Favorite YouTube Language Channels

No particular order... except the linguistic and cultural stuff will be higher, and straight-up language-learning tutorial channels will be lower.

https://www.youtube.com/@julesytooshoes

https://www.youtube.com/@scriptingjapan

https://www.youtube.com/@Dogen

https://www.youtube.com/@GoBillyKorean

https://www.youtube.com/@talktomeinkorean

Unavoidable HDMI recording audio glitches and their fix

Been noticing some unavoidable noise when capturing from a certain HDMI source. It always sounds like scrunching up a newspaper, happens about once per 20 minutes (if at all), and looks like this in Audacity:

I don't ever hear it watching live; it's just in the recording. I've found ripping the raw wav and loading it in Audacity is both the best way to find the glitch at all, as well as the only way to fix it. So at this point I recapture and get a clip of the audio without the glitch, and replace this audio. 

This is already zoomed in, but I like to zoom in even further, to the point where the thin lines of the waveform become thick again. Then I just line up the audio and mute out the bad portion. It's sort of touch-and-go at this point; it's not as easy as it should be. I try to find an identifiable peak on the main audio and split there, then on the clean audio make the same split, trim, then snap and move. Maybe mute where necessary and then Track > Mix > Mix and Render. 

In AviSynth, I load like this: 

rawfile1v=LWLibavVideoSource("Untitled 115.avi")
rawfile1a=LWLibavAudioSource("Untitled 115 fixed.wav")
AudioDubEx(rawfile1v, rawfile1a)
stream1=last
rawfile1=last

Another problem I had was Blackmagic Media Express not recognizing audio from certain sources, such as:

• RetroTINK-5X Pro into OSSC Pro (individually, both scalers would work fine)

• EZCOO 4K splitter with manual downscaling

• RetroTINK-4K Pro with HDMI input, e.g. PSTV + splitter (even if I would get audio from a component source into the RT4K just fine)

My solution was to run the HDMI output into an HDMI + Audio Converter box, connect that to an HDMI Audio Embedder using a S/PDIF optical cable, and then finally to the capture card. 

My equipment chain, for the curious. And might I add, Google Drawings was plenty enough for this. Just had to set the canvas to a reasonable size in File > Page Setup (I chose 4K resolution, or 3840 × 2160) and set the measurements to pixels instead of inches, and everything else was easy to understand. I can't believe I wasted time dabbling with Lucidchart which limited the number of shapes I could use and wanted me to pay per month... and they wanted me to pay more per month if I wanted to pay for a whole year! Got rid of that app's permission real fast. 

New final best firmware setups for PSP and Vita in 2026

PSP:

On any model, it's ARK-4. Grab your official 6.61 firmware, remove any trace of former CFW, update to OFW, and add your new ARK-4 CFW. It's even updateable right from the console itself. The firmware even allows for WPA2 (something the PSP didn't originally support), which is absolutely nuts. 

https://github.com/PSP-Archive/ARK-4 Main link

https://github.com/PSP-Archive/ARK-4/wiki/Recommended-Plugins Recommended Plugins, though I don't use all of them myself. 

Vita and PSTV

First things first: it's best to completely eliminate all dependency on Sony's crappy proprietary Vita memory cards. This tutorial shows how to add internal storage on a Vita 1000 without any memory card or PC at all:

1. Run HENlo jailbreak, install Henkaku, and without exiting, replace NEAR with VitaDeploy. System reboots. 
2. Run HENlo jailbreak, install Henkaku, exit, then go to Settings > Henkaku Settings, Enable Unsafe Homebrew. 
3. Run VitaDeploy > Miscellaneous > Create an internal memory card > choose Default 2xxx storage configuration. System reboots.
4. Go to Settings >  Format > Format Memory Card > check Internal Memory Card and format. System reboots. You now have just enough space to Download everything VitaDeploy offers, including Enso if you need to downgrade
• Side note: If you're on the latest official firmware (3.74) and had to downgrade to 3.65 in the first place, you won't be able to fully replace Near when you're on 3.65, if you care about that at all. In my case, the icon was restored but the icon name (unchangeable) still said vdep. The devs recommend disabling firmware spoofing and going back up to 3.74 (which is safe and fine because the internal memory card partition persists across firmware updates). At this point Near should be restored.  You can use that internal memory on your HENlo'd 3.74 to download the version of VitaDeploy that doesn't remove Near, download Enso along with other apps you want from the Downloads menu within VitaDeploy, and you're good. 
5. Use ITLS-Enso (from VitaDeploy) to uninstall and then reinstall the full certificate to regain access to the PS Store.

Reading around, the new partition really is the same "extra memory" that the Vita 2000 and PSTV have, so you're not really losing anything. And the most risky thing (moving across firmwares) has proven to be no issue at all. 

If you're like me and you already had a working homebrew setup with a 4 GB memory card and an SD2Vita, and you wanted to go completely Vita memory card-less, first take note of your bubble layout with a video (none of the bubble manager apps have ever worked for me).. Then you just need to do the following... although this is from memory, so I may be including steps I don't need or missing steps I do need because I was figuring it out as I went along:

1. Shut down Vita and remove original Vita memory card and SD2Vita. 
2. Run HENlo jailbreak, install Henkaku, and without exiting, replace NEAR with VitaDeploy. System reboots.
3. Run HENlo jailbreak, install Henkaku, exit, then go to Settings > Henkaku Settings, Enable Unsafe Homebrew. 
4. Run VitaDeploy > Miscellaneous > Create an internal memory card > choose Default 2xxx storage configuration. System reboots.
5. Go to Settings >  Format > Format Memory Card > check Internal Memory Card and format. System reboots. 
6. Run HENlo jailbreak, install Henkaku, and without exiting, replace NEAR with VitaDeploy. System reboots (but this time, choose to restore). 
7. Shut down Vita, reinsert SD2Vita, and power on. You should have your games again (though need of organizing), while no longer relying on that ticking time bomb that is the proprietary Vita memory card. 

Anyway, on the Vita/PSTV side, you still want 3.65 Enso, which you can downgrade to painlessly straight from the browser. Get started with Henkaku in the browser and click Install. Downgrade to 3.65 and make it permanent with Enso. From there, check my older posts about things you definitely need.

(Jailbreak link again. Why are there so many? https://henkaku.xyz/ or  http://deploy.psp2.dev/ or jailbreak.psp2.dev )

On the PSP side, you want to use Isage's fork for Adrenaline. Stepping back for a bit, although you can apply ARK-4 to the regular Adrenaline, it's only Isage's fork of it that fixes the PSP's recovery mode's autoboot. And having it autoboot the ARK-4 loader is the preferred way to load ARK-4 now because, as the ARK-4 github states, the Adrenaline Bubbles Manager method installs an older version of Adrenaline. That means you don't want to use Adrenaline Bubbles Manager at all anymore. 

Continuing, you want to use Game Categories Lite v1.7-js1 by Ticky, making sure to add and enable it in VSH.text and PLUGINS.txt, then going into the XMB Settings (and ARK-4 Plugin Manager) to make sure it's on. This fork is the version recommended by the ARK-4 team (linked above). 

https://github.com/isage/Adrenaline/releases/tag/v7.1.7

https://github.com/ticky/game-categories-lite/releases/tag/1.7-js1

Thoughts on Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions (PSP version)

Made another too-long comment on YouTube and it'd be a waste to let it disappear into the ether so here it is: 

I still want to play the PSP version the most, if only for those extra characters and classes, but it needs all sorts of hacks for a comfortable experience. 

Slowdown: Fixed with LivePatch or a patched ISO. 

Graphics: Fixed with LivePatch or a patched ISO, and probably combined or bundled with the slowdown patch.  Makes the game look absolutely perfect on PSTV with Sharpscale, or on original hardware with component output with a RetroTINK 4K zooming in. Many PSP games actually have "pixel perfect" screen modes that shrink the game area to 240p for extra sharpness; such modes are too small for me to bother with on an actual PSP screen, but benefit tremendously when playing on a TV. 

Soft Reset: Best plugin I've found for this is GameMenu, also known as In game VSH menu (satellite). Highly configurable so you can even hit that musical note button on your PSP to bring up a menu in-game where you can reset, but I like binding it to Home + Select so I can reset with a Dual Shock 3 when playing on a docked PSPgo. There was another plugin called EzGameReset but it tended to crash the game back to the XMB instead of resetting.

Spell quote restoration: Need a tool called Valhalla, but I don't think there was much progress made on this and I haven't bothered with it. Hopefully someone out there documented all the Ivalice Chronicles spell quotes so they can be easily implemented.

Music restoration: Practically modern-day sorcery and I have yet to attempt this. Ideally you'd use the Final Fantasy Tactics OST rip. Then you'd have to do the hard work in Audacity with finding and marking beginning and end loop markers for each track, encoding to .at3 with AT9&AT3 Converter, then putting it all together with UMDGen. At least I think that's how it works. When I've solved all my other problems, have all the free time in the world, and am bored of absolutely everything else, I suppose I'll try this for real.

EDIT: My PSX2PSP searches have yielded ATRACTool-Reloaded for audio conversion as well. 

Swytch e-bike kit: legality and longevity

Legality in the States in 2025: 

• Ebike Laws by State 2025: What Every Rider Should Know
• Swytch kits: "They are made to order and comply with the highest standards in eBike battery safety regulations worldwide including CE, UKCA and UL2271"
• Overview of worldwide standards

UL Certification:

• What does it mean for something to be UL 2849 Compliant?
• What is UL Certification and Why is it Important for Batteries?
• Battery Safety Testing and Certification (UL.com)
• E-Bikes Certification: Evaluating and Testing to UL 2849
• Legal E-Bike Conversion Kits: Where to Buy in 2025
• Notably: 
• 3. Swytch – London, UK (Ships Worldwide)
• Highlight: Featherweight 250 W front-hub kit that snaps on/off with a quick-release power pack.
• Compliance: Certified to EN 15194 (EU) and CPSC wattage limits for U.S. customers.
• List of battery packs that are UL certified?

Battery Repair and Replacements:

• SWAP-E Swytch Adapter (https://www.swap-e.co.uk/) - "This kit allows any 36V third party battery to be used instead."
• Adapters for both Gen2 and Gen3 are available 
• To be used with a generic battery like this which is UL2271 Certified
• Found from this thread: "Solution for Swytch Kit Users Needing Battery Replacements or Longer Range", namely this post
• Swytch Max Battery Teardown
• I Built a TINY E-Bike Battery— How Far Will It Go?

Wyrmwood Hex Tile Planning

My goals: 

• Have one of each configuration and color
• With four tiles (minus Tavern) and eight woods, I want a pair of each tile
• Each tile pair should be different woods
• Each tile pair should also be on opposite ends of (1) color and (2) price
• And based on all of this, it should be easy to distinguish similar-looking woods (e.g. if it's a very dark Solo Tile, it has to be Ebony because my pair of Solo Tiles is either Elm or Ebony)
• For each hex tile pairing, there should be one more of the cheaper wood tile than the higher-priced wood tile (e.g. 2 elm & 1 ebony, or 3 padauk & 2 wenge)
• Total number of hex tiles should be 14 because that's two hex tile racks or one hex party tray's worth

What I have / am aiming for so far:

• 2 Solo Tile / Elm (own x2)
• 1 Solo Tile / Ebony (own x1)

• 2 Duo Tile / Cherry (own x1)
• 1 Duo Tile / Bolivian Rosewood (own x1)

• 3 Card Tile / Padauk (own x1)
• 2 Card Tile / Wenge (own x2)

• 2 Combo Tile / Black Walnut (own x2)
• 1 Combo Tile / Purpleheart (own x1)

Got the official Steam Deck Dock!

And I am not happy!

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/11xbgfx/comment/n07o7os/

EDIT: 

Seems I have a lot more success if I have the TV input already set, and then connect the dock while it's already on. In other words, don't have the dock in standby mode when you connect the dock (with power and HDMI already connected) to the port on the top of the Steam Deck. 

This only applies to connecting the dock to an actual TV. I still needed to connect it to my DVDO Edge for capture and video monitors... or maybe the TESmart switcher doesn't like it. But even if the switcher was the problem, I'm not going to do anything about it now. 

EDIT 2: 

I'm convinced the Steam Deck just needs SOME kind of scaler if not hooked directly up to an actual TV. But I don't need to move furniture around just to connect it to my DVDO Edge either. The RetroTINK-4K Pro that I already have is more convenient and the picture looks fantastic!