I think one of the worst things about big USB dongles is the fact that they stick out like a sore thumb. And like a sore thumb, you always seem to smack it at the wrong time. This has been the case with this $400 Samson XP106w Wireless PA system for it’s entire life. Whenever the USB receiver for the wireless microphone is plugged in, it always gets bent one way or the other. Continue this for a year or 2, eventually you become the owner of a broken receiver.
Look at this thing. Whose idea was it to have this USB jut out?! There are better ways to do this.
With my hot air station set to 830° F, I make quick work of removing the USB 3.0 plug from the board. Unfortunately, I don’t have a spare plug on hand, so I need to salvage from a 32GB Sandisk flashdrive. I feel really bad about this, because this thing has worked flawlessly for years. But sometimes you gotta make sacrifices. When I have a spare plug on hand, I’ll fix the flashdrive.
Once the plug end is removed from our donor flashdrive, we begin the part I’m bad at: soldering it back together.
This took me forever. The pitch between the pins on the board was much smaller than I’ve worked with before, so it took a lot of trial and error to get everything cleanly attached.
After some cleaning with 90% isopropyl and a toothbrush, I’m left with a great fix. Next, I will get a small USB 3.0 extender in order to get that pesky dongle out of danger.
Look at this thing. Whose idea was it to have this USB jut out?! There are better ways to do this.
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| That's bad! |
With my hot air station set to 830° F, I make quick work of removing the USB 3.0 plug from the board. Unfortunately, I don’t have a spare plug on hand, so I need to salvage from a 32GB Sandisk flashdrive. I feel really bad about this, because this thing has worked flawlessly for years. But sometimes you gotta make sacrifices. When I have a spare plug on hand, I’ll fix the flashdrive.
Once the plug end is removed from our donor flashdrive, we begin the part I’m bad at: soldering it back together.
This took me forever. The pitch between the pins on the board was much smaller than I’ve worked with before, so it took a lot of trial and error to get everything cleanly attached.
After some cleaning with 90% isopropyl and a toothbrush, I’m left with a great fix. Next, I will get a small USB 3.0 extender in order to get that pesky dongle out of danger.
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