Random thoughts.... [Tech Edition]

While the discussion is somewhat on a topic of power tools, I'll jump right in.

It seems my decade old cheap electric screwdriver is finally dying. It was an off-brand 6V tiny thing, and I'm completely blown away by how long it held together and how much stuff it helped me build over the years, but it's lost a lot of torque and isn't holding charge for more than a few minutes of work anymore, and the battery is non-removable, so basically dead.

Now I'm thinking, this might be a good point to start a proper 18V power tool set going. Currently looking at Ryobi with a "drill/screwdriver + 2x 2Ah batteries + fast charger" starter set (R18DD3-220TA17) at 126€ regular price. There are also a couple other 18V tools Ryobi makes that I'd look into for expanding the set - hand vacuum and hot glue gun being the ones I'd want first.

Makita was recommended as an alternative on Telegram, and they do have similar stuff. But it seems more expensive, at least in regular pricing. I'll probably be waiting for Black Friday/CyberMonday/whatever the sales are called that come before the holiday season, there's no rush.

Any recommendations, experiences and general comments much welcome :)
Honestly, Ryobi will probably suit you well. Unless you’re using it for your job and drilling stuff all day. When I was in a trade that required such tools, something like Milwaukee was fine and many others used Makita, Rigid, or DeWalt. All 3 could be used for 8 hours while interchanging batteries as one dies and the next finishes charging.
 
Unless you’re using it for your job and drilling stuff all day.
Nah, the hardest my tools ever have to work are furniture assembly and various household repair/mod sessions. Maybe some car work when I eventually move to a place with a garage and buy another MX-5 :p Having two batteries to swap will probably be overkill for like 90% of my use already.
 
Yeah Ryobi should be fine, I bought into Makita because I felt like it I suppose... when it comes to some things I like to pay a bit extra for better quality. Going by the amount of use mine get they should pretty much last forever. The important thing when I bought the drill was having a metal chuck, some Ryobi models have this too.

The glue gun is also on my list, adapters to use Makita batteries (like the very slim Badaptor) are cheap enough to make buying non-Makita tools reasonable.
 
I mean.... Mighty Car Mods exclusively use Ryobi power tools. *shrug*
 
I just bought a 12V Bosch cordless drill/screwdriver with a toolkit and case!




And completely forgot I needed to drill concrete and this thing is NOT a hammerdrill and therefore useless for what I need.
*headdesk*

Oh, well. I'll see if I can borrow or rent one. Fuck buying an impact drill for ONE thing.
 
blew up an ancient g4 halogen lamp the other day and thought to myself "better replace that with LED". took the gamble with the power supply to see whether it'd start with only a 3W load instead of the old 20W... and it seems the power supply is so old that it doesn't care. yay for that, no need to spend another 3€ for a different psu :p

regarding power tools: this past weekend i had to endure one of the nieghbours trying and failing to drill a few holes into the concrete walls here because he had a laughingly underpowered hammerdrill it seems. lots of squeaking and squealing going through the whole house, ugh. go big or go ho... err... away! yeah.
 
I just bought a 12V Bosch cordless drill/screwdriver with a toolkit and case!




And completely forgot I needed to drill concrete and this thing is NOT a hammerdrill and therefore useless for what I need.
*headdesk*

Oh, well. I'll see if I can borrow or rent one. Fuck buying an impact drill for ONE thing.
Eh, I’ve defaulted to impact drills purely so that when I’m drilling something my hand doesn’t twist with the tool when it bottoms out. Though yes, a hammer drill is what you’d need. Do you have a DIY store that offer such things to rent?
 
Eh, I’ve defaulted to impact drills purely so that when I’m drilling something my hand doesn’t twist with the tool when it bottoms out. Though yes, a hammer drill is what you’d need. Do you have a DIY store that offer such things to rent?
Yes, for a reasonable 15 euros per day, but first I'll try to lend a better drill.
 
I ordered the DeWalt DCC018N inflator/compressor thingy today on eBay, from a seller in Spain. Significantly cheaper than the UK sellers, hopefully that's not due to anything shady but it is supposed to be brand new. From what I can tell I shouldn't pay any import taxes.

It's still around twice the price of the Ryobi but to get that to run on 12V I would need to get a beefy 12V to 18/19/20V laptop charger which boosts the price by a fair amount. I would never be happy plugging that rig into the Tesla either, at least with a properly built device I have some comeback if it causes problems.

As for my idea of using this machine to top off my pressure-tank oil filler, I'm just going to find out the relief pressure, set it just below that and keep pressing the go button every time the pressure drops. It might not be able to keep up with the pressure drop anyway. I only use the filler once in a blue moon so it's not like it's critical and just prodding a button every 30 seconds will be much better than pumping the handle constantly.
 
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So... our regional telco and ISP got gobbled up by a bigger one a few years back. Customer service went to shit and they're quickly discontinuing copper and cable service in areas where it isn't considered profitable. My parents got a letter the other day that their tv, cable internet and oldskool phone service will be cut off on new years eve. They're offering their own 4G and internet TV service as replacement.

So now I ordered the mother of all LTE modems, a beefy outdoor unit that goes on the roof. It has 7dBi antennas and there's no antenna cable for that signal gain to get lost in, because the modem and everything is built into the outdoor unit. It's fed by PoE and will be connected to an AmpliFi mesh system. Their wi-fi is built into the cable modem so it'll need replacing as well, and I might as well do it properly to get rid of the dead zones in their house.

We still have to get the TV service sorted out, but I think I know what to go with.

And no, we won't be buying any of these services from the ISP that just shafted a couple that's been a loyal customer for 40+ years.
 
I lent I wired, hammerdrill!


The drill bits suck!
 
So now I ordered the mother of all LTE modems, a beefy outdoor unit that goes on the roof.

This thing produced almost 100Mbit/s on the floor in my living room. My iPhone using the exact same carrier and plan managed 29.

I’m impressed.
 
Contention on that must be horrible?

Getting TV on satellite?
 
This thing produced almost 100Mbit/s on the floor in my living room. My iPhone using the exact same carrier and plan managed 29.

I’m impressed.
It's one of the reasons I don't care much for 5G at the moment, 4G is plenty fast enough with the right hardware. What's the upload like?

Pretty sure I'm going to order an iPhone 12 Pro Max, working around the issue of the thing not physically fitting in the Tesla's phone holder and the charging coil being offset, using full scale paper cutouts. I don't want to miss out on the fairly significant benefits the Max brings over the Pro for the relatively small price increase.

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If I remove the little shelf stand thing on this charger it should come back in line, the car still has a stop so the phone won't fall out. This was an aftermarket phone holder so I don't mind butchering it, already opened it up to see where the coils were so know there's nothing important behind there.

Following my earlier comment I wouldn't be upgrading to a 5G contract unless it's included automatically at some point.
 
On /r/teslamotors there were some posts showing the 12 Pro Max fitting onto the charger and charging fine, even with some (thin) cases. I'd probably try it out before doing any modifications...
 
It's one of the reasons I don't care much for 5G at the moment, 4G is plenty fast enough with the right hardware. What's the upload like?

10 or so, both on my phone and on the modem. I'm all for 5G but this is in a sparsely populated area, even by Finnish standards, and I think it'll be a while before we get 5G. I'm trying to make the best of what we have.

In a completely unrelated note:

In a recent FG Google Meet, we discussed why Finland's country code is +358 while all our neighbouring countries to the west are +44, 45, 46 and 47. The reason is (and this really is the truth) that the guy we sent out to the conference to secure +48 or whatever got drunk and was passed out under the table when the deals were made. We got what was left.
 
On /r/teslamotors there were some posts showing the 12 Pro Max fitting onto the charger and charging fine, even with some (thin) cases. I'd probably try it out before doing any modifications...
Huh that's interesting, thanks. You're right, it's definitely worth trying before chopping things up (no matter how eager I am to get the saw out). I like chunky cases and ultimately want to get a Moment case when it's available, that allows different lenses to be fitted in addition to providing protection.

Edit: To paraphrase LGR, I bought the stupid big phone. :LOL:

10 or so, both on my phone and on the modem.
More than acceptable and scales with my 200Mbps down connection that offers 20 up. Funny what you can do without the power consumption restriction of a mobile device.
 
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Just ran a quick speedtest on my phone on 4G, can't imagine it will be much faster when 5G is deployed here.

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