The Blog

Cisco SPA8000-G4 8-Port IP Telephony Gateway - Recap Overview

Nix McRetro // 15th January 2023 // Repairs

Good old Su’scon capacitors. Where do they sit? Tier 4, the lowest of the tiers. If Tom’s Hardware capacitor manufacturer tier list is anything to go off then they are trash. They placed my favourites at the top (Panasonic and Rubycon) so I’m inclined to agree with them. And there’s... Continue reading

Horizon Forbidden West (2022, PS4 Live Stream)

Nix McRetro // 31st December 2022 // Livestream, Sony, YouTube

Firstly, I would like to take my hat off to the developers. This game did not crash once on my PlayStation 4 slim, and performance felt on par with Horizon Zero Dawn. Plus, I only got stuck in a wall once! And after Cyberpunk 2077… I’d happily get stuck in... Continue reading

dd Progress Bar in macOS

Nix McRetro // 17th November 2022 // Apple, Guides

I’ve been using dd to clone some disks recently, usually when they use filesystems macOS does not handle natively. macOS is a UNIX operating system; Linux is Unix-like, and their command-line tools are similar without being identical. Homebrew fills in plenty of the gaps. Thanks to Dave Jansen’s dd with... Continue reading

Project Gnome - 3D PLA Print Test

Nix McRetro // 12th November 2022 // Nature, YouTube

I don’t own many things. However, I do own this gnome. This heavy, concrete gnome. I don’t have a garden or any outdoor space because those things are expensive where I live. Sigh. Luckily, I was able to turn him into a digital 3D model using photogrammetry and Agisoft Metashape.... Continue reading

RetroChallenge 2022/10 - GeoCities Rebuild on Dial-up at 28.8k

Nix McRetro // 7th November 2022 // Raspberry Pi, YouTube

That’s right, we doubled the speed to 28.8k, but it’s still only 28.8k… maybe that’s why the video is four hours long. Haha! Or maybe it’s because I was searching for the perfect Evangelion MIDI. I do need to find some new SoundFonts! We were using the Spirit Viper V.34... Continue reading