I'm pleased with how this little system is coming together. Do people use the term "pleased" anymore???... You don't hear it used often, but I think it applies here.[emoji4] There's not a lot left to do... a little paint; a few additions to the patch panel. The power cord for my Surface Pro comes tomorrow, so that will be the last item I need to finish this project up.
Having decided to use the Surface Pro as my backup, there are a couple of things I need to do. The surface Pro only has 128GB of storage; not nearly enough for a copy of my music library. I have plenty of external drives around, so no problem adding an external hard drive, but where would it sit???... Won't fit on the laptop stand, and sitting on the table with a cable running to it would offend my sensibilities (I think we've been through this before). The best way to do it, I think, is to run a USB cable (inside the robotic arm) to the patch panel, and mount a USB hub and the external hard drive inside the rack. However, they MUST be mounted securely in there, because the case I currently use to transport this system gets turned every-which-way, and the rack is often sitting on its side inside the case (that's the way the case has to sit to fit in the space provided in my minivan). In my Large System, I have a rack Shelf mounted backward (facing inside the rack), on which my My DMX and IMP Line Combiner are mounted. I could do something similar, but it would add some weight. I kinda like how much lighter this system is since I removed the steel drawer. I have to give this one some thought.[emoji848]
I haven't done a thing to address goal #5... Building a convertible Table/Case on wheels is still a good idea, but maybe this isn't the right time to build it. The Floating Facade bracket was made very specifically for my current DJ table, so to build a new table might require a new bracket (or significant modifications). I'm having some second thoughts about this goal.[emoji1]