efaardvark Posted August 22, 2025 Share Posted August 22, 2025 (edited) Got a couple more items for the solar power setup. I decided to get a second battery and to make this one a 48V battery. The first one was a 24V because that's what my solar panels put out. This operation being something of an experiment however I decided I'd like to have a higher-voltage battery to play with as well. There's some tradeoffs due to the different voltage levels so I wanted an opportunity to try both. With the new battery I needed another charge controller because my 24V controller can't boost the 24V panel voltage to the ~50 volts the new battery needs to charge. So I got one of those too. The battery came a couple days ago but the new charge controller just came today and by the time I got home from work the sun was already too low to see how that part works. This evening I read the manual, installed the app (there's always an app), and got the unit physically wired up and waiting for tomorrow's sunrise. If I did that right then by tomorrow evening it should have the battery fully charged. This weekend when I have more time to play I'll put the thing through it's paces. Spoiler Edited August 22, 2025 by efaardvark Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sonic Whammy Posted October 10, 2025 Share Posted October 10, 2025 Been a big fan of the board game Heroquest since the original run in the early 90s. When the game came back in 2021, I started collecting again the following year (missed the initial crowdfunding, found out months after). And as of now, I have all the current pieces thanks to the release of the remaining Mythic Tier expansion pack: Joe Manganiello's The Crypt of Perpetual Darkness. Haven't played it yet because I haven't gotten the kids up for a round in a while, but I look forward to it, it all looks awesome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted December 16, 2025 Share Posted December 16, 2025 Got some more DSN swag from work today.. a DSN 60-year anniversary poster: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted December 21, 2025 Share Posted December 21, 2025 (edited) Got a CPU cooler to add to the pile of parts I’ve been collecting for a completely new computer build. At this point I’ve got pretty much everything. I just have one key part left to acquire, the GPU. Once I have that I'll start putting it all together. Still haven't quite decided which OS to put on it. Linux for sure but I haven't picked the distro. Definitely not Ubuntu. I might have to try a couple distros before selecting a winner. I have Pop on my laptop so that's one contender. CachyOS is getting a lot of hits on distrowatch lately. It's also Arch based, which is a plus in my book. Maybe one or two others will get a chance if something interesting catches my attention. (Suggestions welcome.) I'm keeping my old system (that I'm typing this on) at least until I get the new one up and running and I took a couple weeks off work for the holidays so I don't really have a deadline to meet to get it all done. I can take my time deciding the details. Edited December 21, 2025 by efaardvark 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted December 24, 2025 Share Posted December 24, 2025 (edited) And finally the last piece of the build arrives… Edited December 24, 2025 by efaardvark 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReverzerO Posted December 24, 2025 Share Posted December 24, 2025 On 12/21/2025 at 1:05 PM, efaardvark said: Got a CPU cooler to add to the pile of parts I’ve been collecting for a completely new computer build. At this point I’ve got pretty much everything. I just have one key part left to acquire, the GPU. Once I have that I'll start putting it all together. Still haven't quite decided which OS to put on it. Linux for sure but I haven't picked the distro. Definitely not Ubuntu. I might have to try a couple distros before selecting a winner. I have Pop on my laptop so that's one contender. CachyOS is getting a lot of hits on distrowatch lately. It's also Arch based, which is a plus in my book. Maybe one or two others will get a chance if something interesting catches my attention. (Suggestions welcome.) I'm keeping my old system (that I'm typing this on) at least until I get the new one up and running and I took a couple weeks off work for the holidays so I don't really have a deadline to meet to get it all done. I can take my time deciding the details. Will it work dual booting? Linux and windows! I tried on my deck but after several months, the new update ruin the dual boot! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted December 24, 2025 Share Posted December 24, 2025 2 hours ago, ReverzerO said: Will it work dual booting? Linux and windows! I tried on my deck but after several months, the new update ruin the dual boot! I don't use Windows so I wont be dual booting. (Believe it or not I've never owned a Windows system.) There's nothing in the hardware that would get in the way of doing so if I wanted to however. If it doesn't work then I'd consider it a MSFT / software bug. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LaEspoir Posted December 25, 2025 Share Posted December 25, 2025 honestly I am not much of a collector, I'd say the recent stuff I added was probably these two laptops that I thrifted and fixed up and ended up not using them cause ones too fat to take anywhere and the other has battery issues. (Yes Ik buy a new battery) But now theyre just rotting in my room, I had initially thrifted the smaller stuff to begin writing scripts for my youtube channel and work on a novel even. But i am a wage slave and do not even have the energy to work on anything before or after work! On 12/23/2025 at 8:53 PM, efaardvark said: And finally the last piece of the build arrives… watering at the mouth looking at this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReverzerO Posted December 28, 2025 Share Posted December 28, 2025 On 12/24/2025 at 10:16 PM, efaardvark said: I don't use Windows so I wont be dual booting. (Believe it or not I've never owned a Windows system.) There's nothing in the hardware that would get in the way of doing so if I wanted to however. If it doesn't work then I'd consider it a MSFT / software bug. We're opposite, I never owned Linux 'till I owned a deck with Linux-based os or simply steam os but after I replaced windows because most of the softwares am using are only for windows. Proton is causing serious glitches by running windows softwares on steam os! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 (edited) I got one of those wireless oven thermometers. Seems to work pretty well when it comes to things like chicken or fish that can easily get dry or chewy if overcooked. I haven’t tried it with fish yet but the chicken I tried was juicy and didn’t give me salmonella. It has a decent range too. It is Bluetooth but I was able to take the hand unit from the kitchen to the computer a couple rooms away and it still let me know when the temperature limit was met. Edited February 7 by efaardvark 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeref Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 6 hours ago, efaardvark said: I got one of those wireless oven thermometers. Seems to work pretty well when it comes to things like chicken or fish that can easily get dry or chewy if overcooked. I haven’t tried it with fish yet but the chicken I tried was juicy and didn’t give me salmonella. It has a decent range too. It is Bluetooth but I was able to take the hand unit from the kitchen to the computer a couple rooms away and it still let me know when the temperature limit was met. I saw one of these not long ago and thought about buy one but wasn't sure how good they might work. Sold me on you didn't catch salmonella though lol. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sakura Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 Not getting salmonella is always a W lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted February 17 Share Posted February 17 (edited) Having been alive and a techie for the past couple decades I of course have a large number of various vintages of USB cables. Some of them are of dubious manufacture, doing data but not power or power but not data. So I finally went and bought a USB cable tester. This one reports the info in the cables’ eMarker chip (if any) but it also claims to actually test the cable. We’ll see. It should at least help me triage the rats nest of cables that I have and tell me which ones to get rid of. Edited February 17 by efaardvark 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sakura Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 I finally got my gaming headphones in the mail today ~ I was recommended this brand by several streamer friends and they are soooo amazing. One of my friends that uses them said she tested the charge life and she got up to 94 hours before without having to recharge them, which is pretty impressive. They aren't super duper expensive either, they range in $40 - $80. So far I've tried out the mic and it's amazinggggg, the sound is really good, no latency issues playing games or in VC's. Plus, optional kitty kat ears, I'm set 1 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Animedragon Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 5 hours ago, Sakura said: I finally got my gaming headphones in the mail today ~ I was recommended this brand by several streamer friends and they are soooo amazing. One of my friends that uses them said she tested the charge life and she got up to 94 hours before without having to recharge them, which is pretty impressive. They aren't super duper expensive either, they range in $40 - $80. So far I've tried out the mic and it's amazinggggg, the sound is really good, no latency issues playing games or in VC's. Plus, optional kitty kat ears, I'm set They look very nice, pink, as would be expected and little cat-ears as well. Yup, they certainly suit you 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jellal Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 10 hours ago, Sakura said: I finally got my gaming headphones in the mail today ~ I was recommended this brand by several streamer friends and they are soooo amazing. One of my friends that uses them said she tested the charge life and she got up to 94 hours before without having to recharge them, which is pretty impressive. They aren't super duper expensive either, they range in $40 - $80. So far I've tried out the mic and it's amazinggggg, the sound is really good, no latency issues playing games or in VC's. Plus, optional kitty kat ears, I'm set This is what I use and I'm never using another kind again. No mine don't have cat ears everyone lol 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Animedragon Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 7 hours ago, Jellal said: This is what I use and I'm never using another kind again. No mine don't have cat ears everyone lol Well cat ears wouldn't suit you as well as they do @Sakura but are yours pink as well? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sakura Posted February 18 Share Posted February 18 9 hours ago, Jellal said: This is what I use and I'm never using another kind again. No mine don't have cat ears everyone lol YEAH RIGHT WE KNOW YOU GOT THE CAT EARS LOL 2 hours ago, Animedragon said: Well cat ears wouldn't suit you as well as they do @Sakura but are yours pink as well? His are prolly pink AND have cat ears LOL ~ I was also really happy to find out that these can connect to my PC, laptop, tablet, phone, playstation controler, xbox controllers, switch, and about anything. I wanna find out if this company sells normal headphones too because I loveeee these Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
efaardvark Posted March 24 Share Posted March 24 (edited) Got a "challenge coin" - sometimes called a "unit" or "memorial" coin - and yet another pin for collection. These were for my part in the ECC activation back in January of last year when the "Eaton" fire burned all those houses in Altadena and Pasadena and forced the evacuation and shutdown of JPL, including the realtime tracking and data processing for all the NASA spacecraft and rovers flying at the time. Had to move all that to an emergency data processing facility out at Goldstone, then move things back once the winds and fire allowed the Lab to reopen. Edited March 24 by efaardvark wiki url 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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