Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[factory]

I think there were a few interested in buying a 5245x series counter, an older one has appeared for a not too unreasonable BIN price in the US, has the preset plug-in and some unknown H91 option.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/294984585812


David

[mnementh]

Yeeg... ad sez "I am 99 and cannot accept returns. I am selling my collection."

Fuck... he's doing his own SK sale. 

mnem
*toddles off to look for someplace less... dark. *

[mansaxel]

Fuck... he's doing his own SK sale. 

Here, it's a thing. It's literally called "death cleaning".

[Specmaster]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

[TERRA Operative]

Just bought a Sony Digital8 camera, blast from the past.....
Wife handed me a bag of Hi8 cassettes and told me to figure out how to copy them to PC as her dad got one done at the local shops and they did a predictably terrible job of it and charged too much to boot.

Luckily my laptop (Dell Precision) has a firewire port, so the camera can be directly connected and the tapes ripped to video files.

Here's hoping it works ok, I don't want to have to bother with analogue S-Video capture dongles, most you see around are crap...

[KG7AMV]

Siglent Film Peeling Event..

[vk6zgo]

OK. Cool. "Trolley" over here is reserved for one of these.

Ohh!......A "Tram"?

[vk6zgo]

lots of pop corns and drink

 

there is always a bigger fish...

EDIT: Now that I finished watching it, 57 minutes and something worth every single second. Goose bumps.

Well, I certainly give him an "A" for effort and probably sounds fantastic. But is it way overkill? Without a doubt but to each his own. At least I did not see nor detect any outright audio foolery or snake oil. Well....maybe a bit with that turntable. 

Agreed, but I tend to  think that the speakers are also way over the top, surely if you're trying to get as close to the original as possible, then shouldn't your drivers be at approx the height as the instruments would have been? His speakers were 8ft tall FFS. Also, of course, he did rely on a lot of processor power, which is how Bose and the like get such "fantastic" one note bass response from such a small driver and enclosure.

Back in the 1950s/early '60s various "HIFI" nuts went to enormous lengths. I remember reading about one bloke who had built a ginormous re-entrant horn speaker system out of concrete .(A Mono one!)
The output end of the horn took up most of his living room wall, & had a nice wrought iron guard fence to stop the unwary from falling into it!
Those are the days when Hams were "mainstream" & HIFI addicts were weirdos!

[vk6zgo]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

In Perth, West Oz, I have a 9 minute walk to the train station, then it takes about 30mins into the city.

Great, if you work in the CBD in one of the shiny glass towers, not so fine, if you work in one of the suburbs!
The "everybody works in the city" mindset seems to be endemic, although there are some "circular" route buses which run various convoluted routes (a pretty wiggly "circle") between suburbs, but usually its better to just go to the city & change trains or catch a bus to your final destination.
I'm retired, so it isn't a problem now, but I travelled a lot of public transport miles back when I was still working.

[cyclin_al]

I think there were a few interested in buying a 5245x series counter, an older one has appeared for a not too unreasonable BIN price in the US, has the preset plug-in and some unknown H91 option.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/294984585812


David

Hmmm, I think I could barely afford that unit, once the exchange rate is factored in.
However, the shipping to the GWN ... 

[BU508A]

lots of pop corns and drink

 

there is always a bigger fish...

EDIT: Now that I finished watching it, 57 minutes and something worth every single second. Goose bumps.

Well, I certainly give him an "A" for effort and probably sounds fantastic. But is it way overkill? Without a doubt but to each his own. At least I did not see nor detect any outright audio foolery or snake oil. Well....maybe a bit with that turntable. 

Agreed, but I tend to  think that the speakers are also way over the top, surely if you're trying to get as close to the original as possible, then shouldn't your drivers be at approx the height as the instruments would have been? His speakers were 8ft tall FFS. Also, of course, he did rely on a lot of processor power, which is how Bose and the like get such "fantastic" one note bass response from such a small driver and enclosure.

Back in the 1950s/early '60s various "HIFI" nuts went to enormous lengths. I remember reading about one bloke who had built a ginormous re-entrant horn speaker system out of concrete .(A Mono one!)
The output end of the horn took up most of his living room wall, & had a nice wrought iron guard fence to stop the unwary from falling into it!
Those are the days when Hams were "mainstream" & HIFI addicts were weirdos!

You mean, something like this?
http://web.tiscali.it/royaldevice/custom3.htm



Edit:

Oh, and Onkyo is broke.
https://www.lbtechreviews.com/news/hi-fi/onkyo-has-gone-bankrupt

[ch_scr]

If someone lives nearby (PLZ 58809), this high octane mini-pc is a steal for the price, but pick-up only.
NAWTS as usual.

[bd139]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

Here comes the real issue. Cars are expensive. If you want an electric car it’s £30k investment minimum. If you want a banger it’s a perpetual risk and the fuel is expensive. I run the mid ground and I can’t justify keeping it for the trivial mileage I do. Most people I know are somewhat screwed financially which means they are not in a position to make either class of investment. That means relying on public transport and living somewhere that there is a decent public transport system.  On top of that as you get older, mobility problems arise and disabilities increase. Even getting upstairs in a nice semi out in the middle of nowhere becomes a mortality risk (don’t ask how I know that). That leads to a dependency on simplicity and infrastructure to do simple tasks. Ergo better to be poor or rich in London than anything else anywhere else and leverage public transport.

And then there’s the necessity of transport. Bar people who can’t stay local to work, we should be investing in building cities that don’t need as much travel and transport due to the environmental and capital costs of doing so. But no one will do this because it costs money and takes long term planning and commitment. Our political processes are tuned to very short cycles and are wasteful.

On that note I’ve signed up for zipcar. It’ll do the job for hamfests. If I run all my capital and operating expenditure of my car I break even on public transport and zipcar. That means I eliminate service, insurance and depreciation and capital costs of a new vehicle entirely from my finances. More sleep and the shittiest of zipcar will take a couple of Teks in it 

Got to have a poke at Cerberus here as well. A friend of mine is always poking me at how much he spends on electricity on his Tesla. My car didn’t cost £88k so I could run mine on Absolut vodka and still be better off 

[Specmaster]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

In Perth, West Oz, I have a 9 minute walk to the train station, then it takes about 30mins into the city.

Great, if you work in the CBD in one of the shiny glass towers, not so fine, if you work in one of the suburbs!
The "everybody works in the city" mindset seems to be endemic, although there are some "circular" route buses which run various convoluted routes (a pretty wiggly "circle") between suburbs, but usually its better to just go to the city & change trains or catch a bus to your final destination.
I'm retired, so it isn't a problem now, but I travelled a lot of public transport miles back when I was still working.

The term "circular route" is not a real circular route, its what the bus company calls them. They are in fact a number of routes to points in the suburbs, we have 12 such routes, emanating from either the bus station or the rail station to their destinations and back via the same route. If you want to go from a suburb to another that is east or west from your current location, then that means getting a bus to the city centre, then getting another out again. It would make so much more sense if they did run a couple circular routes  around the centre as well, but means that they would have to think logical and that is something that doesn't happen very often.

[tggzzz]

Fuck... he's doing his own SK sale. 

Here, it's a thing. It's literally called "death cleaning".

Don't knock it! It enabled me to get a 465 CRT and a 485 from someone with an Alladin's cave shed of Tek and HP stuff. He's been silent on fleabay for a while, so I hope his sons have done the decent thing.

[tggzzz]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

Here comes the real issue. Cars are expensive. If you want an electric car it’s £30k investment minimum. If you want a banger it’s a perpetual risk and the fuel is expensive.

Not always. My car (Mazda 2 a.k.a Ford Fiesta) is 18 years old and has failed twice but I managed to get it to the garage, and I only had it serviced once per 5 years. My "parents" car van (Toyota Yaris Verso) is 19 years old and half-failed once; the AA bloke said they don't see many of those!

I run the mid ground and I can’t justify keeping it for the trivial mileage I do. Most people I know are somewhat screwed financially which means they are not in a position to make either class of investment. That means relying on public transport and living somewhere that there is a decent public transport system. 

Living in the centre of London makes cars difficult and unnecessary. You are just outside the "boundary" of where they have zipcars.

On top of that as you get older, mobility problems arise and disabilities increase. Even getting upstairs in a nice semi out in the middle of nowhere becomes a mortality risk (don’t ask how I know that). That leads to a dependency on simplicity and infrastructure to do simple tasks. Ergo better to be poor or rich in London than anything else anywhere else and leverage public transport.

Except getting to a zipcar by public transport would be difficult with a mobility problem. As for getting a mobility scooter in/out of a (non-van) boot, good luck with that. Then there's the issue of what happens if the convenient car is already booked.

The decent big cities outside London have good infrastructure and you don't have to travel so far to get to somewhere worth going to.

I grew up in Epsom, and there was nothing worth visiting between there and the centre of London. I expect Twickenham and other place equidistant from the centre are simlar.
 

And then there’s the necessity of transport. Bar people who can’t stay local to work, we should be investing in building cities that don’t need as much travel and transport due to the environmental and capital costs of doing so. But no one will do this because it costs money and takes long term planning and commitment. Our political processes are tuned to very short cycles and are wasteful.

On that note I’ve signed up for zipcar. It’ll do the job for hamfests. If I run all my capital and operating expenditure of my car I break even on public transport and zipcar. That means I eliminate service, insurance and depreciation and capital costs of a new vehicle entirely from my finances. More sleep and the shittiest of zipcar will take a couple of Teks in it 

The finances of such things need to be worked out in individual cases.

Zipcar covers 4 cities in the UK; Brizzle is one. To get to the nearest cars would take 45mins using the bus plus either 1 mile walk or a second bus trip. Unappealing, especially if I had mobility issues.

Zipcars seem to be ~£100/day, which means I'd really want to know it would be a good hamfest before setting off. Couldn't fit some of the stuff I've brought back from PPAuctions in them

Having said that, there are three alternative companies in Brizzle, some usefully cheaper (at first glance), but they all have the not-where-I-live issue mentioned above.

Got to have a poke at Cerberus here as well. A friend of mine is always poking me at how much he spends on electricity on his Tesla. My car didn’t cost £88k so I could run mine on Absolut vodka and still be better off 

Quite.

Get you friend to demonstrate how, while driving along, he deals with

• the screen starts misting up: how does he redirect ventilation
• you are about to drive through smoke from a fire; how does he switch from external air to recirculating air

[Vince]

Double diode saga follow-up.

Hmmm... I might have come across one that actually, truly behaves like I mistakenly thought that this TO3 vintage diode was doing.

I have here a more modern, TO220  STSP20xxCT made by ... well ST.

Datasheet available. It is indeed a dual diode, common cathode, low drop / Schottky.

Chinese tester confirms this but again shows a resistance between the two anodes !
Not a short this time, more like a few k-ohms, 5,000 something like that.
I confirmed this "by hand" with a DMM.

I am not dreaming this time... it is happening.

I don't understand how this is possible but it's there.

[Specmaster]

<snip>
We're far from out in zombie land and our Friday evening journey (2.9 miles both ways) to go out for a birthday meal for SWMBO and a few friends, took fifteen minutes, was made in silent, air conditioned comfort for the grand expenditure in £0.88 in electricity.   Even had free off-street parking at the remote end. There's actually an almost direct bus service (1/4 mile walk at our end) that we have used before for the same restaurant when I've wanted to have a drink, but it goes around the houses so takes at least 40 minutes each way and would cost £1.65 each way. Having the luxury of a choice, I know which one I'd make.

That is the problem with buses or indeed any form of public transport apart from a taxi, they either sometimes involve a reasonable amount of walking, or they go round the houses and take so long doing that. The former is no joke if you're all dressed up and the heavens open up and dump on you, even an umbrella does not afford complete protection, or if it's in the depth of winter, and you're freezing your tits off.

In the example I gave of my journey, the buses all run into the city centre on a circular route, there are no routes that go one side to the other of the city. They all radiate from the centre,  so that adds on another couple of miles, and if they get delayed, then you have to wait for your other connection to arrive. So who in their right minds would want to do that when, as you say, you have air-conditioned luxury sitting outside.

Here comes the real issue. Cars are expensive. If you want an electric car it’s £30k investment minimum. If you want a banger it’s a perpetual risk and the fuel is expensive.

Not always. My car (Mazda 2 a.k.a Ford Fiesta) is 18 years old and has failed twice but I managed to get it to the garage, and I only had it serviced once per 5 years. My "parents" car van (Toyota Yaris Verso) is 19 years old and half-failed once; the AA bloke said they don't see many of those!

I run the mid ground and I can’t justify keeping it for the trivial mileage I do. Most people I know are somewhat screwed financially which means they are not in a position to make either class of investment. That means relying on public transport and living somewhere that there is a decent public transport system. 

Living in the centre of London makes cars difficult and unnecessary. You are just outside the "boundary" of where they have zipcars.

On top of that as you get older, mobility problems arise and disabilities increase. Even getting upstairs in a nice semi out in the middle of nowhere becomes a mortality risk (don’t ask how I know that). That leads to a dependency on simplicity and infrastructure to do simple tasks. Ergo better to be poor or rich in London than anything else anywhere else and leverage public transport.

Except getting to a zipcar by public transport would be difficult with a mobility problem. As for getting a mobility scooter in/out of a (non-van) boot, good luck with that. Then there's the issue of what happens if the convenient car is already booked.

The decent big cities outside London have good infrastructure and you don't have to travel so far to get to somewhere worth going to.

I grew up in Epsom, and there was nothing worth visiting between there and the centre of London. I expect Twickenham and other place equidistant from the centre are simlar.
 

And then there’s the necessity of transport. Bar people who can’t stay local to work, we should be investing in building cities that don’t need as much travel and transport due to the environmental and capital costs of doing so. But no one will do this because it costs money and takes long term planning and commitment. Our political processes are tuned to very short cycles and are wasteful.

On that note I’ve signed up for zipcar. It’ll do the job for hamfests. If I run all my capital and operating expenditure of my car I break even on public transport and zipcar. That means I eliminate service, insurance and depreciation and capital costs of a new vehicle entirely from my finances. More sleep and the shittiest of zipcar will take a couple of Teks in it 

The finances of such things need to be worked out in individual cases.

Zipcar covers 4 cities in the UK; Brizzle is one. To get to the nearest cars would take 45mins using the bus plus either 1 mile walk or a second bus trip. Unappealing, especially if I had mobility issues.

Zipcars seem to be ~£100/day, which means I'd really want to know it would be a good hamfest before setting off. Couldn't fit some of the stuff I've brought back from PPAuctions in them

Having said that, there are three alternative companies in Brizzle, some usefully cheaper (at first glance), but they all have the not-where-I-live issue mentioned above.

Got to have a poke at Cerberus here as well. A friend of mine is always poking me at how much he spends on electricity on his Tesla. My car didn’t cost £88k so I could run mine on Absolut vodka and still be better off 

Quite.

Get you friend to demonstrate how, while driving along, he deals with

• the screen starts misting up: how does he redirect ventilation
• you are about to drive through smoke from a fire; how does he switch from external air to recirculating air

Exactly, these schemes are OK if you are in the right location, but even then there are limitations, for instance, assuming there was a Zipcar dept in my city it would not work out for me with my regular tips to RAF bases for instances, such as Lakenheath, that journey would exceed the 60miles allowed, 29p per mile extra (Plus - Chelmsford) (assuming a Chelmsford dept) is 140 to 160miles with nipping to and from Mildenhall, plus of course the hourly charge would mean that it would cost me at least £99 to £110 a day, plus of course the getting to and from the car dept, plus on top there is almost zero chance of my 6ft 4" frame and I'm no twiggy, into the front seat of a Vauxhall Corsa is laughable. I think I'll stick with my limo sized car that will take 5 people like me in air-conditioned luxury door to door, anytime I like, at the drop of a hat, no pre-booking / planning.

[tggzzz]

Double diode saga follow-up.

Hmmm... I might have come across one that actually, truly behaves like I mistakenly thought that this TO3 vintage diode was doing.

I have here a more modern, TO220  STSP20xxCT made by ... well ST.

Datasheet available. It is indeed a dual diode, common cathode, low drop / Schottky.

Chinese tester confirms this but again shows a resistance between the two anodes !
Not a short this time, more like a few k-ohms, 5,000 something like that.
I confirmed this "by hand" with a DMM.

I am not dreaming this time... it is happening.

I don't understand how this is possible but it's there.

Why don't you plot V vs I for each component? That would give useful information.

[Specmaster]

Double diode saga follow-up.

Hmmm... I might have come across one that actually, truly behaves like I mistakenly thought that this TO3 vintage diode was doing.

I have here a more modern, TO220  STSP20xxCT made by ... well ST.

Datasheet available. It is indeed a dual diode, common cathode, low drop / Schottky.

Chinese tester confirms this but again shows a resistance between the two anodes !
Not a short this time, more like a few k-ohms, 5,000 something like that.
I confirmed this "by hand" with a DMM.

I am not dreaming this time... it is happening.

I don't understand how this is possible but it's there.

Those Chinese testers are never going to be 100% but they certainly should be about 96-97% accurate and are more than capable of giving you a go no go test and more importantly they will identify loads of parts for you such as the double diode, npn or pnp transistor, inductors, capacitors, ESR and MosFets so you can see if a part is working or not. Shame that they can't give you part numbers as well, but I think that may well change in the future. You can already get testers for generic jelly bean IC's that will also give you part numbers as well test them for functionality.

[med6753]

Here comes the real issue. Cars are expensive. If you want an electric car it’s £30k investment minimum. If you want a banger it’s a perpetual risk and the fuel is expensive. I run the mid ground and I can’t justify keeping it for the trivial mileage I do. Most people I know are somewhat screwed financially which means they are not in a position to make either class of investment. That means relying on public transport and living somewhere that there is a decent public transport system.  On top of that as you get older, mobility problems arise and disabilities increase. Even getting upstairs in a nice semi out in the middle of nowhere becomes a mortality risk (don’t ask how I know that). That leads to a dependency on simplicity and infrastructure to do simple tasks. Ergo better to be poor or rich in London than anything else anywhere else and leverage public transport.

And then there’s the necessity of transport. Bar people who can’t stay local to work, we should be investing in building cities that don’t need as much travel and transport due to the environmental and capital costs of doing so. But no one will do this because it costs money and takes long term planning and commitment. Our political processes are tuned to very short cycles and are wasteful.

On that note I’ve signed up for zipcar. It’ll do the job for hamfests. If I run all my capital and operating expenditure of my car I break even on public transport and zipcar. That means I eliminate service, insurance and depreciation and capital costs of a new vehicle entirely from my finances. More sleep and the shittiest of zipcar will take a couple of Teks in it 

Got to have a poke at Cerberus here as well. A friend of mine is always poking me at how much he spends on electricity on his Tesla. My car didn’t cost £88k so I could run mine on Absolut vodka and still be better off 

I suggested this once before but at that time you were still under the spell of redheads. 

Get exercise at the same time. Wanna haul Tek's? Get a roof rack. 

[McBryce]

On the mini Voltcraft Scope these buttons don't latch anymore. Is it worth taking them apart to fix, or would I just end up spending the afternoon looking for springs and other small parts on the floor? Or should I just look for replacements?

McBryce.

[Vince]

Double diode saga follow-up.

Hmmm... I might have come across one that actually, truly behaves like I mistakenly thought that this TO3 vintage diode was doing.

I have here a more modern, TO220  STSP20xxCT made by ... well ST.

Datasheet available. It is indeed a dual diode, common cathode, low drop / Schottky.

Chinese tester confirms this but again shows a resistance between the two anodes !
Not a short this time, more like a few k-ohms, 5,000 something like that.
I confirmed this "by hand" with a DMM.

I am not dreaming this time... it is happening.

I don't understand how this is possible but it's there.

Why don't you plot V vs I for each component? That would give useful information.

Well because I have not time for that right now. I am focused on sorting all these freaking components for now ! 

So for now I have set that diode aside. Will come back to it later.

I am almost done sorting though, should be finished this evening I think.
A few components I just can't find a datasheet or any info on them, so I am not wasting my time with them, they have been discarded. Not thrown away just yet, just discarded...

[Specmaster]

On the mini Voltcraft Scope these buttons don't latch anymore. Is it worth taking them apart to fix, or would I just end up spending the afternoon looking for springs and other small parts on the floor? Or should I just look for replacements?

McBryce.

Generally better and less hassle to find replacement switches if you can.

[Vince]

On the mini Voltcraft Scope these buttons don't latch anymore. Is it worth taking them apart to fix, or would I just end up spending the afternoon looking for springs and other small parts on the floor? Or should I just look for replacements?

McBryce.

Well from what I understand you have basically nothing to lose so might as well give it a shot !   
Yes sure beware of little springs inside, so be careful and anticipate them trying to escape...