David Hingtgen

Or more simply: "Somehow, Dedra returned".  

Got a weird problem with booting Windows (10):

I normally shutdown every night.  But this week I was working on a big Excel sheet (online, Windows Office), so only "went to sleep" for 4 nights in a row, to keep the site+page open.  I think Windows wanted to do an update during then.  When I finally was ready to shut down---it wouldn't.  Wouldn't close the browser, which is pretty weird.  Super-stuck.  Had to force it to shut down.  And of course, windows tends not to like that mid-update.

Anyways---wouldn't boot into Windows after that.  Tried everything, including unplugging other drives.  Oddly, it now seems to boot when my main STORAGE drive is unplugged.  But plugging the storage drive back in causes issues.  The drive should be fine---in device manager, it can sense it and says it's working--but it won't assign a drive letter and has no volume.   

Can't figure out what's going on---I kinda "would like my storage drive to be plugged into the PC like it was this morning".  My backup's old, I'd definitely lose a notable amount of stuff/work.   Considering buying like an external mount/adapter, to treat it like a true "backup" drive and see if I can just pull files off it that way, and get a new one.  

(but really, I think the drive is fine, just the windows update totally borked drive assignments etc)---I did notice that it would NOT accept a windows media USB, which is very odd.  I was planning on doing a repair reinstall, as that usually fixes most "weird" problems.  But if it won't take the windows install USB...

::edit::  I think it's something with drives/letters-----half the time, if I put a USB drive in---it takes FOREVER to detect it, show the folders, etc.  And half the time it just freezes.  There is definitely something wrong with how it handles drives now.   

In short--what on earth happened, that Windows now even CARES about a storage drive?  

Ok, almost all of those things are covered in the video I linked above.  I think only the "right elbow" thing is something additional to look out for.  

It's so refreshing to own a valk that is simply SCREWED together, and not GLUED together. So easy to open it up to work on.  

I plan to totally take it apart and fix every little bit of flash and burring, based on this vid I found:

(the auto-translate subtitles work pretty well)

What specifically were the arm issues? I don't recall seeing anything from the first release. 

Early morning valk delivery!   

5 designs are finalists, but only 1 will be produced---go vote!

https://ideas.lego.com/blogs/a4ae09b6-0d4c-4307-9da8-3ee9f3d368d6/post/d955d940-972b-4401-b013-eb948fcb5a62

And if you're not sure, I highly recommend/request you vote for the carousel.  

If you got it shipped from ShowZ on May 14th, then wouldn't it be the revised "Macross-free" version that is even closer to the G1 markings?  

Thank you, appreciate the links.  

Hmmn, looks like the valk itself is identical, no improvement to the fitment of parts or crispness of the deco.  (which is inferior to the original releases)

Yeah, I can't see it either.  Is it like a members-only tweet?

Dang, that's an expensive impulse buy, but I might have decided the same...

Was wondering if there's listing of what ones come with what color heatshields--at this point in time, it can be hard to tell what's original vs replacement when buying off Mandarake or Yahoo.jp or ebay etc.   And Yamato especially had a nasty habit of photographing prototypes and putting those pics on the box---then changing things (like heatshield or backpack/leg coloring details) for the actual release.   

Specifically, I'm wondering about ones that may be molded in color vs painted that color, and stripping off Jolly Rogers markings etc.   Are black ones always molded that way, always painted that way, etc?   Same question for red.  

*talking about the V2 mold, not the OLD mold

My 1/60 Roy DYRL VF-1S has recently turned yellow similarly.  NEVER exposed to sunlight, always kept in a windowless room.  And for the past couple (5+ actually?) years, kept inside its windowless box in the closet.  It wasn't yellow at all when I packed it up.  Unpacking it a few years later--yellow.  

Anyone ever tried to get a wing off?  

On a related note, I swear my landing gear doors used to close flush, but now the right one won't stay down.  The gear itself just won't go *all the way down*--only by like 1mm, but it's enough to keep popping the door open/up.  

Back left of the new pic---are they teasing a Lt Rand?   Slowly working our way through the crew of the Excelsior...  (though, the scene/hair is clearly ST III, not ST VI)

It's down again. 

Way before the Fine Molds 1/72 F-14 existed, there was pretty much the Hasegawa and Fujimi options.  And the Fujimi just had a way better parts breakdown and fit than the Hasegawa.  So I imagine a VF-1 from them could have an equally-notable "modeler-friendly while still being highly detailed" aspect to it.  

If they manage to make Sharon Apple instead of Skynet...

I'm still glad I bought my 3060 when I did---things have only gotten worse overall with newer stuff/prices, and the 3060 is only SLIGHTLY cheaper now than when I bought mine, despite it being older now.  

That said, I am tempted by the 4060 Ti 16GB...

5 hours ago, TangledThorns said:

 

Try the used market like Criaigslist or Facebook Marketplace to save some $$. I see 5800X3D's selling for $300 to $350 which I think is a tad high. I'll be buying used PC parts for my son's complete build later this year.    

Yeah, I'm thinking half of that, budget-wise.  Anything $200 or more is better spent on a GPU at this point.  Paying a premium for "the very best an old mobo can handle" is a bit of a waste.  

None of the CPU's seem like they'd be THAT big an improvement, so I'm currently leaning towards the 5600X, or MAYBE the 5700X "as cheap as can be reliably had from aliexpress"

4 hours ago, Thom said:

I don't recall the -23 being so rivet-y around the intakes...

Thinking about upgrading CPU while I'm at it.  Would very much like to keep my DDR4 RAM if at all possible.   So just new mobo+CPU.   Currently have a Ryzen 5 3600. 

Or is DDR4 old enough that it limits mobo options too much?  DDR5 had/has a very slow adoption rate.   

Looking for just a cheap upgrade, not "a giant leap in ability".   Might even do CPU-only.  Checking around, it seems the last BIOS update for my mobo will allow the Ryzen 5600 series, but not officially the 5700/5800----but reddit says the 5800 actually works fine.   

Used 3090's still go for $$$ because of their 24GB VRAM.   

Ended up getting a 990 Evo Plus for my new OS drive.  2TB, because the price wasn't much more than 1TB.  And I can finally use my cool anodized M2 heatsink I bought like a year ago...

Clonezilla worked great (and fast), and then Diskpart easily reallocated the partitions. But as the old OS drive was the oldest one I had, it was cloned as MBR, and that's not gonna work for Win11 in the future.  So used the nifty "MBR2GPT" program that Windows itself apparently has now.  And so far everything's working, better/easier than I thought it would.   Still have some of the more "finicky" Python/Conda stuff to check out.  

Yeah, but by that logic, Prime shouldn't be a Freightliner, and Sideswipe shouldn't be a Countach.   Just "close enough".  But people do tend to often want "the real car/truck" for most toy Autobots--yet give "not the real plane" a pass for the Aerialbots and Seekers...