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Reduce the pinginess of a mechanical keyboard

Dave Farquhar Hardware December 4, 2023November 19, 2023

A mechanical keyboard will always be louder than a membrane keyboard because of their physical characteristics. A membrane keyboard involves a plastic tray with some keyboard sliders striking a rubber membrane to make contact with a circuit board. Mechanical keyboards almost always have a metal plate that holds mechanical switches with springs in them, so even a linear switch that doesn’t click still makes a tapping noise when it bottoms out, and when bottoming out, it can make that metal plate vibrate and make a pinging noise. Here’s how I reduced the pinginess of my mechanical keyboard.

Marx train set 4338 for W.T. Grant

Dave Farquhar Toy trains November 30, 2023December 14, 2023

The Marx 4338 was a low end train set that was the result of a long time collaboration between two companies who were nearing the end of the line. It was an inexpensive electric train set exclusive to W.T. Grant, which was still the third fastest growing retailer in the United States at the time.

What defense in depth is in information security

Dave Farquhar security November 29, 2023November 26, 2023

Defense in depth is a common phrase you hear in information security. It’s also frequently misunderstood. In this blog post, I’ll provide links to a couple of examples of defense in depth, and provide some insights into the mindset. Because more than anything else, defense in depth is a mindset that takes more than seeing examples to grasp.

Are Black Friday tools any good?

Dave Farquhar DIY November 28, 2023November 27, 2023

Black Friday is the biggest shopping day of the year in the United States. But not all Black Friday deals are what they first appear to be. That’s true in the case of tools. But if you know what you’re getting, they can still be fine for what they are. It’s not necessarily a case of whether Black Friday tools are any good, but rather, if they are suitable for your intended use case.

Ryobi Black Friday $79 combo kit review

Dave Farquhar DIY November 27, 2023November 25, 2023

For Black Friday 2023, Home Depot offered a Ryobi combo kit for $79. It included a drill, a saw, and a work light. They billed it as a $300 value. I bought one so you don’t necessarily have to. In this blog post, I’ll tell you whether it’s worth considering.

Manage Engine Patch Manager review: Just what you needed

Dave Farquhar security November 22, 2023May 13, 2025

I’ve been evaluating Zoho Manage Engine Patch Manager, and so far I like what I see. It is a capable patch deployment tool that supports Windows, Linux, and Macintosh, and crucially, it will deploy patches for third party applications, including open source applications, both popular and obscure.

Hosts file to stop Windows from spying on you

Dave Farquhar security November 21, 2023November 19, 2023

Modern versions of Windows collect a huge amount of telemetry on you. But running older versions of Windows puts you at greater security risk, and running another OS may or may not always be feasible. So for those instances, it’s possible to use a hosts file to stop Windows from spying on you.

Jetway 386WB motherboard

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing November 20, 2023March 2, 2026

The Jetway 386WB was an inexpensive clone motherboard with an Opti chipset available in the 1989 /1990 time frame.

I’m familiar with the Jetway board because I own one, but many manufacturers in Taiwan produced boards based on the same Opti reference design. Essentially, Opti did the engineering work, and the Taiwan-based manufacturers handled production. The result was an unassuming board that provided good value for money.

Marx Happi-Time 9605 train set

Dave Farquhar Toy trains November 16, 2023May 2, 2024

Marx train set 9605 was an electric train set Marx that Sears sold in 1955. But you may also hear collectors refer to it as Happi-Time train set 9605, because that’s what Marx printed on the box.

DEC Tulip packet drivers for DOS

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing November 15, 2023March 12, 2024

Back when I was getting started in Linux, the network card to get was anything based on the DEC Tulip chipset. DEC sold them themselves for a short time, but so did Netgear, Linksys, and probably others. Unlike DEC ISA cards, which were junk, the Tulip chipset was great. At least in Linux and Windows. DOS? I never had reason to check. Here’s how (and why) I set up DEC Tulip packet drivers for DOS.

I recently came across a couple of old DEC Tulip cards in my parts stash, and I decided to try to get them working in DOS. I’ve had mixed success with PCI cards and DOS, so if I could get those old Tulip cards working, it could make life easier for me when I run DOS on that type of machine. Here’s how I did it.