Welcome to my computing page. Here, I give various advice associated with personal computers mods, home network and Raspberry Pi and similar projects.

My interest in computing dates a long time back, but even now, I still proudly built and own a desktop computer I use almost daily, as well as my own server. Over the years since upgrading a Pentium 133 to an AMD K6-II 300 and adding an 800MB hard drive, I've probably built 20 or more PCs for myself, family and helped friends. As of now though, I own:

1. A PC in the small bedroom (office) room for working and some gaming - Mini ITX, AMD Ryzen 9 5900x, AMD RX 6700XT, 2x 1TB NVMe SSDs, 32GB RAM, Linux Mint 21
2. A router and server handling my Internet and hosting my data - Mini ITX, Core i7 10700, 1TB NVMe SSD, 512GB NVMe SSD, 2x 1TB SSDs, 1x 2TB backup drive, 32GB RAM, Linux Ubuntu 22.04
3. Wife's PC - Mini ITX, Core i5-9600, 1TB SSD, Blu Ray drive, 16GB RAM, Windows 11
4. A PC in the bedroom room for watching online content - Mini ITX (again), Core i5 2390T, 256GB SSD, 8GB RAM, LibreElec
5. A second server handling VMs - Mini ITX (again!), Core i7 3770S, 512GB SATA SSD, 500GB backup drive, 16GB RAM, Linux Ubuntu 20.04

And then there were laptops, which I've owned many since my first second hand Toshiba Tecra 700CDT I got late 1999. I hardly use laptops of my own now though so I currently have an old Lenovo Flex 2-14 (FHD touch, Core i5-4210U, 16GB RAM, 120GB SSD, Linux Mint 21) and a Lenovo IdeaPad 120S-11 (Celeron, 4GB RAM, Linux Mint 21).

Since 2017, I used Linux Mint on my desktop, and now use it everywhere and recommend it over Windows® these days, but I do still keep a Windows 11 VM for that occasional need.

Below are my projects old and new, however my blog page also contains smaller posts with info on PC upgrades, Laptop upgrades, Linux and Windows® tips.

Raspberry Pi Projects

Raspberry Pi OS Tweaks NEW - tweaks and recommendations you should apply to your Raspberry Pi project for longevity and security.

Raspberry Pi IR and Thermal Camera NEW - see in the dark, and see heat with this camera project that can view and record day/night and measure thermal temperature of objects using the Raspberry Pi official No-IR camera, and AMG8833 thermal module.

Raspberry Pi Air Quality and Environment Meter NEW - measure, record and analyse particle matter, air quality, temperature, humidity, pressure, gas and more using PMS7003 and BME688 sensors.

Raspberry Pi Audio Streamer with PSU, Amplifier and Tone Control NEW - stream radio, Spotify, mp3s, oggs and AirPlay through the Raspberry Pi using moOde. Details of the associated electronics including DIY amplifier, PSU and tone control.

Home Network

Homebuild PC Router NAS - Updated Ubuntu 20.04 and 22.04 - Homemade PC Router and NAS, running Linux Ubuntu 20.04. Full build instructions here of how you too can use PC hardware to create a brilliant home router and NAS solution! This is a fully updated set of pages for Ubuntu Server versions 22.04 and 20.04 with installation instructions, more secure VPN setup and better detail of NAS installation.

Homebuild PC Router NAS - Original 18.04 guide - Homemade PC Router and NAS, running Linux Ubuntu 18.04 with VM router. Obsoleted by above guide, for reference only.

Homebuild PC Router NAS - Original 16.04 guide - Homemade PC Router and NAS, running Linux Ubuntu 16.04 with VM router. Obsoleted by above guide, for reference only.

PC and Laptop projects, hardware and mods

PIC USB Mouse Jiggler - Keep your PC/laptop awake with these USB jiggler/wiggler that can be activated/deactivated with a simple press and has a timeout (electronics project).

HP Pavilion Laptop 14-bf101na Upgrades - This is a guide of how to upgrade components in the HP Pavilion 14 2018 lines to improve the hardware, and also a guide of how to make Linux Mint 20 run well on it.

Kolink Rocket Mini ITX Case Airflow Cooling Mod UPDATED - Here you can read about my troubles with an overheating PC in the Kolink Rocket case and what I decided to do about it.

Gigabyte B450 I AORUS VRM Heatsink Modification - a minor modification to a motherboard that improves the VRM cooling.

4 pin PWM fan to 3 pin fan controller - A fan controller that can adapt a 4 pin PWM output from motherboards that have them, to standard 3 pin fans.

PC Fan Controller - A small fan controller based on a voltage regulator.

Cooling mods - Some mods I have made to my ATX case back in 2004 that allow much more efficient cooling at a low price.

Blowhole Mod, Case Respray and Window - Here is a long four page article back from 2004 about how I made a blow hole in the top of my case and how I spent money and time respraying my case to make it look really nice and put a window in it.