[X] My Assistant

Pics of radio keyed up, and using a bootleg probe to hook up a frequency counter. I am unsure if the radio, or the counter is the one in error, and I noticed a jitter of some 50Hz. Neither instrument was fully warmed up, though, and the counter is sitting directly on a radio that isn't sheilded properly.
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VFO is set to 14.3MHz with digital hold turned on, counter is displaying KHz.
'Probe' is a 220K 1/2W and 2K2 1/4W resistor, helping hand has a jumper to the radio chassis for RF ground. The alligator clip coupled by just dangling nearby gave too much jitter, and RF output is potentially over 100V RMS. I should get a real 100:1 50Z 50MHz or so probe...

I wish I had a frequency counter. I used one at my old job and it was fantastic.

That one used nixie tubes for the display, though.

Meanwell PS-45-27 finally fixed. This is what was actually wrong with it: a resistor, an optocoupler, a zener, and the bariable voltage reference were blown. PWM controller was replaced but likely didn't need to be, and many parts were tested in situ or removed to test.
Added a pair of 1N6377 15 volt TVSS diodes in series across the output. They'll clamp any positive voltage over ~32V and negative over 1V, so it should prevent me from blowing it out again. The supply has great isolation and layered protection for itself, but lacked any protection against external power. Zener I blew was an overvoltage sense, I had two 16V zeners to replace the 31V one if I recall the values correctly. Board had pads for a single or series zeners there anyways.
TVSS diodes and zeners came from my parts boxes via cheap component assortments.

Voltage refference 'SHR1', resistor R32, zener ZD2 (replaced by ZD3 and ZD4), and optocoupler U2 are what got cooked. New protection diodes are in the group of caps at bottome right.

Glad you figured out what happened.

I just spent a little while wrestling with a suckless (ew) program before deciding that it wasn't worth my time.

I am unable to get `tabbed` to work with xterm in such a way that the 'status line'/terminal title gets updated in sync with me changing directories. It works fine when running xterm on its own (basically I hook on PROMPT_COMMAND and use it to set the status line). With tabbed wrapping it, it is always one directory behind wherever I currently am (e.g., where I was before I last ran 'cd').

I was just trying it because I'm trying to reduce overhead however I can on my powerbook. But even suckless tools use freetype/xft fonts (instead of just using X bitmaps).

I remain convinced that suckless is a meme.

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Apr 24 2021, 23:18

life is suck. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/anime_cry.gif)

life is suck. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/anime_cry.gif)

pretty much, but suckless especially sucks

My new computer is about 10x faster at video encoding, than my old one, not that I do much encoding anymore.

My new computer is about 10x faster at video encoding, than my old one, not that I do much encoding anymore.

Nice; the last time I remember having that kind of improvement was when I moved from a Pentium D to something that wasn't a Pentium D.

VP9 encoding is still hella slow, though; I wonder if that'll get more optimized anytime soonish.

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Apr 27 2021, 08:01

AMD is adding a hardware VP9 decoder i think, novideo doesn't have that i also think.

Their new drivers also drastically reduce watt usage on idle and video playback.

This post has been edited by Pillowgirl: Apr 27 2021, 16:25

WD40 works alright on GPU fans, as long as you take the fan out in order to apply it and let it dry before you put it back. No one sells GPU fans for 10+ years old GPUs anymore apparently so the only option is to fix it by oneself. I'm so glad that my machine does not sound like soviet tractor anymore.

WD40 works alright on GPU fans, as long as you take the fan out in order to apply it and let it dry before you put it back. No one sells GPU fans for 10+ years old GPUs anymore apparently so the only option is to fix it by oneself. I'm so glad that my machine does not sound like soviet tractor anymore.

I thought you just take off the shroud and attach cpu fans on it?

WD40 works alright on GPU fans, as long as you take the fan out in order to apply it and let it dry before you put it back. No one sells GPU fans for 10+ years old GPUs anymore apparently so the only option is to fix it by oneself. I'm so glad that my machine does not sound like soviet tractor anymore.

Electric motor oil, or a similar product will be much better. WD-40 doesn't have terribly good long term lubricating properties, and leaves a slightly gummy film that can attract more grime.



Did a partial recap of the TS-830S- the high voltage B+, screen, and grid caps. Also replaced were the bleed resistors and bypass caps across the B+ caps, the old carbon composition screen and cathode resistors, and the DC blocking cap at the anode of the finals. Got it on the air and heard some other stations, but wasn't able to make a contact (largely in part to the relatively poor antenna I setup for testing).

As time permits, I'll go through the service manuals for it + it's matching accessories, and place a digikey order for the remaining small electrolytic capacitors, and possibly aquire a spare set of tubes for it. There's a risk-reward tradeoff for replacing every electrolytic cap I'll have to mull over, but small caps are cheap and the ones that are highest risk are done.



Also made major headway in refurbishing a large switching supply I got cheap- but unknown to me had a hack job done in it, and was rendered electrically quite unsafe. To spare the nitty gritty, the worst thing I found- the 12AWG linecord had it's ground chopped off, and was jumered to the chassis via a 20awg wire (from a lamp zip-cord) tacked to a solder eye dtuck under a standoff.

Electric motor oil, or a similar product will be much better.

You beat me to it. I use a little bottle of oil meant for model train engines and stuff for PC fans (and also for old CD drives' spindle motors). "Fractional horsepower electric motor oil" or something like that.

WD-40 doesn't have terribly good long term lubricating properties, and leaves a slightly gummy film that can attract more grime.

Yeah.
I wonder if electrical contact cleaner (such as QRC) would strip that film off? Might need to try it sometime.
That all being said, I did successfully use WD-40 to get a seized up turntable platter spinning again for someone a few years ago; as of last year it was still working fine. Quite a bit bigger than just a tiny electric motor, though, and IDK if I'd have done that were I doing it again today.

Also made major headway in refurbishing a large switching supply I got cheap- but unknown to me had a hack job done in it, and was rendered electrically quite unsafe. To spare the nitty gritty, the worst thing I found- the 12AWG linecord had it's ground chopped off, and was jumered to the chassis via a 20awg wire (from a lamp zip-cord) tacked to a solder eye dtuck under a standoff.

Heh. Probably was for guerrilla ground loop removal or something.

I thought you just take off the shroud and attach cpu fans on it?

If they fit, sure, but in my GPU the fan is actually moulded into the shroud and there are no mounting points for other fan types; it's probably doable with erector set parts or something but it'd be a hassle.
Maybe wrapping cable ties around it would work, though.

AMD is adding a hardware VP9 decoder i think, novideo doesn't have that i also think.

Their new drivers also drastically reduce watt usage on idle and video playback.

But I'm talking about encoding. Also, VP8 and VP9 both aren't too well optimized compared to something like x264/x265, even on pure-CPU implementations.

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Apr 28 2021, 00:11

Sorry, double-post again.

This post has been edited by dragontamer8740: Apr 28 2021, 00:08

I thought you just take off the shroud and attach cpu fans on it?

That is plan F indeed.

Electric motor oil, or a similar product will be much better. WD-40 doesn't have terribly good long term lubricating properties, and leaves a slightly gummy film that can attract more grime.

I guess I'll need to invest into some good machine oil if the current fix does not last. The position of the card allows it to escape the dust coming from the cpu fan so I am hopeful that it will hold for a while.

Nice; the last time I remember having that kind of improvement was when I moved from a Pentium D to something that wasn't a Pentium D.

VP9 encoding is still hella slow, though; I wonder if that'll get more optimized anytime soonish.

Yeah same, from the D to the i7 920 was a huge jump.

You beat me to it. I use a little bottle of oil meant for model train engines and stuff for PC fans (and also for old CD drives' spindle motors). "Fractional horsepower electric motor oil" or something like that.Yeah.
I wonder if electrical contact cleaner (such as QRC) would strip that film off? Might need to try it sometime.

CRC or Chemtronics should clean it up, yeah. I got a little dropper bottle of anti-oxidant + protector contact cleaner, I need to apply to some rotary switches and buttons...

Probably was for guerrilla ground loop removal or something.

The ground was tagged off that same terminal to a very chinese line filter, and all the dc and ac lines were hacked to peices with ferrites on them. #12awg THHN was used to make up additional length in the DC side, lamp cord in the AC side. On the line, both sides on an 18awg lamp cord was used. I cut all of that out and replaced the jakey huge capacitors after the line rectifier- the terminals wiggled relative to the cans.
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Rear panel, and power relay aren't done yet.
This is a 1500W output, 1800W from the wall variable lab supply. The guy I got it from said he used it to run radios, and he aquired it second hand, and denies ever having the chassis open. Tbh, only opened it because I heard hardwre rattling around inside. He also used it to run radios, which is a "doing it wrong" for anything more than checking power draw, or seeing how the voltage effects the RF output.

I got my linears second hand, but they were unmolested inside. I added a thermal switch and bypass for it to rhe fan wiring of one.

Random pic of resistor replacement in radio. The blue resistors replaced some carbon comp ones known to roman candle on failure.
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Found out that the samsung fast chargers don't play nice with an increasing number of electronics.

With qualcomm enabled devices it does a slow charge.

With other electronics it can over charge.

What are the pros and cons of encoding to videos with Variable frame rate mode even if the source's frame frate is Constant?

What are the pros and cons of encoding to videos with Variable frame rate mode even if the source's frame frate is Constant?

When recording with a lower frame rate for darker environments this can extend the exposure time per frame and improve the ability of the sensor to capture light.


For encoding this can allow better compression in the best case scenario when there are more static frames.

Its great for creating videos of power point presentations (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/ohmy.gif)

It can be a strategy to allow devices with high max frame rates and relatively low storage capacities to record more; eg mobile phones.

Animation can be a use case as well and streaming.


VBR is probably the easier way to achieve higher compression with lower trade offs.

This post has been edited by EsotericSatire: Apr 29 2021, 12:08