Scheer

It is either press fit in, or soldered in... Either way its going to be a pain to remove.
 
EDIT: Damn you curiosity!
 
Actually, pretty easy to remove... it was just press fit, my cute little 4" vise did it no problem. I did have to add in some more spacers on the backside due to the length of the plug, but got lazy with the pictures, sorry.
 

 

 

 

 
Note: One mosquito was harmed in the process of removing the slug.
 
If you plan to scrap it, it weighs in at 2.5 oz (70g), for a total of about $0.47

I really thought it would start getting better right around this time, but I just learned its only getting worse. I know at least one ammo producer just completely ran out of their primer stockpile and had to start limiting employee's OT because there aren't enough coming in to keep them as busy as they'd like. About a month ago it was going to to take until May 2022 to catch up to the current backorders at the current production, which is now less... this might be a several year long ammo drought.
 
I never wanted to be one of those guys who hordes hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammo, but I'm sure regretting it right now... Took a few months, but I finally got ahold of two boxes of .270, so hopefully I've got enough for an upcoming hog hunt.
 
In other news, was at my parents to grab some 6.5CM and found a box of 500 Nitro Express in the safe. I've never seen it in person before and pictures really don't do it justice, that is a .223 next to it.
 

Haven't posted in here for a while, so a little update on my firearm adventures.... I forgot to keep my AR's separated and they made little baby ARs so I had to pickup a 5D jig to finish milling them up. No real plans for them, pry just throw them in the safe and save for a rainy day. Finally bought a AR10 lower as well that I'll likely do a 6.5CM build on. The 5D jig was a little janky for how much money they want for it, I really should have just bought a milling machine instead. Right around two hours for the first lower and a bit under an hour for the rest of them once you get the hang of it.
 

 
Had a really disappointing deer firearm season and didn't see a single one worth shooting until we saw a massive buck about 1500 yards out right at sunset on the final day and didn't have near enough time to hunt him down. So I figured I'd take advantage of muzzleloading season and picked up a CVA Optima and mounted a Crossfire II scope on it. The Crossfire II is hands down the best scope in the $100-200 range IMO, I really don't know how Vortex does it at this price and offer a no questions asked warranty. (My brother in law left his Vortex binoculars on top his skidsteer tracks after looking at something, then ran them over, called Vortex and they 2nd Day Aired him brand new replacements...) Spent 3-4 days trying to get close enough to the buck, but never could get closer than 500 yards and that's not happening with a smokepole. Meanwhile all that time doe are running all over the place, so first day of late season I get the 6.5 back out and sure enough not a doe to be seen... thankfully they extended late season until end of January so I have another two weekends to get a few for jerky.
 

 
A couple of days ago I found out something about the foam in the bottom of my gun safe doesn't sit well with brass and had a butt plate all tarnished. About 10 minutes on the buffing wheel shined it right back up, and gave me an excuse to polish up the rest of the gun.


 
I believe I'm finally happy with the setup of my 6.5CM. Had the barrel chopped down to 18" and threaded for an eventual DeadAir Nomad, picked up a LuthAR MBA3, and found an old Larue grip that I didn't like on an AR, but fits and feel awesome on this setup. Only thing left to swap out is the bipod to the Magpul one, just waiting for them to come back into stock...
 

 
My grandfather in law passed away a few months ago, so at Christmas his guns were distributed among the kids. Only picture I can find right now and I don't want to go digging through the safe, but two of them were an AR15 I built for him as a truck gun, and an old Remington 1100. I'm very sentimental about firearms, and its special to have some of his to make it feel like he is still out hunting with us when we take them out. The Henry Goldenboy above and a matching blued Henry also came from him the year prior.
 

 
I've always wanted to stipple a handgun, but never wanted to risk messing one up. Last year my cousin was riding in the horse arena and lost his Glock 17, well after about a year it finally showed back up when they were dragging the sand smooth, and it was in pretty rough shape so it became the perfect practice gun. Not super happy with the stippling... but its at least better than it was. I did clean up the border between stipple and non-stipple a little better after this picture, but I never did find a good way of doing it. Took a few hours of scrubbing but the internals cleaned up nice, and it mag dumped the first mag without a hitch after getting it back together.
 

 
With this whole ammo panic going on, I finally bit the bullet and started messing with reloading. So far just have a Lee APP that I've been depriming 300blk with just to get the feel for it, and have a Lee C frame on order to load a few hundred rounds of 300blk and see how it goes. I figure if I don't want to mess with reloading I'm not out much money this way, and if I do like it I can pickup a nice Hornady press and its always going to be handy having a spare press around for a quick job. Primers and powder have been the biggest issue so far, but my uncle found a few pounds of powder tonight that he is bringing back, and I think I have a lead on some primers...
 

 
And lastly, picked up some 1/2" AR500 targets as a Christmas present for my brother in law, to put up at his house so I can shoot them. 😁 
 

 

Haven't posted in here for a while, so a little update on my firearm adventures.... I forgot to keep my AR's separated and they made little baby ARs so I had to pickup a 5D jig to finish milling them up. No real plans for them, pry just throw them in the safe and save for a rainy day. Finally bought a AR10 lower as well that I'll likely do a 6.5CM build on. The 5D jig was a little janky for how much money they want for it, I really should have just bought a milling machine instead. Right around two hours for the first lower and a bit under an hour for the rest of them once you get the hang of it.
 

 
Had a really disappointing deer firearm season and didn't see a single one worth shooting until we saw a massive buck about 1500 yards out right at sunset on the final day and didn't have near enough time to hunt him down. So I figured I'd take advantage of muzzleloading season and picked up a CVA Optima and mounted a Crossfire II scope on it. The Crossfire II is hands down the best scope in the $100-200 range IMO, I really don't know how Vortex does it at this price and offer a no questions asked warranty. (My brother in law left his Vortex binoculars on top his skidsteer tracks after looking at something, then ran them over, called Vortex and they 2nd Day Aired him brand new replacements...) Spent 3-4 days trying to get close enough to the buck, but never could get closer than 500 yards and that's not happening with a smokepole. Meanwhile all that time doe are running all over the place, so first day of late season I get the 6.5 back out and sure enough not a doe to be seen... thankfully they extended late season until end of January so I have another two weekends to get a few for jerky.
 

 
A couple of days ago I found out something about the foam in the bottom of my gun safe doesn't sit well with brass and had a butt plate all tarnished. About 10 minutes on the buffing wheel shined it right back up, and gave me an excuse to polish up the rest of the gun.


 
I believe I'm finally happy with the setup of my 6.5CM. Had the barrel chopped down to 18" and threaded for an eventual DeadAir Nomad, picked up a LuthAR MBA3, and found an old Larue grip that I didn't like on an AR, but fits and feel awesome on this setup. Only thing left to swap out is the bipod to the Magpul one, just waiting for them to come back into stock...
 

 
My grandfather in law passed away a few months ago, so at Christmas his guns were distributed among the kids. Only picture I can find right now and I don't want to go digging through the safe, but two of them were an AR15 I built for him as a truck gun, and an old Remington 1100. I'm very sentimental about firearms, and its special to have some of his to make it feel like he is still out hunting with us when we take them out. The Henry Goldenboy above and a matching blued Henry also came from him the year prior.
 

 
I've always wanted to stipple a handgun, but never wanted to risk messing one up. Last year my cousin was riding in the horse arena and lost his Glock 17, well after about a year it finally showed back up when they were dragging the sand smooth, and it was in pretty rough shape so it became the perfect practice gun. Not super happy with the stippling... but its at least better than it was. I did clean up the border between stipple and non-stipple a little better after this picture, but I never did find a good way of doing it. Took a few hours of scrubbing but the internals cleaned up nice, and it mag dumped the first mag without a hitch after getting it back together.
 

 
With this whole ammo panic going on, I finally bit the bullet and started messing with reloading. So far just have a Lee APP that I've been depriming 300blk with just to get the feel for it, and have a Lee C frame on order to load a few hundred rounds of 300blk and see how it goes. I figure if I don't want to mess with reloading I'm not out much money this way, and if I do like it I can pickup a nice Hornady press and its always going to be handy having a spare press around for a quick job. Primers and powder have been the biggest issue so far, but my uncle found a few pounds of powder tonight that he is bringing back, and I think I have a lead on some primers...
 

 
And lastly, picked up some 1/2" AR500 targets as a Christmas present for my brother in law, to put up at his house so I can shoot them. 😁 
 

 

Haven't posted in here for a while, so a little update on my firearm adventures.... I forgot to keep my AR's separated and they made little baby ARs so I had to pickup a 5D jig to finish milling them up. No real plans for them, pry just throw them in the safe and save for a rainy day. Finally bought a AR10 lower as well that I'll likely do a 6.5CM build on. The 5D jig was a little janky for how much money they want for it, I really should have just bought a milling machine instead. Right around two hours for the first lower and a bit under an hour for the rest of them once you get the hang of it.
 

 
Had a really disappointing deer firearm season and didn't see a single one worth shooting until we saw a massive buck about 1500 yards out right at sunset on the final day and didn't have near enough time to hunt him down. So I figured I'd take advantage of muzzleloading season and picked up a CVA Optima and mounted a Crossfire II scope on it. The Crossfire II is hands down the best scope in the $100-200 range IMO, I really don't know how Vortex does it at this price and offer a no questions asked warranty. (My brother in law left his Vortex binoculars on top his skidsteer tracks after looking at something, then ran them over, called Vortex and they 2nd Day Aired him brand new replacements...) Spent 3-4 days trying to get close enough to the buck, but never could get closer than 500 yards and that's not happening with a smokepole. Meanwhile all that time doe are running all over the place, so first day of late season I get the 6.5 back out and sure enough not a doe to be seen... thankfully they extended late season until end of January so I have another two weekends to get a few for jerky.
 

 
A couple of days ago I found out something about the foam in the bottom of my gun safe doesn't sit well with brass and had a butt plate all tarnished. About 10 minutes on the buffing wheel shined it right back up, and gave me an excuse to polish up the rest of the gun.


 
I believe I'm finally happy with the setup of my 6.5CM. Had the barrel chopped down to 18" and threaded for an eventual DeadAir Nomad, picked up a LuthAR MBA3, and found an old Larue grip that I didn't like on an AR, but fits and feel awesome on this setup. Only thing left to swap out is the bipod to the Magpul one, just waiting for them to come back into stock...
 

 
My grandfather in law passed away a few months ago, so at Christmas his guns were distributed among the kids. Only picture I can find right now and I don't want to go digging through the safe, but two of them were an AR15 I built for him as a truck gun, and an old Remington 1100. I'm very sentimental about firearms, and its special to have some of his to make it feel like he is still out hunting with us when we take them out. The Henry Goldenboy above and a matching blued Henry also came from him the year prior.
 

 
I've always wanted to stipple a handgun, but never wanted to risk messing one up. Last year my cousin was riding in the horse arena and lost his Glock 17, well after about a year it finally showed back up when they were dragging the sand smooth, and it was in pretty rough shape so it became the perfect practice gun. Not super happy with the stippling... but its at least better than it was. I did clean up the border between stipple and non-stipple a little better after this picture, but I never did find a good way of doing it. Took a few hours of scrubbing but the internals cleaned up nice, and it mag dumped the first mag without a hitch after getting it back together.
 

 
With this whole ammo panic going on, I finally bit the bullet and started messing with reloading. So far just have a Lee APP that I've been depriming 300blk with just to get the feel for it, and have a Lee C frame on order to load a few hundred rounds of 300blk and see how it goes. I figure if I don't want to mess with reloading I'm not out much money this way, and if I do like it I can pickup a nice Hornady press and its always going to be handy having a spare press around for a quick job. Primers and powder have been the biggest issue so far, but my uncle found a few pounds of powder tonight that he is bringing back, and I think I have a lead on some primers...
 

 
And lastly, picked up some 1/2" AR500 targets as a Christmas present for my brother in law, to put up at his house so I can shoot them. 😁 
 

 

Not sure if it would be high enough, but they do make risers for the SGA: https://magpul.com/sga-high-cheek-riser-kit.html?mp_global_color=undefined
 
As far as backup sights I'd find a way to mill out the center of the picatinny wide on everything but the lug closest to the stock, and on the last lug cut it out to behave as the rear sight. It looks like the height is at least close to working. 

Honestly nothing legal will have the power to blast through concrete walls, you will need to put multiple APs in so get several of the cheapest - UAP-AC-Lite. Mesh systems won't work very well as they need good signal to the mesh point to properly repeat it.
 
That being said, if 160mbps is too slow for whatever your usage is you shouldn't be on WiFi anyways, run a cable.

Amazon sidewalk is basically this: https://www.thethingsnetwork.org/
 
And to be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if they literally just use a private TTN network... Its been around for years and works extremely well. There is very likely a public TTN hotspot near you, if not there is almost certainly a private TTN network near you.
 
The concept of LoraWAN is amazing IMO, and TTN's makes it even better. You willingly host the hotspot, essentially for the greater good of the technology, and get access to every public hotspot to send data across without any monthly charges, really I don't think you even need to host a hotspot... You could build a small transmitter that sends GPS coords every 30 minutes for under $50 with a battery life of several years, so if you bike is ever stolen you can track it down, and its going to work as long as it is within 5ish miles outdoors or halfish of a mile inside of any public hotspot. The only downside is the fairly slow adoption rate of hotspots, but if Amazon was to tie Sidewalk in it would instantly become the greatest IOT network.
 
As for Amazon's implementation, this isn't going to be for sending a video stream of your Ring camera across the internet to you at work, its simply going to be a tiny payload that will send a notification saying your internet is out. Lets say your house starts on fire while your internet is out, or a door gets opened while the system is armed... rather than needing to pay $10+/month for cellular backup it will just send the tiny payload with a warning to you.
 
In a nutshell, think of it like a free miniature version of a very slow network of cellular towers. Plus you get the excitement of another new "deadly cancer causing network" for the media to flip out about and watch people start burning down other people's houses to get rid of the Echo's.
 
 
It is so low bandwidth I really don't think it could realistically carry IP traffic as it sends payloads of a few bits, a single IP packet is several bytes. Most implementations will send something like 8 bits every 15 minutes or so for status monitoring or even as small as 2 bits for state change if you were to press a button (plus the overhead of end to end 128bit encryption which is most of the bandwidth), we will just have to wait and see how they end up setting it all up. I'm sure there is someway to hack the system and get some sort of encrypted data out of it, but why waste the time, if you already have internet there are a thousand much easier ways to steal information from you.
 

Some pretty terrible reporting on this--the devices aren't making WIFI networks, but a 900MHz mesh-network to pass around IoT device messages. Depending on how the networking is implemented, this could not be the biggest vulnerability? Only time will tell. 
 
I suspect that this would be an extremely minute amount of data being transferred over your network, seeing as IoT devices are generally low power/low bandwidth. 
Not really though? I've yet to see any evidence that any of the major smart-home devices are recording your conversations 24/7 (or doing anything beyond processing them locally on-device to see if they match a trigger phrase). In fact, I've seen lots of network analysis of the devices which show the chance that this is happening is near 0% (unless somehow they can somehow transfer data over a network without being detected).

New tool showed up yesterday, the M12 Installation Drill Driver, pretty pleased with this one. I expected it to be on par with the M12 Screwdriver, but it has quite a bit more power, and came with 24wh batteries rather than standard 16wh, which was a nice surprise. Entirely possible all M12 have moved to coming with 24wh though, I haven't bought one for a good while. Its pretty crazy the difference the battery alone makes, on a 16wh in the 2nd speed it will drive a 4" #10 GRK into a 2x4, but stall out right as the screw head is flush, on the 24wh it will drive it right down until the bit can't reach any further into the wood. The 16wh I used was a couple years old, but it is dedicated to my M12 thermal imager so it is only been through a handful of charge cycles and should still be at peak performance.
 

 
The best part is all the weird angles you can get into with the different heads, and the offset adapter will make hiding screws in corners much easier.
 

 
And then I finally finished my M18 soldering iron I found on thingiverse, just waiting for epoxy to dry on the spade connectors for the battery connection. I've never had good luck with butane irons, and lately I've been using a T12 handle wired up to a LiPo battery, but lack of heat control has been a PITA. While this will be noticeably larger, I'm much more likely to have a charged M18 laying around, and gain nice heat control, it will be worth it.
 

After being disappointed with results from my DIY Prusa i2 and then i3 clones several years ago, I picked up an Ender 3 Pro to print the parts to make a nice printer like the Voron or Ulitmaker clone. I still haven't bothered to print the parts and build it... I've been extremely happy with the Ender 3 Pro, and I have no idea how another printer could be as good for even triple the price. It took a bit of tweaking and $100 or so for a BL Touch, PEI on spring steel, Aluminum extruder, and bed springs, but the thing runs like a champ. Even doing a lot of ABS printing now that I have an enclosure.
 
IMO, even if you are comfortable spending $1k+, just get the Ender 3 first to know if you will like the hobby or not. It never hurts to have a backup printer, or you could get at least half your money back out of it by selling it. After you spend some time with one, you will know more about what you ultimately want in your "endgame" printer.

Every time I got into RCs I would get bored of them very shortly after, so every time the allure came around again I told myself if I just buy a bigger better one and upgrade more and more on it, I will enjoy it more, but that was never the case.
 
Started on the normal $2-300 RTR kits, put around $2-300 in aftermarket parts on them so they didn't break every 5 minutes. Then stepped it up to a Mini E-Revo with a Castle Creations 1/10th scale setup, RPM arms and beadlocker wheels, wasn't much more at around $750 all setup, but at the time (and maybe still, haven't looked in years) there were no good options for chassis upgrades so you'd snap the bulkheads every time you took it out and spend an hour or so replacing it. I thought it was too small, and didn't to spend the money on a full size E-Revo, so I took my old E-Maxx, put in dual brushless motors, hardened gears, every aluminum part I could find, and absolutely hated it, because when you give it that much power and strengthen almost everything, every break is expensive. So then it was time to really step it up and moved to "pro" levels with a Mugen MBX (4 or 5?, was still Nitro at the time, did a conversion to brushless on it) and while it held up way better than anything thus far, it still did break and parts were really hard to find at the time so it would only be usable every other weekend. 
 
Now, its not like these are all fragile as glass, if you are careful with them and just taking it easy around a track or backyard they'd likely never break... but that is boring.
 
At this point I decided to give up on RC cars for good, and then the Losi 1/24th scale came out.... My son was maybe one at the time, so I thought a cheap yet still hobby grade RC would be fun and exciting for him, and I fell in love with it. Nearly 10 years later I still drive them around every so often, making little mods and tweaks. Parts are extremely cheap, they rarely ever break, and you can drive them indoors. They are still nearly as moddable as the bigger ones, I have a few Micro's that can do 60mph if you can find a smooth enough road.
 
Also in all that I had a 1/12 scale hydroplane boat, which was nitro and spent quite a lot of time keeping it running, which is no fun... still have plans to brushless convert this at some point. A few Blade Heli's, the little Coaxial MCX was actually a lot of fun, but anymore I'd rather just fly a quad copter around. And my brother had some Axial crawlers, but I've never had anything put me to sleep so fast.
 
So long story short, I've tried about everything RC (aside from 1/5 scale and road cars) and 1/36 or 1/24 Losi have easily been the cheapest AND most fun I've had with RC.

That will work, but its a bad time to buy a USG or USG-Pro, they are likely to be discontinued any day now.
 
If you need it right now, look into a Dream Machine or Dream Machine Pro, if you can wait a little bit Ubiquiti is releasing a direct replacement for the USG called the UXG. Should have been in Early Access by now, but Covid seems to have delayed it. https://community.ui.com/questions/Introducing-the-UniFi-Next-Gen-Gateway-Product-Line-Starting-with-UXG-Pro-/732dd4dd-10bf-463c-8622-382d77702872

I've had two Corsair units die on me now, your CPU will just hit the thermal limit and downclock to ~300mhz. Then you will get pissed off why your computer is slow, finally figure out why, wait 3 weeks to get it replaced under RMA, have it fail a couple years later, install your old Hyper 212 on the system and realize AIO was a waste of time and money. Then a few years later see that shiny new RGB, get a new AIO cooler from a different brand, wait a year, wonder why your computer is so slow, reinstall Hyper 212 with an RBG fan from the AIO.
 
Ooo, I can get an AIO with a screen on it now??? Bye Hyper 212, see you in two years.
 
(Just my experience with my cursed main computer, I have AIOs in two of my SFF computers and one of them has been going strong for over a decade  )

Needed is subjective, if you want to download something from the internet at 1gbps, while downloading files from your NAS loaded with SSDs at 5gbps+, all day every day and absolutely cannot wait, then it would probably be worth it.
 
I feel like I'm a power user, have a full server rack in my basement with over a dozen VMs, SSD backup server, Plex server, NVR for IP cameras, etc... and I've never felt I NEED 10gbps LAN. Sure I want it, but its getting cheaper every year, so I'm just holding out for a bit. Worst case scenario backups and file transfers take a few minutes longer.
 
That being said, if you value your time at say $50 an hour, and it will save you 10 minutes a day... it would pay for itself in under a year.

Needed is subjective, if you want to download something from the internet at 1gbps, while downloading files from your NAS loaded with SSDs at 5gbps+, all day every day and absolutely cannot wait, then it would probably be worth it.
 
I feel like I'm a power user, have a full server rack in my basement with over a dozen VMs, SSD backup server, Plex server, NVR for IP cameras, etc... and I've never felt I NEED 10gbps LAN. Sure I want it, but its getting cheaper every year, so I'm just holding out for a bit. Worst case scenario backups and file transfers take a few minutes longer.
 
That being said, if you value your time at say $50 an hour, and it will save you 10 minutes a day... it would pay for itself in under a year.

Would work fine:
 

AutoCAD will run fine on any modern computer, so just aim for a gaming computer, nothing special to spec out for the CAD side.

I believe it is a male RP-MMCX.
 
You will also need to figure out what kind of cable you have, as the connectors will be different for the diameter of the cable. Most will be crimp on connectors, and need a strip tool, so you'll pry be well over $30 to buy the connector and tools. If it was a little bit bigger you could get away with a razor blade and steady hand to strip them, and just crimp with a pair of small pliers, but these really small connectors are a PITA to terminate properly.

Be careful with some of the really old eBay servers you see for $50-$100, their power usage is really high for the relatively low performance they offer, and can be extremely loud.
 
I have a Dell R210ii, R220, T30 (tower), and Lenovo TS140 (tower), all of which are basically the same system within a few years of each other. The towers are near silent, the rack mounts are a bit louder but still quiet enough for a closet rack. The TS140 was actually transplanted into a 3U case quite easily, and still nice and quiet since you can fit larger fans in there. The TS140 and T30 were new for $300, the R210ii and R220s were both found on eBay for ~$100 with low specs, but I was then able to buy whatever CPU worked best for its use case, actually have a e3-1241v3 (roughly i7-4770 performance) on the way for the R220 that was only $70. The one downside is that you need UDIMM ECC RAM which is a bit more expensive than standard DDR3, but its come down quite a bit in price over the past few years.
 
Power consumption is between 50-100W running misc services on them, pry more than what you are wanting to do so that makes it negligible for operating cost, and the R210ii and R220 are short depth servers so they will fit in a lot of the small networking wall mount rack cabinets, dual Gbe is nice, and one PCIe slot for RAID or networking. IIRC there is only one 3.5" drive mount... I just lay SSDs in the front of the case though, and you can fit 5 in there easy.

Another benefit for Ryzen (at least assuming so) is going to be power efficiency.
 
Either way they will likely be much better than your T7500, I had a dual CPU HP Z620 that sucked down 240 watts at idle... you notice that on the power bill.

Both your powerbank and laptop have USB C, so just use a USB C to C cable.
 
Its always better to stay on the same power type for efficiency reasons, otherwise you are going DC to AC to DC, and ~20% of your power is just turning to heat being wasted.

If you can find them in NZ, a Digispark clone with the Attiny85 would work and only cost a few dollars here.
 

 
And if you have access to a 3D printer, here are files for a housing to use Cherry switches: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3168287

I did a custom version of one of the older CNCRouterparts.com machines and for one off aluminum projects it will get the job done with a small router spindle. It's the same company LTT got their CNC/plasma machine from and are great guys to deal with. All in you can do a 2'x2' machine for around $2k cutting some corners and it's a lot beefier than the to be assembled hobby machines, but you do need a decent amount of tools to build one. Figure around $4-5k to do it proper. 
 
If you have the room and think you might use the extra cutting space, build a 2'x4' with a 4' gantry. Will cost a bit more now, but in the future it is easy and relatively cheap to just extend it out to a 4'x8' machine. 
 
Fusion 360 for the CAD side is free, it has CAM as well but I don't like it so I use Vectric. The 2D (actually 2.5D) program is only a few hundred dollars, and very easy to use. For the machine controller there are some free Linux options that are a royal PITA, so just pay the $200 for Mach 4. 
 
Lastly, it wasn't worth the time messing with random issues I had with parallel ports and cards... Getting an Ethernet Smoothstepper is well worth it. 

If you have to pay for power it will be a challenge to make any money with it.  Not saying you can't but a challenge.
if you are feeling generous, there is always BOINC and Folding@home...