The "New Toys" Thread

Frickin' lasers!

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Something to play with over the Christmas break since I can't go anywhere - a 5.5W laser head for my 3018 CNC. Apparently makes short work of acrylic and a channel showing the ability to cut your own gasket paper sold the idea to me. Haven't decided if I trust the goggles yet...

PSU does actually come with like this with a hard wired US plug and Euro adapter, I'm going to just cut the plug off and put a proper UK one on.
 
Frickin' lasers!

View attachment 3559572

Something to play with over the Christmas break since I can't go anywhere - a 5.5W laser head for my 3018 CNC. Apparently makes short work of acrylic and a channel showing the ability to cut your own gasket paper sold the idea to me. Haven't decided if I trust the goggles yet...

PSU does actually come with like this with a hard wired US plug and Euro adapter, I'm going to just cut the plug off and put a proper UK one on.

When does your Styropyro-like channel start?
 
Frickin' lasers!
What I ask myself every time with these laser cutters - but somehow never hard enough to justify proper research (sorry!): what is the laser dumped / trapped in once it's through the actual work piece that you're cutting? or rather: what prevents you from just cutting through a hole through the friggin floor? I am kidding here ofc, but is it "just" basically a question of timing / forward speed?
 
What I ask myself every time with these laser cutters - but somehow never hard enough to justify proper research (sorry!): what is the laser dumped / trapped in once it's through the actual work piece that you're cutting? or rather: what prevents you from just cutting through a hole through the friggin floor? I am kidding here ofc, but is it "just" basically a question of timing / forward speed?
It's the feed rate that stops it burning through whatever the workpiece is sitting on but beyond that it's also the focus of the laser. It has to be adjusted for each different height of material to have enough concentrated energy to cut, if you could theoretically have the workpiece floating then once the laser cut through it would not be focused enough to cut through the bottom of an enclosed machine, the floor or the entire planet. :D

Space lasers, on the other hand...

I know you didn't ask but you'll be pleased to know that you can apparently make toast with a laser cutter. I feel like I should prove it.
 
Hah, neat - somehow the focus thing didn't occur to me, but that does make a lot of sense.
And yeah, the toast thing doesn't surprise me one bit. I've seen lasered apples (like the skin burnt off to make a logo) for promotional purposes quite a few times already...
 
Frickin' lasers!

View attachment 3559572

Something to play with over the Christmas break since I can't go anywhere - a 5.5W laser head for my 3018 CNC. Apparently makes short work of acrylic and a channel showing the ability to cut your own gasket paper sold the idea to me. Haven't decided if I trust the goggles yet...

PSU does actually come with like this with a hard wired US plug and Euro adapter, I'm going to just cut the plug off and put a proper UK one on.
Really neat. A small CNC is something I've also been thinking of getting/making - occasionally a part comes up that I need for a drone/plane/some DIY project that is much easier to cut from a flat piece than 3D print, if the latter is at all possible. My wordclock has been running with a paper-printed "temporary" front cover for years now, a laser-cut piece of acrylic would be ideal there :) Maybe something basic like this, I do already have the Dremel for the "spindle"... https://www.instructables.com/DIY-3D-Printed-Dremel-CNC/

Do tell how your experience with the laser goes.
 
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A 500GB Samsung 860 EVO SSD for my Dell workstation PC. This is the last bit I'll upgrade for now, if 500GB proves to be insufficient (which I doubt it will), I'll probably go for another one of these and RAID 0 them with the integrated Intel SATA RAID controller. Alternatively, I could go for a pricier option and put an NVMe drive with an adaptor in one of the PCI-E slots, but I don't think I'll need more than 500GB SSD storage for now.

Also, the PSU adaptor for the GTX 1080 arrived today, and I already tried Forza Horizon 4 Demo. I must say the game gets constant 60 FPS even with all the settings cranked up to the max. I can say that I definitely won't be bored during the winter break!
 
My Steelseries left click started giving up, figured i'd try wireless again. So far I can see the hype, took me less than a minute to get super comfy with it and click heads.

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Christmas brought me a pair of AirPods... which is really weird because I was actually looking for some cordless earphones to wear while running and I just cannot stand the in-ear Type. Strange coincidence. Anyway so far I am quite happy with them (I actually like the fact that they don’t block out noise very well), and while I’ve not worn them for a run yet, I am fairly confident I’m not going to lose them.

also, come February, I’ll hopefully have one of these, because it seems I’m old and a sucker for kitchen gadgets:
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I envy you SO MUCH right now.
 
I envy you SO MUCH right now.
I was honestly surprised how cheap the damn thing actually is! We currently have basically the cheapest Bosch full-size oven, and honestly, it’s not great (it doesn’t suck, it’s rather meh). This thing is basically 300€ more (yes, still a lot of money, basically twice the price) but I’d expected it to be way in the 4 digits tbh.
 
I was honestly surprised how cheap the damn thing actually is! We currently have basically the cheapest Bosch full-size oven, and honestly, it’s not great (it doesn’t suck, it’s rather meh). This thing is basically 300€ more (yes, still a lot of money, basically twice the price) but I’d expected it to be way in the 4 digits tbh.
Yeah, I read some reviews and that convinced me.
I was 100% happy with my thermocirculator so I was curious to see this oven.
I miss my thermocirculator, I should buy a new one.
 
That is very reasonably priced. When my parents renovated their kitchen a few years ago they bought a similar sort of oven as a secondary oven in the kitchen. I believe it's something like this one, so they are generally not cheap. Extremely convenient though...
 
That is very reasonably priced. When my parents renovated their kitchen a few years ago they bought a similar sort of oven as a secondary oven in the kitchen. I believe it's something like this one, so they are generally not cheap. Extremely convenient though...
That's what I thought... since it's basically competing against stuff usually reserved for professional kitchens, it's crazy that it is less than 1/5th of what the corresponding Miele costs. I mean, Miele has to be twice the price compared to Electrolux (which is basically what this is - Anova is owned by Electrolux), but 5x is a different story.

... on another note, anyone nearby need a basic Bosch oven from February? no? :p
 
I was honestly surprised how cheap the damn thing actually is! We currently have basically the cheapest Bosch full-size oven, and honestly, it’s not great (it doesn’t suck, it’s rather meh). This thing is basically 300€ more (yes, still a lot of money, basically twice the price) but I’d expected it to be way in the 4 digits tbh.
I have one of the cheapest Bosch US-Market made dishwasher and for me, it’s the best new appliance, it’s the most quiet dishwasher I’ve owned. With my house being smaller and much less usual of the American suburban McMansion style, kitchen and bedrooms are close by and this solves the noise issue entirely. You can pretty much only hear it if you’re standing next to it, or if you focus on it from a distance. No longer do I think about running it while I’m out or setting the timer to have it start while I’m at work. Oh, and it cleans dishes.
 
I bought a new dishwasher to replace my old one when the wash result started deteriorating. The new one isn't much better and I'm guessing it's because of the environment.
 
I don't know if they are hooked up the same way as they are here, but try running the hot water in the nearby sink faucet. This way the first rinse is already hot.
 
No, appliances are fed using cold water. I think it's just a case of a more modern appliance designed to save as much water as possible instead of rinsing things properly.

I'm not suggesting you should pour your used engine oil on the ground and burn used car tires to heat your home, but sometimes these things get ridiculous. The switch in my old (German made) cable modem was set to 10/100 to "save energy". Not optimal when you've got a 250Mbit cable connection...
 
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