Squier Bullet Telecaster gets returned
The magic just wasn't there.
This was a guitar I bought (for a very nice price) but had to return because it was yet again one of those things where it didn't survive the honeymoon period.
I'll explain.
As I've said before, I've never played a guitar that felt or sounded perfect on the first try. What happens is that I'll try a guitar in the store I know I can afford, and if I think it will be okay, I'll make the buy and take it home.
Once I get the guitar back home, that's when the honeymoon period begins. I install new strings of my preferred thickness, set the guitar up and then hope for the best.
In the past, there have been a few guitars I bought and returned the same day because I would discover something very wrong after getting it back to the house. For example, one of those was a Thinline Telecaster I bought where it sounded fantastic in the store, but back at the house I found it had electronics issues that would require gutting and rewiring the entire guitar. I wasn't having any of that, so back to the store it went.
The Bullet Telecaster I just returned didn't have any such issues and stayed at home for a little while before getting returned.
What happened this time around was just a "meh" feeling. The guitar just wasn't speaking to me. Sounded fine, played fine, but the magic wasn't there. I can't describe it any better than that.
Sometimes you will come across guitars like this. You'll get the guitar, everything checks out okay, you install the strings you like, set it up exactly the way you want, but it just won't sing for you.
I'll end this one by telling you a very weird thing about guitars.
Take two guitars that come off the production line that are exactly the same. Brand and price doesn't matter. Both guitars are the same color, same shape, same everything.
It is absolutely possible that one of them will play wonderfully and the other will be awful, even though they're both the same.
The reason this happens is that there are no two guitars that are absolutely 100% identical to each other, and to this day there is no manufacturing process where a guitar is built all by robot. Every guitar constructed at some point has human hands touch it to finalize the build process.
Also, no two necks are exactly the same either. For two guitars that are the same model, one may have a neck that flexes more and the other less, resulting in a very different way each of them play.
This is, incidentally, why you should try two like-to-like guitars when in the guitar store whenever possible. It's almost a certainty that one will play better than the other.
The tale of my ratty old Dell Latitude E6430s
This laptop was almost dead. I fixed it.
There are two computers I use primarily, both of which are old Dell Latitude laptops from the 2012 era. One is a E6430s and another which is a E6430.
The 6430s, which is the one I'll be talking about, is the first one I acquired in '16. The second with a slightly faster CPU was acquired in '19.
One would assume the 6430s and 6430 are the same machine. They are not. In fact, they are drastically different under the hood as I found out.
The story is basically this:
Both my laptops started making fan noises due to age. Okay, no problem, just take out the fan and lubricate. Easy, right?
Well, on the 6430, it is. The entire fan and heat sink can be removed where you can not only oil the fan but also apply new thermal paste for the CPU. Unscrew the back, pop off the cover, 4 more screws and you're there. It's a quick and easy job.
On the 6430s however, total nightmare.
There is absolutely no way to get to the fan and heat sink assembly from the rear. Not possible. It has to be done from the top. But hang on, it gets better. The rear cover has to be removed, the keyboard and palm rest have to be removed, and motherboard detached. Takes something like 25 screws to get to do all this, crack off the rear, crack off the keyboard bezel, crack off the palm rest, don't break any ribbon cables and a whole bunch of other crap. And oh, what a joy this is to do with plastics that are over 10 years old.
Yeah, it is that bad just to get to the CPU fan.
I was two steps away from throwing the laptop out, because even after all the disassembly I still couldn't get the thing out of there. But just before I threw in the towel, I gave it one more go and managed to wriggle out that heat sink and fan assembly.
Once I finally got that stupid fan out, I took off the fan cover (4 tiny screws including one hidden by a rubber piece), popped off the blades and then I could finally lubricate the stupid thing.
For now, the E6430s is saved. It now works again.
My E6430s has not been treated well and not aged well. It's been banged around, the LCD is dim, the plastics are degrading, the rubber covering on top of the palm rest is sticky from age, there are chips of plastic missing here and there, and regardless of how well I clean it, it always looks gross.
Why don't I just replace the fan and heat sink? Because I absolutely don't want to put any money in this thing, given its condition. It works and that's what matters.
My E6430s's sole purpose in life right now is as a Windows 11 machine just so I can do Garmin GPS and OpenStreetMap map generation things on it. And for that task, it gets the job done.
Why bother hanging on to old computers when new laptops can be bought easily for under $300?
Answer: I have everything set up the way I want on both machines and I don't feel like configuring new computers. Also, because I keep my OSes clean, they run quick. In addition, both Windows and Linux really like older Dell Latitude laptops. You are never hunting for drivers with a Latitude that's a few years old. Everything detects and everything works.
On an end note, yeah, a 10-year-old Latitude can run Windows 11 easily because it does have the secure boot and TPM Win11 requires to install. It's right there in the BIOS. Boot up, tap F12, into BIOS, enable Secure Boot and TPM, install Win11 and you're good to go.
A calculator that actually works for guitar players
Your life gets easier when you use this specific calculator regardless of what computer you use.
Two things guitar players use calculators for are distance conversions and date calculations. The distance conversions are for converting feet to inches, feet to centimeters, inches to millimeters, and so on. Date calculations are used to figure out a future date for something (such as when a warranty expires). When you buy guitars or tools or parts or whatever, that info is good to know.
The stock calculator in literally any modern operating system either buries these functions under a lot of submenus making them difficult to use, or just outright can't do the calculations you want...
...unless you use the Qalculate! calculator. Is it free? Yes, it is. Does it work in Windows? Yes. On a Mac? Yes. In Linux? Also a yes.
Qalculate! has a crazy amount of functionality to it where you can do everything in just one program instead of bouncing around to different programs or web sites to do the same thing.
See the example above. 25.5" is the Fender standard scale length, and when I want that in millimeters, all I have to type on Qalculate! is 25.5" to mm and press Enter. That's it.
What about a Gibson scale length in millimeters? No problem:
If I buy a guitar from Guitar Center, there is a 45-day return policy on that. If the date of purchase is 2023-July-10, I write that numerically as 2023-07-10 then just add 45 days like this using addDays:
...and now I know the date 45 days from 2023-07-10 is 2023-08-24. Believe me, the date calculator comes in handy a lot for figuring out fast when a warranty period ends so you can jot it down elsewhere (such as directly on the receipt).
What's the percentage increase from a Gibson 24.75" scale to Fender 25.5" scale?
Now I know it's 3.03%.
This is just scratching the surface of how good Qalculate! actually is. It has a monster amount of calculator stuff you can do in it that's genuinely useful.
Before Qalculate!, I had a few sites bookmarked to do calculations like this. Not anymore. I can do it all in one calculator now. And that makes it worth having on your computer.
I bought another Squier Telecaster
This one is actually a re-buy but at the same time not.
The specific guitar I'm talking about, the Squier Bullet Telecaster, is one I've owned before. In fact, it looks exactly like the one I owned before. It's just a dirt cheap no-frills import.
Is the guitar exactly the same as the one I used to have? Almost.
There's one rather major difference between the current model and the one sold a few years back, which is she's a top-loader.
You might be thinking, "So? What's such a big deal about a top-loader Telecaster vs. a string-through?"
Oh, believe me, this affects the guitar more than you know.
Top-loaded strings make for easier string bending because the break angle is decreased.
In a regular Telecaster, you have 2 to 3 break angles depending on which string it is. The first angle is at the string saddle. Second angle is at the nut. Third is at the string tree for strings routed under those. If you have a single string tree, B and high-E have 3 break angles. If you have 2 string trees then it's D, G, B and high-E that have 3 break angles.
Strings routed through the back of a Telecaster have a rather sharp break angle after the string saddle. Top-loaded strings however have a significantly lessened break angle.
When you bend strings on a top-loaded Tele, oh yes, you will notice the difference. A top-loaded Tele is, without question, the "slinkiest" feeling Tele you can get...
...but will you actually like it?
Personally, I much prefer top-loaded.
Other players feel a top-loaded Tele makes it feel too "loose". Those who do chicken picking and/or use thumb picks may not get along with a top-loader. Or, if you're the type to snap back strings with fingers on a Tele a lot, you may not get as much snap as you'd like.
In the end, the best thing about the Squier Bullet Telecaster is that it's one of the cheapest ways to get top-loader Tele.
If you've played the Bullet Telecaster before, everything else more or less feels the same. It's fat-necked with some decent shoulder to it, and the neck finish is a barely-there satin urethane coating which feels almost like unfinished wood (don't worry, no splinters or anything like that).
Does the Bullet Tele qualify as a "cheap 1958 Telecaster", as that particular year was top-loaded? No, because you don't get the woods used back then, nor the barrel style saddles (as in two string per saddle), nor the ashtray style bridge - BUT - you do get a fat-necked top-loader for cheap.
Prior to how the Bullet Tele is made now, your only option for a low-cost top-loaded Squier Tele was the Affinity Series (which is now no longer top-loaded). But now you can get top-loaded at a real nice price.
I'm glad I got mine.
So I bought a Casio WS1600H anyway
Yeah, I have some explaining to do.
I said flat out that I wasn't going to buy this. The annoyances I listed were all legitimate and I was certain that nope, wouldn't get it.
But then the price dropped for a WS1600H quite a bit. I thought about it, and said eh... okay, let's give it a try.
I was certain that I'd wear the watch for a day and return it. Surprisingly, I didn't, it's still on my wrist now, and I'll most likely keep it.
This thing is complicated but the dial makes up for it
All of the complicated stuff has to do with the stopwatch and countdown timers. You're not going to get W218H simplicity out of the WS1600H. Not happening.
The actions of starting, stopping and resetting the stopwatch are weird. Then when it comes to the timers, there are preset and interval. Preset timers can be repeated, but interval timers cannot... sort of. I found a way to get a normal auto-repeat timer out of the WS1600H however.
In the end, it is the dial that makes up for the complicated stuff. Large day, large month-date, large time, dual-bulb amber night light.
The WS1600H has one of the largest month-date displays for a Casio digital. The W218H has a big day-date but doesn't display the month on the main time screen. Where day and month-date display are concerned, the WS1600H is only outdone by the WS1000H.
If you can deal with the complicated nature of the stopwatch and countdown timers of the WS1600H, then yes it's worth getting. Or if you just want something AE1200 sized where the time, day and month-date are large, that's also a good reason to get one.