I hadn't set it back up after moving. I gave OpenClaw ssh credentials and it updated the OS and packages, then couldn't get back in after a restart.

I plugged in keyboard and screen and it was stuck at boot, couldn't mount a drive.

I sent OpenClaw screenshots and it told me to type in journalctl commands. Then it had me modify fstab so boot could continue.

After that, OpenClaw could get back in on its own. It found the drive I'd been using had 1300 bad sectors and was going to die. It saw that another drive was perfectly healthy. It said the bad disc sectors were all early and probably just filesystem metadata and my files were probably fine. It copied 1.5Tb to the newer drive and restored everything.

I probably would have thrown the whole box out, as I hadn't used it in a year and wasn't looking for a project like that.

When starting a hardware product, it's so easy to buy small quantities at commercial prices, no questions asked.

In the US, it seems all sales is relationship-based. I need to fill out forms on bad websites, wait for emails from sales reps, who sniff out immediately that I only want a small order. The overhead for processing an order isn't deemed worth the time, and any US-based small-time project ends there.

Also I know a 3d printer that can print molds for injection molding, and I know a guy with a set of printers who'd be happy to take orders.

some ppl don't believe this cus it seems crazy.

anyways, yes they're trying to make their own chips to not be beholden to nvidia, and are investing in other chip startups. And at the same time, nvidia is thinking that if they can make an AI, why should they ever even sell their chips, and so they're working on that too.

And of course the cost goes way up.

Yeah, the goal is to make a cool thing, and then make a fun game.

Well the internet liked the idea, and saw some of the same promise in it that I did (plus HN is a sucker for e-ink). With all the interest, and people asking how they can get their hands on one, I ran a crowdfunding campaign to make devkits for everyone who wanted.

Turns out making 25 of something is way more work than making 2 of a thing. The supplier changed the display firmware on me, I had to make things to more exact measurements so parts were interchangeable, I had to write docs and make videos, etc etc. Took a whole year.

Now the pressure is off and I don't owe people products after they gave me money for them, so I can take a break to clear out my backlog of minor projects, then get onto designing my own game, using my own devkit :)

Once I have an actually fun game, I could increase volume and bring down the costs. My goal is to make the game accessible for $80. I'll need the e-ink price to come down a little, and use injection molding instead of resin casting and wood. Plus the base won't need a Raspberry Pi, that's just for my quick iteration. Final product will need to be embedded.

(Almost all the devkits sold were to friends and family, with only a few going to actual game designers. CrowdSupply itself puts in an order for more units along with the campaign, so that they can stock them after the campaign ends and initial delivery is over. Except they negotiate a different price for those because the margins work differently)

I meant walking up to a super cool music visualization at an outdoor art festival and they guy there happily explaining to me their entire system built out of a node flow diagram implemented on Max but adapted to visual graphics using a plugin called Vsynth.

Or going over to a friend's house and seeing their modular synth system and they happily explain to you how it works for an hour.

Just this weekend I met an amazing engineer with a street-legal steam-powered motorcycle which he patiently explained for an hour.

Those flat flex displays are awesome, though way pricier. Then I'd lose the nice stiff pcb board which allows all the contacts on the back to mate. I could go wireless, but then the power delivery needs to charge a capacitor and the delay between button press and display refresh will go to 30 seconds or beyond

Yes, still no game, I spent the last year delivering the crowdfunded devkits.

My elevator pitch usually goes something like: MTG meets Yu-gi-oh meets Pokemon (the RPG) meets Tamagotchi.

Since the intention is a children's toy, I'm trying to get the price as low as possible. This display size is cheap because it's intended for grocery store price tags ;)

Flat Flex e-paper displays are available but much more expensive. Plus, the magnets in the cards which let them mate to the base take up most of the thickness. I'd have to rethink that physical interface entirely if they needed to be much thinner. My next step will be to design an actual game and then I can come back to size for a v2.