2024-05-20 02:19:21

Every winter: 🦝 ah, time to make the annual "Here's how to DIY an anti-SAD lightbox" post
Every summer: 🦝 oho, time to make the annual "Here's how to suck cold air in" post

2024-05-07 21:57:25

Periodic reminder that I'll advertise your weird hobby website to my Improbable Island players for free, no catch, https://www.improbableisland.com/hobbysites.php
Why? Because google doesn't like it when people give away what they're trying to sell, and fuck those guys lol

2024-04-11 14:04:24

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Spudge around the outside with yer spudger, releasing the plastic clips holding the two sides of the case together. This is often a PITA but not this time, this was super chill.
Folk unused to taking things apart will often use a butter knife or something for this, don't do that. Use a plastic spudger. Using a metal thing inevitably ends up chewing up the plastic.
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/252/951/999/744/921/original/3bda54897f002ecd.webp

2024-04-11 14:01:37

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This is a show-and-tell thread, so images will be described inside the post text rather than alt text.
First these six screws on the back come off, you'll need a T6 screwdriver.
There's no hidden screw behind the model number sticker there. I'm so used to manufacturers hiding screws behind that sticker that this feels WEIRD.
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/252/944/958/077/809/original/e7d9152a211a50e6.webp

2024-04-11 13:59:17

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Aah let's do a nice easy relaxing #gameDad joystick swap.
At this point in the process, everything was super chill.
https://retro.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/252/937/514/050/894/original/190950cc5e028703.webp

2024-04-11 05:04:58

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It's 1am, I'm about to fall into exhausted sleep, but first an update on my #gameDad joystick swap, I'll tell y'all the whole sordid tale tomorrow but have these two highlights in the meantime:
1. Gulikit hall-effect joysticks are mockable clownshoes nonsense, people only think they're good because they're comparing them to broken Nintendo Switch joysticks and they only work at all because Nintendo made an excellent calibration system to try to squeak a few more months out of their crummy Switch joysticks.
2. Linux has two joystick APIs and it's not easy to find out which one your software is using, but the important part is that they both suck.
🐰 Gee Dan, wasn't the start of this thread all about doing happy little quick repair jobs so you could get back to doing your cosy nightly ritual which involves playing open source games on a tiny little handheld Linux computer with cute little joysticks
🦝 buddy lemme fckn tell you smth

2024-04-07 18:11:03

Spouse and I have kinda settled into a nice routine where we listen to a podcast together immediately after putting sproglet to bed. We drink tea and listen to No Such Thing As A Fish. She knits and I play Rollercoaster Tycoon on my #gameDad. Sometimes we light some incense. This is our transitional time of shifting gears between work/parenting and doing our own thing for the rest of the evening. It's very cosy and nice.
Between the occasional playing with mucky/oily hands because I have the gameDad with me in the car, and simply putting so much time on the joysticks, I've pretty much completely worn them out. Fortunately this Anbernic RG353V uses bog-standard Nintendo Switch style joycon joysticks, so I've ordered a pair of replacements that should be here tomorrow.
So I guess expect a little disassembly thread in the next few days :)