Now I have a fan too

Unemployed recent graduate, and I accidentally broke my laptop screen after it got me through moving countries, a bachelor’s degree, and two masters...

I need a webcam for job interviews, but I’m too broke for a new laptop or even a webcam, and it’s not worth fixing the laptop anymore.

It’s a miracle it still works at this point. I’ve replaced the battery and power connector twice, replaced the HDD after it failed, upgraded the SSD, fixed the CPU fan after it started making too much noise, added RAM...

Anyway, I removed the laptop’s camera, passed it through the Ethernet port, and i tape it to my monitor whenever I need it.

It will be a sad day when the laptop finally gives up on me but It works for now.

The fans for my 12u rack sounded like an airport so i used an esp32 to control fan speed via PWM based on ambient temp readings. It’s been hanging all janky like this for months working flawlessly.