Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[25 CPS]

Damn I wish there was a Tim Horton's close to me. Nearest is 60 miles in White Plains.

But the one near Lady Cop in Staten Island closed. That's where this pix was taken.

Tim Horton’s always seems to have a rough go of it each time they try to expand into the United States.  It never works out as well as they hope it will.  One thing I did notice though is that the coffee at US Tim Hortons is better than ours here. I encountered that a number of years ago driving home from friends in Pennsylvania when I stopped at one in an NYS Thruway plaza.  The coffee was darker, much more full flavoured and not as bitter than the stuff they serve here and the cups mentioned that it was roasted in New York State.  What that said to me was that they were taking the Canadian marketplace completely for granted and trading off quality for more profit vs. trying to compete for business to break into the market during that go round of American expansion.  Unfortunately, Tim Hortons slid badly here about 20 years ago when they brought in the automatic cream/milk and sugar dispensers, went to reheating all the pastries instead of baking them fresh in each shop, and watered down the coffee all at the same time.

It just looks so....Canadian 

What? No snow, not a Maple leaf in sight, and, most concerning, not a single item of Hockey equipment anywhere. Couple of Loonies through...

No snow.  We won’t be getting that for another month at least.  However, that Tim Hortons and the area that Mnementh lives in is north of the 401 which firmly places it in the snow belt above where the moderating effect of Lake Ontario runs out. Maple leaves?  Plenty of them...  I took the long and windy back way home after and enjoyed some spectacular fall colours.

And no hockey equipment either.  But, in certain circumstances, sports equipment and test equipment go together really well:



About two years ago the stars aligned.  There was some really nice gear being auctioned off on gcsurplus.ca.  They didn’t provide an option for shipping back then so you had to go in person to their warehouse in Ottawa to pick up your items and that had to take place within a certain number of days of payment which in turn had to take place within three days of the auctions ending.  I was able to pick up a nice pulse/function generator, signal generator, counter, and VNA all timed off so the pickup could be done on the Friday before my football team’s away game in Ottawa on the weekend.  So I drove up early on the Friday, collected everything at the gcsurplus.ca warehouse, saw some of the sites, had dinner, checked into the hotel, played in the game Saturday, then took the scenic route home along Highway 7 on Sunday.  How to avoid having all this test gear in the back of my SUV screaming smash the windows and steal me in every parking lot the whole weekend?  Hide it underneath a bunch of alternate jerseys.  It worked perfectly.

[bd139]

I just discovered there are Tim Hortons here in the U.K. which was surprising. We had an unsuccessful Taco Bell invasion a few years back.

Med looks like he owns a small plane in that picture and can get anything in from Mexico for enough greenbacks.

[25 CPS]

I just discovered there are Tim Hortons here in the U.K. which was surprising. We had an unsuccessful Taco Bell invasion a few years back.

Med looks like he owns a small plane in that picture and can get anything in from Mexico for enough greenbacks.

Given the choice, I'd rather have Gregg's frankly.

[bd139]

Yeah Greggs are pretty good. You can buy their stuff frozen in the UK now so I can enjoy Greggs at home without having to haul my fat arse out of the house 

[Specmaster]

@bd139, shit, I  thought your fibre was installed months ago, thats a real bummer, so you was using mobile data for a whole day  How the feck can they have the cheek to charge for something, before its been installed, even if they are refunding you, its still 2 months that they have had your money, money which could have been invested in savings and earning you a little bit of  interest. Sounds like rally sharp business practise to me 

All the parts for the PL310 should be with me this Friday via Fedex from Mouser. So much for their free shipping for orders over £33, I had an order made out £40 and they still were going to charge me for the Fedex delivery, so F that, I only ordered what I needed in the minimum quants 

[bd139]

I had it scheduled for installation right in the middle of lockdown and as you can imagine it got postponed as OR stopped doing home visits. So yes, mobile data.
Was looking at network redundancy options and worked out "just tether the laptop to the phone" and it works fine . I'm not a terrible bandwidth abuser so I'd probably be quite happy running like that.

Technically Zen are charging me for the broadband that OpenReach haven't provisioned yet. If they cancel the charging it'll cancel my order which means going to the back of the queue again. So they just refund me and pay me compensation for not having the promised bandwidth 

Good luck with the PL310 - hope it's not of the "bastard" variety.

[tggzzz]

Yeah Greggs are pretty good. You can buy their stuff frozen in the UK now so I can enjoy Greggs at home without having to haul my fat arse out of the house 

Eat too much Greggs stuff and you will have a fat arse!

[med6753]

Med looks like he owns a small plane in that picture and can get anything in from Mexico for enough greenbacks.

Huh? 

[mnementh]

That guy from Con Air... yeah, I can see the resemblance.

mnem
 

[bd139]

Yeah Greggs are pretty good. You can buy their stuff frozen in the UK now so I can enjoy Greggs at home without having to haul my fat arse out of the house 

Eat too much Greggs stuff and you will have a fat arse!

Very true. My ex. QED.

Not going down that hole again. Greggs --> 5k run now. You start to enjoy it eventually. Until you fall on your arse and break something 

Med looks like he owns a small plane in that picture and can get anything in from Mexico for enough greenbacks.

Huh? 

It's that halo that did it 

[mansaxel]

Interesting fact: The NYC water system does not require pumps. It is almost completely gravity fed from the Shokan Reservoir in the Catskill Mountains. And.....several times it has been judged the best tasting water in the entire US.   

Which, TBH, isn't very hard. The further out in flyover county one goes, the more the water tastes like dunking your head in the kids pool (where the chlorination is upped just a bit to offset the e.coli). I do remember Manhattan water to be OK, so you're not wrong, it is the rest of the country that equates "pool taste" with "potable". Probably sensible precaution. To pick up the thread from Cerberus, it has been argued that clean water (and as a necessary part of that, working sewers) is the true mark of a civilisation.

Simply because "being able to take getting clean water for granted" leaves us free to concentrate on the rest of the problems we face so much more efficiently. 

[BU508A]

On other notes: Eddie van Halen is dead.   

Thirteen minute's silence to honor him.

[Specmaster]

Eat too much Greggs stuff and you will have a fat arse!

Very true. My ex. QED.

Not going down that hole again. Greggs --> 5k run now. You start to enjoy it eventually. Until you fall on your arse and break something 

You mean like you did during the lockdown, remember you're not as young as you were, its time to reign such activities in now so you can enjoy your retirement as soon as your able to 

[bd139]

I dunno. As I get older and see other people's health around me, I feel that it is necessary to do that to fully enjoy retirement. My average 5k time on the last 3 runs is now in the fastest group which is 16-19 year olds. I was doing that last one round the park on Sunday and a regular woman in there, clearly in her 80s, lapped me just to show off. YMMV but a big chunk of my family didn't even make 80. It's approx 40 minutes 3 times a week 

RIP to Van Halen 

Edit: re falling over, I healed pretty quick and the reason I fell over was incorrect footwear for the terrain which has been sorted. Got some trail running shoes.

[med6753]

RIP to Van Halen 

Ditto. 

[bd139]

Agilent labelled 34401A ... £304. Checked SN and it's manufactured 2006. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/164423512290

No cal status or evidence of labels and missing front bumper so I'm going to skip that one.

The local one for £320 is now accepting offers but it's 2001 vintage which is a bit old. I'd like to try and nail a 2010 or later unit if I can.

[Specmaster]

Agilent labelled 34401A ... £304. Checked SN and it's manufactured 2006. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/164423512290

No cal status or evidence of labels and missing front bumper so I'm going to skip that one.

The local one for £320 is now accepting offers but it's 2001 vintage which is a bit old. I'd like to try and nail a 2010 or later unit if I can.

Yep, its the early ones that have the issues with the display as well I seem to recall, so its wise to give that one a wide berth.

[bd139]

The Agilent branded ones are way past the ones with the early display controllers in them. That 2006 one is pretty good.

[Specmaster]

The 2006 one is OK without the front bumper, but it would affect its resale value, best avoided.

[bd139]

Yeah that's why I'm not buying it  .

My criteria are:

1. Close or below £300
2. Has bumpers and handle
3. Agilent branded (eliminates a lot of risks)
4. Pref 2010 or later. May risk earlier if in decent condition.
5. Visible cal sticker in last 5 years.

[Cerebus]

Rubber baby buggy bumpers.

Just felt the need to say that. I'll get my coat...

[mnementh]

   

Forgive me brothers for I have sinned; it has been 17 days since my last confession. I seek absolution for the following misdeeds: I have molested this perfectly good MOSFET switch module for components; and worse, I did scab said MOSFET onto the mainboard of my 3D printer in place of this little D-PAK for no other reason than it was easier than rewiring for the module.

I have atoned by way of 2 blisters and a dozen ow-dammitt-ows; followed by at least three shit litanies.
 
What further expiation is required that I may attain absolution...?

mnem
Perhaps I should have pants on if I'm going to be in this booth... 

[bd139]

If you won and it didn’t draw blood or burn you and you didn’t swear at it then it was a dishonourable fight.

[tautech]

Technically Zen are charging me for the broadband that OpenReach haven't provisioned yet. If they cancel the charging it'll cancel my order which means going to the back of the queue again. So they just refund me and pay me compensation for not having the promised bandwidth 

 
What mumblefuck dreamed up that retarded way to do business ? 

Dumb as a sack full of hammers !

[bd139]

It’s a combination of breaking up our telecoms monopoly and incremental changes to law caused by the larger privatised providers abusing their customers since.

This is the default state that everything evolved into in the human race thus we are doomed.