Fortunately that fad is somewhat over and manufacturers mostly learnt not to put in the brightest led they could source.
Now that I think about it, that was probably actually one motherboard ago and it might be different now... but the tape's working just fine so who needs to check?
A little more expensive, but they look a little nicer too.
Has one of the brightest LEDs I've seen lately right on front of the charger whenever a device is on it. Why would they put a bright light on a night-stand accessory, and put it in the front where its shining right into your eyes as you try to sleep?
Or better yet, why have an LED on it at all in the first place? Any device I'm putting on it has its own charging indicator, I don't need the charger itself to have one.
Don’t get me started on kids toys that are too loud!
V-tech have a lot to answer for. As do all well-meaning relatives who buy them as presents. Straight under the stairs they go.
(Just scrape it down a bit)
Not a fan of LEDs, but I at least understand why this as it is.
When you move into a new place, always check they are real and work.
Router has a button which disable all lights until it's pressed again, monitors have the setting in their menus.
The only device thats shining brightly in my home is a storage controller I've got in my home server, with no way of turning it off - or at least dimming it down
If you're on Linux the dot on the cover is /sys/class/leds/tpacpi::lid_logo_dot. See the other files in that directory for other LEDs.
I don't know about Windows off-hand because I don't use it, but the BIOS exposes the functionality so there should be a program to do it. In a quick search: https://github.com/valinet/ThinkPadLEDControl
FreeBSD doesn't support it, but quite easy to write a patch for it if you want it (I actually wrote a patch for this, but didn't really put the finishing touches on it and submit it as my previous one got no feedback at all, so *shrug* – I ended up just installing Linux again). Same for the other BSDs.
[1]: You need to compile your own kernel for the charging/power LED which wasn't needed on older models, because that's registered as "unknown LED" and protected behind a compile option. It's a tad annoying, but it's possible.
Two additional ways to calm an indicator LED are with the modern self-laminating labelmaker tape:
* White tape -- Put 1 or more layers over the LED, to dim and diffuse.
* Black tape -- Use a pin to poke a hole through the tape, from behind, before putting it over the LED. (If there's 3+ LEDs, like on a network switch or server front panel, it will look neater if you measure the pitch of the centers of the LEDs, then use a ruler over the back of the labelmaker tape to match that with the holes. If the back of the tape has two strips you peel off to expose the adhesive, you can use that as a guide for keeping each hole level.)
You could also put black tape over white, but I haven't had to do that so far.
Did you try talking to them about it first?
Idk, I’d consider it highly provocative if a neighbour installed anything on or tampered with my property without not only my permission but even the decency of notification. At that point, they not only lose the benefit of doubt but the benefit of civility since I’m not sure what other social conventions and laws they may be comfortable casually violating.
Assuming the worst at first is a bad habit but assuming bad intent after a bad track record is established is healthy and helpful.
Not advocating any course of action, just gaming out the options a little.
If the neighbor had antisocial personality traits (narcissism is most common), trying to talk to them would only trigger a conflict which cannot be resolved.
Maybe a light bar for the rear of the car and some reflective material for the sunvisor?
I once came up behind a semi on a rural stretch of I-80 with my brights on. He hit me with a set of rear-mounted flood lights.
Probably illegal, but who's going to stop him? Plus, I got the message.
Just took a few people flashing brights at me to make me realize and do the (very easy) adjustment to proper specs.
Doesn’t solve people behind you, but it’s not like they’re going to pull over and adjust anyway. Flash brights and consider it a favor to the person in front of the offender.
But yeah, it's kind of shocking how often people are like "I hate this thing that person is doing" and I'm like "Have you asked them to stop?" and they haven't. Just... ask? Worse case scenario they say no and you're in the same spot you were.
Avoiding such negative consequences of rejection may require a confrontation and possibly very expensive dental treatment (or sponsoring one for the victim of your assault, which it may be interpreted as if you win even if you do not hit first) when it is between two men, and other concerns for personal safety if it is a woman against a man.
(Anecdotally, unfamiliar women seem to have less of an issue asking each other to change their behaviour this way, as do men asking women.)
So, it is more preferable to not complain and instead raise your social status such that you do not come in contact with those people (either real status or at least imagined one, through bottled-up contempt towards those rubes or whatever offending term the context calls for).
I’m not saying it is ideal, just describing why it seems pretty to me obvious how person A would often rather not “simply” ask person B to stop doing something or change something to accommodate person A.
Similar to the effect when an oncoming car is cresting a small hill and the headlight angle of incidence changes to impact your eyes
If you are building a product and it has any indicator lights please dim/diffuse/lightpipe them.
It seems to be a trend these days of ultra bright LEDs for indicators, I have so many devices I've either disconnected, dimmed or taped over the LEDs because it is so bloody bright.
For people doing software, press for the love of god just make that shit adjustable. Only fucking noobs hard code variables. Practicing good habits will help everyone, including you. Unless you got a serious reason not to, expose that to the users. Even if you don't think anyone will want it, I promise you, someone does. There's a lot of people and everyone thinks differently. So only lock down what needs to be locked down.
Unless you're trying to create e-waste or piss people off. Which in that case I only have two words for you and they aren't nice
Also don't forget about response time. You may not be able to do it that fast. Depends on the led
Cheapest light pipe on digikey: 16 cents Cheapest photodiode on digikey: 11 cents Cheapest LED (obviously that annoying blue): 625 milli cents!
Part costs matter! Its not just the BOM, its the NRE from the increased complexity. Im not saying saying its OK, just that its inevitable considering the economic conditions.
I do board level designs and drop down LEDs. If you are not specialising in indicators, its hard to visualise how bright 10mA through your diode is going to be. Add to this that sometimes you never even see the thing you designed!
> 16 cents Cheapest photodiode on digikey
> I do board level designs and drop down LEDs. If you are not specialising in indicators, its hard to visualise how bright 10mA through your diode is going to be.
But if you want to get creative you could use the diodes in the circuit or even your led if you'll blink it. But that last one doesn't tell you the led brightness, only ambient.
[0] https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/harvatek-corporat...
[1] https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/1-4V-20-30-45-60_6253...
[2] https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/JST3-3MM-receiver-pho...
I think annoying at 10m is sufficient power to require a 'power' LED, so that shouldnt be hard to avoid in a design I would agree. Annoying in your kitchen however is much harder to eyeball a value for (excuse the pun).
> I quoted qty=1 prices though
A big part of the assumption that I was making in my original comment is that you're mass producing devices, not treating it as a hobby project. I agree, the constraints are very different in these two settings. A major difference is the cost/ratio of parts to other costs/time. In mass production the price per part is going to approach <$0.01 for standard COTS parts. Same reason Alibaba has them for so cheap (which doesn't include shipping)
> Annoying in your kitchen however is much harder to eyeball a value for (excuse the pun).
*BUT* it is something the bureaucrats will be able to look at and say that they need to remove it because at scale it will save "a lot of money." But does it? I'm unconvinced. To me it seems to just make the consumers more upset and annoyed. Sure, you might have saved the company $100k because you are producing 10M units, but I'm pretty confident most consumers would rather pay $0.10 to have that part. The bigger problem might be a Lemon Market type of problem where consumers don't actually know/realize they want such a feature at time of purchase but randomly and intermittently realize it over the next week or couple years. It never gets priority thought because there's usually other things to complain about and well then we need to have a larger conversation about if we're doing our jobs as engineers. Are we actually providing value to people with the products we make? Can we take pride in our work? You may be making something dumb, but can you honestly tell yourself "I made the best thing I could"?
The business people need pushback because they don't care about the product, they only care about the profits. That's part of your job as an engineer. Because your job as an engineer isn't to be concerned with the profits, it is to be concerned with the product. Your engineering managers are the bridge, not you the engineer. And a good engineering manager doesn't fully align with the business people either. Because when push comes to shove you have to decide between either: 1) sacrificing the product in favor or profit or 2) sacrificing profits in favor of the product. As an engineer, your job is to have the latter.
Expects vandalism or more serious crime.
...put a small green sticker
Ok, good engineer!