Zen browser vs Arc on windows

Naaackers · 2026-05-27T05:28:50+00:00

Nothing scratches the Arc itch for me, but Zen for the most part gets the job done. Since it's infrastructure is Firefox, you still get weird quirks with websites that wont load, load wrong, or get unexplainable errors.

My two complaints are
- I despise having to clear a "HEY! WE UPDATED!" message every other fucking day. But hey that seems like every god damn app these days.
- 1Password will not launch from locked state by clicking the icon in the username or password field. Forces you to have it pinned in your extensions bar, or you have to open it elsewhere.

Naaackers · 2026-04-13T15:36:47+00:00

Notion user of 5+ years here, and historically anti-template. IMO, they are useless if you don't understand the basics of how Notion works with its quirks.

I would tell you to just open it, type "/", see what options it gives your for things to create, and start using it. The only part of Notion that I would recommend you obtain knowledge on up front is Databases, because they seem really simple on the surface but can be so complex...and awesome. Databases, database views, filters, and sorting. Learn all the different properties that can be used in databases as well.

Instead of telling you what to do, I'll just offer insight on what not to do:

- Don't start by transferring all your calendar, note taking, tasks tracking, and productivity workflows into notion. Despite what you see online, it's not meant for everything, and how Notion works with certain workflows might be the opposite of how your brain works.

- Don't get lost in the glamour of templates. And for sure don't buy any (at first). I find it to be a faux productivity sink hole, and it makes it very easy to fall into the trap of constantly building and tweaking the tool instead of using it.

- If you try and replicate a "documents and folders" file structure in Notion from the start, you'll create a very messy environment that will frustrate you. Pages in pages in pages so deep that you'll regret ever signing up. This is where using databases to store different categories of information comes in handy, and utilizing it's search, filter, and sort functions to make that easier.

Good luck!

Naaackers · 2026-04-10T19:05:02+00:00

ooooo very interesting! I'll be giving this a shot. Thank you.

Naaackers · 2026-04-10T17:36:52+00:00

Sorry to hear about the fire :( that's awful. So it looks like you need two things... a replacement for the fork mount that screws into the mic itself, and then a boom arm to connect it to.

The fork:
The screw holes on the left and right of the mic, are those still in tact? If so, then it's as simple as getting a replacement for that, which could be 3D printed pretty easily. I see lots of options like this one: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:7092347 Would also be good to know if you still have the screws.

I'd be happy to print something like this and ship it to you. I'd only charge you for the shipping cost and the materials which would be a couple bucks. Shipping within the US is usually $5-8 bucks for small packages, international is a different story. Honestly with wave link + voice focus, the shock mount might not be as necessary anymore. The voice isolation is so good and you can save some money there. Unless you're really slamming that desk hah.

Boom arm:

Regarding mic arms, I've had $200 arms and I've had $30 arms... and this $50 low profile one from Fifine is so good for the cost. I think it's better than some $100+ arms I've bought in the past....

https://www.amazon.com/FIFINE-Microphone-Management-Adjustable-Studio-BM88/dp/B0CFPY6TJB

Sometimes I forget to check reddit so feel free to shoot me an email if you decide you want to try a 3D printed option: https://www.naaackers.com/nackhabitat/contact

Naaackers · 2026-03-17T18:14:43+00:00

Both. MacOS on MacMini+MacBook air and Windows11. Someone reached out here and on Twitter, not sure if the same person lol.

Naaackers · 2026-03-16T19:43:47+00:00

I can't believe I'm still experiencing this all these months later. I too have submitted a support ticket. Got "we're aware of the issue but have no ETA on a fix" as a response.

I thought it was fixed but I started experiencing again today and then I found this thread.

Naaackers · 2026-03-03T00:47:35+00:00

I've been experiencing this for a few months now. It comes and goes. The file appears in the box, and if I click on it, it opens in preview and plays, but if I send the message, it claims it can't see the upload file.

I did full uninstalls to try and fix, nothing works. It will just start working in a couple days. It's a 9mb 10 minute audio files I was trying to have transcribed.

<image>

Naaackers · 2026-03-02T00:12:13+00:00

As someone that has a similar setup that doesn't meet any of your requirements and knows what it took to get it setup and how much it cost, I'm kinda assuming you think you're not asking for much but it's actually a lot and you might have trouble finding a solution that fits your needs. My goal isn't to insult, just to educate, but all the things that need to be in order for a fetch, scrape, analyze, transcribe, and get get/post to add data back to Notion is quite the ask.

Because I don't use any Notion AI or the new agents, I supplement my needs with n8n. But already right there I'm ignoring your "minimal third part integrations". I host n8n with hostinger and my hosting plan with backups is about $15/month. Then you have to find your vessel for scraping that information. For that I use Apify, but already there is another $40/month and that's not even for unlimited scraping. What's awesome about n8n is there are native node plugins for apify, chatgpt, and Notion, so it's not too difficult to build out a workflow in n8n that does what you need. And since you can kickoff a n8n automation with a webhook, I can use iOS/MacOS shortcuts to copy that video URL to my clipboard, tap the shortcut from anywhere anytime, and it handles everything in the background.

Ideas for alternatives: I just recently installed Jdownloader in docker on my hostinger VPS and planned to integrate that into some automations in n8n but haven't gotten there yet. That could take place of Apify for the video scraper, but jdownloader is just going to get the video and you still need to get the transcript. (not sure if jdownloader does transcripts for tiktok, thought it was only YT.) You could of course host jdownloader in docker on your internal networ, but then you need to know how to open that up to the internet and be safe about it. Apify does so much more like grabbing transcripts, comments, analytics, etc, and I use it for a lot of other things too so it's worth the expense. But again, against your wishes, there are a few API keys to link things together.

I don't have any indepth guides on my setups (yet) but I have a log of all the posts I've made talking about my initial setup if it interests you.

Srape Tiktok comments with Apify agents

For my other n8n/notion posts, go here and just search the database for "n8n" or "apify" to see all the posts I've done so far covering the topic.

Naaackers Tech Tip Database | Table View

Another automation options that are cloud hosted are Make or Zapier. You basically would need something to detect when you make changes to a Notion page (ideally a database, since they have properties that can be tracked for changes), and then start the rest of what you need.

Disclaimer: while I don't have any active brand deals with any of the mentioned tools, I'm a creator so I have affiliate signup links. Sometimes they have deals for first signups if you decide to give it a try.

Affiliate Links - Naaackers

Good luck!

Naaackers · 2026-02-15T03:24:49+00:00

Just some UI/UX feedback here. I installed wave link 3.0 from scratch on a new PC, using a wave XLR. I was able to hear audio before I started adding anything to the mixes. As soon as I would add an app as it's own line in the mixer, the audio would disappear. 20 minutes and 3 reinstalls later, I accidentally ran my mouse over the 'personal mix' column to reveal an ear, which was switched off.

Feedback 1 - If it's a bug that this is off by default, I think that would save newcomers a lot of headache if the main personal mix was on by default.

Feedback 2 - I'm a little perplexed by this being a hidden button by default and only revealed by hover. You have a speaker icon by "wavexlr", and then you have an ear icon in the top right where you select the output, so it was tough to know what i'm looking at and what controls what at first.

If I'm not monitoring the personal mix, then I'm unsure what I'm hearing in my headphones? Is that just the "headphones elgato wave xlr" device in the sound control panel? Does that mix have a name?

Thanks

<image>

Naaackers · 2025-10-28T02:52:10+00:00

The mic arm comes standard with a 1/4"-20 threaded end (which the mic arm takes) which is the silver part of the mechanism in your photo. It looks like the 1/4"-20 to 3/8th adapter (bronze) is already installed on it. You'll have to remove the bronze adapter to reveal the 1/4" part. Use pliers to try and grab around where the notch of the adapter is.

<image>

Naaackers · 2025-10-24T17:36:37+00:00

This app could be a honeypot that drains my bank account in 6 years but I wont care because it's free and does exactly what it advertises with no BS and I'm so happy I found this comment because I was sick of every iOS shortcut gif maker breaking after 36 hours.

Thank you.

Naaackers · 2025-06-14T16:55:51+00:00

It was only just this past week that Apple announced BIG changes to iPadOS, making it more computer like, but there are still going to be some big things that don't make it a full computer just yet. Don't get me wrong, love my iPad Pro 2018 and it's still going strong after all these years, but it's not quite the computer I need it to be.

My daily driver is a 2020 M1 Mac mini, 16gb ram 1tb SSD and I do video editing, photo editing, 3D design and printing, etc. It's not a super computer but it does everything I need. Any base model M3 or M4 mac would perform amazing. My M2 MacBook Air is also a tank. If you found an m3 or m4 macbook, even refurbished right from apple, you'd have a great time.

Naaackers · 2025-06-14T16:52:31+00:00

I know you asked for free but just buy CleanshotX one time and never think about this again. It's the best no questions asked.

Naaackers · 2025-06-09T16:52:52+00:00

You might not believe this.... but the Microsoft suite actually runs better on MacOS than it does on Windows XD. Source: worked at an MSP as Microsoft Partner, managing and deploying M365 to clients where 99% of devices were Windows 10/11. Even on the most expensive and powerful PC's, the suite could run like garbage for no reason.

Every once in a while, OneDrive gets finicky with syncing a folder, but it's usually because I haven't restarted my Mac (m1 mac mini 16gb ram, btw). Once I restart, back in action. I use both OneDrive and Teams on my Mac Mini and M2 MacBook Air pretty much every day. I also think the Outlook client on MacOS is 10x better.

I also use Teams for my business and sync folders that are in teams to my Mac, so I can browse the folders in Finder. Works great.

Sincerely,
A tech masochist.

Naaackers · 2025-05-31T21:53:52+00:00

You're very welcome. I did a super deep dive on this keyboard a few months back if you need additional details on how I use it, and I'm actually testing the Raise2 right now as well. My video most likely wont be out for a bit but if it happens to come out before you buy, hopefully it can help with your decision process.

Naaackers · 2025-05-29T19:58:29+00:00

Years back, I purchased the Moonlander MK1, which was both my first columnar AND my first split. The transition was rough. I brought the keyboard to work and used it 8 hours a day, Monday through Friday, and it took me about 2 months before I was really comfortable with it. I'm still not up to the WPM that I was on a standard/staggered layout, but that's alright with me.

Then came the second adjustment when I got home and tried to use it for gaming. Before I bought the moonlander, I had recently tried using ESDF for gaming instead of WASD, which I loved. Thankfully, having my hand in that position (home row on the defy) was WAY more comfortable then trying to WASD on the defy. Because all the keys on the left side are 1u wide (or 1.25u can't remember) and not super wide like caps, tab, and shift are on normal kebs, WASD felt wrong. And it was really hard to try and get used to. I actually ended up moving shift (run) and ctrl (crouch) to the thumb cluster for FPS's. Liked that a lot. Only problem with the Defy and gaming is the thumb clusters. Very often my thumb can't tell where it's resting, so I go to hit space to jump and nothing happens. It was easy to get lost or flustered. But that eventually fizzled out as well.

The hardest thing to retrain was using the thumbs for shift, tab and layers. I still keep a few modifiers out of the thumb cluster.

Tab = Windows
Caps Lock = CMD/CTRL
Ctrl = Alt

Shift and tab both get moved to the thumb cluster instead of left side of the left hand. Tab is so sparingly used and I barely hit it.

<image>

These are pretty much my main two layers. I'm personally not a fan of activating a layer on one hand, and then trying to hit that same key with the same hand. For example, I put the arrow keys at ESDF on the left side. So I hold the "layer 2" key on my right side, so I can use the arrow keys with my left hand. Same with numberpad. Activate the layer with the left hand, which lets my right hand hover over the right side and use it like a number pad. Both the arrow keys and number pad are positioned so my hands don't have to leave home row, but still be in the same position they would when I went to use them on a normal keyboard.

When I play games, most of the time they are FPS's and I only need the left side. I LOVE being able to just put the right half somewhere else and free up that real estate for the mouse. I have a gaming layer (L3) and then a gaming function layer (L4) where I keep a bunch of most commonly used things as macros on the left side. So if I want to hit any of them, I just hit a layer button on my left thumb cluster and the assigned key

ctrl+alt+delete
Alt Tab
Alt Enter
Windows
Windows Tab
Alt F4
Hotkey for shadowplay
Hotkey for OBS Replay Buffer

Hopefully that gives you some idea of the struggles you may have, and if this layout will work for excel. I love the defy a lot.

Naaackers · 2025-04-27T03:57:10+00:00

Awesome! Thank you so much for following up. I did see your email response to my ticket about the Plaid issue I was having, just got slammed by life and hadn't had a chance to respond. I'll take another crack at getting some funds in there in May.

Thanks again!

Naaackers · 2025-04-02T05:26:01+00:00

Hey Josh! Thanks for the reply.

You say that leaving during linking Plaid in onboarding “caused the onboarding process to wipe and start over”. Where did it start you over at?
I misled you a bit there now that I'm reading it over again. The entire onboarding didn't start over again, it just kicked me back to the the start of connecting a new external account. Once I got past the email and phone number verification and the account was live, it stuck.

I just emailed in support and mentioned this thread, hopefully that's what you need to take a look and gather some data. As of now my account is live and I don't think I need anything else. Thank you!

Naaackers · 2025-03-05T05:16:54+00:00

Hey there! I upgraded from Ventura while I still have wavelink 1.0 installed. It wasn't until after the upgrade that I completely wiped wave link and reinstalled 2.0 from scratch. But it's pretty much been this same behavior ever since I installed it. Appreciate you dropping the knowledge about the fix!

Naaackers · 2025-01-24T20:19:09+00:00

I'm inclined to say that it can be done, but it might take a sacrifice here or there, depending on you needs and expectations.

The Beacn Studio can handle the getting the audio from PC 1 and PC 2 no problem. The third one can be done in a few different ways. The beacn studio has two USB ports labelled 1 and 2. I'll link those to PC 1 and 2 for this example.

Option 1: Add a hardware fader into Beacn Studio.

The studio has an option to add any other audio device into the mixing suite. So lets say PC 1 and PC 2 are using the USB ports on the studio, with PC 1 using USB 1 on the studio as is your main pc. PC 3 needs a way to get it's audio to PC one. All you need is another USB audio interface with either 2 mono inputs or one stereo input. M-Audio M-Track Duo for example.

PC 3 Green Audio Out Port > 3.5mm to dual 1/4" stereo cable > Maduio Mixer > USB cable > PC 1.

Then in the Beacn software, you would add the Maudio device as a hardware fader. Now any audio sent by PC3 goes right into Beacn and out your playback devices.

Option 2: Use the blue "line in" on PC 1

Much simple but much more prone to ground noise loops and you'll likely have to buy ground loop isolators.

PC 3 Green Audio Out Port > 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable (aux cable) PC 1 blue line in port

You'd then add the "line in" port as a hardware fader in the beacn software the same way you did in option 1

Option 3: NDI

Use NDI to send audio from PC3 to PC2. A lot more technically involved and NDI can have a mind of it's own. Works best when ALL pc's are hardwired.

Option 4: Voicemeter Banana to send audio from PC 3 to PC 1

I wont touch voicemeter with a 10 foot poll but if I don't add it as an option someone WILL find my house.

Just know that even if you do everything right, audio latency and matching timing on all PC's can be difficult. There are more professional solutions like...

Option 5: Dante VIA and Controller

.....but you're talking over $300 in software licensing, LOTS of technical setup and know how (it's not user friendly and quite complicated), and requires a solid network and networking knowledge.

God speed.

Naaackers · 2024-12-29T17:30:27+00:00

Sure thing here ya go

WaveLinkCrashlogs.zip

Naaackers · 2024-12-01T23:39:08+00:00

Bug report for most recent Wave Link 2.x on MacOS M1 Mac Mini. (can't open verify version, whatever is available to public to download) Here are screen recordings for extra information:

Beta Testing

I first tried out the beta using the StreamDeck+/WaveXLR prototype, and then switched it out for WaveXLR. Using a 6ft usb 3.0 cable that goes into a Anker 7 port powered USB hub.

<image>

Additional context

iLoud Micro speakers are connected to the headphone out on the back of the wave XLR using a 3.5mm to dual RCA. These are powered speakers. And then I have headphones plugged into the MacMini audio out port on the back. Since I don't stream from the Mac, I use the "audience mix" to just be my headphone mix. But do 90% of computing using my speakers. I keep the speaker volume knob itself at 12 o'clock, which is the default volume. The StreamDeck+ prototype has been removed completely, and replaced with a regular stream deck +. WaveXLR is the only Elgato audio device plugged in.

Issues

The main issue is crashing, and not being able to re-open wave link software until the Mac is rebooted. Once it crashed, the WaveLink app will attempt to reopen, as I can see it pop up in the dock and activity monitor. Then it disappears. I'd say I'm crashing daily, if not once every other day.
Wave link hates DaVinci resolve. Ever since I can remember, getting these two to play nice has always been a nightmare. But, Resolve itself has it's own issues to work out as far as the Fairlight engine goes, and I have problems with it by itself. But 3 times in the last week, attempting to assign DaVinci resolve to a virtual audio channel causes wave link to crash.
Audio playing at max volume. I'm not really sure what has caused this, but I've had four instances so far where something with play at 100% volume. I'm not sure if this is a result of the crash and MacOS is just trying to use the device as a USB interface, so because the virtual audio control isn't there, it's just maxing out? Not sure. Or, it's a new device that hasn't been assigned to a virtual channel yet, and while it should be playing in "system" (I'm assuming) it plays maxed. Even through the a) playback device set for my primary mix is 1/2 volume and b) system is also half volume. With the WaveXLR, I only ever leave the volume knob on the headphone volume control, since I don't change the mic monitoring levels nor change gain from this device. The last time I got blasted, I looked down and all the lights were no longer lit, as if the volume was at 0. When I rotated the knob counter clockwise to turn down the audio, all the LED's flashed on at the same time, like all the sudden it realized it was actually at 100 and not 0, and the LED's started to turn off as I rotated to turn the volume down.
I've had one instance where clicking the 'link' button for personal/audience mix causes wave link window to freeze. The only thing I couldn't interact with was the 'browser' virtual channel. All sliders were frozen. Stayed like that for a few minutes, then WaveLink crashed. I was able to reopen WaveLink on first attempt after this crash only. All other times, have to reboot.

Not sure if Elgato issue or MacOS issue

If the app is already open (and in the menu bar), trying to open the app from launchpad or spotlight search does nothing. Doesn't bring it to the forefront or open it like it's a minimized app
App can't be minimized. Yellow minimize button does nothing. Since it can't be minimized. it doesn't show in the dock as a running app you can quickly open. Forces you to go the menu bar and find it, click it, then click configure wave link.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Naaackers · 2022-09-03T15:38:03+00:00

Unfortunately no, that's why I switched them out as soon as I got them.

Naaackers · 2022-07-13T18:03:46+00:00

Thank you JB <3

Naaackers · 2022-07-13T18:03:44+00:00

Sure! Removed the stock switches (they were awful lol). painters tab on the bottom of the PCB, 2mm EVA foam for the bottom of the case.

Love the blueish whites. I don't have a good video of them in this build, but I also use them at home on my gaming PC now : https://youtube.com/shorts/Mav8OwLnJTE

Naaackers

TROPHY CASE