- SATA 3 port
- FIDO key
Simply a GPIO out, also was thinking if something like jumperless breadboard could be possible to integrate as an input module
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I2C, SPI, CAN, and GPIO ā seriously, I would buy it in a heartbeat.
AM/FM receiver. AM/FM transmitter. to listen to radio on the laptop, and the other to easily convert any old stereo into a bluetooth speaker
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I got one!
Better speaker (s) expansion card (s)!
One (two for stereo) side/bottom firing speakers to enhance audio on the FW13 and FW16. Less ports for more audio punch!
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PoE enabled ethernet card, for charging and/or output, so you can test PoE devices right with the laptop
Oh, thatās an interesting idea. Probably could do one for the Expansion Slot of the FW 16 pretty easily actually. Maybe even put a whole 4 port switch inside.
I was more thinking about setting up a single raspberry pi that would have a PoE HAT, in the wild or something. Or use the PoE switch in your rack to power the laptop and jack into the network with a single connector.
Oh I get that, having a PoE out for setting an RPi with PoE hat, or a PoE Access Point, or something similar, is an interesting idea.
However, using PoE to power the laptop, well, thatās where it gets quite complicated. Passive PoE Iād say is out, there are too many vendor specific versions at a guess, even if most of them are pretty similar.
802.3af (aka PoE) with 15.4W (12.95W at device) is quite small, help extend runtime only a little
802.3at (aka PoE+) with 25.5W is starting to get closer, probably can extend the runtime appreciably
802.3bt (aka PoE++/4PPoE) is 51W or 71.3W, this is where we actually can recharge as well as extend runtime, assuming the PoE switch supports this
So perhaps even just old 802.3af is sufficient, for slightly extended runtime. Probably easier to just carry around an external battery pack or the like.
Having PoE out, that I can see some use case for, depending on your job. Would be pretty neat to have a 2.5G 4 port switch, or really 4 port NIC which sits on PCIe which you can use for whatever in the OS, which includes turning it into a switch or what not. If youāre really that much of data center engineer, 1, maybe 2 SFP+ and 1-3 1-2.5G ports would be really interesting. To be able to plug an SFP+ right into your laptop directly without extra dongles or boxes or what not in an Expansion Slot is neat.
Never said your idea about the expansion bay is bad, actually it will be great after an updated motherboard comes out to create a custom router headless from the old board. Router, wifi ap, NAS, and other servers, easily possible. If you make the expansion bay with a router chip and not all data has to go to the cpu, except those explicitly pointed at that server(say, custom dns, jellyfin/plex, whatever) and everything else just handled on the expansion bay, you could get 2x10G spf, 4-8 Gbit or faster ports. Wifi could be handled by the main board at that point, still should be fast enough through PCIe.
Itās a great idea, but I donāt think itās good enough for a mobile workstation to plug and unplug 4 connectors, and if you donāt do that, a handful of cards(up to 5, technically, 1 card for the charger) should be enough for most things.
So yeah I see myself switching out my router/pihole/synology setup with my R9 board 5 years down the line, if someone creates such a router board.
At the point of pulling and old board, probably would be better to do a PCIe breakout and have a single PCIe x8, or possibly more expensive a switch chip and go for 2 x4 or 1 x4 and 2 x2 slots, so standard cards can be used.
Hrm, wonder if you can basically just use USB4(TB3) ā PCIe, something like https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-Thunderbolt-PCIe-Expansion-Chassis/dp/B075RJHLB4, instead. Jeeze thatās not cheap though.
Basic functionality of Flipper Zero?
Sub 1 GHz
RFID
NFC
I would love a m.2 adapter. It could function similarly to a sd card. Keep the expansion port in the laptop and just insert your m.2 card
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I donāt know if its possible but a retractable wired earphones expansion card seems pretty useful.
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Bubble level tool
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Oh, and a super strong magnet(s) for securing the laptop to the fridge doorā¦
Welcome to the forum
I imagine this is meant in jest. But I want to mention, for those that donāt know, that we all carry around a free digital / virtual bubble level in our pockets. The accelerometer built into virtually every smartphone, which provides automatic screen rotation, is an accurate digital level. It comes in handy sometimes.
Digital level app: Bubble | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository. Free, no ads, tiny 1.4 MiB size, open source.
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Nice find. Turns out my desk is out of level thoughā¦ 
This is useless as most phones have camera bumps that make them not sit level.
You can use any edge of your phone. Iāve used many times. I get virtually the same reading as my actual dedicated digital level.