Aaron Parecki

  • Life Stack

    This is my "life stack" - the tools, apps, services and other things I use to manage my work and life. Last updated January 2018.

    I only add things to this page if I feel comfortable personally recommending them. You can help me out by following the links on this page so that I receive an affiliate commission when you buy them.

    Computing

    12" Rose Gold Macbook - The 2017 12" Macbook finally has an i7 processor! This is my main machine, I do everything on it! It even holds up okay for video editing in Final Cut.

    Dell 24" Monitor - This is my main monitor for my desk, it sits above my Macbook at eye level.

    GeChic 13" Monitor - An external monitor as thin as a Macbook Air, great for traveling.

    Logitech C930e Camera - Wide angle USB camera with a decent microphone.

    Jabra Speak 510 Bluetooth Speaker - This speaker is great for conference calls. Loud output and great microphone for picking up everyone at the table.

    Yubikey - Get this and use it for 2-factor auth on your Google, Dropbox, GitHub, and many other accounts.

    HooToo USB-C Adapter - This USB-C adapter has three USB-A ports, HDMI, and an SD card reader. Far more functional than the Apple brand adapter, but a little bulkier.

    Mac Productivity

    • 1Password - The best password manager, syncs between desktop and iOS, and great for secure notes and storing credit card info.
    • Todoist - A nice todo app with projects, labels, shared lists, and anything else you can think of.
    • Backblaze - Off-site backup. $5/mo for unlimited backups from a machine. I have one computer dedicated as my backup server, and all my other computers copy their files to it for backups.
    • Spotify - Music discovery, offline playlists.
    • NVAlt - A simple app to quickly manage and edit text files. Great for quickly taking notes.
    • Flycut - Simple tiny clipboard manager.
    • ShareMouse - Control another computer's mouse from your main computer. Works between Windows and OSX too!
    • Timelapse Assembler - No-frills utility for when you need to quickly create a video from a sequence of timelapse images.
    • Disk Inventory X - Shows what's taking up space on your hard drive visually.
    • Dropbox - The best syncing between multiple computers and iOS.
    • Bartender - Get your menu bar items under control.
    • Sip - Color palette management, with a sticky widget that makes your palettes easily accessible all the time.
    • Soulver - Better than a calculator, and a scratchpad for quickly doing math when a spreadsheet is overkill.
    • Audio Hijack - This lets you intercept system audio to record Skype/Hangouts calls, great for podcast interviews.

    Programming Tools

    • Sublime Text - My text editor of choice.
    • Coda 2 - The editor I use when I need to edit things directly on a remote server.
    • Tower - Git client.
    • Sequel Pro - MySQL database client.
    • Dash - Offline documentation for various programming languages and libraries.

    iOS Productivity

    • 1Password - The best password manager, syncs between desktop and iOS, and great for secure notes and storing credit card info.
    • Todoist - A nice todo app with projects, labels, shared lists, and anything else you can think of.
    • Spotify - Music discovery, offline playlists.
    • Dropbox - The best app for backing up your camera roll to your computer.
    • Google Maps - Replace the Maps app on your home screen with Google Maps. Supports offline areas, biking directions, and remembers your searches you do on desktop.
    • Aviary - A powerful but simple photo editor.
    • Termius - An SSH client for iPhone and iPad, and it also supports Mosh.
    • View Source - Lets you view the source of web pages on your phone.

    Tech Accessories

    ScanSnap ix500 - The best and fastest document scanner. Does double sided scans, handles receipts, and can chew through a stack of paper super quick.

    Synology DS1515+ - Five-bay network storage, with a great web interface and the ability to run apps like Plex.tv, your own private dropbox, and more.

    Brother Laser Printer - I've had this printer for years. It's small, the wireless is actually pretty good, and it supports automatic duplex printing.

    CyberPower 1500VA UPS - This UPS is surprisingly compact, and also provides a pure sine wave. I use this to power my Synology as well as a small home server.

    Ubiquiti Unifi Wifi Access Point - Ubiquiti makes enterprise-grade wifi hardware that is relatively easy to manage. This has replaced my Apple Airport at home.

    Bose QuietComfort 35 - Noise-cancelling Bluetooth headphones. Can connect to two devices simultaneously.

    Bose Soundlink Mini - A fantastic Bluetooth speaker with solid bass output, and is great when you want to watch TV while traveling, or for listening to music at the park.

    Anker 5-Port USB Charger - Five high-power USB ports so you can charge all your devices while traveling.

    Anker 10-Port USB 3.0 Hub - I leave this hub on my desk, and it's able to power external hard drives, and connect to all the USB accessories I use regularly. Combined with the USB-C adapter, this means I only need to plug one connector into my computer and I get all my USB devices.

    Anker 26800mAh Battery - This is the hugest battery. It charges your phone (or three) forever. Really any Anker battery is great though, so get a small one as well so you have a more portable one too.

    Optoma Pico Projector - This ML550 is a little bigger than the older one I have (the PK320), but is the same idea. The 320 is only 100 lumens, this is 500, and even mine can project an impressive picture.

    Personal Finance

    • Personal Capital - ($20 referral bonus for signing up) - I use this to track my investment accounts and other non-day-to-day finances. I don't use their investment products.
    • YNAB - The best personal budgeting tool. It has a companion iOS app that makes data entry easy on the go. My only regret is not starting to use it sooner.

    Quantified Self

    • FitBit Charge 2 HR+ - The FitBit records steps, heart rate and sleep.
    • Swarm - I use Swarm to check in to places I go. These are pushed to my website via OwnYourSwarm.
    • Toggl - Time tracking.
    • Overland - My GPS tracking app which pushes data to my own server.
    • Moves - Record your daily walking/cycling automatically from your iPhone.

    Home Theater

    • ViewSonic VT-4200L Commercial Display - These days it's almost impossible to find a TV that isn't "smart". The trick is to look for a "commercial display". I have the VT-4200L, which is out of production, but this ViewSonic CDE4302 looks similar.
    • Apple TV - This is a great device even if you're not already tied to the Apple ecosystem.
    • Yamaha YAS-106 Sound Bar - I finally replaced my receiver and surround speakers with a sound bar. This sound bar is surprisingly a lot better than the Bose sound bar.

    Household Appliances

    Instant Pot - This pressure cooker is cheap, simple to use, and makes cooking everything so much easier. Black beans in 40 minutes? Yes please. Also great for cooking squash, and makes rice or risotto super easy.

    Kitchenaid Immersion Blender - Paired with the Instant Pot, this blender makes cooking large batches of soups ridiculously easy.

    Cuisinart Kettle - This is a solid kettle with a few temperature options.

    NutriBullet Blender - This blender can chew through anything! I use it all the time for smoothies, soups and salsa.

    Philips Sonicare Diamond Clean - I actually started getting compliments from my dentist after I started using this electric toothbrush.

    Panasonic Electric Shaver - Waterproof, uses AA batteries, easy to clean.

    Belkin SurgePlus 6-Outlet - Give yourself a few more outlets and USB on your kitchen counters.

    Home Automation

    • Sesame - Finally a smart lock that installs over your existing deadbolt and fits even the craziest apartment doors.
    • Hue lights - Wireless multi-color light bulbs. The LED strips add a nice touch as well. I like that the bulbs themselves are not wifi, they use a different wireless protocol instead.
    • Nest Thermostat - Control and monitor the temperature of your home. At a previous apartment I actually requested that they swap out the built-in thermostat with this one.

    Musical Instruments

    Yamaha P85 Digital Piano - I've had this for over 10 years. It's a simple no-frills keyboard with hammer-action keys, so it feels almost like a real piano. The P85 is no longer in production, but it was replaced by the P115 which is similar. I like it because it doesn't have a lot of features.

    XKey 25-Key Musical Keyboard - This piano keyboard is as thin and stylish as a Mac keyboard, great for traveling. The keys are full size, but the action is nothing like real piano keys. It's enough to pluck out an idea, and is worth it because it's so conveniently small.

    Korg nanoKONTROL2 - This is a nice little control surface with 8 knobs and faders, and some buttons to control playback. I used this a lot during my 100 Days of Music project in Logic Pro.

    Bike Stuff

    Brompton Folding Bike - This bike folds into a tiny space, it's my main mode of transport, and I bring it inside to coffee shops and bars all the time.

    Cargo Node Xtracycle - This cargo bike is also a folding bike! It fits into relatively small spaces, and expands to a full size cargo bike that can carry a surprising amount of things!

    Quad-Lock Bike Mount for iPhone - This is a phone case with a connector that you can use to quickly clamp onto your bike handlebars. I have one mount on each of my bikes.

    AfterShockz - Wireless bone-conduction headphones that don't cover your ear. These are great for listening to podcasts while biking since you can still hear what's happening around you.

    Lumintrail Seatpost Rack - This seatpost rack quickly clamps on to my Brompton, giving it a huge increased carrying capacity paired with the bag below.

    Bushwhacker Trunk Bag - This bag sits on the rear rack. It's insulated so you can carry food, and has relatively large side pockets as well. I've also strapped things underneath it like tripods or a folding chair.

    Travel

    • Global Entry - Global Entry makes coming back through US customs a breeze, and also gives me access to the Pre-Check lane at security.
    • Spirit Airlines - Spirit often gets a lot of criticism for charging piecemeal for every single thing on the flight, but I actually prefer that. It means I get super cheap tickets if I'm flying with only a backpack.
    • Dark Sky - Hyperlocal weather. When it says "Heavy rain starting in 20 minutes" you quickly pack up and rush home.

    Services

    • Amazon Prime - Free 2-day shipping, and unlimited photo storage through Amazon Drive.
    • Stickermule makes the best custom stickers. I've ordered thousands of stickers from them over many years.
    • Linode is where I host my website and many other apps. I've been with them since 2007.
    • Dreamhost is where I host any Wordpress sites that I run, as well as several other small sites.
    • Mint SIM - Mint starts at $15/month if you pre-pay a year, and includes unlimited SMS and voice and 2GB of data. Instead of immediately charging you for data overages, they'll throttle you down to 3G speeds and you can pay for more LTE data if you want. I now pay $15/month most months, and if I'm traveling and use lots of data I can pay $10 for another 1GB of data.

    Video Equipment

    Samson XP106w PA - We use this PA system at DonutJS. It comes with a wireless mic, and has an additional XLR input, as well as Bluetooth. This makes it easy to have a stage mic as well as play music during breaks. There is a 1/4" output which I use to record the audio. The wireless mic receiver is USB, and you can also plug it into a computer and it shows up as an audio device.

    Portable Multi-Camera

    Here is a list of all the components of my Multi-Camera Video Recording Rig.

    Wireless Multi-Camera

    Graveyard

    Formerly recommended products and services that I no longer recommend for various reasons.

    • Turboscan - Turn your iPhone into a scanner. It'll find the edges of a page and straighten and brighten the image automatically.
      • 2017-12-01 Dropbox has built-in scanning and straightening so I just use that now
    • Airport Extreme - My favorite wifi access point. Works flawlessly with every device, and easy to set up and manage.
      • 2017-06-04 I replaced my Airport Extreme with Ubiquiti gear and have been very happy
    • Ting - My favorite cell phone carrier. They only bill for what you use, and since I don't use any voice minutes or SMS (everything goes through iMessage or Hangouts), I don't pay for any SMS or voice!
      • 2017-12-27 I've been using Mint for a couple months now with no issues. I pay $15-25 now instead of $27-37.
    • Prompt 2 - For those times when you really need an SSH client on your phone.
      • 2017-12-01 I switched to Termius since the new Prompt app was a (expensive) paid upgrade from Prompt 2.
    • Dropvox ✭✭✭✭✭ - Voice memos that record straight to your Dropbox account.
      • 2017-11-05 Switched to JustPressRecord which is just as easy to use and saves recordings to iCloud drive.
    • Wunderlist - A very nice todo list. Syncs between desktop and iOS.
      • 2018-01-14 Switched to Todoist after Wunderlist was acquired by Microsoft.

    Others

    Here are some pages documenting tools other people use.

    If you want to see things I'm currently interested in, check out my Amazon Wish List.

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