Meditation Kit: Using tech to tame your brain! | This Old Nerd S03E10

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Iyaz’s brain is noisy at times, so it’s been recommended he meditate (particularly mindfulness meditation). So, he turned to tech. He mainly uses the app Buddhify (available on iOS and Android). But the thing is, sometimes stuff goes wrong. The app doesn’t load on a particular phone. Or the app is fine, but on a device that is dead. So, here comes the meditation kit.

But, of course, Iyaz didn’t stop there. He wanted to get those guided meditations, so he found a way to extract the audio files.

Support this 100% independent show by visiting https://patreon.com/iyaz

Apps Iyaz uses:

Timecodes:
00:00 – The project
00:33 – Why meditation?
01:30 – Tech for meditation
02:30 – The meditation kit
03:05 – Origins of the meditation kit
03:53 – The kit explained
04:51 – Best practices for your old phone
05:50 – Not happy. Need to extract the audio.
06:26 – How to get audio from an iPad app
06:55 – Figuring out which audio file is which
08:09 – A snag with the audio files
08:51- Partner acceptance rating (How your tech impacts the people you live with)
10:25 – Support the show!
11:08 – Post-credit scene/Cheddar

HDMI-CEC: Your Logitech Harmony Remote replacement | This Old Nerd S03E08

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It was a sad day when Logitech announced it would discontinue its excellent line of Harmony universal remotes. These devices let you easily control your home theater components. Complicated activities could be done with the press of a button or a virtual button in an app.

So what’s the future? Well, it’s the present. HDMI-CEC seems to be the way we’ll have to control things until some product is as good as the Harmony line. HDMI-CEC stands for High Definition Multimedia Interface – Consumer Electronics Control. If a component has HDMI-CEC it can control or be controlled by another HDMI-CEC-enabled component. Is this great? Not exactly.

Support this 100% independent show by watching, sharing, and heading to http://patreon.com/iyaz

Timecodes:

  • 0:00 – Welcome!
  • 0:27 – Today’s project: Goodbye, Harmony
  • 1:25 – HDMI-CEC is the future
  • 3:54 – Other options?
  • 4:12 – Why you should NOT keep your Harmony devices around.
  • 8:45 – The full rant.

Network expansion revisited! | This Old Nerd S03E07

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Iyaz takes on the Asus RT-AC68U once again. In this episode, Iyaz finds a way to take the Asus RT-AC68U and turn it into a node for his home mesh network. The key was using a third-party intermediate firmware.

*Apologies for the crackly audio. We’ll figure out a solution!*

Links for everything we talked about:

  • Asus RT-AC68U: https://amzn.to/3UugC1Y
  • Asus WRT Merlin third-party firmware explainer: https://dongknows.com/asus-routers-and-merlin-firmware/
  • The intermediate firmware you NEED to upgrade the RT-AC68U: https://www.snbforums.com/threads/asus-rt-ac68u-firmware-update-failure.70432/

Timecodes:

  • 0:00 – Welcome
  • 0:30 – Today’s Project
  • 1:26 – Failed Attempts
  • 3:55 – Closer to the answer
  • 4:54 – Finding the answer
  • 7:37 – Make updated router into node
  • 8:37 – Partner Acceptance Rating

Bond Bridge: Connect your ceiling fan to your smart home | This Old Nerd S03E06

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Iyaz decides to take his remote-controlled ceiling fans and make them work with his smart home. The Bond Bridge is the perfect solution to bring those fans into Google Home, Amazon Alexa and SmartThings.

Support this 100% independent show by watching, sharing, and heading to http://patreon.com/iyaz

Here are links to everything we talked about: