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Gadget WEEKENDS

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nosh:
I went for a Spyderco Sharpmaker a few years back and am really happy with it - it's a compromise between one of these sharpener gizmos and hardcore manual sharpening using stones.

Be careful with the sharpener there - there's no safety feature so it's possible to miss by a little and slash through your finger resting on the device. I still bear a mark on my finger from ~20 years back. The sharpmaker has bronze safety rods and does two different angles 15 degrees and 22.5 degrees (listed as 30 and 45 degrees because they count both edges.) It comes with regular and fine ceramic rods and you can purchase diamond and extra-fine rods separately. It's also preferable over a sharpening gadget if you're sharpening high end knives that you want to avoid scratching at the sides.

wraith808:
I've purchased a few things recently, and figured I'd put them in one post.

First, I purchased a rather simple stand that I now have four of- it was so cheap and so useful and so easy to use, I had to buy a couple for my wife.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B072B6BG38/

The next two are semi-related:

I've been using a logitech headset for my meetings at work, and wanted something with better wireless and better fidelity, so I purchased a Sennheiser RS185: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00TOT9G1W

It's great!  The most I've ever spent on headphones, but the $70 difference between the logitech when they first came out to the sennheiser really sold me on the fact that yes, audio gear gets better as you spend more.

But I needed a microphone.  I initially was trying to make it a headset, using the antlion modmic: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00R98JVVU/

It was ok, but annoying.  From finding the mute switch when in meetings, to adjusting the mic (it uses rare earth magnets to attach it to the base on the headphones- really cool idea, not so good in practice), and of course adhering to the headphones was touch and go.

So I decided to just go with a full microphone, and it was the best decision ever!

I purchased the Blue Yeti Blackout Edition: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00N1YPXW2/

People say it's like I'm in the room with them.  The little blinking light for the mute is always visible, and easy to cancel with just a button press.  It's great!  The only thing is having two audio devices, sometimes skype will reset to using the Blue Yeti as the default device for audio also.  But that's just a minor annoyance, and I think it's skype more than anything else.

Those two together are a bit more expensive than I ever thought I'd get to for a sound setup, but it's definitely made work meetings from home more bearable.

The last things were the Stand Steady standing desk surface- https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BXOGHQI and the ErgoTech freedom arm- https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B008TYF0F4/

I've wanted to get a standing desk, but have resisted it.  I have a very good desk, and really didn't want to get another.  I thought of one of those ergodesk/vivodesk additions to the desktop that allow you to raise and lower, but still use your desk.  But they're pretty expensive too, and after trying it out, I'm not sure that it would work as well for me.

Then I thought, I have my laptop sitting there, and my desktop.  What if I made one a standing station, and the other my sitting station.  For a fraction of the price of even the ergodesk/vivodesk, I got an easy to use station, and the monitor raises and lowers on the laptop station, so I can bring it down easily- but honestly don't do it much; I just put the monitor in the highest position, and put my stand there next to it, and have pretty much left it that way.  I got a mat to go along with it (https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KJT547K/), and it really does seem to work to reduce stress, and I feel better, because sometimes I just want to stand up and stretch out the kinks.

mouser:
Did I already post about this?

I have a rechargeable battery pack I keep in my car that can power/charge mobile phone and also jump start the car.

There are a ton of them on amazon, here's the one I have:


https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01D42TYFC

Deozaan:
I have recently become an owner of a Ledger Nano S:



It's what is known as a "hardware wallet" for cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Doge, Dash, Zcash, and more. It's widely considered to be one of the safest ways to securely store your cryptocurrency, because (if I understand it correctly) it never exposes your private keys to the computer/internet. It can also be used as a FIDO U2F device for 2FA logins. Now if I only knew whether or not any sites I use support the FIDO U2F standard. . .

I'm still playing with it, trying to figure out how it works, but so far I'm really glad to have it and am enjoying it.

Gadget WEEKENDS

Not shown very well in the images above is the fact that it has a couple of buttons on it that you can use to interact with the device and navigate the menus and confirm/cancel certain actions.

Gadget WEEKENDS

4wd:
It can also be used as a FIDO U2F device for 2FA logins. Now if I only knew whether or not any sites I use support the FIDO U2F standard. . .-Deozaan (October 14, 2017, 08:04 PM)
--- End quote ---

Check here: Dongle Authentication

I use mine mainly for Google, CoinJar, and one other site.

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