Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[mnementh]

In Other News:



Currently burn-testing a $31 (So far) HP DV6-2150US laptop I plan to give my dad; his circa 2005 spotted cow running XP  has finally ceased and desisted. Well, the few places he goes on the web no longer support any browser that will still run on it, so we're FINALLY getting him into something semi-civilized. I got the thing along with a 2K HD Android TV box for $25 at a yard sale so I consider cost to be essentially $0; added new keyboard & battery for $31 off slAmazon.

I picked this one because A) I had it lying around and 2) it's Windoze 7, so will not give the poor man apoplexy trying to adapt himself to the new OS. Hopefully in a year or so when MS gives the last of us Win7 lingerers the boot, we'll be ready for 10. Or at least 8.1. 

It's a nice big 15.5 16:10 format screen, i3 M330 processor & 4GB DDR3-1600 RAM. Unofficially will support 8GB, but the price of the stuff on fleaBay is just crazy. Folks wanting ~$40 for used when I can get new GSkill on Newegg for $44. 

Previous owner had critters, liked to eat at the computer, and was one of those who did her makeup using the laptop as a mirror. Don't laugh; it was one of the "abuse cases" they taught us as an HP ASP to look for... keyboards gunked up with makeup are not covered under warranty.   

So yesterday I tore it all apart; no... ALL APART... even the CPU fan was furry. 

Lots of work de-gunking/de-fur-ing/de-crumbing with tweezers, alcohol on a rag and toothbrush, and fresh thermal paste on CPU. Turned out halfway decent; if it survives burn-in for 24 hours I'll make it my daily driver for a week or three to see if it behaves, then give it to him when he comes to visit around Thanksgiving.

mnem out.

[mnementh]

   My cleaner came from that well known shop Lidl, stainless bowl, in a plastic case with a plastic basket and is not one of those stupid little cheap arse jewellery cleaners, although it is sold as that but it's so much more capable and has a time upto 10 mins. and heats the bath as well so the items get a hot wash. Its large enough to take 3 or 4 of these tuners at a time, approx 150mm x 120mm at a guess.

Gave it 3 goes at 10 mins in distilled water, scrubbing at the end of each one, then replaced the water for Isopropyl and repeated 3 more times and it was pretty warm at the end of it.

Blow Dried using hairdryer and will now leave it to sit in open air while I pack up my TDS210 and take it the post office so Ebay can do their bit on the Global Shipping Program and then I'll refit this to the stereo and try it.

Attached are before and after photos.   

Fuggin' A-diddy! 

Take a closer look at your ICs; I see some scale there around some pins you'll want to clean away with a plastic pick and brush; but otherwise stellar results. I make it a habit to blow out pin headers like that one with compressed air as well.

I thought you were in love with your TDS210? Or was this one you bought to fix/resell?

mnem
*Says a prayer to Ifni for the testing phase*

[bd139]

Previous owner had critters, liked to eat at the computer, and was one of those who did her makeup using the laptop as a mirror. Don't laugh; it was one of the "abuse cases" they taught us as an HP ASP to look for... keyboards gunked up with makeup are not covered under warranty.   

So yesterday I tore it all apart; no... ALL APART... even the CPU fan was furry. 

Lots of work de-gunking/de-fur-ing/de-crumbing with tweezers, alcohol on a rag and toothbrush, and fresh thermal paste on CPU. Turned out halfway decent; if it survives burn-in for 24 hours I'll make it my daily driver for a week or three to see if it behaves, then give it to him when he comes to visit around Thanksgiving.

I used to help myself to crimes from the "fucked laptops" pile at a company I worked for a few years back. There was one where the user had poured nail polish into it by accident. Probably using it as a mirror as well. Disappoints me seeing stuff like that.

It was a relatively new at the time Lenovo X201. Asked if I could take it home. "yeah sure but you'll have to find a disk and caddy for it". So I did. Needed new keyboard, some scrubbing with nail polish remover, chucked an SSD in it and a new disk caddy and bought a (genuine) Lenovo (not electric shock brand) charger and that was it. That was my backup machine until about 18 months ago when I got this T440.

The stupid thing is I haven't touched the main machine, the Macobook much - only the backup ones!

[mnementh]

Oh lawdy... the X201; one of the last holdovers from the IBM design line.

I can't count how many of those I replaced MBs on for euckered RJ-45 jacks because some dingle repeatedly KEPT trying to jam a USB into the wrong port without looking. You'd think they'd learn that lesson, NEVER PUT THE ETHERNET PORT ANYWHERE NEAR A USB PORT... but no. 

And then there was the tablet version... what a charlie-foxtrot. Constantly breaking around the swivel and needing to be rebuilt.  Of course... if every design was great, I'd lose out on easy money tickets like those... but still. 

mnem
*over-taxed*

[bd139]

Yeah the ethernet right next to the USB was unforgivable. Same on the T440 

Mine wasn't the tablet version. The other ones were pretty indestructable though - I dropped it numerous times 

On a positive note they're dead easy to get inside to futz with.

[Specmaster]

   My cleaner came from that well known shop Lidl, stainless bowl, in a plastic case with a plastic basket and is not one of those stupid little cheap arse jewellery cleaners, although it is sold as that but it's so much more capable and has a time upto 10 mins. and heats the bath as well so the items get a hot wash. Its large enough to take 3 or 4 of these tuners at a time, approx 150mm x 120mm at a guess.

Gave it 3 goes at 10 mins in distilled water, scrubbing at the end of each one, then replaced the water for Isopropyl and repeated 3 more times and it was pretty warm at the end of it.

Blow Dried using hairdryer and will now leave it to sit in open air while I pack up my TDS210 and take it the post office so Ebay can do their bit on the Global Shipping Program and then I'll refit this to the stereo and try it.

Attached are before and after photos.   

Fuggin' A-diddy! 

Take a closer look at your ICs; I see some scale there around some pins you'll want to clean away with a plastic pick and brush; but otherwise stellar results. I make it a habit to blow out pin headers like that one with compressed air as well.

I thought you were in love with your TDS210? Or was this one you bought to fix/resell?

mnem
*Says a prayer to Ifni for the testing phase*

Spotted that bit of crud its been dealt with. The TDS210 is one of two I snagged, 1 was working and the other had no contrast on the screen and failed post test with acquisition failure and also had crappy BNC's on it. I managed to source a working main board, fitted that which removed the problem with the BNC's bing shitty as the new board had 3 new ones fitted, printed a new knob for it and put it all together and its working just fine so I thought I list it on evilbay and within 10 minutes I had an offer for half of the asking price, promptly declined it and the following day somebody else overseas brought at the asking price so over the pair of them I made something like £200 on, not to be sniffed at.

That's what I'm doing now to bring in a little extra money now I've retired, buying broken shit, repairing them and selling on again, keeps my brain active and broadens my experience and finding the odd keeper along the way.

I did buy the other scopes originally as a sparer but I didn't really need keep 2 TDS210's, I have one low usage one and that lovely Fluke PM3390B combiscope so I think I'm ok for a while, so decided to chuck the spare into the cash pile.

[Specmaster]

That looks pretty excellent actually. A miracle perhaps!

We'll find out real soon if it still works or not, then onto solving the dead channel, looks like a few caps are suspect, at least 1 has a bulge on it.

[Ice-Tea]

So, uhm, I got racks 

[bd139]

Dexion FTW!

[Brumby]

Ahhhh ..... Shiny 

[mnementh]

Yeah the ethernet right next to the USB was unforgivable. Same on the T440 

Mine wasn't the tablet version. The other ones were pretty indestructable though - I dropped it numerous times 

On a positive note they're dead easy to get inside to futz with.

Lenovo's newer ThinkPad line... the clunky rounded-corner models that look like this X131 I bought for my son's upcoming birthday for $104 with a new install of win10 ready to use... and the T440... are probably the best value in used laptops out there; whatever the current model that's just coming off off-lease or bulk contract. Built for education/student and corporate muppet abuse; they're not light, but they usually have reasonable daily driver CPU/RAM, hold up well and usually can be resurrected with minimal assache. If not for the fact it's 12.5" and I wanted optical drive and at least a 15" screen for dad's old eyes, I'd have bought a second one for him.

Just pulled the trigger on 2 modules of Micron 4 GB PC3L-12800 DDR3L-1600 from a vendor in FL; $31 shipped w/warranty. If this dinosaur actually supports PC3L, will run at least 2-3 ticks faster interleave than current PC3 spec RAM, plus of course 8GB is where Win7 wakes up and actually runs.

mnem
*Off to the Px for Sudafed*

[Ice-Tea]

Dexion FTW!

Storacon, actually, but maybe the same factory? 

Look quite similar.

[mnementh]

So, uhm, I got racks 

https://youtu.be/j0O9NPmqk2E

Nice rack.

mnem

[mnementh]

fuck. me.

mnem
 

[Specmaster]

So, uhm, I got racks 

Nice but access to the shelves behind is how? What gives with all the stickers applied to the screens FFS, one of my pet hates is that 

[mnementh]

Al he has to do is work his way through those units to "unlock" access to those hidden chambers. 

It looks to me like those stickers (and the gear underneath) are a byproduct of one or more "pallet sales". I've seen similar myself... and it too is one of my pet peeves. 


In other news...

That trim piece was not nearly the assache I thought it was going to be. I was able to get just enough clearance to slip it underneath the screen without having to remove the top KB bezel, which is good, as that requires removing the KB, which requires removing two covers on the bottom, and oodles of screws, and... grrr. Just grrr.

And my HP 3478A shows as "Out For Delivery" today. w00t! 

mnem
Procrastina-a-ation... is making me hate. Myself. For not working on my taxes.

[bd139]

Need some amps?

8V 580A Lol:

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F323494202663

[Housedad]

Dang.  I never thought about using a ultrasonic cleaner for electronics boards.  Hmmm.  That is cool.  I don't even have to acquire more TEA!!  I have a Quantrex 650 6.5 gallon in my garage left over from my days as a Gunsmith.

https://www.brownells.com/gun-cleaning-chemicals/professional-cleaning-systems/ultrasonic-cleaning-kits/quantrex-650-ultrasonic-cleaning-lubrication-system-prod24817.aspx

[Cerebus]

Nice but access to the shelves behind is how?

He gets the two nonagenarian Italian Nonnas who live down the road to come and lift the whole rack out of the way. Never underestimate the lifting power of an old Italian woman dressed all in black. 

[mnementh]

Need some amps?

8V 580A Lol:

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F323494202663

Mmmm! Juicy!! 

This 6600w/0-15V sibling of that unit is still available as well... $1995/Make Offer. 

Dang.  I never thought about using a ultrasonic cleaner for electronics boards.  Hmmm.  That is cool.  I don't even have to acquire more TEA!!  I have a Quantrex 650 in my garage left over from my days as a Gunsmith.

https://www.brownells.com/gun-cleaning-chemicals/professional-cleaning-systems/ultrasonic-cleaning-kits/quantrex-650-ultrasonic-cleaning-lubrication-system-prod24817.aspx

Mmmm.... tingly!!!

Nice but access to the shelves behind is how?

He gets the two nonagenarian Italian Nonnas who live down the road to come and lift the whole rack out of the way. Never underestimate the lifting power of an old Italian woman dressed all in black. 

mmmm... and they got the power of the Bleeding Christ on their side... they will eff you up, man. You do NOT mess widda Nonnas. 

mnem
mmmm... I need to get back to my taxes. *Thwack widda ruler*  "SEE?!?"

[Cerebus]

In other news:

You know we were joking here and in other threads about the assorted shortcomings of the F-35?

Well: F-35 jets: US military grounds entire fleet (via BBC).

[Ero-Shan]

I'm finally back. No, that's not true. I was never away. I was simply unable to keep up with this thread. Just reading it is becoming a full time job.

After the futile repair attempt of my 464 I looked for work that needed no brains. Like putting the resistors out of 240 plastic bags and into those little drawers for easy access.

Before (just for illustration, see below):


After:


Sounds like an easy task, doesn't it? Don't get fooled by the 'Before' pic - these are overspill, they just wouldn't fit. In reality the bags were filled with them in various appearances. Of course the available space doesn't allow them to have full-length leads, so you have to sort out the ones that are too long and cut them. Or cut them from the tapes, which becomes arduous work rather quick. On average, it took about 40 minutes to fill one drawer! Needless to say, there was also a chance to fuck up that I couldn't let pass: Pushing a drawer into the cabinet it somehow snagged and slipped out of my hand, spoiling its contents all over the floor and whatever happened to be there. 
Believe me, those critters are small - to read the color bands I need a loupe (my glasses won't do). And the colors are often hard to read - orange/red or green/blue are easily mistaken. Just let me tell you that all further drawer-in-cabinet placements were undertaken with utmost diligence.

Finished task (sans printed labels):


The upside is that the space occupied by 240 plastic bags is now empty. 

@Ice-Tea: Absolutely awesome. I feel utterly understuffed.

While I wrote this, 5 more messages were posted ... See what I mean?

[bd139]

Very neat. I bought a binder of royal ohm ones and sold about 11kg of mixed bag ones I had on eBay rather than sort them because I’m lazy  .  This worked out smaller and cheaper than the drawers would have been! Plus I have nowhere to put ‘em. I would love some drawers.

In other news:

You know we were joking here and in other threads about the assorted shortcomings of the F-35?

Well: F-35 jets: US military grounds entire fleet (via BBC).

That’s a pretty big failure. By version 4.3.24.9762 service pack 1 the aircraft will remain in the sky.

[Ice-Tea]

So, uhm, I got racks 

Nice but access to the shelves behind is how? What gives with all the stickers applied to the screens FFS, one of my pet hates is that 

The shelves behind came with the office. I actually asked to have them removed, but they refused. I have no need for them. As the cupboard below extends a bit further it can be used as a ledge to walk on and gain access to it if needed but... As I said, I don't need 'm.

And yes, sticker-to-screen seems to be the favoured "fuck-you-all" method from the auction Gremlins.

[Specmaster]

Very neat. I bought a binder of royal ohm ones and sold about 11kg of mixed bag ones I had on eBay rather than sort them because I’m lazy  .  This worked out smaller and cheaper than the drawers would have been! Plus I have nowhere to put ‘em. I would love some drawers.

In other news:

You know we were joking here and in other threads about the assorted shortcomings of the F-35?

Well: F-35 jets: US military grounds entire fleet (via BBC).

That’s a pretty big failure. By version 4.3.24.9762 service pack 1 the aircraft will remain in the sky.

RAF have also grounded all F-35 jets.

EDIT.
Problem with is that it is just too complicated for its own good, for the most part the pilot is just there for the ride as the computer's fly the plane and it relies 100% on everything doing what it should to keep it in the air. It's too expensive and complicated, we need greater numbers of cheaper planes that are more robust and quicker to repair.

What is the point of having planes so expensive that we can only afford a few and then they are are either going "tech" due to them being so difficult to maintain quickly or too complicated that they are being grounded while fixes are found? When our airspace is constantly being probed by others, we need to be able to respond quickly and decisively.

We used to have a reasonable sized and capable air force that has been bludgeoned to death, whole fleets of planes scraped over the last few years and still more to go soon.

These days the USAF with only 2 active bases in the UK fly more daily sorties than the RAF do with all their bases.