BoxOfFeet

I saw the movie in high school, when it came out on VHS, and I loved it. I bought the book, and couldn't put it down. It was perhaps my favorite piece of sci-fi for a while. I thought John Travolta was delightfully hammy, and that the movie was extremely quotable and fun.

A coworker of mine were just talking about musicals this morning, and my strong dislike of Hamilton. For some reason, it popped into my head that I would love a musical of Battlefield Earth, and John Travolta should sing in it. This sentiment was not shared by my coworker. So, yeah, that's it.

The TI-86 is my absolute favorite calculator. I find it a pleasure to program for, I love the custom menu buttons, and I love the screen compared to that of the 83/84. I love the design, the uniform buttons and dark color scheme look very professional. This is my second one, after the screen died in my original baby that got me through high school and college. Which leads me to another thing I love about it, they are dirt cheap on eBay. Most are under $20.

Back in my college days, I saw somebody online had modded theirs with the frontlight from a GBA SP. The AGS-001, not the AGS-101. That was brilliant. I did a ton of calculator programming and math in low-light conditions at the time. Lounges in the dorms, during lectures. A calculator with a lit screen would have been awesome. I know all three major brands have options like that now, but it was pretty novel at the time. I think the only one out with a backlight was the Casio 9860 Slim, which was quite pricey. Unfortunately, even a broken GBA was outside of my broke college budget, and those tri-wing screwdrivers were not common yet. So, the dream faded.

Until, for some reason, a couple weeks ago. I do not know why it popped back into my head, and I could not find the source of the mod again for the life of me. But I knew I had to do it. And these days, you can get aftermarket GBA parts super easy and cheap. I still had my old 86, and I took it apart for proof of concept work. I tried every single test point for something that just turned on and off with the calculator, and could not find a single thing. Well, at least not anything without a signal from it. So, I resigned to just using a switch. Which I remember is what the original mod also did. I hid it in the battery compartment. It works fantastic. I wish I did this 20 years ago. There are a few specks of dust on it, and the frontlight makes them hugely visible. I'm going to get them off, but I'm out of Rodico at the moment. Anyway, just thought I'd share.

Or is there a way to set a resolution as a default for specific displays?

I have 3 monitors in my setup. Two are on a KVM, and one is always on my Mint PC. That monitor is an old XP era Dell. But it isn't hooked up with DVI, instead I have it connected via HDMI to an audio extractor to the Dell speakers, then HDMI to DVI. It works great. Except when I hit the KVM switch, and for some reason the resolution on the Dell changes from 1280x1024 to 1920x1080, which is unsupported.

How the heck do I get 1280x1024 to be persistent?

I really don't know why. I don't take that many notes. When I'm in meetings, I've been telling people I color code my notes. But honestly, I have just been switching pens at random.. I'm never going to use all this ink before they dry up, and it's going to be a pain to clean them all. Normally, I'll only have one or two inked at a time.

It took probably 10 hours of troubleshooting going off his troubleshooting guide. There was a tiny short i couldn't even see through my jewelers loupe, but measurements said it was there. So, I scraped between a couple pins with my smallest tweezers, and boom. Done.

Then, after I finished, I discovered there is a newer and better version of this mod, the iFlash2PS2. The IDE Resurrector only supports up to 128GB cards. The iFlash can handle up to 1TB. And it looks like slightly less soldering. So, learn from me. Do the iFlash.

I'm assuming you all know about FMCB, and how to rip your discs to ISO files. If you don't, this is a great way to save your console that won't read discs anymore, like this one I picked up in an "as-is" bin super cheap at a used game store. I'd look up Tito from Macho Nacho's PS2 mod videos.

Here's a pic of my terrible wiring. Yes, that's from a CAT5 cable. The wire is ordered for this mod wasn't small enough and I was too impatient to wait for more. It's very ugly, but it works. You're going to want 30ga to do this right. CAT5 is 24ga, and it barely, barely fits. Honestly, if i get ambitious I might rewire it later. The SD slot wiring is way easier than the board soldering. You can't see it of course, but I know it's there. And I'll have to see it again when I eventually install a Retrogem.

I have a toddler that's starting to get into Disney, so I've been expanding my collection. Last week, I got the Masterpiece Lion King boxed set. I already have a lot (probably a dozen) Disney Home Video CLV discs, I think I'm going to try to get the CAV releases instead.

I got this when he sold his house to move to an assisted living facility. It's just been sitting in my garage for a couple years. Busy with the kid and all that. Well, we just got a little child trailer, and I didn't want to pull it with my mountain bike so figured it would be a good time to clean this guy up. New tires and tubes. Cleaned and lubed. Waxed. I thought it was trying hard to look like an old Schwinn, so I thought some nice shiny fenders would help out with that.

I have so many memories of going on rides with him, and of him taking it camping. I always thought it was a nice looking bike. I'll have to show him a picture of it all cleaned up next time I see him, I don't think he's ridden it in at least a decade.

Next on the agenda is new brake pads, and some retro lights. Any other suggestions? Maybe a white saddle seat, or different handlebars? I'm pretty sure its only value is sentimental, so the best suggestions are cheap suggestions. Thanks!

I can't stand the SpaceMouse Pro. They ruined it! Why would they swap the nice tactile buttons for stupid gummy membrane buttons? And why coat the whole thing in nasty soft touch coating that is going to turn to goo? We peaked with the previous generation of space balls.

Since I've been working from home though, it has gotten quite annoying to unplug my SpaceExplorer and take it back and forth to the office. It would be so nice to have one of those fancy new wireless ones. But that's not happening, since they ruined it.

So, I added USB-C to mine, instead. Now, I'll just have a cable at the office, and a cable at home and just take the unit itself back and forth. I can even leave a USB-C to USB-C cord in my case, in case I need to use it with my laptop away from my docks! If anyone is interested, I can share the STL for the little breakout board mounting piece I made.

I tried just about every suggestion here, but still couldn't get an airtight print. This is transparent PLA. I'm going to play with my speeds and overlap to try to get it clearer, but it was dimensionally accurate and completely sealed the first try.

Don't look too carefully at the barrel, it's just a hollow test one. I was able to eyedropper fill and test the grip section with it, but the OD is wrong, and there's no real filling mechanism in it. That's phase 2 of this project!

I had a really hard time capturing the colors right here for the buttons and the minute hand. In real life, they're much closer than they look here. The GBA has a Funnyplaying IPS, and the watch is a HEAVILY modded Seiko SKX. Honestly, the only things original are the case, crown tube, and bezel at this point.

It started as a eBay Frankenwatch. Unfortunately, and obviously, the 6309 in it was useless. Also, it was completely the wrong type of crystal, just ground to fit. So, it got one of my spare 7S26's. It took a custom spacer to fit, and I had to grind a larger bevel on the rotor to fit it in the caseback. Hands and dial are Yobokies.

Edit: also, it came with no gaskets, even on the crown. So, it got a whole new set.