Gunstar

I have decided, just today, to add one more aesthetic and protective upgrade to the subwoofer and both my front tower speakers (that I also completely rebuilt this past year with all new 3-way speakers, protective covers  and new paint job). I just ordered a 24-pc metal corner protectors for all three. I'll post pictures of all three speakers once the corner protectors are mounted. below is a picture of what I'm getting along with a speaker example, that I copied off of Amazon.

My living room speakers are very similar to those.

So cute! We ultimately ended up with a GS (day 4 actually!) but there were two Rotties that were in the mix that we almost went with!

Merry Christmas everyone! By the way, where the pups are now, in the photo, was my Male Huskey's regular bed, and he's a Grinch for Christmas because he lost his bed and restricted from his room. I have a male Shepard that sleeps in the room too, and he's also exiled for a few weeks. They still have the rest of the house.

OK, ...1 more,   Why Not?   Here's a fan made video that nearly looks official (W/much actual Voivod artwork),  Unfortunately sometimes production fails the mighty Voivod (it's from 1989...), so I'd turn it up until the drums are a pummeling wave (Apocalyptic volume should do it), then...Enjoy!

Love BOC!  One of the best live acts you're likely to see anywhere, and they still tour! Making the rounds at fairgrounds, etc. at least.      Consider them avant-garde for the time, especially considering how early they started. Hits are great, but tune for tune and album by album... their 70's/early 80's music are excellent. If on the fence about 'em, can't go wrong with the 5 Classic Album series that can be had for reasonable. There's a Vol 1 and Vol 2. Each album best listened to all the way through... maybe in the background while you're working or something if you need. I find that's an excellent way to let new bands "sink in" sometimes before I accept or appreciate what I'm hearing. May take several listens, depends on the band. 

PS  A little note to explain one little piece of Voivod's Awesomeness!  (At least as I hear it)  Hear the drums in the chorus above? (With the words Lapse of Time,  etc.)  Cool double bass, (though mixed a bit low IMHO),  But now listen just to the ride cymbal,...See?  It's going with the guitar!  The cymbal is being played the way the guitar is being strummed.   Just one of many neat things they do...

Cheers!

LOL! I know, I know. I said my peace and I won't argue about such stuff. I'm really an audiofan, not audiophile, even if I occasionally refer to myself as one to some people.

So even though I do appreciate the best recordings I can get, and also defend media's against others if I feel it deserves it, I'm also a fan of all vintage audio hardware and all medias for what they are and how they work. So while I'll defend my ears and their analog sensitivities, I'll still record stuff on cassette or 8-track which is obviously inferior, and listen to it.

I just make sure I have the best metal tapes and record and playback them back correctly with the proper noise-reduction techniques on the best audio hardware I can afford, for the best the media can be on my system.

I'll put up with inferior older media, as long as the recordings are the best they possibly can be on a particular media.

I'm the type of audiofan who is likely to take an old original, officially recorded, store-bought cassette, remove the old normal-bias tape from the case, install a superior high-bias metal tape inside and record the new tape from a remastered LP version so it sounds far better than original, even when it was new.

I almost bought one of these just for the hell of it last year...I was thinking of using it to save and load like cassettes with my 8-bit Atari (my 1010 recorder has a custom I/O I installed out the back and I can plug any source into it).

Albums started arriving this past week that I recently ordered. So far the 3 90's CD's including Roll the Bones, Counterparts and Test for Echo. Also the Permanent Waves 40th anniversary box set arrived.

The two live recordings records are never before released recording of the Permanent Waves tour (it wasn't really specified in the sale auction, and instead of researching further I just decided to wait and see exactly, but I did suspect it. Of course they play some songs from earlier albums in the concert recordings too, and it's always nice to hear some different live versions of their songs in different eras...different stages you might say...

I'm expecting the Presto album and Different Stages CD by Monday. But I have everything I ordered when I posted this thread now. I'll update for the later orders in that activity thread.

I'll be taking the 3 90's CD's along in my truck to listen to today at work. Of course I have listened to these 3 albums through at least once or twice via streaming on Amazon or Youtube music.

There is nothing new for me to here in Rush's discography at this point as I've listened through all the studio recordings. Only live performances left that I haven't listened to yet are left. 

I now have more Rush CD's than I can fit al at once in my truck's 6-CD changer now to totally annoying my millennial partner with! Though previously it was only their music from Rush's first decade and their cover album Feedback of 60's songs.

This will be his first listening to 90's Rush which is a bit different and maybe modern enough for his liking. Not that he's said either way if he likes Rush or not, but I have a feeling he's mainly into 21st century crappy pop music like Justin Beeber and Japanese pop music as that seems to be the type of crap always emanating from his phone ringtones, etc. Crap I consider kids stuff, modern or not. However the guy is 30+ years old, but I always have to take into consideration his autistic disabilities I asked him yesterday what music genres he likes and if he has a favorite artist or group and he didn't answer me.

But he's autistic so some days he's more of a conversationalist toward me than others and I never press if he doesn't respond to me sometimes. I may ask a second time when he's in a different mood and he'll happily answer. I never know, he's like a box of chocolates with his social interaction. 

I've no idea if I'm making him listen to something or if he likes it when I play my old-school rock, he doesn't respond either way. And when I told him yesterday that I had 3 new Rush CD's I forgot to bring, so he got lucky, no response there either.

Which would normally might lead me to believe he doesn't like it but doesn't want to say so if he were your average person, but he's not, so a non response can't be assumed to be a negative in anyway, he just didn't feel like responding. Autistics often being overwhelmed by to much sensory input, he might not know what to even make of Rush and just blocks it all or he may not mind it at all, even if he doesn't care for the genre.

I'll ask him at the end of the day if he felt any different about this Rush music than what I had played of them with him before.

 Never judge a sub-woofer by it's cover...even if it looks like it was totally made up of junk I had laying around (which is exactly what it is, except for the $20 amp board). But I bet it will sound better than any active-sub-woofer (self amplified) you can find for $20. At least it works...I think...🤓😬

Well, last September when I made my DIY subwoofer, it worked, but it sounded terrible, and at first I thought it might be because I was trying to use 3 speakers combined in it instead of one. So I removed the smaller speakers and just left the 4 ohm car speaker attached thinking this would fix the issue. But it still sounded terrible with way too much distortion. So I then decided that it was the old car speaker that was the issue, so I decided to spend a bit more money and by a speaker specifically designed to be used as a bass subwoofer speaker. After installing it, same result, terrible distortion.

So, since I generally know what I am doing and hooking up multiple speakers in series or parallel, and using high/low-pass filter for 2/3-way speakers, etc., I knew I had made the power subwoofer correctly (though I've only ever used integrated passive subwoofers in the past and this was my first powered one). I came to the conclusion that the mono amplifier board I purchased on the cheap was the culprit and gave up on the project until I got around to buying a better amplifier board.

In the meantime, I purchased new mid range and tweeter speakers for my main, tower 3-way old-school speakers, upgrading them which meant I had to do some math to replace the high-pass filter capacitors and inductors to match the new speakers. While doing this something occurred to me about the sub-woofer. I needed a low-pass filter for the speaker added to the equation. You see, since my new theater amplifier had a separate RCA output specifically made for a powered subwoofer, I made the assumption that the amplifier included a low-pass filter within it and the mono audio signal output already had the mid and high range frequencies isolated out leaving only the low end. This was a false assumption apparently and the mono RCA out for a powered subwoofer is still the entire frequency range and the subwoofer required a low-pass filter of it's own still. 

So after installing an inductor to the positive of the woofer speaker, everything suddenly worked better than I even imagined! The bass is incredible! And I made it all for about $50. and I couldn't have bought a better one for less than a few hundred. All that is left now it taking the ugly box pictured above (which has one round woofer in it now and the other holes closed) and cover it with the black vinyl cloth I purchased to cover the enclosure and look like a professional job, aesthetically as well as functionally. I'll post a picture of the end result of my DIY subwoofer once I've completed the upholstery to it's exterior.

Woo Hoo!

How time flies! already over a year since the last time I checked the status update section or added any of my own! 

Well here is a long over due update (one among many) now that it is my business's off-season and I have time for personal projects and doing blogs and status updates.

@save2600 You commented that you hoped my DIY subwoofer sounds better than it looks, and rightly so as it still looked bad while I was concentrating of making it sound good. I told you not to judge a book by it's cover, but now you can in this case. Here are the overdo pictures I promised in the last sentence of my last reply to this update. I completed the subwoofer close to a year ago, then got busy with my business,. fully vinyl covered and completed aesthetically. Though I must admit, as proud as I am of my final product in this DIY project, it does still sound better than it looks. I've made more upgrades and additions to my sound system too, including a vintage reel-to-reel tape deck, but I'll show that in a new status update soon.

placement of power cord, on/off switch and audio input were chosen because originally this subwoofer was intended to lie on it's back, facing up under my Barcolounger theater seat, But I didn't take into account a lack of room for it when not in the reclining position. I would still have the power button and input on the front for ease of access as it sits under a table in front of my projection screen, but I didn't feel like moving the power cord. The only thing I would have done differently if starting over.

Cool, I think you're gonna really like Roll The Bones! I know you said you used to have the CD, but didn't really listen to it BITD before it got lost? Might take a few listens before it sinks in, but there's some real gems on it. Not willing to let my copy go just yet, so if you want to snag that one on discogs, seems like a good deal. Hopefully it still includes the download code. Can just burn a CD of it for mobile listening. 

Yeah, the CD was a gift from my younger brother who knew of the couple Rush LP's I owned and bought it for my birthday. 
We both listened to it through in my car once, I didn't really give it a chance at the time, it sat and collected dust for years after that, mainly just because I was just going to college and my life got busy and it was sort of forgotten about.

But I must have lost it at some point over the years as it wasn't with all m old CD's, tapes and LP's when I finally pulled them out of storage earlier this year. I went looking for it this summer when I started getting into Rush again, but couldn't find it. I still have a few things in my storage shed though and plan to clean it out and re-organize it this fall, so maybe the CD will still turn up somewhere.

One thing is for sure, after listening to Roll the Bones through again, via streaming music, earlier this summer, I think this album is the most unique in Rush's discography.

I give the album a proper sit down and listening too when I get it. I'll crank up the my hi-fi system and kick back in my reclining home theatre chair*, dim the lights and just take it all in.

*My current man-cave setup has my theater projector and hi-fi all integrated with speakers all around and my theater chair in the middle.

I did watch the 2112 in 2012 DVD which was a remastered recording with the "new" comic strip of the story to watch while listening and it is fantastic! The paired CD is in my truck's disc changer now with my four other Rush CD's. It's a 6 disc changer and I have one more spot free right now that I use for discs other than Rush.

I'm probably driving my millennial business partner mad with all the Rush I'm playing, but to his credit he hasn't said a thing, good or bad. 

I've got Clockwork Angels, Exit Stage Left, A Farewell to Kings, 2112 and Feedback all in the disc changer on rotation. I'll invoke the disc/track randomizer starting tomorrow, and remove the Feedback CD so I have two spots for my Led Zeppelin BBC sessions double disc set. So I can drive him crazy with random Rush and Led Zeppelin. I think my partner's musical tastes are millennial pop music, so hopefully he's appreciating how good music can be for a change...

He's actually a high-functioning autistic, so he goes for long periods sometimes without saying a word. But I just have to push the right buttons to get him involved in conversation; like bring up video games like Minecraft and Skyrim, or talk about good old D&D role playing with books, die and a DM, he loves that stuff. I was actually very surprised to find a millennial and his 3 millennial friends were into non-video game D&D, old school style. It made me think there is hope for that generation yet! 

Ok, so I'm finally getting around to watching the music videos you guys are posting of other bands for me to check out. I'm starting back at the beginning in this thread where @GoldLeader posted Iron Maiden: The Writing On The Wall.

What can I say? It was a great song. The animation to go with it of course was very cool, I like the newer Rush official videos too that do this, though some are more like graphic novels while others are animated. There aren't enough of them though.

But I'm going to have to listen a second and third time, once with the lyrics, I got about 75% of what he sung. And the third time will be to concentrate on the drumming. Not because I prefer drums over guitars and bass, not at all, but because if I concentrate on the other instruments, then that is all I seem to retain or can focus on. But for some reason my brain only multi-tasks in different ways for different things.

With rock music, if I concentrate on the drums, pay attention to every beat, and close my eyes, in a very short time the other instruments seem to come to the foreground more and my brain is able to do this balancing act where I can hear all of it in unison, yet individually at the same time and not miss a thing.

But if I stray from concentrating on the drums to one of the other instruments then it all falls apart and I only hear that instrument clearly and the others fade into the background. Not that I can't take it all in, and enjoy the songs as a whole without all this, but to my brain the difference is literally like the quality difference of a VHS quality brain focus and retention  compared to Blu-ray quality.

I still amaze myself every time I do this. But the first time I just take it all in including the video and enjoy the ride and entire production. When listening to audio only on my stereo alone, I always follow this procedure with every song. 

I can also do this with my eyes open if I'm watching the virtual light show on my Jaguar or Xbox while playing a CD, I just have to sort of daze-out on the graphics and get that distant look in my eyes like I'm looking into or beyond it all, like how those 3D pictures work that you have to look at out of focus, beyond it, for the 3D image to emerge from the back ground. Though no, I see no 3D images with the virtual light shows just color flashing before my eyes. Then I concentrate on the drums and all the rest falls into place that way too. It doesn't work for me though with my eyes open if I'm just staring at a wall or something else in the world around me.

Of course I don't assume this is some unique ability, I'm sure plenty of other can do stuff like this, maybe even without trying and focusing on the drums like I do. It just is what it is and I take advantage of the ability. Common or not others. I just know there are people with abilities far beyond the norm, like those who have photographic memories. I certainly wish I did! But it's an ability I have that works for me.

My brain also works in a way when working with mathematics and scientific calculation type of stuff, geometry, calculous, etc., where I close my eyes and can just figure it all out in my head because my mind's eye see's it all in front of me like my own virtual world with numbers and mathematic symbols in different colors and sort of 3D floating in front of me. It's sort of like those 3D hologram images that are used a lot in sci-fi showing the galaxy envelop the person(s) and they focus and zoom in on something and can move and rotate, zoom in and out, etc.

I always hated the classes where the professor wants you to show all your work, written down for each exercise or test. Because that's not how my brain works it out, though I could do it as I go along, but I'd have to have all the time I needed to complete, which was never the case. I had one professor when I was studying electronics whom I told about my situation, and he understood and allowed me an exception to forego writing down my work. He used to work for NASA and he new people there that did mathematics the same way.

This was also the same professor who let us use notes during the exams. His reasoning, which I think was very wise, he would put to the question; "Who would you trust more to engineer the next Golden Gate Bridge? The engineer who does it all from memory, or the one who constantly refers to references and double-checks things with engineering books?" At NASA they all always used references while engineering and designing. No room for errors. So why make you memorize it all if you are going to constantly reference things to make sure you have it all right in the professional world?

 I retained the habit; when I work on electronics or programming or mechanics, what ever, I always refer back to my old college text books or other reference materials I've collected. I know Boolean reduction and Karnaugh mapping, etc. in electronics, but I still always reference the texts on them while doing it. I still always look to resister, transistor, and capacitor, etc. diagrams even though I could think it through myself from memory.

Sorry, that's my A.D.D. getting me off on tangents again...I eventually come back around though, if you can stand the journey.

So, 'The Writing On The Wall' does make me want to explore and revisit Iron Maiden's discography. What better reaction could you want from me?

^None Better!  :0)

You're probably aware of this site, but in case not... might be able to help with your belt:

http://cedmagic.com

@save2600 Actually that's the site where I found the info on the new pully and belt I need to get to repair my RCA CED. But thanks for trying to help! Of course I haven't been to the site for a couple of years, so maybe a source of original belts has been found? I suppose it's worth checking.

I went on a short road trip into the big city (LOL, Tulsa) today, with big money. A spur of the moment decision while taking a break from equipment maintenance for my business, I asked my business partner if he wanted to go have a bit of fun looking around a vintage media store called Vintage Stock (3 locations!). They sell new & used videos, music, video games, new & used consoles and peripherals, D&D craft, trading cards, posters, swords, daggers and light-sabres, etc. You know, the ultimate store for man-cave items.

I of course was looking for Rush Albums mainly, see if I could find any deals (I'm preparing to go to my neighbor's house Sunday afternoon with all my Rush media and jam out to Rush). They had absolutely ZERO Rush media unfortunately.

Of course I rummaged through the vintage game cartridges as usual, looking for any lost pearls mistakenly being sold to cheap (common 2600 carts sell for $.99-1.99 but I've found gold there for that price that sells for much more on ebay), 2600, Intellivision, Genesis/Megadrive, etc.

I looked to see if they had any used laserdiscs for sale. Nothing there either, though they had plenty of VHS tapes and even a couple CED movies (nothing I was interested in). They have quite an extensive LP section too, of course, but I was surprised to find it mostly new LP's and very little used LP's actually. At first I thought there wasn't anything used, until I spied a few milk-bins tucked underneath the main rack of LP's which were used LP's.

Though I didn't find anything I was hoping for, non specific, I did find a diamond in the rough, so to speak, in those bins of used LP's; an Emerson, Lake and Palmer double LP 'Works: Volume 1' The Album cover is quite worn on the outside, but the LP's inside are in pristine condition! And for only $3.99!

Of course pictures of the LP's are post-cleaning with my kit:

Since getting a new stylus for my turn-table, and this LP cleaning kit (stylus cleaning kit too), every record gets cleaned with the kit every time before being played (and stylus gel used to clean the needle before every use too).

But after finding no Rush at Vintage Stock, I came home and purchased the 'Live in Rio' concert on Blue-ray. After taking your advice @save2600 and at least watching the full streaming version of the concert on Youtube Music. The audio quality from that sounded fine to me, setting the very enthusiastic crowd noise aside, and streaming quality of my internet service is subpar here, so I expect the Blue-ray of it to sound and look a hell of a lot better. But I also decided you were right in that I didn't want just the audio only of a live concert, at least for 'Live in Rio' so I decided not to buy the 180g LP of it and just get the Blue-ray to watch Rush recorded live in Rio.

In other news the RUSH Feedback tribute (to 60's bands) cover CD and my RUSH Caress of Steel original LP both finally arrived today, ordered over a month ago, hoping to get them by my birthday on August 12th. But at least they arrived in the same month I guess.

I didn't take pictures, but the CD is new and the LP used in excellent condition. I don't think it got much play by the original owner as the LP still looks pristine, not the slightest blemish, scuff or scratch, so it might as well be new.

I didn't have time to listen to the LP yet, but the CD I took in the truck to work with me and listened. My second listening, the first time being the full album on Youtube with my headphones.

They did a surprisingly good job on the cover songs and Geddy sounds good singing them all. Great stuff with RUSH's guitar. bass and of course drum flair that I feel makes them even better sounding than the original artists, but then I'm biased as the holy trio rock legends are my favorite band of all time and I'm an addict...again, after 30 years on the wagon I've fallen off again...and will never give up this addiction again.

Life is just better when you listen to RUSH on a regular basis. And I'm loving all the new-to-me material I'd never heard before, beginning with Counterparts and forward, especially since they are back to the power trio of guitar, bass and drums, yet modern rock that still keeps with the times through the 90's and 2000's with a triumphant final studio album with Clockwork Angels and sort of full circle as the whole album, while distinct songs is an entire story more like the 70's Operas of Rock they produced, in the sense of them being stories or epics. And still comes from Closer To The Heart. 

I decided to post a picture of more of a profile angle of the controller to show what the thumb-stick looks like better.

By the way, I listened to my Rush Clockwork Angels CD on my Atari Jaguar CD with it's VLM (Virtual Light Machine) music CD player tonight. Rush and the VLM were made for each other!

I enjoyed this!  All of it.  Maybe,  I'll just agree to disagree about records ever sounding better than CDs though.  I know,  I know the spirit of the comment was to say, 'Damn!  This sounds good!"  And I Like records!  Don't get me wrong.  It's that warmth;  Some of it we remember like something fun and nostalgic from a near forgotten past, a simpler time,  like the smell of fresh baked cookies on Christmas Eve...Ummm Nevermind.    ..In fact,  forget I mentioned it...Cheers! 

Regarding the weight settings on your needle, personally I don't think it will have much effect on the audible characteristics of the music. I think it is more intended, along with anti-skating, to help prevent the needle from skipping out of the groove. It could have some long-term wear-and-tear effect on the records, so personally I'd go for the lightest settings that don't skip. Since you've got a pretty high quality needle that's also going to help prevent skipping. That's just my perspective - I'm a scratching DJ so I put a lot of weight on the needle but I think it's not necessary for simply listening.

Thanks for the advice @Zoyous, I will reduce the weight down to 2g in that case, and anti-skate to match. 

Glad you're feeling better Gunstar and Happy Birthday! Btw: Clockwork Angels is available on LP. I have an original Anthem first pressing (around the time of the CD release), but has been out of print for quite a while. Good news though... the album has been re-pressed and is current:

https://store.acousticsounds.com/d/82301/Rush-Clockwork_Angels-180_Gram_Vinyl_Record

...backordered here so need to be patient for best price, but there's some on eBay if you want to pop for another $10-$20.

Yes please! Thank you! I can get it and keep the CD in my work truck.

Last Spring I found this book at a discount outlet and I've been going through it. Reading about the albums in that mid 80s - earl 90s period has certainly sparked some of my interest: https://www.amazon.com/Rush-Album-Martin-Popoff/dp/0760352208

It's a fun read either way.

It's not that I have no taste for synthesizers, I love them actually, as well as chip tune music from 80's computers, especially the Pokey and SID and especially the newer stuff created this century, and even like Geddy's synths when used more sparingly, some of their best music just wouldn't or couldn't be the same or as good without it. But Rush just didn't sound like the Rush I'd come to love to that point.

But that decade from about '85 to '95, buying music of any type dropped to near zero as I spent spare money on my computer and console interests beginning with my first Atari, the 130XE in '85 and ending with my last Atari, the Jaguar in '95. Then after Atari's demise my passion faded for new computers and consoles, my last new-bought console being the Dreamcast in '99. Since then I stuck to vintage stuff mostly, and newer Xbox and PS consoles I own are all hand-me down's from my brother who always get's the latest console as soon as it's released and never looks back, so I get his fallout for free.

My music audiophile passion returned with the new century and Rush passion, unfortunately, was forgotten until Neil died as well as coincidentally about the same time I had rediscovered my music collection that had been in storage for about 15 years, including Rush. But a good portion of my LP's were water damaged, some I salvaged the actual LP's but some stuff was too ruined, So I've started slowly recollecting some vinyl and once I get what I want, expand to new vinyl.

But back to Rush; I like a song here and there off of their albums between Signals and and Test for Echo, but unfortunately none of those albums are "not a bad song on it" (for me) albums like stuff up to Signals. I'm sure I'll eventually re-explore that Rush era, but I don't intend to pay premium LP prices for any of them, tapes and CD's are good enough for the audio collection and I can find those used in the wild for a couple bucks each.

First though, I have barely scratched the surface of their late albums from Test for Echo onward, and I'll be listening through them in MP3 form to find out which ones I may like enough to splurge for an LP or just get cheap CD's of them. 

Besides, I've got to have some of their works on CD format so I can play them on my Jaguar CD and 3DO with their light shows and they'll work nicely with Rush synth-age music.

Well, I've gone and done it! I went over-board on my reunion with my favorite band ever, Rush. I've listened through the three LP's (2112. Moving Pictures, Caress of Steel) and one CD (Clockwork Angels) albums I bought myself for my birthday (August 12th-54), three old favorites and one totally new-to-me Rush album, at least twice over each. I then went on Youtube and listened to more Rush songs and albums available there, and started watching TONS of Rush reaction videos...I'm addicted and need Rush-rehab now. I find I can't listen to any other bands now because they aren't RUSH! The only other bands I've been able to stomach since becoming a RUSH addict AGAIN has been WISHBONE ASH and KANSAS! An addiction I don't want to recover from though...it's nothing but a HEADLONG FLIGHT left for me!

Oh, and I absolutely had to upgrade my Pioneer turntable's OEM cartridge& needle  to $150 Shure raw diamond naked needle; .03x.06

I love how you painted your Jag, CD and controller all to match.  Looks great!

Thank you! I still like it too, and it's been about 20 years since I custom painted it, give or take a year or two, and it looks as good as the day I painted it all still, except for, strangely, the original Pro-controller's red paint has some wear around the PAUSE & OPTION buttons, the pad and 6 buttons get used far more. That has been like that for about 10 years that I've never got 'round to repainting yet. I have a reproduction pro-controller (very top shelf in pictures above) that I use now to save wear-and-tear on the original, still in working condition. Though I did replace contanct bubbles in it a couple times throughout the years.

Eventually I intend to have blogs or albums up of all my systems that I've customized internally and/or externally. I have left posts in some of the console threads about them over the years, or in my personal news/update feed if I felt it wasn't worthy of a full blog or album. I've only a couple of blogs up now that have been completed yet, some, the projects have been delayed due to time, and others are finished, but I just haven't had the time to finish the blogs yet. 

This is due to the way I treat blogs, I don't do them all at once after I finish a project, I add to them as I continue with the project I am currently working on, so it's all fresh in my mind, and then I edit and continue the blog. But life gets in the way and in some cases it's months or years in between blog additions.

Some systems I keep original, some I decide to customize, usually because I can't permanently return them to restored/mint condition. For example the Dreamcast which I retro-brited twice, but the yellowing came back soon and worse each time and the second time didn't even get back to full original color. Paint is more permanent if it's taken care of properly. Even on controllers.

Though the Jaguar and Atari 7800 are systems I had kept in mint condition from the start, but decided I wanted to customize them after seeing other's custom machines. 

P.S.-within the last week or two I did an update in my own public feed showing more and closer images of the Jaguar system, as I was showing off the new dust cover and cartridge end labels I had purchased. This was previous to my new shelving above that is the focus of this update.

If you care to see more of my Jaguar you can scroll down my activity feed, it shouldn't be too far down yet...

I just checked. If you go into my profile and select the "all activity" button near the top right of the home screen, then go to the second page of the list, about 3/4 of the way down. You will pass by pictures of my 3D printer...

The upgrading is complete! At least on the hardware side, I still have to download new firmware and software for the auto-leveler and the Laser engraver.

Here are the finished photos I promised, with close-ups of all my upgrades, including purchased and ones I printed or made myself (pully for filament was made from a dog-run pully and a scrap piece of 3D printed plastic-it works great!).

I haven't installed the metal upgrade extruder yet, as the original plastic on is still in perfect working order, so I'll get my monies worth out of it and save the metal extruder for a replacement.

One thing that I always thought was odd about the 3D printers I've seen on the net, mostly browsing Amazon or ebay, and only printers in the $200-800 approximate price range, and I wouldn't be surprised at this point if it was true of many much higher priced HOME printers; none come with an extruder knob included in the kit or pre-built that I found.

And it's just a small bit of plastic and a couple hours to print one, there are a number of styles to choose from on sites like Thingyvurse. It's a piece that is needed if you don't want to have to grab the pin and twist/rotate with a tool every time you want to insert or back the filament out too.

So why not have it as a basic piece available from the lowest end model on up? To me it's paramount to a disk player not having an open/close button and needing to grab some needle nose pliers and manually force-pull the tray out and push it in again! Of course if they made them like that in the case of disc players/drives, top-loader styles would take over the market completely. Granted a roll of filament lasts a while, so it's more like a multi-disc changer that holds a a couple dozen CD's.

I guess it's no big deal, really, I printed one, it works well, I spray painted it and it looks good along with the rest. But that's the point, it's not a big deal for the companies to include such a part that cost them a penny to produce themselves, a tiny gesture that would be appreciated by their customers.

What do you guys think? Owners of 3D printers and those who if they decided they wanted to get a 3D printer, would you appreciate a turn-knob included with a crucial part of the printer?

Or you wouldn't care, you'd use a tool the first time you feed the filament in, and your first practice prints would be an extruder knob? That's my story, short of the not caring part. I still would rather of not needing too and print other things.

One more bit of upgrade kit I'm getting for my Ender 3 Pro clone is a dual Z-axis upgrade kit. Especially since I'll have the laser engraver's weight on it when doing engraving, I'll probably have to re-level the Z-axis often and support on both sides would alleviate that as an issue. 

By the way, I have had no mechanical, electrical or digital "break downs" with this Sain Smart brand Ender 3 Pro clone since I got it about two years ago, maybe more.

The heated bed "pad" that came with it (which is a free-be bonus as many 3D printer don't include them) to print on that appeared to be fiberglass on the bottom facing the heated metal bed and a vinyl veneer on top, did go bad when the repeated heating and cooling and long hours of heat started causing bubbling of the vinyl layer and separation from the fiberglass plate, which got quite bad to the point of being unusable when I upgraded to tempered glass about 6 months ago.

But as I stated in the first post above, the glass plate for the bed has made printouts 100% better than even when the printer was new and I have always gotten what I thought were pretty good prints, until I saw what the printer could print on a perfectly-smooth, evenly heated surface. Night and day in the print quality.

Not to mention that to get the "pretty good" prints I never went above 35 for print head speed, and now I print out all but perfect prints at 100% speed.

If I do slow down to 35 speed or less, of course the prints are cleaner still, but it also takes three times as long to print for diminishing returns and I guess it's not supposed to be good to have a 3D printer on for more than half a dozen hours I've read? I've been allowing prints to run for 3 days straight though with nary and issue of over-heating.

Anyway, this printer was less than $200 initially, and I spent about $150 on upgrades and another $35 for the second Z-axis to come. So for $385 dollars for the quality of prints I get now, and longevity of original parts and continued quality, even a possibility of income using it, I consider it a fantastic deal and possibly a wise investment.

This is a well designed printer and well built and I am completely shocked with the quality of this clone knock-off Sain Smart brand of Creality line of original printers. I don't see how Creality themselves could have better quality in their original version of this printer than Sain Smart has put into their clone.  Of course all the upgrade parts I've bought have been Creality OEM parts, except for the laser engraver which is some other company entirely, and I haven't tried it yet and can't comment.

A little anecdote. When I was in college, I visited one of my college friend's home during a break. He had the Sears Video Arcade II tucked away under his bed. When he pulled it out to show me (he had seen my 7800 in my dorm room and played it) I was amazed as I never knew Sears released a VA2 in the 7800 style case (nor had I heard of the 2800 at the time) and I thought it WAS a Sears version of the 7800! My friend didn't know much about it himself, he had no idea of the 7800's existence before meeting me, and had only ever played 2600 games on it. We brought it back to college with us, but of course it was no-joy when I attempted to plug a 7800 game cart into the VA2 slot! But I'd preferred the top case style and buttons with LED's over the 7800 brushed metal plate and buttons have lamented over Atari not releasing the 7800 with the 2800/VA2 style case. Now, some 25+ years later I will make my own!

Sorry about basically changing the topic mid-thread, still feel free to reply to either topic if you desire.

Hey @SlidellMan, speaking of the timeless styling of the C128 (and 64C), due to the lighter beige coloring, I bet the original VIC-20 colored peripherals would even look better with them than the light brownish coloring of the original breadbox C64. What do you think?

I think so, but I was born after the VIC-20's production conclusion.

Though I looked through all the auction and other buy/sell web sites, and it seems no one has bothered to make a dust cover for the 7800. Except for vintage ones that might have been sold once upon a time.

But I'm not hunting for vintage dust covers, I'm hunting and buying quality home-brew (Granny with her sewing machine) ones produced now, as per all shown above. 

But check this sh*t out! while browsing Etsy I did come across a dust cover for my 7800 (I'll have to order another now that I have a Sears VA2 on the way), but it's one made for the much rarer and lesser know Sears Video Arcade II! So if you've been pining and searching for a 7800 dust cover, you might consider the VA2 dust cover as I have. 

These are made of canvas an in a variety of colors, my others ae faux leather/Vinyl, so this one won't quite match due to the material, but I did order a black one so the color will match. Reviews are raving about the canvas ones, and I can tell you personally that the vinyl leather ones are quality and well made.

I also ordered a couple yards of black vinyl material from Amazon, since no one sells new dust covers for disk drives and printers and whatnot, peripherals anyway, and I plan to cut out and make my own covers. Though I'll cut to overlap and use Velcro at the seams instead of sewing them.

And while grabbing the link for the VA2 dust cover, I discovered that the same seller DID have 7800 embroidered dust covers too, but they didn't show up in the search when I wanted to buy because they are out of stock. 

So it's all like destiny or synchronicity or something, getting a VA2 dust cover for my 7800, then getting a VA2! I'll just wait until 7800 dust covers are back in stock and buy one of them too.

 Anyway, links below showing both.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/967590969/video-arcade-ii-system-dust-covers?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=video+arcade+dust+cover&ref=sr_gallery-1-1&frs=1&cns=1&organic_search_click=1

https://www.etsy.com/listing/221879138/atari-7800-system-dust-covers?show_sold_out_detail=1&ref=nla_listing_details

What am I looking at? Since there was no World Wide Web in 1983, it must be a magazine advertisement. Yet the layout seems much more web than magazine. How can one watch a video of something in that era, order a VHS cassette?

Or are you just pulling our legs?

It is a screen shot of a digital version of an 80's magazine ad I pulled from the net. My guess is it was either a half-page ad so it fits in the window in the screen shot, or it was a double page ad spread but the screen shot is from original phot archives so there is no page seem. I remember seeing the ad in a computer magazine back in the day, but never noticed, or long forgot, about the iPhone bit in the ad until now. But I haven't bothered to look for a full screen shot of the original ad, but I'm sure one could be found. No fooling here, the old ad is/was real.

My guess is it was captured from Apple.com like the screen shot says, and can probably be found in some history section at Apple.com

Still, very few design and content details in the picture matches what really existed back then. It might have been a 10th anniversary online advertisement from Apple on their website in 1993 (which still is very early, given that the IMG tag barely existed back then). More likely it was created as a 20th anniversary online advertisement in 2003 with tongue in cheek about the iPhone, or simply one big hoax all together.

Pretty cool.   It has always been a goal/dream of mine of calling BBSs with things that should not be calling a BBS. 

Or like getting an Intellivision ECS to post on Atariage.

LOL! That is really cool doctorclu! (your Intellivision on-line)

The way I'm upgrading this Bally Arcade to a computer is sort of the "poor man's" version of the Zgrass Bally computer system that Bally, and later Astrocade company that bought the Bally Arcade from Bally, both promised upgrades but both times it was vaporware because sales were so poor. But third party alternatives  and DIY hackers upgraded the Bally/Astrocade to computer status themselves.

But those both had 64K memory and the keyboard worked like a real keyboard that were all-in-one units that plugged into the Bally/Astrocade IEEE 50-pin expansion bus. I'm doing an in-between with a 32K memory upgrade that plugs into that IEEE port, but the keyboard is a DIY hack job, going by old instructions, but with my own flair.

My keyboard for it will be a high-end mechanical keyboard, but the mod is that it's an un-encoded keyboard that gets hard-wired to the Bally's 24-button keypad. I can use the full Qwerty Keyboard, but when programming in Basic on the Bally keypad you have to press key-combinations to get the entire alphabet, and I'll still have to push that extra "control" key at the same time I press a letter on the Qwerty keyboard.

It's sort of like the old ZX81/Timex 1000 and Spectrum's where they had the Basic commands on the keyboard but you had to press control or something at the same time. Except in this case it's at least a real keyboard and not membrane. But, yeah, as you say, something the console was not intended to do, at least not in my implementation of a computer upgrade.

The last couple of years I'd been looking to expand my 8-bit computer horizons beyond the Atari 8-bit line, and I had this old Bally console sitting in storage for 15 years I got with a lot purchase of old electronics. I finally got around to restoring it, and of course heard about the upgrades, so I decided it would be my second 8-bit computer. And then recently I got a great deal on a TRS-80 Coco 2, so that's my third 8-bit. And it covers the three major competing 8-bit processors; 6502, 6809 and Z80.