A while ago, I wrote about the wonders of having multiple VLANs at home, operating in a mixed “hybrid” access model. While it was great, I made a comment that simultaneous VLAN operation might not be possible under Windows depending...

It hasn’t even been a year since I built my new workstation and already, something seems to be amiss. Lately, it seems I haven’t been sleeping so well, because there seems to be an angry beast in my room. “Grrrrrrrrrr...

Once in a while, out of need or out of desperation to use a discount coupon, I end up buying something, often technology related. This time, it was the latter case, so I went and purchased something I knew would...

If you’ve been wondering why it’s been quiet around here for a while – it’s because I’ve been unusually busy. One of the things I’ve been working on is a review of the B&K Precision BA6010 Battery Analyser I received...

I’ve always been interesting in telephones and networks, but I’ve never really thought of becoming a telephone collector. Rather unexpectedly, through a process of not-throwing-things-out (it’s not hoarding, I swear!), I now have a few phones but not much to...

It’s no big secret that Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and it’s closely related cousin, Edge, are not the world’s favourite browsers. They’re not even my favourite and for a number of good reasons. In the battle for market share, Microsoft has...

In the early days of VoIP, most users were still using analog phones through ATAs and early softphones with services like Free World Dialup (later, FWD) which offered users free SIP accounts that could call within the FWD network for...

As a frequent public transport user, I’ve always had an interest in various modes of transport. By far, the one that has proven to be most entertaining to monitor in recent times has been that of the bus radio, as...

Just the other day, an anonymous poster commented on one of my recent posts asking whether I had considered using HTTPS and reminding me that I needed a Privacy Policy due to the use of Google Adsense and Google Analytics....

This weekend, a friend of ours had a small emergency – her soymilk maker stopped working and was completely dead. The particular unit was a Soyoung S-C18 which claimed to be a unit specially made by Joyoung for the Australian...

I was sitting in my room the other day and something seemed off. It was quiet. Too quiet. But why? As it turns out, I used to have a scanner radio active in idle times to listen to what was...

Towards my later high-school years, in the mid-2000s, armed with a small amount of money, I picked up the hobby of radio scanning. As a person who was curious by nature and had built a number of FM radio microphone...

Being someone who has used consumer gear for a long time, I’ve always been rather frustrated at their inconsistent or general lack of support for VLANs. Long used in corporate networks, the VLAN concept can be extremely useful for realising...

In my quest for more wireless throughput, my hAP ac with three-stream 802.11ac wireless seemed to be the right choice. The problem was that I had absolutely no three-stream capable equipment to use with it – so I wasn’t seeing...

After bathing in nostalgia looking over my old switch and hub, it’s time to come clean – there’s a place for Fast Ethernet and that was a number of years ago. While some of the old equipment might still be...

In the last post, I documented the haul of gear donated by a generous reader. In this post, I take the time to see if I can make things better, do some experiments on the Zip ecosystem and report on...

Blogging seems to be like playing a game of catch-up … I’m always behind on posts. Around a month ago, a very generous reader happened to have some Zip 250 equipment that they were done with and wanted to send...

While looking around for some cheap environmental sensors, I came across the seemingly ideal and relatively popular Bosch Sensortec BME280. This is a digital I2C sensor that can operate at 1.8 or 3.3V, providing temperature, humidity and barometric pressure measurements...

A long time ago during a clean-up salvage, I stumbled across some GU10 LED lamps which were thrown out. I wasn’t sure exactly why, but it’s rare to come across such lamps. As I don’t have a GU10-compatible fixture, I...

After my house move earlier this year, I was in a bit of a networking dilemma. As every self-confessed nerd knows – internet access is critical. I recently upgraded to a TP-Link Archer C7 AC1750 access point at the other...

As a young kid, my parents had told me about how great NiCad rechargeable batteries are for reducing waste and saving money. While we did have some alkaline cells around, we used rechargeable batteries whenever possible. Because these were quite...

Batteries have always been an interesting subject for me and after the test of disposable Alkaline cells, I felt there was another unanswered question. To help answer it, I dug up my old Grandcell Rechargeable Alkaline Manganese Battery Charger (GBTL208MB)...

Ethernet has been around for so many years that we hardly ever take the time to stop and think about it. We take it for granted that most desktop PCs come with Ethernet ports integrated on-board, Ethernet switches are cheap...

Over the past (nearly) two months, I’ve been kept quite busy in my spare time. What was it that was so exciting? The Rohde & Schwarz RTM3004 oscilloscope with all options (except RTM-K18) included – that’s the answer! This is...

For anyone who travels frequently on public transport or is out and about quite often, having a decent set of headphones is indispensable. Besides allowing you to enjoy your own music and videos on the go, it can really help...