What did you buy today? Post your latest purchase!

[pigrew]

I took a chance on an E9300A RF power sensor from eBay "for parts" at about $60. This is a 18GHz dual path diode-based sensor. So far, the connector gaged at 208.8 thou pin depth (seems good, looks like standard N is .208 deep while precision N is .207 deep.) and holds zero within spec, and properly cals. There is no public calibration guide that I can find, perhaps I will compare a siggen's output using another sensor against this one. Comparing to a 8656B siggen at 50 MHz and  950MHz, everything is within 0.2dB from -60 to 10 dBm, so yay, both diodes paths work.

I don't have a N-type cal kit, so I may measure gamma using a calibrated 3.5mm port with port extension as adapter removal. Gamma tables used to be printed on the sensors, but not with the E series. Is there a way to read the cal table from the EEPROM?

EDIT: Nevermind my question, seems like some code to read the EEPROM has been posted.

[gamalot]

My new Raspberry Pi is finally here. It is fast and a little hot! 

What screen is that? And is it a touch-screen?

Cool Purchase!

It is a 7-inch 1024x600 IPS display with a capacitive touch screen from Taobao.

https://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.37.188a3fc8TSXCcf&id=591214164928&ns=1&abbucket=10&skuId=4065284305433

[bitseeker]

I took a chance on an E9300A RF power sensor from eBay "for parts" at about $60. This is a 18GHz dual path diode-based sensor. So far, the connector gaged at 208.8 thou pin depth (seems good, looks like standard N is .208 deep while precision N is .207 deep.) and holds zero within spec, and properly cals. There is no public calibration guide that I can find, perhaps I will compare a siggen's output using another sensor against this one. I don't have a N-type cal kit, so I may measure gamma using a calibrated 3.5mm port with port extension as adapter removal. Gamma tables used to be printed on the sensors, but not with the E series. Is there a way to read the cal table from the EEPROM?

EDIT: Nevermind my question, seems like some code to read the EEPROM has been posted.

Amazing. I just assume all the "for parts" ones have fried diodes.

[TheSteve]

Power sensor gambling!
I have played that game twice and got lucky both times. I don't think I want to play again.

[BU508A]

Any pictures ? It's always nice to see the devices.   

I'll show you mine if you show me yours

This my variac, a Grundig RT5A:







And, to be ontopic, this has been arrived two days ago:

[blueskull]

Some cheap storage.

Amazon is doing a limited time offer today and Sabrent has a $255 2TB USB 3.1 NVMe SSD for sale, so I grabbed it.

The bare M2 drive itself is $220, also on sale. This is a TLC drive with 3115 TBW endurance, yet the price is comparable with Intel and Samsung's QLC drives.

Not a bad idea for a quiet local backup drive and video scratch disk.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07N15HD51

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MTQTNVR

[technix]

Some cheap storage.

Amazon is doing a limited time offer today and Sabrent has a $255 2TB USB 3.1 NVMe SSD for sale, so I grabbed it.

The bare M2 drive itself is $220, also on sale. This is a TLC drive with 3115 TBW endurance, yet the price is comparable with Intel and Samsung's QLC drives.

Not a bad idea for a quiet local backup drive and video scratch disk.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07N15HD51

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MTQTNVR

How does it perform though...

I have actually never really used any TLC or QLC drives. All my SSD's, especially the better ones, uses MLC. I have heard that TLC and QLC has longevity problems and are much slower than SLC and MLC devices.

[blueskull]

How does it perform though...

I have actually never really used any TLC or QLC drives. All my SSD's, especially the better ones, uses MLC. I have heard that TLC and QLC has longevity problems and are much slower than SLC and MLC devices.

Haven't received them yet.

I would be suspicious about QLC, but I would totally trust TLC.

All new SDXC cards but some few industrial ones are TLC, and all recent non-high end pen drives are TLC.

My MacMini came with a TLC drive as well. Considering Apple charged $800 for this 1TB drive (now dropped to $600), I bet they've done the math.

It seems like with 3D technology, the processing node has throttled back from 1x nm to 2x~4x nm, so I won't worry about endurance that much.

As for retention, I have no idea. But since I use it as a temporary backup and scratch disk, I don't care. For archival, I have spinners.

[exe]

And, to be ontopic, this has been arrived two days ago:

Wow, congratulations! I thought they are unobtanium.

[gamalot]

My new Raspberry Pi is finally here. It is fast and a little hot! 

Using a Noctua 40mm cooling fan here seems like an overkill, even though I slightly overclocked it to 1.6GHz.

[Mr.B]

@gamalot,
That’s not the first time I have seen that very nice little RH+T display in your posts.
Initially I wrote them off as some sort of free giveaway from Sensirion.
After a quick search on Mouser… I just ordered a couple.   

[djos]

After destroying my cheap Jaycar bench mat, while removing SMD components with my Hot air gun on the weekend, I finally ordered a hopefully decent mat from Amazon:

Bertech 2059T-18x30BKT ESD High Temperature Rubber Mat Kit with A Wrist Strap and A Grounding Cord, 18" Wide x 30" Long x 0.08"

[gamalot]

@gamalot,
That’s not the first time I have seen that very nice little RH+T display in your posts.
Initially I wrote them off as some sort of free giveaway from Sensirion.
After a quick search on Mouser… I just ordered a couple.   

Which manufacturer will send samples to unemployed people? 

Fortunately, it is not very expensive. 

[McBryce]

I didn't really buy this, rather it was in a box of random devices that I bought. Monacor FSI-117 - An SWR Meter / Dummy load with a few other tricks up its sleeve for the 11m enthusiast. It seems to work fine, but I don't do any radio and have no other uses for it, so it's just going to be a pretty ornament for now unless someone here wants it.
The picture isn't my one, but is in the same condition.

McBryce.

[TiN]

And, to be ontopic, this has been arrived two days ago:

Nice stash of fakes...

[BU508A]

And, to be ontopic, this has been arrived two days ago:

Nice stash of fakes...

I got them from the same source where we examined one and they turned out to be genuine.

[JxR]

So I tried one of those places that can print and deliver a book to you from whatever you provide them.  I know one can get this particular PDF for free, but sometimes I just enjoy having a hard copy.  I'm very happy how it came out, and it was only about $15 + shipping.

[Mr.B]

Thats a pretty decent price.
But, why are the page numbers on the spine side of the page 

[JxR]

Thats a pretty decent price.
But, why are the page numbers on the spine side of the page 

Haha, didn’t even notice that. It was just printed straight from the pdf document, so no editing was involved.  Tektronix probably wouldn’t like me editing their IP anyways, but just so I don’t try and sale copies of it, I doubt they care that I made a book from it. 

[gnavigator1007]

So I tried one of those places that can print and deliver a book to you from whatever you provide them.  I know one can get this particular PDF for free, but sometimes I just enjoy having a hard copy.  I'm very happy how it came out, and it was only about $15 + shipping.

Would you mind sharing who you used for that? Can they bind as hardback too?

[JxR]

Would you mind sharing who you used for that? Can they bind as hardback too?

It was: https://www.prestophoto.com

As to the hardback, I'm unsure. This particular one was printed as a "Textbook". When I originally looked at the Textbook options, there was one for hardback.  But after I uploaded the PDF and was  ready to check out, the hardback option was no longer there.  So, unsure if the PDF I uploaded didn't meet some kind of size/length requirement or what.

[TERRA Operative]

If you ever reprint that book, if you insert a single blank page (The old "This page intentionally left blank") at the start of the PDF (not a whole leaf, just a single page), it'll push the pages along one and put the numbers at the outer edge.

[JxR]

If you ever reprint that book, if you insert a single blank page (The old "This page intentionally left blank") at the start of the PDF (not a whole leaf, just a single page), it'll push the pages along one and put the numbers at the outer edge.

That is a good catch, but after examining the book closer, you do need more than one inserts before certain sections.  Sections 1/2 are fine (but only because I used second page as back cover), section 3/4 needs an insert, and section 5 is fine.  I just happen to take a picture from section 3 I think.  Also probably why I didn't immediately notice the page thing, since it looked fine from my first glance (and I just opened to a random page to snap a pic).

If that site would let me print a hardcover in A4, I might consider redoing it, but looks like 6"x9" is as large as they offer for "Textbook" printing. Just not interested in a smaller size. I looked at a couple alternative sites, but one was wanting ~$100 for a single printing.

Regardless the book has section headings on the outer-edges for nearly every page, so it really is a non-issue for me. If I consider printing another PDF though, I will be a bit more careful about the page numbering.

[TerraHertz]

A piece of retro data storage gear. A HP 82901M  - dual 5.25" floppy disk unit with HP-IB interface.
Not because I needed it; more because it became available for a good price, is fairly rare, and will be compatible with a setup I'm trying to arrange, to drive other HP-IB storage devices.

Pic is after cleaning and a few small fixes.

Without looking it up, who can guess how many K-bytes this thing gets on a floppy?

Introduced in 1980, obsoleted in March of 1985
This is SN: 2101A11418, made around June 1982.

The PDF of the service manual I found at bitsavers is pretty bad, both quality and seeming to be for an earlier model (or had very poor accuracy checking.) So I'm looking for an original, or better PDF

Edit to add:
Density: Double sided, 35 tracks/side, 16 sectors, 256 byte sectors, MFM, hard sectored.
Total capacity: 286,720 bytes. (280KB)   Totally proprietary HP file structure.

It powers up, completes self test, sequentially inits both drives, and does respond on the HP-IB bus. But I don't yet have something that can talk with it properly and R/W files.

Update: better photos. BTW, they appear here in reverse order to that entered. Bug in the new photo upload feature?

[djos]

It's either 180kB SSDD or 360kB DSDD I'd say - nice find!