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  • Author Author: neilk
  • Date Created: Date Created
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Unintended Consequences........

neilk

Just before Christmas last year, my ISP offered me a deal whereby I could have my broadband connection upgraded to twice the speed and actually pay a little bit less, provided I signed up for another 18 months contract. The deal also included a new router. I have been satisfied with my ISP and the price was competitive so I signed up,

 

The router arrived, the switch over occurred and my desk top PC (cable connected) was back online and looking good almost immediately. I then went through the process of reconnecting both laptops and the wireless printer to the new SSID. I then brought the ESP8266 greenhouse monitor inside so that I could update the firmware via a cable connection - can't do OTA updates if the device can't connect to the network! Finally, I reconnected the Humax hard drive video recorder to the new SSID (we don't have a SMART TV).

 

Then the trouble started: my wife's laptop periodically refused to connect to the WiFi, or would drop out whilst she was using it and refuse to re-connect, although mine was OK. The only fix seemed to be to disable and then re-enable the WiFi adapter and then reboot the laptop. Strangely, after a few weeks, this behaviour stopped! Then the Humax video recorder started to regularly disconnect from the network, - every hour or so - flashing a message up on the TV screen to tell us and then re-connecting after a few seconds, flashing another message on the screen!! Although annoying, this was not a big problem, because we rarely streamed content from the Internet.

 

However......... In these extremely difficult times of enforced stay at home, we decided it would be good to be able to access streaming content. So we did, and it was very inconvenient when the recorder disconnected from the network in the middle of a film! I did some Googling and found a suggestion that certain models of Humax recorders don't like to connect to an SSID with a long name. Easy peasy - I logged onto the router, changed the SSID and password and then reconnected the Humax. By this time it was 9:30pm. We didn't stay around long enough to see if this had fixed the problem with the Humax.

 

The next morning, I sorted out the laptops again and then the printer. My brain obviously wasn't working properly, because I then logged on to my server to check the overnight temperatures in the greenhouse. It took me several minutes to realise that logging had stopped at about 9:20pm when I changed the SSID!

 

Out to the greenhouse, disconnect the unit, back inside and connect the unit to my PC and upload an updated firmware image. Check that it's connecting to the network and logging OK, and then back out to the greenhouse. Strange, it's not logging anymore. Back out to the greenhouse; watch it for a while, waiting for the blue LED to flash when it logs - it doesn't.......I wonder if the battery is flat? It shouldn't be!

 

Back to my desk, grab the phone powerpack, back out the greenhouse; plug it in and see the blue LED flash almost immediately! back to my desk and check it's logging. Yes!!

 

Thinking it through, even though the battery had several days of life left in it, when the unit failed to connect to the network at about 9:20pm, it just kept on trying and trying and failing  Connecting to the network and logging are the heaviest drain on power, so it's only to be expected that the remaining life in the battery drained away between 9:20pm and about 11:30am the following day!

 

To add insult to injury, the Humax recorder continues to regularly disconnect from the network and then reconnect!!! I have no idea why!

  • in reply to dubbie

    So true. So true. I can garden but I don't find it mentally stimulating as problem solving. Assembling a kit would be immensely rewarding. 

  • in reply to Andrew J

    Andrew,

     

    I think I agree with you, about being at work - grumpy (although not that grumpy) and then being retired - definitely happy and more social. Regretfully my wife has not (yet!) accepted that doing electronics and building robots is an acceptable retirement activity. I currently have five Tobbie walking robot kits waiting to be assembled (they were bargains). For some reason gardening is more acceptable but again, "why do I need to spend money on plants? We have plants already." I did point out that our garden is currently a riot of colour (daffodils, tulips and primroses - all purchased in the last 12 months) but that didn't seem to cut any ice.

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to neilk

    Your post seems so familiar. You wouldn't by any chance have been strolling down the streets of Morris, Manitoba, Canada yesterday? I had a conversation with my spouse that is strangely familiar.

     

    I retired in 2018. My spouse has continued to work. In December her small mom & pop shop was purchased by a corporation. She has been given the position of supreme ruler by the corporation, even above the people that owned the business. She had worked for the mom & pop place for close to 30 years before it was sold.

     

    What has been hard for me and doubly hard for her is the sudden change in her work environment after the company made the purchase. She thinks, I have worked her before, this is not difficult. The average individual feels the effects of corporate vice over a whole career, in my case 38 years. She has had to learn it over night.

     

    Retirement is both a physical and mental attitude change. I suggest retirement it is like learning how to drive a standard car after driving an automatic your whole life. You get into the standard for the first time and tell your self, I know how to drive a car. You arrive at retirement and think, I know how to do nothing. At least that is what we are told retirement is.

     

    The pandemic that has caused my spouse to work from home is given her a different perspective. I don't think she appreciates what is happening and is chasing the change. I'm not sure of what our lives will be like when the normal 9 to 5 returns.

     

    I'm riding a roller coaster right now. I don't like roller coasters. My spouse is contributing to the disruption of my retirement. I don't feel like taking advice from an armature who sees working from home, like retirement.  If retirement is doing nothing, which is a result of the health crisis, then I think I will need to go back to work.

     

    Word of unsolicited advice NP. Listen, ponder thoughts, formulate a response but keep them to yourself. She doesn't have your perspective and the disruption she is experiencing will make it extremely difficult for her to process your good intentions. Formula for success right now, is put up and shut upimage

  • in reply to neilk

    I stopped working about 6 months before my wife and had the same thing as well - I'd already settled into a retired routine.  It worked itself out after a few weeks once she'd found her own routine and had got work out of her system.  Now we make a concerted effort to do our own things and do things together with a priority on the latter really.  Situation is a bit different here of course but hopefully this won't go on too long.

     

    You may find she doesn't want to go back!  Seeing me going from work-grumpy-miserable to home-happy-cheerful meant it wasn't too long before she decided that her plans for working for two or three years could go out the nearest window image

  • in reply to Andrew J

    Another issue related to "wife WFH" and me being retired - I am used to doing my own thing during her office hours and then being social in the evenings....................that's not turning out too well at the moment image