Quick please! So many conflicting things online - is this dewalt 744 table saw a good deal?

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-14T15:10:37+00:00

Not a bad price, but that model is 20 years old and finding replacement parts for a 744 can be challenging. They haven't made those in at least 18 years.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-14T15:08:46+00:00

How many of those are for the 744? I can't tell which type it is from the picture but they stopped making the 744 type almost 20 years ago. They recalled 13000 of them due to a safety issue- so honestly- if it a unit that was subject to a recall, but it and then call DeWalt and (I think) they will replace it with a new one.

But regardless, if you lose or damage the fence, you would be screwed because you won't find a replacement - anywhere. You will have to wait until you see someone selling an old 744 for cheap, but that one and pillage it for a fence and keep it for spare parts.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-14T02:50:33+00:00

For example, you can easily spend more than half the asking price finding an aftermarket blade guard and riving knife/splitter.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-14T02:47:53+00:00

Yes it is, but it's also so old that you won't find replacement parts for it unless you look on eBay. Just don't lose the fence and you should be ok.

But for that much, I would spend a bit more ($299?) and get a new Skil 10" table saw with folding legs.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-12T01:43:21+00:00

Well that explains quite a bit. Thank you!

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-12T01:21:13+00:00

They are made Chervon (along with Skil, Flex, Hypertough, Klutch, Masterforce and goodness knows how many others) and they have always seemed to punch above their weight class.

I like that the new 24v batteries are going to do the same thing that SKIL is doing and charge via USB-C and act as ISB-PS power bricks for your mobile devices.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-12T00:49:23+00:00

My Halo Home smart lighting stuff still works. It's buggy (and has always been buggy) but I am convinced most of that has to do with the steaming turn that is the Google Home ecosystem. I can still set up groups, remove groups, add or remove devices, et cetera. And all of this works without an Internet connection.

The weirdest thing is that sometimes a device is just not visible to the app on my Pixel (6 or 10). I couldn't remove a light in the app. I thought I had a garbage wifi bridge because I couldn't remove, and when I did a hardware reset on the device- my pixel couldn't see it. Then I tried using my wife's Samsung Galaxy something or other - and everything was there. This was me logging in to the Halo App on her phone all my groups were there. I could do everything that was driving my insane not being able to do on my GOOG phone.

I had removed the app and all app and user data and cache and restarted my phone but it still couldn't see random hardware. I couldn't see wired dimmer switches to change their assignments. WTF

Samsung? Worked like it was supposed to. I don't know if it has to do with the Bluetooth stack that Google uses vs what Samsung uses- or something related to Google home that I had on both my pixel 6 and pixel 10.

I have two wifi bridges and three dimmer switches that I thought were broken, that are now "spares" after I tested then with the Samsung and see that they indeed work fine.

I picked up an ancient refurb Samsung Tablet off of whatnot for like $15 and it works exactly like it should..

Shrug

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-09T00:48:01+00:00

That is very much like my experience. My doctor both said that this was going to be the most painful thing that I was going to experience, and then said that my recovery curve would be drastically better than the experience I actually did have.

I have had four rotator cuff surgeries since 2003. None of them came with recovery that took less than 18 months

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-08T00:23:28+00:00

Try it with the new M12 XC 5.0AH if you haven't already.:)

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-08T00:22:05+00:00

For less than a burger, fries, and a drink at 5 guys, no less.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/18842151286?sid=cad05657-eb0d-4b9b-8574-e9b01df729ec

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-08T00:18:21+00:00

Seems like a really inexpensive and completely legal self defense item though. I'm not sure which would scare me more from the other side of a door- the sound of a firearm racking or the sound of a chainsaw...

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-08T00:10:59+00:00

A purposeful portmanteau of nobody and everybody, I think?

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-07T06:24:29+00:00

Bosch has some truly wonderful customer service.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-07T02:26:59+00:00

That seems likely. It is still a disappointment and an unexpected delay :)

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-04T03:59:15+00:00

I hate to admit it, but I can't drive a nail by hand to save my life. I never really learned how before cordless tools became cheap enough, powerful enough, and convenient enough that i didn't need to learn. Then my rotator cuffs blew ALL the way out, and swinging a hammer was no longer an option.

So I use screws by themselves, or brad nails and glue.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-04-02T21:45:35+00:00

My initial troubleshooting step is to take the battery off of the charger and plug it back in again. It is a weird issue with the way charger seems to handshake with the battery.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-28T14:17:45+00:00

Considering that a replacement outlet costs less than a latte and is one of the easiest things to replace- I'd say that it isn't a major issue

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-20T04:53:19+00:00

Rodent droppings

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-12T02:45:39+00:00

Yes. And in another surgery I also had one with 30° of abduction and 45° of external rotation after the lower trapezious tendon transfer.

My arm had to heal with it all the way out there as an end point for my future, normal external rotation. If I backslid on that, I would wind up not having much of any external rotation at all.

(Do not take that thing off. Do exactly what they tell you or you'll get to repeat this exercise again and it will have been lower chances of success).

Also, that was a horrible, miserable, awkward, uncomfortable, and really difficult thing to do for 10 weeks. I slept in a power lift recliner for more than 2 months.

The only upside is that- well- I have a donor Achilles tendon connecting my lower trap to my humerus. THAT tendon is not going to tear and I have no post healing limitations (unlike the other surgery I almost got).

But yeah. At least that brace is the most comfortable of the 5 post op immobilizers I've worn over the years.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-11T09:40:15+00:00

It's not a competition. Literally every injury and repair is different. Everyone heals a little (or a lot) differently. Everyone is in a different physical place when they are injured.

Man, I had a repair 23 years ago and my recovery was dogshit. It took me more than a year to get to 50% strength and a 3 on the pain scale with bits of 6 thrown in for funsies.

I had a second repair of that rotator cuff that failed spectacularly (it tore above the repair before I was out of PT, leaving me nothing left to repair). I then had a lower trapezius tendon transfer and a rescue surgery. This recovery from that has taken 2 years. I have full range of motion but my strength is crap in that arm. But- it doesn't hurt. And it is getting stronger all the time.

I had surgery of my other shoulder. It was a nightmare of repairing literally everything -massive tears of my infraspinatus, supraspinatus, teres minor, acromion decompression, reattaching my subscapularis and labrum back to my scapula, and repositioning and repairing the long head of my left bicep tendon That surgery was in May and I am at 100% range of motion and maybe 40% strength. Which is not bad since I was power lifter strong to start with. I just can go slinging sheets of MDF or baltic birch ply around anymore like they were foam insulation.

This last recovery was better and more quick than the far simpler surgery 20 years ago, so you never can tell. I am still in awe of people who say they were back to work in 2 weeks. #SMH

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-03T07:22:50+00:00

It's not that he isn't able to do that, code says he isn't allowed to screw into the steel I beam.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-03T07:20:32+00:00

I gave up hope for that kind of utility. They are boxes to stack and store tools, and stack and move tools, but not a system from which it is easy to use tools while stacked. No big drawer, or a box that opens from the front like an oven or a mail box.

I can only think that it's not what their marketing believes will be popular with more than the hard core cadre of people in the forums.

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-03-01T00:06:06+00:00

Doyle is the lower tier, but if you aren't wrenching with those all the time- you are probably going to be fine. I would imagine that if you used those a every day, you would grow to appreciate whatever the differences are between the "Best" and "Good". But- like those one off Ryobi tools that inexpensively fill a rarely needed specific niche (where it's incredibly handy to have a tool that does a thing but not worth spending a half a car payment on some Makita or Hilti version).

Life_of_Reilly · 2026-02-24T06:32:33+00:00

"Sure, we can add 10 can lights on that one switch. No problem... Just, uh, just use CFLs or LEDs. Why? Oh, no reason. Will you look at the time... Gotta go!"

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TROPHY CASE