So I went back and found some receipts, and it turns out that we're pretty much on the same page. This thing was actually about $900 of hardware, which was basically a higher end mid tier build. I remember looking for high quality components but I wasn't grabbing high performance ones. I've probably spent $300 on drives and RAM so cost per year is under $100.

As far as how much I value my time - one does not spend a mere 30 minutes swapping a mainboard out of the everything-box that runs all your shit, so I value hardware stability quite a bit. I moved most of the time-consuming compatibility hacks into docker containers the last time around so hopefully it's a lot easier next time. I have to deal with this stuff all day long at work so my appetite for PC projects at home is very low. If I can throw some more cash at it to stave off the need to swap out a drive or even the whole PC for a couple more years I'll gladly do it.

There tends to be a correlation between quality, longevity, and price. It's not a perfect fit but it's definitely a thing that exists.

I built a brand new cutting edge PC for a family member in 2011. They wanted to change careers and get into IT and figured they needed the bestest fastest PC they could afford. Anyway, it worked great until they decided it was time for a new one in 2019. I got to keep the 2011 PC in exchange for some assistance with selecting components for the new build. I put in a shiny new SDD, ebayed 16GB of old RAM that was the fastest thing the motherboard could handle, and I'm still using it as my primary server / workstation / web browser / cloud backup automation controller / etc. It cost more upfront but the amount of time that 2 different people have not spent with fucking around building new PCs has more than offset that in my opinion.

So this PC is on its 3rd round of HDDs and 2nd round of RAM but that was only to boost performance, not because of a hardware failure. I haven't lost a power supply, motherboard cap, fan motor, or USB port on it yet. That's pretty remarkable for a 14 year old machine that's been running 24/7. The 2019 build hasn't had a hiccup in almost 6 years now either.

Residential style doors and windows aren't really designed for pressurized water spray from every direction like what your trailer will encounter so weatherproofing it will be the hard part. I'd keep an eye out for some different implementations on buses, trailers, aftermarket truck beds, etc. Try to see how they handled it, ask the owners how well it works, and then see if that's something you can copy. Structurally I think it looks fine as long as you have enough support at every corner and your header is strong enough.

I picked up a 3D printer and it's been a game changer for things like this. Not exactly a quick and easy solution though.

Looks solid!

Do you have any IoT devices chewing up a lot more bandwidth than they should be?

The factory reset idea is mostly to clear out any unauthorized customization that may have been made. If you can confirm that hasn't happened then it wouldn't be necessary. I have a router that's not supported by my ISP so I feel your pain. Fortunately I only had to figure out how to tag a particular vlan on the WAN to get it working and someone else had posted a guide that got me most of the way there.

Can you get into your router's admin interface? At the very least assuming you don't have much networking experience I'd do these things in this order:

1 - Check for firmware updates and apply them

2 - Factory reset

3 - Change password

4 - Recheck for updates in case the reset wiped them out

There's a million other things you can do to get more info on what's going on and put in security layers to do this and that. But if you just want the maximum results for the minimum effort this is the best place to start.

Sorry, I've been trying to login at least a couple times a week but haven't seen any notifications that there were new posts. I tried to watch the video but it says the r/DIY community is private. Just based on your description though I was wondering if maybe you need to balance the fan blade. I've had that problem with a few cheap fans and was able to get them to run about 90% more quietly by just eyeballing the blades and bending the one that looked "off" back into place. I think Mattias Wandel has a video somewhere on how to get really scientific about it if you want to get down to zero vibration.

Thanks! They only use it for paper, cardboard, and really thin boards, like less than 1/8". Sheet metal would definitely have a sharp edge and the little crescent moon chips it makes would be absolute hell if they ever were to get spilled in the carpet or lawn.

I added a sink to it over the weekend, now there's a place to rinse out paintbrushes and wash hands. It's hooked up to a garden hose, so there's no hot water. There's a twist timer at the end of the hose so it will shut the water off automatically after 2 hours in case the 3 year old leaves the sink running. The drain just goes out the back corner and into the lawn. I've been dumping my buckets of paint water in the side yard for several years now and it hasn't killed my grass yet so it should be OK.

It works perfectly! I was able to leave a 6 and 3 year old out there with 50 little paint bottles completely unattended for 45 minutes while I made dinner last night. There's paint all over the place in the playhouse but none got in their hair or in our house so I call that a win.

Thanks!

I was wondering about this also when I tried to sign up to lemmy.world on Monday and it seemed like it just timed out while I was trying to register and login. It looked like they were getting some traffic but it shouldn't have been enough to bring everything to a crawl like that.

Did you make the catio too? I was thinking about making one of those with an exit from a basement egress window.

As long as you're careful when you're stripping the outside protective sheath and don't cut thru the black or white insulation on the internal wires and don't have any stray / frayed conductors sticking out after you screw everything to the terminals it's going to be plenty safe. I usually try to make the first cut above the ground wire because it doesn't matter if I slice into that one on accident. Making AC cords is a lot easier than terminating coax or cat-6, you just have to bear in mind that the consequences for screwing it up can be a lot higher.

Usually when you need something really specific like that and you're not selling this PC to someone else, it's best to just make your own. Get a c13 or c14 rewireable end, cut up an existing cable, and stick it on there. As long as you do a clean job and don't put the wrong wire on the wrong terminal and it's all secured properly you'll be fine.

If you cinch a small ziptie down really tight on the black insulation right where it tries to exit the end you modified, you can give it some extra strain relief and reduce stress on the terminal screws.

I bet she loves that, good work!

Thanks!

Thanks! I might have used it myself once or twice when I didn't feel like cleaning up after the jigsaw...