Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[mansaxel]

There is "enough bandwidth". You know you've reached that point when the problem is actually "too much latency". You can buy wider bandwidth, but not reduced latency.

I agree there are diminishing returns in bandwidth, yes, but not until you can't saturate the available link with one computer only.

And, you are completely right in the latency discussion. I once made a complicated WAN procurement centered around minimised latencies. There was a formula in the selection process where reduction in latency gave a calculated (not actual) rebate on the price offered when compared to other, longer, cheaper paths. Thus, we stimulated the suppliers to offer a high-quality network and not to go for price only. It was highly successful.

[Specmaster]

Interesting. That breaker panel has no master disconnect. For that size panel older typically a 100 AMP breaker, newer typically 200 AMP.   I've seen that once before and I guess it is (or was) code legal.

it's at the bottom ?

You're right. The primary is coming in on the bottom. It appears there is a master disconnect located there. Nevermind. 

The odd thing here is that all the breakers are at the top of the board. Surely it is best practise to start populating the board at the bottom with the heaviest loads nearest to the incoming supply and the lightest load above them? 

[bd139]

Why would anyone buy cheap far eastern PSUs / Chargers??? Do you want an insurance claim for the house burning down or something?
We know these things are crap, I won't let them in the house.
Had a similar dsicussion on a ham group about £5 inc shipping 12V 240W "meanwell" modular PSUs. You get what you pay for, people have died because of this crap.

I know those cheap arses. Yaesu FTdx101D in the shack? Check! £20 piece of shit power supply plugged into it with no OVP crowbar? Check! Investment risk? About £3k 

Edit: these are actually the sort of people I have seen arguing with the tech guys in ML&S because they reverse volted it as well.

[bd139]

but I already pay a ridiculous $82/mo just for 60. 400 would be over $40/mo more. And that's just internet. No TV or VOIP.

I pay ~ $40 per month for symmetrical 100Mbit.  GE symmetrical would set me back ~$75 (which is a new-subscribers-only deal).

That's pretty cheap. Things are looking good here finally. I've booked install for asymmetric fibre here. Getting 900 down 100 up for 70 GBP/month. And no damn blocking or traffic management. So that's basically gigabit to my desktop from the internet finally

[bd139]

Given bd's recent home brew sa purchase, maybe this will float his boat:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353180084478

Interesting. Not sure what it's used for. Almost worth it for the enclosure and controls etc.

[AVGresponding]

Interesting. That breaker panel has no master disconnect. For that size panel older typically a 100 AMP breaker, newer typically 200 AMP.   I've seen that once before and I guess it is (or was) code legal.

it's at the bottom ?

You're right. The primary is coming in on the bottom. It appears there is a master disconnect located there. Nevermind. 

The odd thing here is that all the breakers are at the top of the board. Surely it is best practise to start populating the board at the bottom with the heaviest loads nearest to the incoming supply and the lightest load above them?

Nope, you always start from the top left.

The bus bars are plenty big enough that it's not an issue, we do the same with panel boards as well.


That resonant frequency tester went unsold again and it's relisted at £15 this time.

[capt bullshot]

That's why I put the makers name in quotes and all lowercase. Clearly you are not getting a genuine Mean Well for £50 inc shipping but some people can't see past the moths in their wallet.

£50 for a 240W MeanWell?
That's a normal price tag IMO:

Typo (now corrected), £5 per my earlier post.

OK, that should be identifiable by close looks if it's a bargain or crap.

For that charger I bought, I was aware of the risk it might be crap. Turned out it's not just crap, but fraud also (doesn't match its specs).
There are more expensive ones available that look exactly the same, just a different label, made me assuming it might be just the same crap inside, so I deliberately chose the cheapest one. For the original project, I've ordered now a genuine Mean Well supply that I can mod for the purpose. A ready made charger would have been less effort, so I tried this one first. I couldn't find such kind of charger from "known good" manufacturers.

[Zucca]

That's pretty cheap. Things are looking good here finally. I've booked install for asymmetric fibre here. Getting 900 down 100 up for 70 GBP/month. And no damn blocking or traffic management. So that's basically gigabit to my desktop from the internet finally

In Italy at my parents house we have 20/1 ADSL2 (50€/Month), but no worries FTTC should come in 2018.
Oh I just realized it is 2020 and still no FTTC. 

PS: Those bastards tried to sell me a new VDSL Modem (more money out the window), not one, not twice but three times.
They should all burn in hell in eternity, with a 36K baud connection.

[tggzzz]

Given bd's recent home brew sa purchase, maybe this will float his boat:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353180084478

Interesting. Not sure what it's used for. Almost worth it for the enclosure and controls etc.

Ah, the joys of our youthful years. There are some things I'm glad I don't try to recapture.

Now if the components really are special, that's a different kettle of fish.

[Cubdriver]

Interesting. That breaker panel has no master disconnect. For that size panel older typically a 100 AMP breaker, newer typically 200 AMP.   I've seen that once before and I guess it is (or was) code legal.

it's at the bottom ?

You're right. The primary is coming in on the bottom. It appears there is a master disconnect located there. Nevermind. 

The odd thing here is that all the breakers are at the top of the board. Surely it is best practise to start populating the board at the bottom with the heaviest loads nearest to the incoming supply and the lightest load above them?

As heavy as the busses are, I don't think it's really necessary. The only thing I'd try to keep as close as possible to the main breaker would be a panel-sized MOV for lightning protection.

And as for Mike's comment about there initially appearing to be no main breaker in the panel, there actually could be instances in the US at least of the main panel not containing the main breaker - if the panel is located more than about ten feet (can't recall exactly) from the service entrance (meaning that more than ten feet of the service feed is inside the building before reaching the panel) then the NEC requires the main disconnect to be located at the service entrance rather than in the panel to prevent a long run of effectively unprotected wiring within the building, and the panel is treated as a sub panel with the ground and neutral separated from one another and joined at the meter box rather than in the panel.

I ran into this when rewiring my house as my service entrance is about 25 feet from the breaker panel, with the feed lines running through a crawlspace.  I had to buy a special meter box that includes a main breaker (and of course the utility only approves certain ones, the most readily available of which set me back about $700 - highway robbery!!).  It was great fun pulling three 2/0 and one 1/0 cables through twenty-some-odd feet of conduit by myself.  Laid them out across the yard, taped 'em together and fed all four at once, and mostly pushed them through from outside.  I used a standard main panel with a breaker in it, too, so I can still kill everything from inside the house, but if a fault should develop in the crawl space the breaker in the meter box will trip to protect things.

-Pat

[bd139]

That's pretty cheap. Things are looking good here finally. I've booked install for asymmetric fibre here. Getting 900 down 100 up for 70 GBP/month. And no damn blocking or traffic management. So that's basically gigabit to my desktop from the internet finally

In Italy at my parents house we have 20/1 ADSL2 (50€/Month), but no worries FTTC should come in 2018.
Oh I just realized it is 2020 and still no FTTC. 

PS: Those bastards tried to sell me a new VDSL Modem (more money out the window), not one, not twice but three times.
They should all burn in hell in eternity, with a 36K baud connection.

Only just improved here and I'm in the middle of London in an area where most of the tech staff live. Basically 3 years ago I was on copper to the exchange at 17 down and 3 up. They installed FTTC very late in our area because some miserable old fuckers managed to get the planning permission denied for the box. Now they've literally only just put fibre runs in everywhere a couple of months back.

It KILLED me for the last 10 years seeing some village in rural Derbyshire with FTTC cabinets up everywhere getting 60+ down. But some people here want to live in the dark ages 

Given bd's recent home brew sa purchase, maybe this will float his boat:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353180084478

Interesting. Not sure what it's used for. Almost worth it for the enclosure and controls etc.

Ah, the joys of our youthful years. There are some things I'm glad I don't try to recapture.

Now if the components really are special, that's a different kettle of fish.

Yeah that's a good point. TBH a decent enclosure is 10-20 quid from China / ebay now so hardly worth doing that any more.

[mansaxel]

It KILLED me for the last 10 years seeing some village in rural Derbyshire with FTTC cabinets up everywhere getting 60+ down. But some people here want to live in the dark ages 

It's the same here. If you knew your way around the various government programmes and displayed some initiative, combined with a friend with an excavator, you had symmetric 1GE 15 years ago, but only if you passed forest, cows or reindeer on your way to work, AND had at least 50km to the first traffic lights.

[med6753]

And as for Mike's comment about there initially appearing to be no main breaker in the panel, there actually could be instances in the US at least of the main panel not containing the main breaker - if the panel is located more than about ten feet (can't recall exactly) from the service entrance (meaning that more than ten feet of the service feed is inside the building before reaching the panel) then the NEC requires the main disconnect to be located at the service entrance rather than in the panel to prevent a long run of effectively unprotected wiring within the building, and the panel is treated as a sub panel with the ground and neutral separated from one another and joined at the meter box rather than in the panel.

I ran into this when rewiring my house as my service entrance is about 25 feet from the breaker panel, with the feed lines running through a crawlspace.  I had to buy a special meter box that includes a main breaker (and of course the utility only approves certain ones, the most readily available of which set me back about $700 - highway robbery!!).  It was great fun pulling three 2/0 and one 1/0 cables through twenty-some-odd feet of conduit by myself.  Laid them out across the yard, taped 'em together and fed all four at once, and mostly pushed them through from outside.  I used a standard main panel with a breaker in it, too, so I can still kill everything from inside the house, but if a fault should develop in the crawl space the breaker in the meter box will trip to protect things.

-Pat

Here's are the 2 instances were the breaker panel had no main disconnect yet was on the wall directly opposite the service entrance:

My parent's house which was built in 1954. It was 100 AMP service and surprisingly used breakers rather than fuses. And ganged breakers for 240V dryer and stove. But wiring was BX (armored cable) and outlets non-polarized duplex with no ground. And no master disconnect. The only way to shut down the entire house was to pull the meter.

I did some electrical work for a friend and this house was built in the 1960's. 100 AMP service with no master disconnect. And again, panel was on wall directly opposite service entrance. NMB cabling with 3 prong outlets and 240V for dryer. Since there was no master disconnect I had to install new breakers on a hot panel. Not fun. Work real carefully and slowly and it worked out.

[tggzzz]

Given bd's recent home brew sa purchase, maybe this will float his boat:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353180084478

Interesting. Not sure what it's used for. Almost worth it for the enclosure and controls etc.

Ah, the joys of our youthful years. There are some things I'm glad I don't try to recapture.

Now if the components really are special, that's a different kettle of fish.

Yeah that's a good point. TBH a decent enclosure is 10-20 quid from China / ebay now so hardly worth doing that any more.

The only exception I've made was to buy some small enclosures when Maplin was closing down. Big enclosures aren't worth storing on the off-chance the might come in handy.

[Specmaster]

Interesting. That breaker panel has no master disconnect. For that size panel older typically a 100 AMP breaker, newer typically 200 AMP.   I've seen that once before and I guess it is (or was) code legal.

it's at the bottom ?

You're right. The primary is coming in on the bottom. It appears there is a master disconnect located there. Nevermind. 

The odd thing here is that all the breakers are at the top of the board. Surely it is best practise to start populating the board at the bottom with the heaviest loads nearest to the incoming supply and the lightest load above them?

Nope, you always start from the top left.

The bus bars are plenty big enough that it's not an issue, we do the same with panel boards as well.


That resonant frequency tester went unsold again and it's relisted at £15 this time.

When I installed those, I always started bottom left and worked my way up in order from the largest first to the smallest and leaving the top section filled with blanks for future expansion. It was I thought the safest method as once the cover was removed, the lower and therefore the most accessible busbar section was filled with breakers. Helps to prevent the risk of accidental contact with live busbars when working on live systems, particularly in 3 phase boards. 

[Cerebus]

Turned out the genius before me had installed a coaxial attenuator on the cable coming in.

Any idea why?

Maybe for TV service only? I have no idea. It certainly interfered with the internet service. I only have cable internet...nothing else. In fact I recently got them to cough up another 12 month promo for me. 

[edit] Gigabit on DOCSIS uses a lot more bandwidth than lower speeds...it might have been that the attenuator is fine on a lower speed plan.

Quite plausible. I had a friend who was near the head end for cable TV and the signal he was getting came through so hot that it completely saturated the input amp on this TV set - looked like a square wave with lots of ringing once we slipped a scope probe in after the input stage. Fixed with a 20 dB pad. Here in the UK some of the cable TV providers skimped on plant and just had stupidly long cable runs with fewer head ends than they should have - result: if you were near the head end it was way too hot, if you were at the far end you could just get a signal that had enough oomph left in it. Must have cost them a fortune in new plant when they started trying to use the same cabling for DOCSIS a few years later as there's no way the existing runs would have met DOCSIS requirements - they probably had to cut each run in half and install 100s or 1000s of new head ends in each town they served.

[AVGresponding]

When I installed those, I always started bottom left and worked my way up in order from the largest first to the smallest and leaving the top section filled with blanks for future expansion. It was I thought the safest method as once the cover was removed, the lower and therefore the most accessible busbar section was filled with breakers. Helps to prevent the risk of accidental contact with live busbars when working on live systems, particularly in 3 phase boards. 

Modern boards don't have exposed bus bars in any case.
Merlin Gerin invented the Isobar system (owned by Schneider Electric nowadays) which improves safety in boards even more.
Working in a live board is pretty safe (comparitively) these days.

[nfmax]

That's pretty cheap. Things are looking good here finally. I've booked install for asymmetric fibre here. Getting 900 down 100 up for 70 GBP/month. And no damn blocking or traffic management. So that's basically gigabit to my desktop from the internet finally

In Italy at my parents house we have 20/1 ADSL2 (50€/Month), but no worries FTTC should come in 2018.
Oh I just realized it is 2020 and still no FTTC. 

PS: Those bastards tried to sell me a new VDSL Modem (more money out the window), not one, not twice but three times.
They should all burn in hell in eternity, with a 36K baud connection.

Only just improved here and I'm in the middle of London in an area where most of the tech staff live. Basically 3 years ago I was on copper to the exchange at 17 down and 3 up. They installed FTTC very late in our area because some miserable old fuckers managed to get the planning permission denied for the box. Now they've literally only just put fibre runs in everywhere a couple of months back.

It KILLED me for the last 10 years seeing some village in rural Derbyshire with FTTC cabinets up everywhere getting 60+ down. But some people here want to live in the dark ages 

5 down 1 up here on VDSL   

We thought we were lucky when we got VDSL and the neighbouring villages got practically nothing. Now, BT have upgraded them with genuine FTTP, (fibre on overhead poles, aerial splice chambers, Corning CDPs) while we, being on a different exchange, are still stuck where we were, thanks to a bungled planning application for a fill-in cabinet. Soon after the start of lock down, I took pity on a chap in a van wandering around looking at poles and asked him if he was lost? Turns out he was doing a survey for an FTTP roll-out here as well - though he said not to hold my breath.

When/if they do install fibre here, I will put on my best greybeard impression and pull out from the garage the reel of 50/125 GI fibre I pulled myself, from a preform I made myself back in about 1981, and ask them what took so long? 

[tonyalbus]

25,- Spectrum analyzer(working according seller) incl flightcase ... the case is worth it.. 

[tonyalbus]

In a small country and no hills,rocks... these things are more easy i guess
250 is limmited on my contract, can have 500 or 1000 also...but costs..and 250 is okey
its cable

[tonyalbus]

Woops Dave!!
Certificate expires......Thursday, August 27, 2020

[Specmaster]

Here is my reading for download and upload on Virgin cable.

[tonyalbus]

Yeah!!

[PA0PBZ]

Woops Dave!!
Certificate expires......Thursday, August 27, 2020

Yes, I already reported it in the supporters lounge.

[Specmaster]

Woops Dave!!
Certificate expires......Thursday, August 27, 2020

Yep, I got similar warning, although my browser was more concerned because the internet times did not agree.