u/GRBreaks

Amazon has the Hantek DSO2C50 for $339.49. I don't see any reviews yet, these came out at the end of 2025. If it works at all, that seems like a screaming deal. Is this thing any good?

I understand Hantek is usually considered a cut below RIgol/Siglent, Tek/Keysight are out of the question for a hobby scope. Can craft my own 500ohm probe from RG174 and a 450 ohm series resistor. Expecting a bug or two and to curse at the UI on occasion. I know that a claimed bandwidth of one quarter the sample rate is pushing it. But will it really show a 50ohm 500mhz sine wave at 3db down single channel? Does it trigger properly? Any chance it might outlast the Amazon return policy? Is the 8bit ADC at least monotonic?

Retired EE and ham, last personal scope I bought was a Rigol DS1052E back in 2010 for $400. Time for an upgrade, especially if I can get 5x the bandwidth at under $400. (Yes, I did upgrade the firmware on the Rigol for 100mhz bandwidth.)

We're a non-profit organization running a community hall for a small town of 2000. We would like to set up one GV number for the public to enquire about reserving the hall. Use case might be to have it go immediately to voicemail, and several of us monitor for messages left. Perhaps the monitoring is done by having a transcript of the voicemail emailed or sent as SMS text to multiple people. Whoever notices it first somehow makes an outgoing call showing the GV caller ID to respond to the request. Is GV an appropriate choice for this? What would be the procedure for responding to the call, this must show the GV number on caller ID, but the phone should otherwise be usable on it's default caller ID number. Perhaps best if we sign into GV in a browser and make the call from the computer? If signing in is required (when responding from either a cell phone or a browser) what happens if multiple people try to sign in simultaneously? Before responding to the call they would first inform the other potential responders (perhaps SMS text or email) that they have this request covered.

Would be even better if one of us could choose to somehow pick up the incoming call before it goes to voicemail.

Here's one of the responses (further comments are also interesting) to a similar question as of 2019. Assuming it mostly works, I see no reason the consumer version of GV would not be sufficient here. If we need to bump up to a paid version, that is a possibility. https://support.google.com/voice/thread/10535947/can-i-link-multiple-phones-to-one-google-voice-number?hl=en

"Yes, in theory, you can link up to six different 10-digit, 48-state US telephone numbers as forwarding numbers. This is the consumer version of Google Voice.  It does not have any customer support, and it does have occasional problems, which could adversely impact your business.  Aside from that, every person on that rotation would need to know the Google account's password and thus, have full access to its Gmail, calendar, documents contacts, etc. Messes and mayhem could result."

Bought this 12000 BTU/hr Temprium SAC001-B-12K mini split off Amazon for $450: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GJYJQRLZ

Claims a SEER2 rating of 22.0, an HSPF2 of 9.0

Manual says ""When temperatures are below 19.4F (-7C), using models equpped with a heating belt is recommended."

What is a heating belt?

The Amazon webpage says "reliable heating down to 5°F", and the manual also says minimum outside air temp of 5F when used for heating. But what does that mean? Perhaps anything less than 5F and the COP falls below 1.0? I doubt I'll be getting 12000 BTU/hr.

Also bought a vacuum pump and gauges, currently doing a self install. Starting out with this very cheap mini split to learn about heat pumps, hope to eventually dig trenches for a ground source water-to-water heat pump. We included hydronic tubing when we put in our mud floors, but so far have been heating the house with just a wood stove.