New Desktop
I recently bought a new GPU (an AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT). While traveling last week, I saw a great deal on a parts combo at Newegg (CPU, DDR5, …
blog.awill.me
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New GPU
Prices RAM and GPUs are rumoured to exploed in the coming months. My current desktop is still pretty decent, and I plan to keep it for a …
New networking Gear
I built a new desktop 5 years ago. It was my first 2.5Gb device. But as the rest of my equipment was stuck on ancient 1Gb NICs, I didn’t see …
Bluetooth Page Turner
Recently I bought a new piano and figured maybe it was time I modernized to using an iPad for sheet music. Turning the page can be a bit of …
New Work Laptop
Apple launched their own laptop/desktop silicon line, starting with the M1, back in 2021. Of course, Apple isn’t just starting out here. …
New Storage Server
I’ve had my current server, a NAS mostly used for plex, for almost 10 years. It has performed perfectly, and in 10 years I’ve only had a …
Why Do Companies Sabotage Themselves?
Just in the last month, three companies have decided to screw over their customers hoping to make a few extra bucks. All three have …
What I Don't Like About iOS
So, I’ve been using iOS now for around 2 months. There’s a lot to like, but also a lot to dislike. Google and Apple have copied each other …
About
My name is Antony and I’m am a British-born Electrical Engineer living in Seattle. My past jobs include analog circuit designer, software …
Discovering iOS apps
After 14 years on Android, I switched to an iPhone 14 Pro Max last week. The hardware is, as expected, excellent. I just needed to learn the …
Switching to iOS
I’ve used Android exclusively since the original HTC Dream (AKA T-Mobile G1) That was 14 year ago! I’ve had countless Android phones since …
Steam Deck Update
I’ve now had my Steam deck for a few months. It’s an incredible device with just three flaws. Middling battery life, a mediocre screen, and …
Upgrading my server to AlmaLinux 9
I have been running my current server running CentOS 7 for almost 8 years. It runs Plex, acts as a NAS, and runs a few other small things. …
Keychron Q3
Earlier this year my old Cooler Master Masterkeys Pro S mechanical keyboard started giving me problems. It uses a micro USB connector, and …
Google Cancels Free Workspace Accounts
Google just announced that they’re removing free Google Workspace accounts. This is yet another terrible anti-consumer move by Google. How …
Xbox Acquisitions
Microsoft just announced their intention to acquire Activision Blizzard for $69B. Less than a year after acquiring Bethesda for $7B. This …
ThiefMD
Many, many years ago I used Evernote. It was fine, but I never loved it. Over the years Evernote lost its focus, trying to solve all kinds …
Pushover
I’ve been using Pushover since 2012. It’s a service that allows you to programmatically send instant push notifications to your devices. …
SSH'ing into Unifi
As I’ve posted about before, my home network is powered by Unifi gear. Since setting it up, I haven’t fiddled with it much. Due to warnings …
How Customer Obsession Relates to Success
I’ve worked at Amazon Web Services (AWS) for almost 7 years now. Amazon is famous for its leadership principles. The intent of these …
Sublime Tooling
I’ve used Sublime Text for the last 9 years. It’s great for my needs. It is simple yet extensible, and thanks to being written in C++ rather …
My WFH setup
When the pandemic started I already owned a pair of Bose NC 700. They’re great, with long battery life, and include multiple high-quality …
The Steam Deck
All the work Valve has been doing to make Linux a viable gaming OS has led to this one device: The Steam Deck, and I’m really excited. It …
Building Boxcars
I thought we’d start the summer with a fun project, so I ordered some boxcars for my two older sons. There were a lot more parts than I …
Selling a car
Last week I sold a car. I decided to use Tred. You get far more money selling a car privately vs trading it in at a dealership. But then you …
Moving to enterprise networking gear
I’ve been rocking a fairly high-end, though consumer-grade, Asus RT-AC88u router for the last 5 years. It’s been Rock solid. Zero issues. No …
Building a Calculator
My first job after university was designing analogue circuits and programming their firmware. I skipped larger through-hole and went …
Redhat abandoning CentOS
My thoughts on Redhat’s announcement that they’re abandoning CentOS. Facts. CentOS is a binary compatible RHEL build. CentOS was doing just …
New Computer
My current PC is 6 years old. It’s surprising it is still working as well as it does. It’s a testament to how well Intel was doing back …
Comcast
As I’ve lived at my new house for 12 months, you can guess that my Comcast XFinity bill increased. It increased by $20, and yet, the bill …
My Tennis Racquet History
Over the last 20+ years I’ve played with many different tennis racquets. As a child I remember 2 different junior Wilson aluminium racquets …
Pixel XL
Starting with the Nexus 4, I’ve owned every single Nexus phone. They were cheap, high spec devices with few compromises (the most complained …
AWS Lambda
After two and a half years running the back end storage data plane of Amazon S3, I’ve decided to join the Amazon Lambda team. I’m really …
Denon AVR-X2300W
Two months ago I bought a 4K TV. The problem was, I was still using a 1080p Denon Receiver, so I was still only able to watch TV at 1080p. I …
Vizio M65-D0
I’ve been rocking a cheap Vizio E-series 1080p TV since Black Friday 2012. I now have a 4K HDR capable nvidia Shield, and I’ve been itching …
gnome-mpv
I’ve used VLC for more than 15 years. Even before I switched to Linux, I used VLC. It can play anything! However, they haven’t been making …
Wiring the house with cat6
Last week we moved in to our new house. I decided I wanted cat6 ethernet between my office - where the comcast modem (ARRIS SB6183) and my …
Goodbye wordpress, hello hugo!
In a previous post I described moving my homepage to hugo hosted on Netlify. Now I finally took the time to move my wordpress blog over …
Jumping on the static site generator bandwagon!
Much of the web these days (>26%) is built on WordPress. Its popularity is likely based around a few reasons: Its usage of common server …
United Airlines are the worst
I’ve lived in the U.S. for the last 15 years. Having always lived close to a Delta Hub, I’ve always flown Delta. I’ve never really had any …
Amazon Web Services
9 months ago I accepted a job offer with Amazon Web Services. I haven’t posted anything since. Partly because the new job required moving …
Thoughts on Apple’s announcements
I haven’t posted in a really long time. Mostly because of this. I really like the below quote from Apple’s biggest and most biased fanboy: …
Enter the Nexus
As rumoured (and expected), Google announced the Nexus 6 phone/phablet last month: And the Nexus 9 tablet: The big shock for many was …
Newegg customer service
For several years now, I’ve noticed Newegg customer service get worse and worse. 15 years ago, I used to order computer parts from them all …
Bait and Switch
We live in a world where many companies have been very successful giving an app or game away for free, and charging for extras – called IAPs …
Google I/O 2014
A month and a half ago, I went to Google I/O 2014. I’d been wanting to go for a long, long time, and finally managed to get tickets! In …
ChromeOS
Denisse had been using my old laptop for the last 5 years. It still worked fine, and, because it runs Linux, was still stable, reliable and …
Almond Plus
I backed my first Kickstarter in March of 2013. It was for a new network router. The company behind it already makes a router (the original …
Company responses to Heartbleed
I haven’t posted in a really long time. These days I do shorter status updates through social networks, and haven’t felt the need for a long …
new job!
It’s been ages since I last posted. I’ve been really, really busy. Just in the last three months I spent a week in Cancún, a week in San …