If there were 0 limits to cost/practicality what software/hardware would you buy | Hacker News Reader

If there were 0 limits to cost/practicality what software/hardware would you buy

3 pointsmywacaday6 comments

I just watched a youtube video where they built a power drill tool for digging holes for seeds that worked great but would be highly impractical to manufacture from a commercial perspective but was interesting from and engineering perspective and got me wondering is there anything like that that would interest me.

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I have something like that tool, it's a dirt auger that goes in a drill. The drill needs a side handle to not hurt wrists though.

I'd probably buy a bunch of portable x ray fluorescence and mass spectrometry gear, give them to all interested friends, and try to make civilian toxin hunting as a hobby be a thing.

I might get a high end PC and do DeepFakes vtubing. Maybe I'd set everything up to be solar offgrid and work on making My whole town mesh network-ified.

Most of the stuff I'd have mentioned is now cheap consumer gear. I've already got a 3D printer and FreeCAD, I've got IoT sensors, cheaper phones are fine, I'm more into tabletop and only very casually interested in video games.

I would buy a $100B datacenter (hire some datacenter architects to make it) and train a big brain AI. Expense also includes siting and electricity and other operational costs.

I've always wanted room-scale anechoic chamber technology to be a thing. It would be cool if some high-tech wallpaper or in-wall speaker could cancel out external noise and give your bedroom or studio apartment peace and quiet.

Anechoic chambers are anechoeic, not soundproof. I used to have access to one, which was very quiet, but that was a side-effect. If you had a neighbor playing loud music, e.g., it would still penetrate. There are some consumer acoustic isolation techniques, like sound insulation and brackets that isolate the drywall from the studs. I don't know how well they work.

Maybe I'm a bit old...but a good, working Babbage Analytical Engine would be so cool to have and tinker with.

Massive Holodeck (without vr headset gear)

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