Blog. HTPC hack, soundbar repair & more!

We turn a laptop into a stationary PC using fridge door magnets, fix a broken Boston Acoustics TVee26 soundbar, look at some out-of-date networking gear, and more. This is a lazy blog video because I've been too lazy to film anything proper lately - I have no excuse.

--
THIS VIDEO IS RELEASED TO THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
To the extent possible under law, I have waived all copyright and related or neighbouring rights to this work, according to the Creative Commons CC0 affirmer. This means that anyone is free to use this content in any manner they see fit, without my objection. However, the video may still contain copyrighted content (images, video, audio, software, etc.) that does not belong to me. WHILE I DO NOT RESERVE THE RIGHTS OF ANY PART OF THIS VIDEO, THE COPYRIGHT OF THIRD-PARTY CONTENT STILL BELONGS TO ITS RESPECTIVE OWNERS. THE COPYRIGHT OF THIRD-PARTY CONTENT IS NOT WAIVED. THE VIDEO IS PROVIDED AS-IS, AND I DO NOT PROVIDE ANY GUARANTEE OF ITS QUALITY.

[combatplayer]

i have a laptop mounted under a TV table, with the lid switch permanently disabled and a power switch mounted on one of the legs of the table. the setup is surprisingly functional, all that's exposed is a DVD drive, 2 USB plugs and a headphone jack. HDMI and Ethernet etc all comes out the back, hidden by the table. all with wires lifted off the board instead of moving the board, so if i cut the wires it'll work fine again. minus the lid switch. the fix for reversing that is adding a magnet back into the display, as that's what i removed.

[tbbw]

Love the roll of toilet paper on the table... not sure that counts as cleaning electronics unless you refer to it as the "alien probe" :P

[craignehring]

Quite worthwhile video, good food for thought.
Thoroughly enjoyable...
Winter IS an excuse to slough off. To busy surviving the cold here. Happy New Year

[gfsh]

Nice setup thats as custome and individual as it gets. Great video as always. I do have a great sense of style it has to be said. Nice one

[deletewin]

Chromecast or a Intel NUC would probably be something you should look into. I’m using Plex and Chromecast on every monitor/screens in my home and It works so good 🧙🏻‍♂️

[alfoncejean]

whenever I see your istalations I feel reassured I'm not the only covering every bit of light with the finest grade of electrical tape I can find. And use extra curtains with shutters.

[Seegalgalguntijak]

What is going on with the red-white-blue color? How do you want to watch anything on a display with a color range like that?

[khachaturian]

THIS is your best kind of video. "Fancy new production standards", meh. Thanks, liked.

[SoJa]

Are you actually transferring movies to the dell before playing them? Good bitrate 1080p x264 is around 20-25Mb/s and the best 4k you can usually find is 50-70Mb/s and 100Mbit ethernet should be perfectly fine for that.

[nerdywolfi]

Would booting that Dell laptop there over WoL be a possible solution as well, providing you would've also ran another Ethernet cable to it?

[twocvbloke]

Now that's a rats nest of finest proportions, which I'm sure has triggered a number of neat-o-philes who must absolutely have everything neatly arranged... :P

And that router, 4G capable? Pretty neat, assuming the 4G reception on it is decent... :D

[Seegalgalguntijak]

The migration from the SSD to HDD issues may have something to do with AHCI mode, which may not be activated in the HDD machine's BIOS?

[Seegalgalguntijak]

On desktop PCs, you have a BIOS option to tell them what to do when power has been lost and is restored. It's usually something like turn on, turn off or remember last state. Maybe the Dell laptop also has this option so you could actually control it over the power bar (or a radio switch for the mains power)? If not, well, then it probably isn't a proper business class machine, but some low-end consumer crap instead. Chug it away for a Lenovo Thinkpad any day! ;)

[Seegalgalguntijak]

Usually, with an external monitor you should be able to switch between internal only, external+internal (either in cloning or expansion mode) or external only. No electronic fix needed for that.

[Seegalgalguntijak]

What about those heat pipes? Why are there ones that can't be mounted vertically, or in any desired direction whatsoever?

[LetsPlayKeldeo]

Its funny how your trash laptops are better then my Main Laptop Im using haha

[wfekhzg]

There is a thing in control panel that tells it to keep putting out a singal even if the lid is close

[Seegalgalguntijak]

A-Link? Is that even worse than D-Link?

[sharonneedlesfreedomsnotfr]

You've got what is arguably probably the best tv ever made n yet your screwing around w this 22" dorm room setup....confused :)

[Seegalgalguntijak]

Cloning Windows from one PC to another? Wow, that wasn't possible only a few years ago (when everyone was using Windows 7). On Linux, however, you could do that all day long, switch from Intel to AMD or from NVidia graphics to AMD graphics without ever encountering any problems (provided that all the hardware you used was supported by drivers). Not even having to install a driver and see 640x480 until this was done. Yes, Linux is the superior system. I bet that instead of a power-hungry HTPC you could just use a Raspberry Pi with some kind of Kodi OS on it to power each display independently. And both running at the same time would probably use less power than either one of your HTPCs. But then, you're in Norway, so electricity is cheap and plentiful, so fire away and live with the fact that you have an inferior, buggy and spying so-called operating system that has the capability to completely take your power and control over the machine away any time it or its maker decide to do so...