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Recording vintage CRTs with a modern Sony mirrorless camera

Recording vintage CRTs with a modern Sony mirrorless camera

Growing up, I remember recording CRTs with any camera was an exercise in frustration. You would either get a black bar that goes across everything, a slowly moving 'shutter' of darkness over the screen, black frame flickering, or even a variety of bright artifacts, especially when moving the camera around.

Mac Classic CRT with flicker line

Just setting your camera's shutter speed to match the refresh rate somewhat closely is usually enough to make it at least bearable (I start at 1/60th and see what looks least annoying).

But I recently discovered, while recording an old Macintosh Classic's CRT, that my Sony A7CII has a built-in anti-flicker feature that's... actually amazing.

Jeff Geerling

Jeff Geerling
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Open Sauce is a confoundingly brilliant Bay Area event

Open Sauce is a confoundingly brilliant Bay Area event

Joe and Jeff Geerling at Open Sauce 2025

This is the second year I brought my Dad (a now-retired radio engineer and co-host of Geerling Engineering) to Open Sauce, a Bay Area maker faire-like event, dreamed up by William Osman and featuring hundreds of exhibits ranging from mad science, to vintage electronics, to games, to world-record-breaking Rubik's Cube solvers:

Jeff Geerling

Jeff Geerling
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Adding GPS and off-grid maps to my Meshtastic T-Deck

Adding GPS and off-grid maps to my Meshtastic T-Deck

Meshtastic is still a bit touch-and-go sometimes, but the St. Louis area Mesh has grown quite a bit, to the point I can regularly mesh with 10-30 other nodes. So far we can't quite get the entire metro covered wirelessly, but there are a few gaps MQTT is connecting currently.

Meshmap.net - St. Louis Missouri

One thing I hadn't really thought about—but can be useful, especially for visualizing the mesh—is GPS positioning on the mesh node itself.

Jeff Geerling

Jeff Geerling
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Upgrading an M4 Pro Mac mini's storage for half the price

Upgrading an M4 Pro Mac mini's storage for half the price

A few months ago, I upgraded my M4 Mac mini from 1 to 2 TB of internal storage, using a then-$269 DIY upgrade kit from ExpandMacMini.

At the time, there was no option for upgrading the M4 Pro Mac mini, despite it also using a user-replaceable, socketed storage drive.

M4 Pro Mac mini guts with M4-SSD 4TB Upgrade Installed

But the folks at M4-SSD reached out and asked if I'd be willing to test out one of their new M4 Pro upgrades, in this case, upgrading the mini I use at the studio for editing from a stock 512 GB SSD to 4 TB.

Jeff Geerling

Jeff Geerling
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Mini NASes marry NVMe to Intel's efficient chip

Mini NASes marry NVMe to Intel's efficient chip

Mini NAS lineup with Coffee Mug

I'm in the process of rebuilding my homelab from the ground up, moving from a 24U full-size 4-post rack to a mini rack.

One of the most difficult devices to downsize (especially economically) is a NAS. But as my needs have changed, I'm bucking the trend of all datahoarders and I need less storage than the 120 TB (80 TB usable) I currently have.

Jeff Geerling

Jeff Geerling
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You will own nothing and be happy (Stop Killing Games)

You will own nothing and be happy (Stop Killing Games)

tl;dr: If you're an EU citizen, sign the Stop Killing Games initiative here. Or, if you're in the UK, sign this petition.

A month ago, I had a second video on self-hosting taken down. YouTube said it was 'harmful or dangerous content'. I appealed that, but my appeal was rejected.

Luckily, I have enough reach I was able to get a second chance. Most content creators aren't so lucky, and content about tools like Jellyfin and LibreELEC get buried over time.

But it's not just self-hosting.

Note: This blog post is a lightly edited transcript of my most recent YouTube video, You will own NOTHING and be HAPPY (SKG).

Jeff Geerling July 2, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Getting weather data from my Acurite sensors was shockingly easy

Getting weather data from my Acurite sensors was shockingly easy

I've had a Pi and SDR earmarked for 'getting weather data from my weather station' for a long time now. I don't know why I waited so long, because it was shockingly easy.

I have a Acurite 5-in-1 weather station (with separate lightning detector) mounted about 15' in the air in my back yard. It comes with a fancy little LCD display to show all the stats it transmits over the 433 MHz wireless frequency.

But I want to ingest that data into my Home Assistant installation, so I can have better access to historical data, set up alerts (like if wind speed is above 50 mph, or there's lightnining less than 10 miles away), etc.

I'll work on the HA integration later, likely using MQTT. But for now, just getting the data to decode on a Raspberry Pi 5 was quick:

Jeff Geerling June 27, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Setting up an Ubuntu Desktop installation for SSH, quickly

Setting up an Ubuntu Desktop installation for SSH, quickly I've enjoyed using Ubuntu Server's GitHub SSH pubkey importer for a long time, it's a quick and easy way when doing an interactive server installation to get the built-in OpenSSH server configured for re...

Jeff Geerling
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How I make thumbnails for YouTube

How I make thumbnails for YouTube Over on the 2nd channel, I posted a video detailing my process for making thumbnails for my YouTube channel: .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed...

Jeff Geerling
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How I monitor and control all my powered devices (Zigbee + HA)

How I monitor and control all my powered devices (Zigbee + HA)

Any time I show power consumption graphs for the SBCs, computers, and servers I test, I get a number of comments asking for more details about the setup.

It's quite simple, really: using my Home Assistant Yellow's built-in Zigbee radio, I connect a number of ThirdReality Zigbee Smart Outlets to it, and then I use ApexCharts Cards to add graphs of power consumption over time on my Home Assistant dashboards.

Jeff Geerling June 14, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Sipeed NanoCluster fits 7-node Pi cluster in 6cm

Sipeed NanoCluster fits 7-node Pi cluster in 6cm

Sipeed's NanoCluster is a tiny compute module clusterboard with room for up to 7 tiny computers.

Each slot has two inline M.2 (NGFF) slots which accept either a custom-designed SoM (System on Module) or an adapter board to adapt a standard Compute Module form-factor board into the slot (as pictured above).

One end has a large fan for cooling, and the other end has power and IO. You can power the board via either PoE++ (60W) or through USB-C PD (65W). Or both, with redundant power fail-over.

Jeff Geerling June 6, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Self-hosting your own media considered harmful

Self-hosting your own media considered harmful

I just received my second community guidelines violation for my video demonstrating the use of LibreELEC on a Raspberry Pi 5, for 4K video playback.

I purposefully avoid demonstrating any of the tools (with a suffix that rhymes with "car") that are popularly used to circumvent purchasing movie, TV, and other media content, or any tools that automatically slurp up YouTube content.

Jeff Geerling June 5, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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A limited-time flavor: Blue Raspberry Pi

A limited-time flavor: Blue Raspberry Pi

The most unique Raspberry Pi I own is a limited-time flavor: blue raspberry. And no, this isn't the Brazilian version, or the red Chinese version. This blue version is one of 1000 blue Pis that were made to celebrate Raspberry Pi's first anniversary, 12 years ago.

Jeff Geerling May 30, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Using GPS for the most accurate time possible on a Mac

Using GPS for the most accurate time possible on a Mac

I'm deep in the rabbit hole of all things time and timing. One step on any modern horologist's journey is GPS time.

NIST just put NIST-F4 online, accurate to within 2.2e-16 ppm (that's 0.00000000000000022 seconds. The clock is described in Metrologia thusly:

The fountain uses optical molasses to laser cool a cloud of cesium atoms and launch it vertically in a fountain geometry.

Jeff Geerling May 16, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Installing an outdoor GPS antenna for more accurate time

Installing an outdoor GPS antenna for more accurate time

I've been deep into time and timing lately (more shenanigans coming tomorrow), but today I posted a video covering the install of a PCTEL GPS/GNSS antenna at my studio.

I put up the antenna after realizing how indoor GPS reception is just never that great, due to a variety of factors (like multipath propagation and interference), even if I placed my antennas up in the plenum space right under the roof. Of course, it doesn't help that my studio has a metal roof :)

Jeff Geerling May 15, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Radxa Orion O6 brings Arm to the midrange PC

Radxa Orion O6 brings Arm to the midrange PC

...with caveats.

Jeff Geerling May 9, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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4x faster network file sync with rclone (vs rsync)

4x faster network file sync with rclone (vs rsync) For the past couple years, I have transported my 'working set' of video and project data to and from work on an external Thunderbolt NVMe SSD. But it's always been slow when I do the sync. In a typical day, I m...

Jeff Geerling
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Trying out a cheap USB VK-172 GPS dongle on a Mac

Trying out a cheap USB VK-172 GPS dongle on a Mac

I've been getting into time, with my most recent project being a DIY PTP Grandmaster Clock with a Raspberry Pi.

For most civilians, the most accurate source of time available comes from satellites—GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, Beidou, etc.—nowadays referred to as GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System). Originally targeted at GPS only, even cheap dongles today cover multiple constellations adding to the accuracy and coverage of satellite-based positioning and timing signals.

Jeff Geerling April 24, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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The (almost) perfect mini NAS for my mini rack

The (almost) perfect mini NAS for my mini rack

The GMKtec G9 N150 4-bay NVMe mini PC is $240 and the nearly perfect NAS for my mini rack:

It has an Intel N150 4-core SoC with halfway-decent Intel UHD integrated graphics, 12 GB of LPDDR5 RAM, dual 2.5 Gbps Ethernet, WiFi 6, and the best part: 4 integrated M.2 NVMe slots.

Granted, splitting up the 9 PCIe Gen 3 lanes limits the performance a bit, but there are some things I love about this design:

Jeff Geerling April 17, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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It's easier than ever to de-censor videos

It's easier than ever to de-censor videos Last month I asked people to hack part of my YouTube video, specifically to de-pixelate the contents of a folder I had pixelated starting at the 4:57 mark. Your browser does not support the video tag. For year...

Jeff Geerling
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Raspberry Pi cluster spotted inside $6k audio processor

Raspberry Pi cluster spotted inside $6k audio processor

People often ask me whether Pi clusters are useful besides just tinkering. I've built my fair share, including my most recent 'Lamp Rack' Kubernetes-in-a-Lamp cluster.

Well... I have a definitive answer: the Orban Optimod 5000-series audio processors:

Jeff Geerling April 9, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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BPS is a GPS alternative that nobody's heard of

BPS is a GPS alternative that nobody's heard of

I came to the NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) show this year with my Dad to learn more about time in broadcast and live production.

I was expecting to learn more about grandmaster clocks, AV sync, timing in protocols like Dante, Livewire, AES67, and more—and I have. But then on the first day here I found this odd little corner of the building with a completely empty booth:

When you see an oscilloscope that costs 3x the value of your car on a trade show floor... well, let's just say my interest was piqued.

Jeff Geerling April 8, 2025

Jeff Geerling
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Running the LAMP Stack in a Lamp Rack

Running the LAMP Stack in a Lamp Rack

I typically don't do anything for April Fool's Day, but this year I thought I'd unite a bit of a meme in the homelab community with something I wanted to make a video on anyway: a lamp rack.

What's a lamp rack? Well, you're looking at one! It's a floor lamp with an integrated mini rack!

I didn't want to make a video about a floor lamp, but more on the fact you don't need fancy racks or any new hardware at all to start a homelab.

Jeff Geerling April 1, 2025