I have a RTL2832U v3 software defined radio that plugs into a USB port. https://www.rtl-sdr.com/tag/v3/
Cool! What do you use it for?
Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
771–780 of 853 posts
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#772I don't use a camera for video conferencing. I use my last-generation mobile device with the Droidcam app. Plus a goose-neck attachment to hold it to one side of the monitor about 10-20 degrees below eye level. Better picture quality and easier to "look at" people when I'm trying to get some point across.
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#773Mobile dev here; I had an issue with organizing the vast quantity of mobile devices I have been given for testing. * Significant QoL gain: take a trip to the dollar store to buy three short CD racks; if you lay them on their sides next to each other, you can mount your laptops and mobile devices vertically! Much nicer than stacking your devices screen to screen, and you can keep them charged and connect them as-neede…
Open up those hatch doors, but keep the goofy gaming chair on the treadmill and you might invent a new sport!
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#774It's not an extremely unusual peripheral, but I use a rather nontraditional display with my Mac Studio, the LG DualUp. It's a 28-inch 16:18 aspect (square-ish) display with 2560x2880 native resolution (roughly the pixel density of a "4K display"). I use it rotated (for 18:16 aspect) and I love it. For general use -- web, photos, terminal windows -- it's great, and it's perfect as a dev machine, which it also is. I'm more fond of it than any display I've used in the past.
The display in my setup: https://www.flickr.com/photos/blakespot/52345176302/in/album...
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#775Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was a big HHKB fan, I actually still have the first model produced with the three cables for sun, mac, PC. If anyone is interested, I would check out not only the new HHBKB, but mechanical keyboards also, the ones you build or have someone build. The amount of programming and customization you can do on them is insane. I moved from HHKB to a 40%, for two reasons: 1) the mouse is incredibly close to the keyboard. It…
I never understood programmers who use stripped-down mechanical keyboard. I use my arrow keys, home, end, and pagedown key all the time; having to use a fn key to access those would really slow me down. Do you just tend to use the mouse more, or are you on some kind of vim-keys-everywhere kind of thing
I used a HHKB for almost 10 years, and the lack of arrow keys was probably an issue for a week. After that week, the motion of pressing fn and whatever keys then represented arrows was just effortless.
I'd still be using that keyboard now if the switches felt better. After ten years of heavy use as a programmer, they've either become stiffer, or I've become less tolerant (probably both) of the keys.
I'm on a simple Drop ALT now with key switches that remind me of the original Topre keys of the HHKB, but much smoother. I can't recall what they are exactly. No complaints after three years of use.
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#776Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s essentially no lag in a dedicated wireless receiver mouse - the additional latency is dwarfed by the baseline latency of the hardware and software. https://www.rtings.com/mouse/tests/control/latency Yes connectivity issues can be a problem in certain environments but luckily this has usually not been a problem with receivers not in close proximity to interference, including USB3. Battery wise I have had cheap…
I've never had a problem in my entire life with wired keyboards, mice, or headphones. I've had probably aggregate thousands of separate instances of problems with wireless devices across the last 20 years. Wireless is awesome for when you're on the go, but if you're going to be sitting at a desk for hours anyway, wired is life.
I have zero tolerance for crappy wireless stuff in general but my wireless Logitech mouse has worked flawlessly. I can't think of a reason to prefer a wired mouse over it.
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#777Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#778I have a heating pad under my keyboard which keeps my hands warm in the winter. Was like $20 on amazon, and I can't even begin to describe how amazing it is, since I was really tired of always having a mug of hot water / tea / coffee to hold and didn't want to keep the heat on my house super high when I could just wear a sweatshirt and be fine except my fingers.
Good idea! Fingerless gloves are sub-optimal.
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#779Earlier quoted context omitted.
Among the neurotic optimizations I’ve made to my cable setup - retracting USB-C cables and normal cables of any length, adapters for any and all devices I own - I have avoided magnetic adapters for the above reasons.
How did you make retracting cables?
You just buy them. I wouldn't trust them for high-power or high-drain devices, personally, but you can just search amazon and see what they have.
Re: Ask HN: What lesser-known accessories do you use with your computer?
#780Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure thing. Here are the specific items I ended up with: - Cam link 4K card: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B09XXBTBYB - Dummy battery kit: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B078PDCF7D - Micro HDMI cable: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B08C2QMT4R In terms of camera settings, I think the main ones were switching the file format to XAVC and turning off the display icons so they don't show when I'm on video. Might be worth…
Or save yourself the cost and latency of the HDMI grabber and use it via gphoto2/v4l2 if you don't mind a little command line action. https://girishjoshi.io/post/using-dslr-camera-as-webcam-on-l...
I tried this approach and the latency was through the roof, easily a second or so off, making it effectively useless for video conferencing. Switched to an HDMI grabber so I could get something that was actually realtime.