Intel recently released the AX200 series of Wi-Fi cards. A batch showed up on eBay too, and surprisingly cheap — pretty friendly compared to the old 7265 and friends, which used to run close to 200. And after the ThinkPad X250, ThinkPad products no longer have a whitelist. Still, even though by conventional wisdom Intel wireless cards and Linux get along just fine, I have to say this product is an exception.

A while back there was a thread on Reddit recommending some cheap Chinese e-waste, and it was pushing this Bluetooth speaker: the Jambox mini. I’d honestly never heard of this Jambox mini thing. I just saw the thread hyping it up with “can’t lose at this price” and “beats stuff at the 500 yuan tier,” so since it was cheap I figured I’d buy one and mess around with it. This kind of thing always reminds me of back in the day when I’d read some idiot “poison-pen” post going on about how some earbuds only cost 49 or 99 and you can’t go wrong buying them, and in the end it turns out you really can’t go wrong — they just sit there gathering dust. This time I couldn’t hold back and ordered one. And the seller, who seemed to be some kind of official Foxconn outlet, took nearly a week and a half to ship. But it did eventually arrive. The speaker is bare-bones: just the unit and a charger, that’s it.

A while back I bought a discounted Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 tablet on eBay to replace my Mi Pad 4 and 360 N7. Its job is watching videos and gaming, plus whatever else comes up. The reasons were simple, just three: The Mi Pad 4 has a “screen gets hot and touch stops responding” problem, so it can’t game The 360 phone games fine but the screen is harsh on the eyes, and the system is basically abandoned after launch Neither of them supports stereo sound for videos — both are single-speaker Don’t ask why I didn’t get an iPad. I don’t use Apple, so Samsung was the only option — it’s the highest-performance Android tablet out there right now. Eventually I searched Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 on eBay and found a US V version with a 4G module, model T837V. Got it for just over 3000 yuan. I’ve used it for almost a month now, so I can share my impressions.

The Redmi Note 3 my parents have been using is almost two years old now, and I’ve had it repaired a bunch of times to keep it breathing, but recently I found out my dad smashed the screen again. So I couldn’t be bothered to keep it on life support. The Redmi Note 7 is out, so let’s just switch to that.

Win10 tablets are everywhere now, and honestly the specs aren’t bad. But Sony was already making this kind of device back around 2005. I remember devices like this — at the very least I saw them in Popular Software. Though it was only ads and reviews, because this thing was expensive as hell, and back then even a desktop couldn’t meet the demands of DOOM3, let alone some overpriced, underpowered “crippled laptop.” But as the old saying goes: “The swallows that once nested in the halls of the nobility now fly into the homes of common folk.” Even something that 14 years ago only the rich and flashy could afford has ended up in my hands. Here I need to thank Duan Ye, a proud Hammer phone fan and man of means, for his support. Duan Ye’s passion for gadgets is full of craftsman spirit — born proud!

I ordered a RhinoShield case on Black Friday when it was on sale, and then one thing led to another. After a bunch of tweaking, the phone feels pretty good to use now, basically satisfied, so I’ll sum it up here.

A while back I modded my OnePlus 5 for wireless charging, so this time I went ahead and did the in-car setup to match. Right now the only trustworthy car wireless charger you can actually buy online is Philips. I know Philips is a company that slaps its name on just about anything, but they seem to have done this one properly.

I bought a Retro Game handheld a while back and it felt pretty good, but something was always missing. Even after updating to the foreign custom firmware, plenty of rough edges remained — short standby time, an ugly look, that sort of thing. The guy behind that firmware has released a new build, possibly the true final version this time. Flashed it and it’s actually decent. Also took the chance to dress the thing up a bit, and I’m liking it more and more.

The Odroid Go is a handheld project built around a dev board that you assemble yourself. In theory it’s open source, and you could put one together entirely by hand. Of course, someone also sells you a finished kit, and I happened to catch it on sale, so I ordered one.

The Pixel Stand was half price on Black Friday. Great news, except for one small problem: the half-price Pixel Stand was at Best Buy. If you’ve ever tried to buy stuff from overseas, you know Best Buy is one of those sites where it’s basically impossible. They ruthlessly cancel anything shipping to a forwarding address, which means you need a real US address to buy. Lucky for me, I had a friend in the States. Thanks to Enneamer, a.k.a. “Dirty Teacher,” I finally got my hands on the one wireless charging dock that can fast-charge a Pixel 3 XL.