overview for sandman2211

[–] sandman2211 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

So I went back and found some receipts, and it turns out that we're pretty much on the same page. This thing was actually about $900 of hardware, which was basically a higher end mid tier build. I remember looking for high quality components but I wasn't grabbing high performance ones. I've probably spent $300 on drives and RAM so cost per year is under $100.

As far as how much I value my time - one does not spend a mere 30 minutes swapping a mainboard out of the everything-box that runs all your shit, so I value hardware stability quite a bit. I moved most of the time-consuming compatibility hacks into docker containers the last time around so hopefully it's a lot easier next time. I have to deal with this stuff all day long at work so my appetite for PC projects at home is very low. If I can throw some more cash at it to stave off the need to swap out a drive or even the whole PC for a couple more years I'll gladly do it.

Anon builds a new PC in c/greentext

[–] sandman2211 4 points 1 week ago (5 children)

There tends to be a correlation between quality, longevity, and price. It's not a perfect fit but it's definitely a thing that exists.

I built a brand new cutting edge PC for a family member in 2011. They wanted to change careers and get into IT and figured they needed the bestest fastest PC they could afford. Anyway, it worked great until they decided it was time for a new one in 2019. I got to keep the 2011 PC in exchange for some assistance with selecting components for the new build. I put in a shiny new SDD, ebayed 16GB of old RAM that was the fastest thing the motherboard could handle, and I'm still using it as my primary server / workstation / web browser / cloud backup automation controller / etc. It cost more upfront but the amount of time that 2 different people have not spent with fucking around building new PCs has more than offset that in my opinion.

So this PC is on its 3rd round of HDDs and 2nd round of RAM but that was only to boost performance, not because of a hardware failure. I haven't lost a power supply, motherboard cap, fan motor, or USB port on it yet. That's pretty remarkable for a 14 year old machine that's been running 24/7. The 2019 build hasn't had a hiccup in almost 6 years now either.

Looking for a safe way to frame an exterior storage on a tiny home trailer. in c/diy

[–] sandman2211 1 points 1 week ago

Residential style doors and windows aren't really designed for pressurized water spray from every direction like what your trailer will encounter so weatherproofing it will be the hard part. I'd keep an eye out for some different implementations on buses, trailers, aftermarket truck beds, etc. Try to see how they handled it, ask the owners how well it works, and then see if that's something you can copy. Structurally I think it looks fine as long as you have enough support at every corner and your header is strong enough.

Faceplate that hides cables into trunking in c/diy

[–] sandman2211 1 points 1 week ago

I picked up a 3D printer and it's been a game changer for things like this. Not exactly a quick and easy solution though.

Chinese researchers break RSA encryption with a quantum computer in c/cybersecurity

[–] sandman2211 5 points 5 months ago (3 children)

I think Schneier wrote this well before quantum computers were a reality - did he miss something fundamental in regards to them? Quantum computers are relatively new but the theory behind them is nearly a century old.

*One of the consequences of the second law of thermodynamics is that a certain amount of energy is necessary to represent information. To record a single bit by changing the state of a system requires an amount of energy no less than kT, where T is the absolute temperature of the system and k is the Boltzman constant. (Stick with me; the physics lesson is almost over.)

Given that k = 1.38×10-16 erg/°Kelvin, and that the ambient temperature of the universe is 3.2°Kelvin, an ideal computer running at 3.2°K would consume 4.4×10-16 ergs every time it set or cleared a bit. To run a computer any colder than the cosmic background radiation would require extra energy to run a heat pump.

Now, the annual energy output of our sun is about 1.21×1041 ergs. This is enough to power about 2.7×1056 single bit changes on our ideal computer; enough state changes to put a 187-bit counter through all its values. If we built a Dyson sphere around the sun and captured all its energy for 32 years, without any loss, we could power a computer to count up to 2192. Of course, it wouldn't have the energy left over to perform any useful calculations with this counter.

But that's just one star, and a measly one at that. A typical supernova releases something like 1051 ergs. (About a hundred times as much energy would be released in the form of neutrinos, but let them go for now.) If all of this energy could be channeled into a single orgy of computation, a 219-bit counter could be cycled through all of its states.

These numbers have nothing to do with the technology of the devices; they are the maximums that thermodynamics will allow. And they strongly imply that brute-force attacks against 256-bit keys will be infeasible until computers are built from something other than matter and occupy something other than space.*

I'm not a physicist but quantum particles were still considered to be matter the last time I checked.

China begins launching a megaconstellation, and it sounds a lot like Starlink in c/spaceflight

[–] sandman2211 5 points 7 months ago

Kessler Syndrome, here we come!

I tried to make a phone case. in c/diy

[–] sandman2211 4 points 8 months ago

Looks solid!

I think my home network may be compromised, please advise in c/networking

[–] sandman2211 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Do you have any IoT devices chewing up a lot more bandwidth than they should be?

I think my home network may be compromised, please advise in c/networking

[–] sandman2211 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The factory reset idea is mostly to clear out any unauthorized customization that may have been made. If you can confirm that hasn't happened then it wouldn't be necessary. I have a router that's not supported by my ISP so I feel your pain. Fortunately I only had to figure out how to tag a particular vlan on the WAN to get it working and someone else had posted a guide that got me most of the way there.

I think my home network may be compromised, please advise in c/networking

[–] sandman2211 3 points 11 months ago (5 children)

Can you get into your router's admin interface? At the very least assuming you don't have much networking experience I'd do these things in this order:

1 - Check for firmware updates and apply them

2 - Factory reset

3 - Change password

4 - Recheck for updates in case the reset wiped them out

There's a million other things you can do to get more info on what's going on and put in security layers to do this and that. But if you just want the maximum results for the minimum effort this is the best place to start.

Did I install this Range Hood Correctly? It Makes a Lot of Noise Due to Some Vibrations. in c/diy

[–] sandman2211 2 points 2 years ago

Sorry, I've been trying to login at least a couple times a week but haven't seen any notifications that there were new posts. I tried to watch the video but it says the r/DIY community is private. Just based on your description though I was wondering if maybe you need to balance the fan blade. I've had that problem with a few cheap fans and was able to get them to run about 90% more quietly by just eyeballing the blades and bending the one that looked "off" back into place. I think Mattias Wandel has a video somewhere on how to get really scientific about it if you want to get down to zero vibration.

kids tablesaw in c/diy

[–] sandman2211 2 points 2 years ago

Thanks! They only use it for paper, cardboard, and really thin boards, like less than 1/8". Sheet metal would definitely have a sharp edge and the little crescent moon chips it makes would be absolute hell if they ever were to get spilled in the carpet or lawn.

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That's not a playhouse...THIS is a playhouse! (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago by sandman2211 to c/diy

4 comments fedilink

This one is still a work in progress, I'm hoping to have all the finish work done by next month. I probably won't get the lighting and stereo and all that installed until the end of the summer. I'm hoping this can be a hangout spot for them and their friends after they outgrow the slide. The huge roof is kind of the keystone of the whole thing. I've driven past hundreds of backyard playhouses and I've never observed a kid actually playing on one of them. I think a large part of it is because once you're done with the built-in toys, it's just not that fun anymore. Plus it's hot as hell under there, even in the shade. I noticed my covered deck is pretty nice and chill even on a hot day due to having a real roof overhead so I wanted to put the same thing over the playhouse. This thing isn't a play set, it's more of an outdoor space where they can hang out, craft, paint, read, play, build, and have their own place to do their own thing. So far they've been out there almost constantly.

Here's the sketchup model I made. It's my first project using CAD instead of scribbling on notepads and offcuts but it has been extremely helpful and I will definitely be using it again.

I got most of the framing done last fall. The basic frame sits on 14"x48" rebar reinforced footings. The posts are 6x6x10, and all joists are 2x8. The joist hangers are attached to tripled 2x10s. This thing is built like a fortress.

It sat idle over the winter but as soon as the weather was nice I got back at it, there's a ton of finish work to do. My daughter said she wanted a garage and a workbench just like mine so I got right on that! It's the first picture up above.

Here's the original one. Back in 2018 we decided it was time to get a playset for the little one. I looked around and thought "There's no way these things are worth $1000-$2000! I better get a used one and save some money." So we found one on a buy/sell/trade site for $100, took it down, and brought it home. Upon trying to set it back up I realized half the boards were rotten. I had a bunch of used deck boards from when I replaced my rotten deck, and I kept the very best looking ones for a future project such as this. Unfortunately I missed a small rotten core somewhere and one of the main structural members rotted out after less than 3 years. So for Round 2 I figured it was time to go big or go home. Just for materials it's going to end up being 4x more than if I'd just bought one brand new the first time around, but I think they're going to get way more enjoyment out of this one.

13

Backyard Shed (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago by sandman2211 to c/diy

1 comments fedilink

It may look like a garage but per my building permit this is definitely just a plain old boring 14x18 storage shed. It took forever to complete because I could only work on it a few hours every few evenings, and maybe an afternoon here and there on some weekends. There was also a lot of normal life and work stuff to deal with and other projects that were competing with this one. It was nearly 28 months from the time I broke ground until the last paint was dry.

It started out in June 2017 by paying the professionals to dig out and build a foundation. Over half the budget went into this but it was totally worth it.

After 5 months I'd finished putting in drainage, backfilling the holes, building retaining walls, leveling out the hilltop adjacent to the shed, and loaded over a dozen truckloads of dirt for various Craigslist respondents to my "please take some free dirt" posts.

It sat mostly idle until the end of the following July when I was able to start framing.

After about 3 months I had it framed, sheathed, roofed, and wrapped.

I built the first set of shelves late that fall so I'd have a safe place to store all the fiber cement siding until I could get around to installing it. A lot of it ended up in the attic as well. I also put in a rolling steel door around this time so it could be sealed up.

Some other things came up and I didn't get any more work done until June 2019, when I built some more storage space in there. It doesn't look like it from the outside but it has 9'6" of clearance to the bottom of the joists along with a pretty decent amount of attic space.

I worked on the finishing touches (fascia, soffit, siding, trim, caulk, paint, etc) through Sept and Oct.

Got it all finished up and passed inspection 3 days before my building permit expired! Here's what it looks like after I filled it up with shelves and storage and all our other junk.

10

Let's see some more projects! (self.diy)

submitted 2 years ago by sandman2211 to c/diy

1 comments fedilink

I don't really understand how the different servers and communities and federated this-and-that works yet but I checked out a few different servers and this one seems pretty cool. I have no idea if this will become an alternative to reddit or not, but if nobody uses it then it surely won't. So I took a shot at recreating one of the parts of that site that I really appreciated.

I threw out some of the random stuff I've made to hopefully get the ball rolling. I know there's folks browsing right now that have made something that's cooler, more functional, more beautiful, or more ridiculous than anything I have in my garage right now. Let's see some of them!

22

alarm clock bedside shelf (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by sandman2211 to c/diy

2 comments fedilink

Made this little guy in about 5 minutes back in the college days when I wasn't allowed to put holes in walls or fill the garage I didn't have with tools I couldn't afford.

The DVD case came from the 2002 Fellowship of the Rings Xbox game. The packaging for the game was by far the best part of that whole experience.

https://www.eurogamer.net/r-vulotr-x

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kids tablesaw (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by sandman2211 to c/diy

5 comments fedilink

Kids need tablesaws too, right? This one uses a sheet metal nibbler so it's completely safe, even a toddler-sized pinkie finger won't fit into the moving cutterhead.

Full credit to this cool instructable - I was going to use an oscillating multitool until I stumbled across this idea which is even safer:

https://www.instructables.com/Table-Saw-for-Kids/

To explain the theme - I have a lot of Dewalt stuff so I wanted my kids to feel like they had a real powertool, not some plastic kiddy toy. It cuts paper, thin wood, thinner cardboard (think Amazon boxes, not Target or diaper boxes) and sheet metal. I haven't tried that last one because I don't want to scratch up my nice paint job.

Functional dust collection port in back

I had an old 18v drill with a wobbly arbor so it was perfect for this project. The cutterhead is just a cheap sheet metal nibbler.

Internals with a coat of paint

Close up of the fence locking hardware

21

bog chairs (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by sandman2211 to c/diy

5 comments fedilink

This project is from several years ago. My dad picked up a set of viking / bog chairs decades ago and over the years all but 1 of them were lost, broken, or loaned and not returned. I made some copies out of cedar for him to replace all the lost ones. Original is on the right.

Freshly stained. I think I used Pittsburgh Cedar Naturaltone deck stain from Menards.

I kept 2 chairs for myself - the best and the worst. This is how the latter looked after 4 years out in the elements. I think it had just been powerwashed before I took this picture in preparation of being restained.

This is the guide I made to cut the tails out with a router.

17

knife block (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by sandman2211 to c/diy

3 comments fedilink

I received some knives as gifts and didn't have a good place to store them so I made a larger knife block.

I made almost all of these cuts on my bandsaw. I had some cedar scraps and offcuts so I made a lot of veneer strips of varying thickness and kind of glued and layered it all into place. Then I trimmed it up, used a router and roundover bit, and sanded it for awhile.

I stained it with basic minwax stain and finished with a few coats of tung oil followed by paste wax.

I don't think I'd use this approach again but I think it turned out OK anyway.