Kiwi Farms didn't save my original massive effortpost- I came back after a long nap with nightmares of these fucking switches, and the nightmare came true- everything was deleted. Fuck the piece of shit Xenforo, and fuck myself for trusting it.
Special thanks to
@Jeffrey Lebowski, for imparting upon me the knowledge of two lifetimes worth of installing dimmer light switches.
"THE PLATE"
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General infodump:
This plate is a non-standard double-gang plate with an unused cat3 port (landline phone).
I ad-hoc assume it's cat3 because of the era it seems to be have sold in, considering that the shield is nonstandard, IE cannot find anywhere on the internet or in catalogues. Seems to be sold at a dollar store or department store- The shield does not look to be of modern standard, especially since the screw holes seem to be on a lower plane than the actual shield.
The sliders are called "Skylark Dimmers," developed by Lutron corp.
Similar color model here:
View attachment 3485254
Similar slider dimmer model stripped down:
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Skylark is a linear dimmer slider for Ralph's giant studio light that very likely came with his rental, in his basement- nobody else would be using dimmers like that otherwise. Maybe Ralph rented the place because it's a basement "studio."
Apparently it's used for high luminosity studio lighting and the such, so the light box Ralph has in his reflection corresponds perfectly. Ralph could be in a basement.
First model of the Lutron Skylark I could find was from 2007.
Entire light switch popularity timespan (and perhaps earliest known date for house existence): 1980-2007
1980s is when sliders started to become extremely popular, as found in
Radio Shack catalog archives.
I also find ~1985 to be the most likely period for when the technologies coincide.
There seems to be no HVAC in his home, he seems to be in a basement.
The upper East coast, due to proximity to the company that invented it, seems to be the most likely place where it would have spread first, radiating from Lutron Electronics, Inc., Suter Road, Coopersburg, Pennsylvania, USA.
Good information to derive:
Figuring out which floor Ralph is on. Using the echo to figure out furnishings, room layout, rough room measurements. Using his head size as a reference for the room size, for understanding if the time period had a building code described in anything listed under rent agencies that allow residence for people with bad credit and a felonious/criminal history.
Jefferey Lebowski also mentioned that most shoddy jobs use 3 wires instead of 6, so that could be a clue for Ralph's wiring, on top of the information for where the stud is, based on how the plate is screwed into the wall.