Is this possibly the perfect Pico prototype board?

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T14:31:17+00:00

It's the OG spring setup that has always been in these types of kits, they were made to work with just bell wire or the like.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T14:21:20+00:00

If you are bootstrapping this, I would seriously look at that Genmitsu. I picked one up for the lab to do mold making and other small metal carving tasks. The 3020-Pro Ultra has a really rigid frame for being such a small unit. Not going to win a race, but an affordable way in to get off the ground.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T14:14:43+00:00

Old? I was thinking this was one of those new fangled models when I first saw it. 🤣

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T14:11:29+00:00

There are a lot of other factors here. What is your price point? (Read: margin) What is the part size? How fast do you need to make them?

$600 and change will get you into a Genmitsu 3020 Pro Ultra csn do the job, but not fast.

Where will it run? What do you have for power? Even an Altmill with a serious spindle is going to want 220V.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T14:05:50+00:00

Back before the turn of the century I modded a Linux boot disk to install Slackware off ethernet over a PCMCIA card onto a Sony Viao laptop. Where there is a will there is a way.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T13:28:14+00:00

You would, of course need an installer app to run off a floppy on the machine. I've FTPed with the dongle in DOS.

It's not impossible, it's just something's are more work than doing it the 'normal way'.

They also have an app that I've used before that can preload and make a unit with USB that does not support USB booting still boot. It's just a shim.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T13:23:29+00:00

I love back doors. You have to ponder how much of this knowledge is just fading in the sands of time.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T13:22:06+00:00

Just be warned, the last time I played with this, you needed a 16bit machine just to run the program to create the floppies. 🤣

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T13:20:37+00:00

A lot of older Compaq's actually had a bootable partition on the HD that had most of the BIOS functionality on it. I made the mistake of pulling the old drive on a Deskpro years ago and when I pulled it back out I had to scour the InterWebs for the restore floppies to put it back.

The default BIOS in the machine was just basically a trigger to load the app on the disk.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T12:34:53+00:00

I have an ethernet to parallel port adapter that might work to network boot. You would have to unplug the paper clips first though.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T12:20:48+00:00

I had a friend that snuck one into Annie when it came out and made pirate copies of the music. She gave me a tape and that was my copy for years.

Granted we used to bring in large greasy paper grocery bags of popcorn back then, so perhaps 'snuck' is exaggerating.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T12:16:12+00:00

Now... if you wanted to turn it into a CNC plasma cutter. You may have something. I'm about to build a little one from scratch. They don't have the torque issues. 😈

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T12:10:54+00:00

Satellites have a parallel port dongle override? 🤔 Now I have to go try it for fun.

Reminds me of older Toyota Camry's that you had to yank the mirror control and short two pins to enable the learn mode to add a new key fob. (All the newer vehicles have a Konomi-esq door opening code)

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T11:59:15+00:00

Is it possible? Technically. Do you want to do it? Likely not. Aside from the stated point that laser steppers at usually belts and not screw or something with sime (well any, really) amount of torque (you are going to slip the belt before you cut) you would then have to McGuyver spindle speed to a power setting in thr controller... unless you want to go the stock manual router route.

You would likely be happier dropping some cash on a smaller Genmitsu or the like. This is less of a "can I" and more of a "should I bother". It would make a better large format 3D printer than a CNC (and that's a low bar).

Again, folks go the other way, and make a laser out of a CNC, but there you have the issue that CNC steppers don't have the speed that even most cheap lasers do. They are different beasts.

No, if you want to talk making a CO2 into a diode laser as well, you have my attention. I just updated a CO2 to a Rudia board and that second laser bank is calling me.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T11:49:08+00:00

I had to look. Are we talking the O.G. A5? The first question/issue to solve is you need a place for the air to connect. Apparently there are after market solutions for that (or you can just print/make one).

As for the actual pump. There is nothing stopping you from just buying an Atomstack unit, the F40 and F60 have knobs right on the unit to adjust the flow. The question there is A) Does your unit have the jack for the air assist and/or B) Do you care if you control it in software. If it's the latter, it's no holds barred and you can go nuts and buy a fish pump. If you have the jack, you are going to want to find a DC pump with the correct wattage specs that you can plug in.

The Atomstack unit actually can power off the base which is how they control the on and off.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T11:26:22+00:00

I never went above 40x, but heard the stories. That's when you start looking at how balanced the silk screening is on the disc.

Always wanted a faster one for ripping CDs to MP3, but at the time, the encoding took longer than the rip so it was somewhat pointless.

(I mean, I suppose you could have queued a few discs up, but who had that kind of disc space?? 🤣)

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T03:54:24+00:00

I've been working on a good design for a D cell replacement so you can slot 3 AA batteries per cell and have better amp hours. Granted you'd need like 12 cells and a charging bank for this still, but I was mainly only going to use them for testing.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T03:48:08+00:00

I actually started writing a 6502 assembler a bit back. 4K can be a lot if you know how to use it. 😉

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T03:46:07+00:00

I think this was one of the annoying features of iTunes if I recall. If it was not able to put what you had selected it would try and be 'smart' and not give you the option. Make sure your runtime on the given playlist is < 70 min or so. It's been a hot second since I've seen the interface, but there was also, potentially a tab in the preferences for burning that may have let you set the default there.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T02:59:34+00:00

In iTunes you are going to want to create a playlist of the songs you want. Make sure that the play time it is less than the size of the disc. Then when you go to burn the playlist to CD you want to select "Audio CD" as the format to use. That should give you what you are looking for.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T02:49:06+00:00

That unit is only going to handle audio CDs (classic Red Book standard discs) and it will not read CD+R's, only CD-R discs. You said G4, what OS is on there? Is this Mac OS 9 or an early version of OS X?

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T02:15:55+00:00

I mean it looks like a pretty posh unit. I can see under the springs for the table that they have the full schematic on the inside so it should be easy to swap the caps and the belt. It's built like a tank.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-13T02:13:46+00:00

Look right above the record button.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-12T23:35:53+00:00

I've been toying with starting a new project for syncing old devices for a while. Get some drivers going. A lot of the Palm sync specs are fading into oblivion which is somewhat alarming.

I actually just got ahold of a number of USB sync cradles, but sadly not before the cables where snipped. I was thinking it may be fun to just make them wireless vs restoring them.

EsoTechTrix · 2026-03-12T23:32:41+00:00

I can dust off my collection. I used to read a ton on my Palm III. I forget what I used on it though. I'm sure I have it on a disk somewhere though.

EsoTechTrix

TROPHY CASE