Test Equipment Anonymous

Handsome cat. And the lab's quite pretty too. I have a length of inverted guttering (I kid you not) over the fluoresecent tube over the bench. The guttering is lined with kitchen foil to make it reflective, and earthed to reduce interference. It is supported at each end by handcrafted bits of MDF bolted to 3mm aluminium plate. Angle of the guttering is critically set to obscure direct sight of the fluorescent tube. Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments. Subsidiary computer is Windoze 7 and talks to the audio test set. Neither have heard of the Internet. This (horrible) Windoze 11 laptop does not talk to test gear. There presently isn't any music in the lab, and that needs sorting. After all, the XP machine has all my CDs on its HDD, and I have DACs and loudspeakers. What I don't have is room in the right place for an amplifier. Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Mike, try to find a TP-Link TL-WR802N N300 WiFi 4 Nano Router locally and they're quite cheap.
Configure it in Bridge mode to give access to your WiFi LAN for any device with a wired LAN connection.

EC8010 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2026 11:10 pm Handsome cat. And the lab's quite pretty too. I have a length of inverted guttering (I kid you not) over the fluoresecent tube over the bench. The guttering is lined with kitchen foil to make it reflective, and earthed to reduce interference. It is supported at each end by handcrafted bits of MDF bolted to 3mm aluminium plate. Angle of the guttering is critically set to obscure direct sight of the fluorescent tube. Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments. Subsidiary computer is Windoze 7 and talks to the audio test set. Neither have heard of the Internet. This (horrible) Windoze 11 laptop does not talk to test gear. There presently isn't any music in the lab, and that needs sorting. After all, the XP machine has all my CDs on its HDD, and I have DACs and loudspeakers. What I don't have is room in the right place for an amplifier. Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Harley was about 6 months old when that pix was taken. He's going to be 3 years in May/June. Don't know the exact date of his birth. The media PC was Win7 when I first built it. I reluctantly upgraded it to Win10. It actually can't be upgraded to Win11 because of that stupid security requirement which the name escapes me at the moment. But I have seen where you can hack install Win11 if you really want it. I don't so it will stay Win10.

It's rare to know a cat's exact birthday. Besides, to them every day is a special day worthy of treats and fuss. I am quite surprised to realise that our cats are probably seven years old apiece.

Something you might want to consider (if it's possible) is thermal stability in your lab. I have all my test gear stacked up against a South-facing wall. Brilliant. It means it suffers serious temperature swings. Short of moving house (absolutely not), there's nothing I can do about that. But I have just moved my best meter from being 300mm below the ceiling (and above other warm instruments) to under the bench on an unheated cabinet and a bit further from that hot wall. I've also left it plugged in and switched on permanently, together with an ADR1001 reference board. Connectors on the front of the DMM have been swaddled in cloth to protect their thermocouples from draughts. The evaluation board is now in a polythene box to protect it from draughts. Number of the day is 4.995712V with a standard deviation of 0.9uV. I should be able to use this as a local calibration for the other meters.

Edit: I've just done much better than cloth round DMM input connectors. You'll be astonished to learn that although cloth swaddling works, it's proper fiddly to do. What you'd really like is a big bit of foam with holes in to cover the connectors. I then realised I had some 6mm bore 30mm outside diameter foam probably intended for insulating air conditioning pipes, so I cut some 4mm lengths with a fresh scalpel blade. It slides easily over 4mm plugs onto the cable, so you just plug the plugs in, slide the foam cylinders over and "Job's a good 'un."

My lab rarely varies more than 10 degrees F (70F - 80F, 21C to 26C) with the sweet spot 75F. Good heat and A/C during the Summer.

AVGresponding wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 5:07 am BT 5.3 max bitrate is 576kbps, so it can deliver decent audio, but video is out of the question, at least HD quality anyway

Thanks for that. I was going to Google it but you answered my questions.

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 4:56 pm My lab rarely varies more than 10 degrees F (70F - 80F, 21C to 26C) with the sweet spot 75F. Good heat and A/C during the Summer.

Air conditioning is rare in the UK. The heat and humidity are almost always acceptable.

tggzzz wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 5:49 pm

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 4:56 pm My lab rarely varies more than 10 degrees F (70F - 80F, 21C to 26C) with the sweet spot 75F. Good heat and A/C during the Summer.

Air conditioning is rare in the UK. The heat and humidity are almost always acceptable.

Yep, I'm aware of that. But lately you guys have had some nasty heat waves which aren't typical for you.

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 7:10 pm Yep, I'm aware of that. But lately you guys have had some nasty heat waves which aren't typical for you.

I'm not sure what the stats show, but there have always been summers with a week or two when it's been too hot to sleep. I remember 1976.

Air conditioning is common in office blocks and similar large buildings, but rarely in homes. Cars have A/C these days. I've found it nice a few days in the summer, but nothing I can't live without. The fluid in mine needs replacing, which I'm told would cost £100. I can think of better uses for the money. If the heating in the car failed, it would be a different matter.

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 7:10 pm

tggzzz wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 5:49 pm

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 4:56 pm My lab rarely varies more than 10 degrees F (70F - 80F, 21C to 26C) with the sweet spot 75F. Good heat and A/C during the Summer.

Air conditioning is rare in the UK. The heat and humidity are almost always acceptable.

Yep, I'm aware of that. But lately you guys have had some nasty heat waves which aren't typical for you.

Yes, but the humidity has been very tolerable, probably around 50% The only time humidity is 90% is when it is raining and cold.

ISTR NY regularly having 30C and 95% humidity, which would be exhausting.

EC8010 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2026 11:10 pm Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments.
..............................................

Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Do you have a GPIB card or a USB adapter?

I hate mice and have always (since 1990) used a track ball. Wireless dinky keyboards and wireless trackballs seem worth looking into.

Zenith wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 9:21 pm

EC8010 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2026 11:10 pm Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments.
..............................................

Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Do you have a GPIB card or a USB adapter?

I hate mice and have always (since 1990) used a track ball. Wireless dinky keyboards and wireless trackballs seem worth looking into.

Mice knacker your wrists. Trackballs knacker your thumbs. Lightpens knacker your shoulder. Clit mice Trackpoints knacker my productivity, probably more. Choose your evil.

I always rather liked the pop out floating mice on a stick, used in the Omnibook 600 and 800. Can't see how lefties would have used them, though.

I have a little yellow Prologix USB to GPIB adapter and it seems fine. I bought it years ago, and being hopeless with computers, it sat around for years doing nothing. Then a friend of mine said that he was looking to do stuff with GPIB and was about to buy a Prologix himself. He started by using EZGPIB, but has now written software of his own, from scratch. Using his software, I'm able to run quite complex experiments. And the Keithley 485 that arrived yesterday has had its DIP switches set to GPIB 16, ready to be talked to. My best oscilloscope has a Perixx dinky wireless keyboard that is very handy. Logitech wireless keyboards seem to fail within a few years. I've never used a tracker ball. Isn't it just an upside-down mouse with a snooker ball rather than a Powerball?

As other inhabitants of Dampland have noted, domestic air conditioning is rare here, especially amongst those of us who remember the summer of '76 (hot, serious hay fever, and "O" levels); we just struggle through. It never occurred to me to ask for special allowance as I suffered in the exams. Lab temperature could fall to 15C overnight in the winter and will probably rise to 30C in summer.

Summer 76 was memorable, not least because the government appointing a minister (for drought) was rapidly successful.

People wondered why I carried and wore a sweater. I explained that my first vacation job was spent in a heavily air-conditioned minicomputer room.

In 2022 it was hotter, reaching 38C for a day or so. I simply opened the windows when it was cooler outside, and closed them when it was hotter. I did walk down the road to the shops in the middle of the day - once only, to see what it was like. No problem, but i was definitely being very cautious.

I also remember the opposite, the winters of 63 and 82.

Zenith wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 9:14 pm

MED6753 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 7:10 pm Yep, I'm aware of that. But lately you guys have had some nasty heat waves which aren't typical for you.

I'm not sure what the stats show, but there have always been summers with a week or two when it's been too hot to sleep. I remember 1976.

Air conditioning is common in office blocks and similar large buildings, but rarely in homes. Cars have A/C these days. I've found it nice a few days in the summer, but nothing I can't live without. The fluid in mine needs replacing, which I'm told would cost £100. I can think of better uses for the money. If the heating in the car failed, it would be a different matter.

It's also good in winter to aid demisting. It's also more fuel efficient than opening the car windows.

Zenith wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 9:21 pm

EC8010 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2026 11:10 pm Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments.
..............................................

Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Do you have a GPIB card or a USB adapter?

I hate mice and have always (since 1990) used a track ball. Wireless dinky keyboards and wireless trackballs seem worth looking into.

Real early adopter then.
Her indoors first experienced a Trackman at a office job nearby some 25yrs back and was instantly hooked so the ol' man had to fork out for one and got hooked on them too !
Now we don't have a conventional mouse in the house ....oh shit that rhymes....

Trying to find original Logitech Trackman's at a reasonable price has been a problem for many years until I stumbled on the Delux brand and got one like this from ePay which I've been pleased with on the #2 PC, a mini thing that has Bluetooth which connects to the mouse and in doing so saves on a USB socket.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/146639767054

tautech wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2026 8:53 am

Zenith wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2026 9:21 pm

EC8010 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2026 11:10 pm Primary computer is XP and talks GPIB to sixteen instruments.
..............................................

Wireless mice are really useful in a lab, as are dinky keyboards.

Do you have a GPIB card or a USB adapter?

I hate mice and have always (since 1990) used a track ball. Wireless dinky keyboards and wireless trackballs seem worth looking into.

Real early adopter then.
Her indoors first experienced a Trackman at a office job nearby some 25yrs back and was instantly hooked so the ol' man had to fork out for one and got hooked on them too !
Now we don't have a conventional mouse in the house ....oh shit that rhymes....

Trying to find original Logitech Trackman's at a reasonable price has been a problem for many years until I stumbled on the Delux brand and got one like this from ePay which I've been pleased with on the #2 PC, a mini thing that has Bluetooth which connects to the mouse and in doing so saves on a USB socket.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/146639767054

Yes, it was a huge thing with an RS232 connection, but comfortable to use. It didn't need a special mat and worked on a cluttered desk without continually running out of room. It was very much like this.

https://www.ergocanada.com/products/mic ... ional.html

Then came a couple of Logitech Trackman, (Marble Mouse) which were good, but the contacts wore after a few years use and had to be shimmed with slivers of razor blade. They had PS/2 connections.

The last are Kensington Orbit Trackballs with USB connections, of which I have four. Once in a while they have to be opened up and the accumulated dust and rubbish cleared out.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kensington-Orb ... ref=sr_1_5

I use one with the DSO because I don't like touch screen operation. I use another with a KVM switch which connects to four computers. The other two are useful to have around.

I like the idea of the anatomically shaped ones, but although I'm right handed I use the trackball left handed, and all the ones I've seen are right handed.

I must look into wireless keyboards and trackballs, as USB leads are a nuisance.

On the rare occasions I have to use a mouse I find it very irritating.

Never tried a Trackball only the more ergonomic Trackman and 100% agree these style of mouse are hard to beat on a busy bench.
On the #1 workstation still using a USB Trackman that is showing its age as the microswitches sometimes miss a click but I now have spares should it get to a truly bothersome stage.

Zenith wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2026 9:47 am I must look into wireless keyboards and trackballs, as USB leads are a nuisance.

I have two wireless keyboards+pads which I use on my workbench. Stops wires trailing over circuits and soldering irons, etc. Black one is for my PC, white one is for my LA.
Elsewhere I prefer USB leads: no finding batteries are dead, and it avoids the syndrome where youngsters think corded landlines are cool because the handset never gets lost under a sofa cushion.

tggzzz wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2026 10:37 am I have two wireless keyboards+pads which I use on my workbench. Stops wires trailing over circuits and soldering irons, etc. Black one is for my PC, white one is for my LA.

Quite. We'll put up with the battery issue for that hugely significant advantage.

Did not realize there were so many mouse haters in here. An Amazon Basics wireless mouse works fine for me.

I may try a trackerball. But the mice I particularly dislike are the ones abandoned in my shoes. Or eviscerated in the dark bit of the hall.

EC8010 wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2026 9:15 pm I may try a trackerball. But the mice I particularly dislike are the ones abandoned in my shoes. Or eviscerated in the dark bit of the hall.

Just be sure not to confuse the more ergonomic Trackman with a Trackball.
With a Trackman all pointer manipulation is done with the thumb leaving the fingers free for the mouse buttons, much like when using a conventional mouse without needing to chase the mouse around a pad.
I've never bothered much with a 5 button version when you can add a function to a scroll wheel press like Shift + Left arrow to have a super convenient Back for use in a browser and such.

Be warned, you might get hooked using a Trackman style mouse.....as many of us have.

EC8010 wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2026 9:15 pm I may try a trackerball. But the mice I particularly dislike are the ones abandoned in my shoes. Or eviscerated in the dark bit of the hall.

Well if you harbour cats you can expect a succession of these tributes. You're lucky it's only mice. It might include; rats, frogs, bats, squirrels, fish, small rabbits, birds of all sizes up to full grown pigeons, and nondescript things that were once animal, but have been abandoned somewhere awkward to reach, and now stink and are covered in bluebottles.