Ordered a Raspberry Pi. It seems silly not to have one...
a pico-itx PSU so that I can fix the internets.
Should be with me tomorrow, until then only one PC in the house can get on the internets (and I should really sort it so the work one can too)
Haven't bought yet but am keeping my eye out for a supermegaonlinedeal for a 256Mb SSD. Still too expensive for my tastes right now.At last sub £100 delievered, worth it now
A 2 GB HDD for Junior's PC, since he has used Steam (yuk! ) to fill his old one to capacity with various shoot-em-up games.
Imaging-fest later in the week.
And a 2GB external USB drive to make image backups of Mrs F's laptop, which is used for work etc.
We had a bit of an incident a few months ago, which came close to nuke from orbit, and this was not a happy option.
So I did promise to do some image-based backup on it.
So another image-fest.
R
A 2 GB HDD
Surely TB not GB R?
Er, yes... :-[A 2 GB HDDSurely TB not GB R?
It doesn't seem so long ago since 2GB seemed big!
Haven't bought yet but am keeping my eye out for a supermegaonlinedeal for a 256Mb SSD. Still too expensive for my tastes right now.
That would definitely be too expensive.Er, yes... :-[A 2 GB HDDSurely TB not GB R?
It doesn't seem so long ago since 2GB seemed big!
This seems to be a recurring theme ...Haven't bought yet but am keeping my eye out for a supermegaonlinedeal for a 256Mb SSD. Still too expensive for my tastes right now.
I'd flog you an old SD card and reader for £20 if I could find one small enough ...
You might like to look at the HP microservers, which ( did ) come with a cashback making them cost a stupidly low sum.
I have 2 here as Lowe Towers, replacing several old behemoths.
The bits to make a little low power, low price, server for home based on an Atom mini-ITX motherboard and a not top speed pair of disks.
Return arranged. New box ordered, from different supplier. I could do without two lots of P&P.
A package from A & A containing a Firebrick 2500 arrived this morning. :thumbsup:
Hooked it up to a Vigor 120 modem and all was good - line retrained from 6503571 to 7154016 on connection (still only 20CN here). A quick test with speedtest.com gave me my best ever download rate (6.93Mb/sec up from around 6.3). Firewall needed a bit of tweaking to get stuff through to the server but that was it.
Next up - native IPv6. Getting tempted with the thought of a second line as the Firebrick will do line bonding (goes away to count the pennies...)
A package from A & A containing a Firebrick 2500 arrived this morning. :thumbsup:
Hooked it up to a Vigor 120 modem and all was good - line retrained from 6503571 to 7154016 on connection (still only 20CN here). A quick test with speedtest.com gave me my best ever download rate (6.93Mb/sec up from around 6.3). Firewall needed a bit of tweaking to get stuff through to the server but that was it.
Next up - native IPv6. Getting tempted with the thought of a second line as the Firebrick will do line bonding (goes away to count the pennies...)
:thumbsup:
You will have fun!
Your config will now be more-or-less the same as mine.
I have an FB2700 hanging off a vigor120 on an AAISP native IPv6 line too.
( the FB 2500 and 2700 are equal in this respect )
PM or e-mail with any questions if you want.
I don't promise good replies!
Regards,
2001:8b0:b7:1::3
Have you used a Linux based machine before? Expect the desktop to be sluggish, use it on an HDMI screen, not a RCA video (which really sucks) and it should be OK.
Mine are fine for their embedded usages. Wireless can be interesting but there are enough people around here who can help if you have questions.
I await the result of your programming (in Python?) with baited breath!
Just ordered a couple of RaspPi to replace the one I destroyed yesterday - connecting the GPIO pins to a live circuit while the raspi was booted :facepalm:That shouldn't kill it. They must have seriously cut some corners in the circuits, left off protective caps and resistors.
Just ordered a couple of RaspPi to replace the one I destroyed yesterday - connecting the GPIO pins to a live circuit while the raspi was booted :facepalm:That shouldn't kill it. They must have seriously cut some corners in the circuits, left off protective caps and resistors.
The dev boards I use get live disconnects/connects over GPIO pins all day long and it doesn't do damage.
Just ordered a couple of RaspPi to replace the one I destroyed yesterday - connecting the GPIO pins to a live circuit while the raspi was booted :facepalm:That shouldn't kill it. They must have seriously cut some corners in the circuits, left off protective caps and resistors.
Precisely - I do have a Gertboard too but wasn't using it, and hurrying to finish the project because i was getting hassled to do something else. At least it was £30 worth of raspi not a couple of grands worth of Mac I was messing about with.
I believe that's exactly what they did, to keep costs down (lots of people won't use the GPIO). Hence all the recommendations to add buffering if you're going to be mucking about on breadboards.
Sounds good.
I await the result of your programming (in Python?) with baited breath!
PS Can I have a copy?
OK, it was last week, but while it's updating itself with 65 updates, I can sit here at the Desktop and do other things - I've bought a Netbook - ASUS EeePC Seashell 1015BX. Best deal was from local Currys. PC World didn't stock! £199. Wanted it now for imminent ski holiday.
Only one snag with it - Win7Starter - I feel a Linux project due to start after the ski trip... :o
That looks really cool. I've never really felt the urge to put a keyboard on my eyeThing. Does it work ergonomically, combination of keyboard and touch?
Trying to embrace an ethos of paperless living,
bidet?Trying to embrace an ethos of paperless living,
It's fine till you need to go for a poo...
Trying to embrace an ethos of paperless living, today I took delivery of an awesome little Doxie One scanner.
It's so much fun, and so easy to use. Next step is to tackle the filing cabinet full of papers in my spare room...
Trying to embrace an ethos of paperless living, today I took delivery of an awesome little Doxie One scanner.
It's so much fun, and so easy to use. Next step is to tackle the filing cabinet full of papers in my spare room...
Would be interested to hear your thoughts on this once you've had a proper play with it - I'm currently weighing up whether to go for this or the 'Go' model for myself, also for the purpose of going as paperless as possible.
It's £50 more for the Go, but it does then go up to 600dpi which would be handy for a couple of projects I have planned (archiving family photos and converting into photobooks amongst others).
Also, how are you dealing with the scans? Evernote seems to be a choice of many.
Yesterday - a kobo touch e-reader. Seems good now I've worked out how to put Gutenberg ebooks on it :)
Toto Washlet.bidet?Trying to embrace an ethos of paperless living,
It's fine till you need to go for a poo...
Whatever the collective noun is for Raspberry Pis.Punnet.
Today, I've ordered not one, not two, but three better* motherboards - described as "for parts or not working, customer returns, purchased from a major IT distributor". P7P55D-E Pro for only £17 each. None of these are left now, but see if the seller has anything else you might like: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/from_bits_to_systems/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=
I'm gambling on at least one of them working. Keep an eye on For Sale anyway for any surplus from me.
* Better than the plain P7P55D-E I have already while being compatible with the same CPU.
That's a ver' ver' nice case, although I tend to steer clear of the window panels these days, opting instead for (probably snake oil) soundproofing foam.
A couple of Energenie power sockets and a RasbPi transmitter to turn them on and off.
The WOL is part of the Broadcom NICs firmware not the motherboards. When you boot the server it may display a post message about the NIC in which case hit "Ctrl S" at that point to get into the firmware for the NIC or if post messages have been suppressed hit "Ctrl S" lots of times as it boots and hope to do it at the correct point. The WOL is OS independent
You could get more control than WOL by using IPMI though..
Why do these things still not have dual DVI connectors? *boggle*
The big graphics cards we order for our developers have dual display port on them, and then you chuck the dongle of choice in the display port or just hook them up to display port capable monitors.
One of these cute little chappies - just look at that ridiculous bezel!:
(http://cnet2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2015/01/13/b80d694b-5c6a-4321-999f-697679dbf76f/thumbnail/770x433/840162588f9b8b81a2f8a49fafa8c8bd/dell-xps-13-2015-product-photos-01.jpg)
Always carried around huge Dell Precision workstation laptops, but more and more I do most of my commissioning work from home rather than having to be onsite (a little Intel NUC sat on site during commissioning phase with RDP). I have a excellent workstation desktop - so it seemed daft to have to carry a heavy laptop (and I cycle everywhere, so a 3kg laptop/psu is not a good thing!). I'd rather be sat at home with two massive monitors, a warm, comfy chair and a decent stereo.
It's a bit of a risk - but I think it'll work out. I've never had such a cheap laptop!
Should arrive early next week - it left China last weekend.
Excited.
The big graphics cards we order for our developers have dual display port on them, and then you chuck the dongle of choice in the display port or just hook them up to display port capable monitors.
it is funny watching folks trying to plug a hdmi lead into them though, they are almost similar, but slightly not.
D.
One of these cute little chappies - just look at that ridiculous bezel!:
(http://cnet2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2015/01/13/b80d694b-5c6a-4321-999f-697679dbf76f/thumbnail/770x433/840162588f9b8b81a2f8a49fafa8c8bd/dell-xps-13-2015-product-photos-01.jpg)
Always carried around huge Dell Precision workstation laptops, but more and more I do most of my commissioning work from home rather than having to be onsite (a little Intel NUC sat on site during commissioning phase with RDP). I have a excellent workstation desktop - so it seemed daft to have to carry a heavy laptop (and I cycle everywhere, so a 3kg laptop/psu is not a good thing!). I'd rather be sat at home with two massive monitors, a warm, comfy chair and a decent stereo.
It's a bit of a risk - but I think it'll work out. I've never had such a cheap laptop!
Should arrive early next week - it left China last weekend.
Excited.
Let me know how you get on with it. I am in the market for a new laptop and that (or the even rarer 15" variant) are at the top of my very short list.
One of these cute little chappies - just look at that ridiculous bezel!:
(http://cnet2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2015/01/13/b80d694b-5c6a-4321-999f-697679dbf76f/thumbnail/770x433/840162588f9b8b81a2f8a49fafa8c8bd/dell-xps-13-2015-product-photos-01.jpg)
Always carried around huge Dell Precision workstation laptops, but more and more I do most of my commissioning work from home rather than having to be onsite (a little Intel NUC sat on site during commissioning phase with RDP). I have a excellent workstation desktop - so it seemed daft to have to carry a heavy laptop (and I cycle everywhere, so a 3kg laptop/psu is not a good thing!). I'd rather be sat at home with two massive monitors, a warm, comfy chair and a decent stereo.
It's a bit of a risk - but I think it'll work out. I've never had such a cheap laptop!
Should arrive early next week - it left China last weekend.
Excited.
Let me know how you get on with it. I am in the market for a new laptop and that (or the even rarer 15" variant) are at the top of my very short list.
Asus GeForce GT 730 (http://www.asus.com/uk/Graphics_Cards/GT730SL2GD3BRK/specifications/) - one of the most powerful fanless graphics cards. Only fifty quid from Amazon.
I'll have to get into a bit of gaming to justify the 2 GB RAM and 384 cores! Wonder what's suitable for middle-aged hand-to-eye coordination?
(http://dlcdnwebsite.asus.com/existone/websites/global/products/AF16kOby2ccmEwBF/GT730-2.png)
That screen cap looks detailed.
The only downside is it's highlighted a few tagging issues, mainly with compilation albums, but I can live with that.
I have a vague recollection of a JF gig at Umist a very long time ago.
Aluminium plate* to place under my laptop save the vents getting covered when on a soft surface.May I recommend an A3 piece of wood? I use the drawing board (a bit bigger than A3 obv. ) that I used to use for my 'O' level Tech. Drawing homework. Nothing special; just a bit of plywood. Light, big enough for laptop and flounder (logitech marble mouse) or trackball of your choice and at 5mm thick no flex.
The only downside is it's highlighted a few tagging issues, mainly with compilation albums, but I can live with that.
At the risk of stating the bleedin' obvious: mp3tag - http://www.mp3tag.de/en/index.html (http://www.mp3tag.de/en/index.html). Jibble with tags and file locations to your heart's content.
I am currently rejibbling 35 John Fahey albums which, over the network, is somewhat slow going :-\
It's worth getting into MP3Tag's more advanced features to do batch jobs, if you haven't yet, if any batch jobs would help. eg. if your compilation albums currently have artist names in the filenames (which you can grab to put in the tags).
On eBay, I bought a new cheap small PC for the kitchen, where I've got fed up using the underpowered netbook. It's not the most powerful PC in the world, but a Core i3-4160, with 8GB of RAM, and a 120GB SSD should be adequate for most of the functions that I require of it. ...
Very neat. Is it fanless?
It's possible to use even a 95W i7 with a fanless cooler, but maybe not in such a small case.
From cpubenchmark.net (https://cpubenchmark.net/)
Pentium G620 = 2267 single thread rating = 1310 two cores
i3 3240 = 4321 single thread rating = 1815 two cores, four threads
i7 920 = 4995 single thread rating = 1159 four cores, eight threads
and a modern i7
i7 4790K = 11,246 single thread rating = 2533
Dave
Edit: the switch is going to have to move somewhere out of sight though coz the blinkenlights will make me homicidal once night has fallen. Also, what kind of cabbage puts the ports on the front of a thing like that ???I was wondering just yesterday why the ports on the switch upstairs were on the back but the lights on the front?
Edit: the switch is going to have to move somewhere out of sight though coz the blinkenlights will make me homicidal once night has fallen. Also, what kind of cabbage puts the ports on the front of a thing like that ???
In another step on the road to becoming a fully-fledged Fruit Addict, this afternoon I cycled the mile and a half over to John Lewis and returned with an Apple TV (http://www.apple.com/uk/appletv/). A bit spendy, compared to a Chromecast, but it seems to play very nicely - especially with my existing iStuff. Like all iThings the main joy is the UI, which is much more enjoyable to use than my previous attempts with Raspberry Pi, MiniATX boxes and teeny little wireless keyboards.
At this point I'm becoming increasingly sure that true to Cupertino's plans my next PC will be running OSX (no way am I going to Windows 8 :sick:). Most likely an iMac, or perhaps a Mini if my monitor is still going strong when I upgrade.
The only problem is that pushing my music library through the TV has only highlighted how poor the inbuilt speakers are. Sadly my decrepit stereo amp isn't up to the job (no optical in, no remote) so an expensive trip to Richer Sounds for an AV receiver might be on the cards one day...
The only problem is that pushing my music library through the TV has only highlighted how poor the inbuilt speakers are. Sadly my decrepit stereo amp isn't up to the job (no optical in, no remote) so an expensive trip to Richer Sounds for an AV receiver might be on the cards one day...
The only problem is that pushing my music library through the TV has only highlighted how poor the inbuilt speakers are. Sadly my decrepit stereo amp isn't up to the job (no optical in, no remote) so an expensive trip to Richer Sounds for an AV receiver might be on the cards one day...
Then double the budget for new and/or extra squeakers, string to attach them to your new Shiny Thing and Strong Drink to recover from the inevitable rolling on the floor with a torch gripped between your teeth plugging everything into everything else.
DAMHIKT
Also a TP-LINK TL-PA8030P AV1200 Homeplug Kit (http://www.scan.co.uk/products/tp-link-tl-pa8030p-kit-av1200-3-port-gigabit-passthrough-powerline-starter-kit) for network over mains, with convenient "passthrough" power sockets.
Also a TP-LINK TL-PA8030P AV1200 Homeplug Kit (http://www.scan.co.uk/products/tp-link-tl-pa8030p-kit-av1200-3-port-gigabit-passthrough-powerline-starter-kit) for network over mains, with convenient "passthrough" power sockets.
These bloody things are letting me down already. Conking out in the evenings. Spells of a few seconds to a couple of minutes with no apparent signal.
I just started my first foray into the world of the Raspberry Pi. A 2B with SD card, housing and power supply.It arrived this morning. It is soo small!
I'm intending to use it for a smart TV using Kodi. It was only E20 more than a VGA to HDMI adapter that I was going to buy to connect the lap top to the TV.
These bloody things are letting me down already. Conking out in the evenings. Spells of a few seconds to a couple of minutes with no apparent signal.
They are sensitive to noise on the mains, so if they are dropping out at a particular time of day, what electrical appliances are on then that aren't on at other times?
Some people say to put the 8's where the 4's are and the 4's in the empty slots; others say it makes bugger all difference.
Stupid question, because I used to know this stuff, but times have a passed since I last built a PC - I'm buying a swanky new iMac and avoiding the Apple RAM premium (£160, I don't think so dears). So I have the base model with 2*4GB filling half the four slots. Now I was going up this to a full set of 4*4GB because 16GB is probably more than enough for what I do. However, I note that 2*8GB isn't that much more expensive.
So, can you do 2*4GB + 2*8GB for 24GBs? Assuming speeds and everything match up.
Stupid question, because I used to know this stuff, but times have a passed since I last built a PC - I'm buying a swanky new iMac and avoiding the Apple RAM premium (£160, I don't think so dears). So I have the base model with 2*4GB filling half the four slots. Now I was going up this to a full set of 4*4GB because 16GB is probably more than enough for what I do. However, I note that 2*8GB isn't that much more expensive.
So, can you do 2*4GB + 2*8GB for 24GBs? Assuming speeds and everything match up.
On a lot of the new Macs the memory is soldered directly onto the board, yes the RAM as well. I'm 100% the macbook, macbook air, and macbook pro are this way and I wouldn't be surprised if the imac isn't the same.
D>
Nine Chrome tabs, three Windows Explorer, two Excel, Thunderbird and VLC is using 3.7 GB out of 16 on this box. The big fukka upstairs has 32 GB and maybe one day I'll find out why.
Nine Chrome tabs, three Windows Explorer, two Excel, Thunderbird and VLC is using 3.7 GB out of 16 on this box. The big fukka upstairs has 32 GB and maybe one day I'll find out why.
Have some server virtualisation and you'll soon eat up that RAM quite easily.
I have datasets that take 45 minutes to re-calculate. On the plus side, on cold days, the laptop fans do a good job of warming my office.
I appear to have had a Keyboard-Nexus5X purchasing interface, it will be very interesting to see how the Marshmallow Oy!-App!-you-aren't-on-screen-so-REALLY-fuck-off-and-go-to-sleep feature works. Allegedly can lead to >30% increase in battery life.
I appear to have had a Keyboard-Nexus5X purchasing interface, it will be very interesting to see how the Marshmallow Oy!-App!-you-aren't-on-screen-so-REALLY-fuck-off-and-go-to-sleep feature works. Allegedly can lead to >30% increase in battery life.
Two days use and currently on 47%
I'm impressed.
Now I have to put it all back. It starts tidy, but it goes all dreadlocks in a swimming pool when you stop looking at it.
The world's most cantankerous USB hub (do those things ever work?)
Ah, I was thinking something else, with iMacs true you'll have screens for each, though you can still screen share if you don't like twisting in your seat or want to relocate it elsewhere. It's what I do with my old Mac Mini, it lives in the meter and IT cupboard under the stairs.
Anyway, I'd recommend you use Dropbox, simply put all the files you might want to share in the Dropbox folder and let the internet take the strain. It'll update to the latest versions on whatever machine you happen to start up.
Yeah, it's all the Nuance engine, though the Mega-Global Fruit Corporation of Cupertino, USAnia will never admit it.
especially if you are Kim and it picks you up freakishly well.
[...] Medusa's bad hair day of wires [...]
One of these
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121518549335?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
Didn't need it, but it makes interesting reading, and should help diagnose USB funnies
One of these
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121518549335?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
Didn't need it, but it makes interesting reading, and should help diagnose USB funnies
Always handy to have one of those around, especially when trying to troubleshoot iThing charger fussiness.
Precision's not fantastic, but if the gadget is drawing less than about a milliPirateNinja[1] it's usually worth breaking out the breakout cables and using a proper meter.
[1] 1 Watt-hour/sol
There's a thought, I have a Fluke, so I could get better results for the price of a USB lead (aka, zero)
Where's the fun in that?
A drawer organiser, again for the new desk, so that we can actually find stuff in the drawer.
Apple sent me a replacement mouse. The wrong kind. There's only two types. My fury burns unabated. They may name a tropical storm after it. Hurricane Miffy.
Good to know.
Will probably invest in the Pro version when they come out, as we've got an abundance of 48V PoE kit (and an aversion to extra dongles and wall-warts), and an increasingly flaky old Netgear thing running DD-WRT as an access point that could do with being retired.
2* RaspPi (v2) + 2*touchscreens for the same, to replace the aging miniITX box that I use as a firewall and the, equally aged, Core2Duo box that is my fileserver. Neither are heavily taxed on the CPU front so a PI makes a lot of sense.
2* RaspPi (v2) + 2*touchscreens for the same, to replace the aging miniITX box that I use as a firewall and the, equally aged, Core2Duo box that is my fileserver. Neither are heavily taxed on the CPU front so a PI makes a lot of sense.
Doesn't the Pi's single GbE port make it an unsuitable candidate for a firewall? Or are you vLan tagging traffic?
2* RaspPi (v2) + 2*touchscreens for the same, to replace the aging miniITX box that I use as a firewall and the, equally aged, Core2Duo box that is my fileserver. Neither are heavily taxed on the CPU front so a PI makes a lot of sense.
Doesn't the Pi's single GbE port make it an unsuitable candidate for a firewall? Or are you vLan tagging traffic?
That's what USB NICs are for! :) VLAN tagging, one NIC firewalls are no-firewalls!
I don't know about the 2, but the original Raspberry Pi's USB (and therefore Ethernet) performance is pants. Probably okay for firewalling a modest internet connection, but I'd hesitate to use it as a file server.
Why do you need a touchscreen on a firewall or server anyway?I don't know about the 2, but the original Raspberry Pi's USB (and therefore Ethernet) performance is pants. Probably okay for firewalling a modest internet connection, but I'd hesitate to use it as a file server.
I'll let you know. If it turns out they are rubbish for that sort of thing then TLD will have a couple of touchscreen devices to practice her Python developing on!
Why do you need a touchscreen on a firewall or server anyway?I don't know about the 2, but the original Raspberry Pi's USB (and therefore Ethernet) performance is pants. Probably okay for firewalling a modest internet connection, but I'd hesitate to use it as a file server.
I'll let you know. If it turns out they are rubbish for that sort of thing then TLD will have a couple of touchscreen devices to practice her Python developing on!
Fair enough, though my approach is to bring the Pi to the screen and keyboard rather than the other way round.Thanks for the reminder, time to do a backup on mine.
IME once a Raspberry Pi gets to that stage you're re-imaging the card anyway.
Fair enough, though my approach is to bring the Pi to the screen and keyboard rather than the other way round.
IME once a Raspberry Pi gets to that stage you're re-imaging the card anyway.
A Nest, to replace the aged CH thermostat. One more step towards a connected home. Next up, maybe, Philips Hue.
A Nest, to replace the aged CH thermostat. One more step towards a connected home. Next up, maybe, Philips Hue.
What do you think? I'm planning on replacing my CH system at some point (the whole lot is pretty knackered) and it seems like a nice idea...
In the interests of learning and privacy, I'm planning on building my own as a learning exercise. All the bits are there waiting for me to start prototyping it.
A new Samsung 1TB SSD as additional storage for my PC, as the existing 1TB SSD is nearly full.In Windows, probably easiest to use the Disk Management tool (run diskmgmt.msc). That will let you create partitions, and format it as required, and give it a drive letter.
I've forgotten, as its not a boot drive, do I have to do anything to it, such as Fdisk, to make a partition, and then format it?
There's an iThing lurking downstairs. Fortunately it's a present, so I don't have to install iTunes on anything.
A new Samsung 1TB SSD as additional storage for my PC, as the existing 1TB SSD is nearly full.In Windows, probably easiest to use the Disk Management tool (run diskmgmt.msc). That will let you create partitions, and format it as required, and give it a drive letter.
I've forgotten, as its not a boot drive, do I have to do anything to it, such as Fdisk, to make a partition, and then format it?
You can generally stick 48V up something that speaks 802.3af and it'll just get on with it.
So, with the RasPi recording Garage Temps, I find the idea of running a fully fledged weather station tempting.
A few mouse clicks later, I learn Maplin sell one for sixty BRITTISH pounds and with the addition of a RFM01 transceiver, the Pi can be made to read the data that the Maplin weather station collects. This expenditure could of course be justified as it will mean my planned smart central heating controller will be able to take account of weather conditions. My theory is detecting a drop in temperature and turning the Central Heating on sooner rather than later could save some energy.
And with all the heavy rain we've had lately, it'd be nice to see some data on a graph!
So, with the RasPi recording Garage Temps, I find the idea of running a fully fledged weather station tempting.
A few mouse clicks later, I learn Maplin sell one for sixty BRITTISH pounds and with the addition of a RFM01 transceiver, the Pi can be made to read the data that the Maplin weather station collects. This expenditure could of course be justified as it will mean my planned smart central heating controller will be able to take account of weather conditions. My theory is detecting a drop in temperature and turning the Central Heating on sooner rather than later could save some energy.
And with all the heavy rain we've had lately, it'd be nice to see some data on a graph!
I've got a Maplin weather station. The device described as a rain gauge is in fact a means of monitoring the spider population.
A 'new' rack mounted server (SGI Supermicro Twin Server) from ebay. The intention is to use one node for home storage and media purposes and the other for database and html development.I think we'll call that a failure.
Been waiting ten days but finally someone in the UK has got some examples of the latest Nvidia GPU graphics cards in stock, which should make the 4k monitor sing and dance.
A 'new' rack mounted server (SGI Supermicro Twin Server) from ebay. The intention is to use one node for home storage and media purposes and the other for database and html development.I think we'll call that a failure.
The server contains 12, yes twelve, fans and consequently is slightly quieter than a737 engine spooling upvacuum cleaner. I tried disconnecting one of the pairs of fans, but the BIOS just drove the remaining fans faster. There is nowhere in the house it can't be heard.
My rule of thumb is that if you want a quiet server, you've got to mantle it from parts that don't have 'server' written on them and sacrifice the space efficiency.
I'm not sure why any semi-decent graphics card won't drive 4k, it's not really speed, it's bandwidth. A fairly middle-of-road Radeon in my iMac drives my 5k and a second 1920x1200 panel.
In silence. I think there's a fan. I've never actually heard it.
Avoid Seagate.
HGST are good.
WD Red/NAS friendly disks are, I feel, a bit of a con if you are using software raid.
Buy them from two different vendors or at different times so you don't get disks from the same batch, thus more likely to fail at the same time.
And generally, I buy cheaper/more - both my main and backup server are RAID1
$ df -g .
Filesystem GB blocks Free %Used Iused %Iused Mounted on
/dev/[CENSORED] 353836.90 104281.90 71% 278788938 80% /[CENSORED]
root@backup01:/# zpool list
NAME SIZE ALLOC FREE CAP DEDUP HEALTH ALTROOT
backup 1016G 966G 50.2G 95% 1.00x ONLINE -
root@backup01:/# zpool status
pool: backup
state: ONLINE
scrub: none requested
config:
NAME STATE READ WRITE CKSUM
backup ONLINE 0 0 0
mirror-0 ONLINE 0 0 0
sdb ONLINE 0 0 0
sdc ONLINE 0 0 0
errors: No known data errors
On a related note, I consider it sensible to swap out RAID drives as a matter of course after N years. The question is, what's a sensible value for N?
On a related note, I consider it sensible to swap out RAID drives as a matter of course after N years. The question is, what's a sensible value for N?
On a related note, I consider it sensible to swap out RAID drives as a matter of course after N years. The question is, what's a sensible value for N?
Surely the point of RAID1 is you don't need to worry about swapping a drive out until it fails and the controller sends you an email?
Good points about different vendors and batches. I've suffered from bad batches of drives at work, thankfully I don't have to deal with that any more...Code: [Select]$ df -g .
Filesystem GB blocks Free %Used Iused %Iused Mounted on
/dev/[CENSORED] 353836.90 104281.90 71% 278788938 80% /[CENSORED]
The joys of a single 345TB filesystem...anyway...
At home though, I don't use RAID on my backup server as it is a VM running on an ESXi box, so I can't do hardware RAID (at the VM level, and don't want to trust it at the Hypervisor level). As the data is backed up elsewhere too I've opted for simple zfs mirroring instead of software RAID.Code: [Select]root@backup01:/# zpool list
NAME SIZE ALLOC FREE CAP DEDUP HEALTH ALTROOT
backup 1016G 966G 50.2G 95% 1.00x ONLINE -
root@backup01:/# zpool status
pool: backup
state: ONLINE
scrub: none requested
config:
NAME STATE READ WRITE CKSUM
backup ONLINE 0 0 0
mirror-0 ONLINE 0 0 0
sdb ONLINE 0 0 0
sdc ONLINE 0 0 0
errors: No known data errors
The ESXi box currently has 32GB RAM, 2x128GB SDD and 2x2TB HDD and I've portioned off a 1TB chunk on each HDD that's visible to my backup VM which sees them as whole drives which zfs is consuming. As you can see the zpool is 95% full.
I've only got one spare SATA port on the motherboard (unless I disconnect the DVD drive) so I was going to add in the new 2TB drive and shuffle stuff around so I use the whole of the 2 of the 2TB drives as mirrors, leaving one 2TB free for other VM images.
Options for lots of storage (my brother and I are going to be each other's offsite backup using rsync...) are:-
1) Get 3 x 4TB drives and use these to replace the existing 2 x 2TB drives. The old 2TB drives I can then use as offsite backups for important stuff by taking one in to work every month and bringing the old one home. This gives me 6TB of mirrored storage.
2) Find a 4 port 6Gbps SATA controller that works well with the free version of ESXi I'm running so I can add more drives as required, there's space for 2 more 3.5" drives in the designated bays and then I've got 2x5.25" bays free that could fit another 3 HDDs. An 8 port controller might future proof it, especially if I want to add more SDDs.
3) Move the bulk backup storage to a separate HP Microserver and get 4x3TB drives for that and do RAID. This leaves the 2x2TB drives free for VMs (mostly my pet projects).
Hmm. Decisions. I'm leaning mostly towards #2 as it keeps everything in one box and costs about the same as #3.
I looked into a PCIe SATA conroller and came to the conclusion tbe cheap ones were crud. The optimal path seemed to be buying a 2nd hand Dell/LSi card. But as I wanted (at the time) ZFS to handle the RAID and that meant re-flashing the controller to do non-raid I decided against it. That and the extra power consumption.
You don't say too much about how much storage you need?
Why don't you just throw out the optical drive and add another couple of disks in a new ZFS mirror? My now 2 yr old server has never had an optical drive in it.
If you have drives in the existing pool of the same age from the same vendor, you could buy two new 2TB disks, resilver your existing mirror to have one new/one old disk and your new mirror to have one old/new disk...
I looked into a PCIe SATA conroller and came to the conclusion tbe cheap ones were crud. The optimal path seemed to be buying a 2nd hand Dell/LSi card. But as I wanted (at the time) ZFS to handle the RAID and that meant re-flashing the controller to do non-raid I decided against it. That and the extra power consumption.
I was looking at £120-ish for a reasonable 8 port SATA controller.
You don't say too much about how much storage you need?
6TB or so would be nice and stop me having to mess around with it for another 3 or 4 years. If I effectively write off the current 2x2TB drives as probably dying soon then I'd like to replace with 4x3TB.Why don't you just throw out the optical drive and add another couple of disks in a new ZFS mirror? My now 2 yr old server has never had an optical drive in it.
I used the optical drive today to upgrade to ESXi 6.0.0, but then that's the first time probably since the initial install. I would like more SATA ports as I've got a couple of ideas for projects that require a reasonable bit of fast storage so I may need to get a few more SSDs in it, and the motherboard's two 6gbps SATA ports are already taken with the existing SSDs.
If you have drives in the existing pool of the same age from the same vendor, you could buy two new 2TB disks, resilver your existing mirror to have one new/one old disk and your new mirror to have one old/new disk...
Thought of that but I'd want more storage, I can't remember enough of zfs configuration to know whether I can do a mirror of 2x2TB + 1x4TB. That way I'd then have a seperate 2x3TB mirror to take me to 5TB total...
You will need to make sure ESXi or whatever hypervisor you are running is compatible with it.
* networking (it may have a wifi connection so it can get to NTP via a hotspot on my iPhone and get the time right as Pi doesn't have a battery powered internal clock to keep the time when it's not powered on)
* networking (it may have a wifi connection so it can get to NTP via a hotspot on my iPhone and get the time right as Pi doesn't have a battery powered internal clock to keep the time when it's not powered on)
You can get realtime clock modules for the Pi, might be more reliable than a phone as a hotspot.
* networking (it may have a wifi connection so it can get to NTP via a hotspot on my iPhone and get the time right as Pi doesn't have a battery powered internal clock to keep the time when it's not powered on)
You can get realtime clock modules for the Pi, might be more reliable than a phone as a hotspot.
It's only a one-off connection it needs in order to do a single ntpupdate at boot time to get the correct time. It won't need the wireless network during the game. My phone is in my bag which will be close enough for the hotspot to work. Just have to remember to enable to hotspot before the game and disable it afterwards (I don't want to leave it on.)
The Pi Zero will already have a 4-port USB hub on top of it so adding another module may be a pain in the arse if the relevant pins are occluded (it comes without a GPIO header, and I don't want to have to solder one on).
(Except won't you be using the GPIO header for the 7-segment displays and switches?)
(http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20161119/12dff192653634bc9e0b5c8866103b6c.jpg)
MrsMekon has wanted one for forever, and the imminent release of the D3 and D5 has caused a decent price drop - our Neato Botvac Connected is called e-Nid. She has LIDAR, the boys love her, and think of her as a little Google car.
She is brilliant. Genuinely amazed at her navigation abilities, and her foibles are endearing - she has a little wander to plan her activities, then methodically cleans the rooms she's scanned. She takes about 45m to clean our downstairs, and sends a notification when she's done. House is cleaner than when my mother in law stays.
If I had the temperament, there would be all sorts of clever hacking to be done, but I don't. Hopefully there will be Google Home or IFTTT integration in the future. As it is, we're manually triggering a clean through the app when we leave the house, and have scheduled cleaning when the boys are in bed.
Maintenance is straightforward, consumable parts are cheap. Navigation works, and the house is noticeably cleaner. I welcome our new robot overlords.
A tangerine 7" 8GB Amazon Kindle, because they're on special (presumably for Black Friday) at £29.99 each ...
my computer has been trying to make me upgrade to windows 10 for a while now . i tried to use google earth today and apparently it is no longer works with my win 7 despite working fine for months >:(. as i can still use google earth on my phone i will stick to use windows 7 as windows 10 seems unnecessary for my light use .
What are running there Larrers, your own bloody datacentre? Taking on Amazon mano-a-mano? Archiving everything that writhes and groans on the internet?
My Buffalo is quite tardy, but that's bovines for you. Useless for mozzarella too. It's called MonsterMunch. Given the names of all our computers, it's probably best we won't be naming any children.
Dell XPS13 Laptop
Finally decided against a MacBook as I really needed external ports and Software I'm familiar with.
Loving the boot speed of the SSD drive.
@Wombat, I've used a free partition manager from AOMEI successfully to jibble partitions on a laptop drive without it crashing, nomming the data or joining the Tory party. Probably worth a try.
Thanks for that Kim. What kind of CPU/MB temperatures to you see?
coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Physical id 0: +31.0°C (high = +80.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 0: +27.0°C (high = +80.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
Core 1: +29.0°C (high = +80.0°C, crit = +100.0°C)
nct6776-isa-0290
Adapter: ISA adapter
SYSTIN: +33.0°C (high = +0.0°C, hyst = +0.0°C) ALARM sensor = thermistor
CPUTIN: +39.5°C (high = +80.0°C, hyst = +75.0°C) sensor = thermistor
AUXTIN: +37.0°C (high = +80.0°C, hyst = +75.0°C) sensor = thermistor
PECI Agent 0: +31.0°C (high = +80.0°C, hyst = +75.0°C)
Sensor 0 34.0°C
Sensor 1 25.0°C
Sensor 2 43.0°CThe trusty Asus laptop is refusing to charge unless I physically apply pressure to the charging connector. It was one of the cheapest laptops you could buy at the time so I can't really complain at 2.5 years service. I will one day learn to solder so I can replace the charging port.
Following a power outage, the drive never properly spun up again, and the box is now dead.
The machine was only ever an experimental build, so no great loss.
But I'm already getting gripes about when will the webmail be back up.
Bugger off and use the IMAP clients I set up for you all!
(http://balius.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/~timo/stuff/JYE_Scope.jpg) (https://www.banggood.com/Orignal-JYE-Tech-DS0150-15001K-DSO-SHELL-DIY-Digital-Oscilloscope-Kit-With-Housing-p-1093865.html)
A 200kHz single channel scope, for £16 !
I'm not expecting a great deal, the bandwidth is low, and it's a single channel with no external trigger, but it should be fun to experiment with. :)
A Dell XPS 13 2 in 1 and an XPS 15. One for me and one for my wife. Finally moving away from the doctor shunning purveyors of overly expensive and now unexciting technology. Hoping it goes well...
A Dell XPS 13 2 in 1 and an XPS 15. One for me and one for my wife. Finally moving away from the doctor shunning purveyors of overly expensive and now unexciting technology. Hoping it goes well...
Same purchase I made 6 months ago. You did get them from the outlet, didn't you?
A Dell XPS 13 2 in 1 and an XPS 15. One for me and one for my wife. Finally moving away from the doctor shunning purveyors of overly expensive and now unexciting technology. Hoping it goes well...
Same purchase I made 6 months ago. You did get them from the outlet, didn't you?
(http://balius.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/~timo/stuff/JYE_Scope.jpg) (https://www.banggood.com/Orignal-JYE-Tech-DS0150-15001K-DSO-SHELL-DIY-Digital-Oscilloscope-Kit-With-Housing-p-1093865.html)
A 200kHz single channel scope, for £16 !
I'm not expecting a great deal, the bandwidth is low, and it's a single channel with no external trigger, but it should be fun to experiment with. :)
I was just thinking the same but I don't appear to be able to connect to the website, it would have been a little addition to my radio box.
D.
That looks like an ideal basis for a lighting evilness detector for barakta. *clicky*
(http://balius.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/~timo/stuff/JYE_Scope.jpg) (https://www.banggood.com/Orignal-JYE-Tech-DS0150-15001K-DSO-SHELL-DIY-Digital-Oscilloscope-Kit-With-Housing-p-1093865.html)
A 200kHz single channel scope, for £16 !
I'm not expecting a great deal, the bandwidth is low, and it's a single channel with no external trigger, but it should be fun to experiment with. :)
That looks like an ideal basis for a lighting evilness detector for barakta. *clicky*
I was just thinking the same but I don't appear to be able to connect to the website, it would have been a little addition to my radio box.
It's always amusing that almost every extra board you buy for a Raspberry Pi Zero W, costs more than the processor board itself !
A 200kHz single channel scope, for £16 !
A 200kHz single channel scope, for £16 !
Just finished building mine (mildly irksome tiny pads on the through-hole stuff that a beginner might find challenging, it benefits from the flux pen treatment, but no real surprises). The case is some of the cheapest nastiest self-untapping plastic rubbish you're likely to come across, but it does appear to work...
(http://www.ductilebiscuit.net/gallery_albums/random/2017_06_06_20_57_20.sized.jpg)
Seems to agree with the Rigol to within the sort of precision you can reasonably eyeball on such a tiny display (it doesn't do measurements).
Shame there isn't space for a 9V battery inside the case really, though it's drawing the best part of 120mA, so it wouldn't last long.
I really need to do something about the wee screamy fans though.
I really need to do something about the wee screamy fans though.
Swap it for a Procurve J9028B. It's the only way to be sure.
[Insert standard rant about rackmount kit all being noisy bastards.]
All this up-down scrolling stuff is nonsense anyway. The One True Scrolling Device is the ring on my Kensignton trackball. It's like a jog/shuttle control - turnwise for forward, widdershins for backward. If the bloody thing had a middle mouse button, it would be perfect.
Not bought, rather blagged.
All this up-down scrolling stuff is nonsense anyway. The One True Scrolling Device is the ring on my Kensignton trackball. It's like a jog/shuttle control - turnwise for forward, widdershins for backward. If the bloody thing had a middle mouse button, it would be perfect.
Still the perfect HID for Defender, IMHO.
Are your bulbs running on ZigBee protocols? Should be fairly easy to get into. It is also possible to build your own but ZigBee (XBee) stuff starts to ramp the price up a bit.
Are your bulbs running on ZigBee protocols? Should be fairly easy to get into. It is also possible to build your own but ZigBee (XBee) stuff starts to ramp the price up a bit.
I'm tempted to change the wake up word from "Alexa" to "Computer".
Are your bulbs running on ZigBee protocols? Should be fairly easy to get into. It is also possible to build your own but ZigBee (XBee) stuff starts to ramp the price up a bit.
Yes they are. The ones I bought are just white ones not vary coloured. Via the Amazon Echo you can change the brightness and turn them on and off but you cant change the colour temperature (if you have coloured ones you cant change the colour). You can dived the lights into different groups and control them by group name. If you want to change temperature or colour you need to get the Philips home hub and get Alexa to control them via that.
For what we need at present the inbuilt home hub in the Echo Dot has sufficient functionality.
I'm pleased with it and Mrs Pcolbeck is too. Currently we keep asking Alexa random things and turning the lights up and down then giggling. Its like being in Start Trek. I'm tempted to change the wake up word from "Alexa" to "Computer".
Shouldn't you rename it Hal?
The future sounds complicated. I'm still operating lights with a switch.
The one I've bought is based on an ESP8266[1] (so it can speak WiFi directly). My plan is to modify the firmware to raise the PWM frequency to about 10kHz (barakta can perceive the flicker upto about 6kHz, so the default 500Hz is no good), hack around the resulting instability, then see about re-writing it for stand-alone colour temperature changing according to the position of the sun behaviour. Anything else is a bonus.
The one I've bought is based on an ESP8266[1] (so it can speak WiFi directly). My plan is to modify the firmware to raise the PWM frequency to about 10kHz (barakta can perceive the flicker upto about 6kHz, so the default 500Hz is no good), hack around the resulting instability, then see about re-writing it for stand-alone colour temperature changing according to the position of the sun behaviour. Anything else is a bonus.
I've got a fair way with LED 5050 strips to colour cast the room based upon time of day. I'm using adafruit feather huzzahs or Wemos D1 Mini Pros for processing, and both have ESP8266 onboard. A quick dash out to wunderground api and I know the sunrise/sunset times for the day. I use similar code for Frebber's nightlight, which sets max lux levels based upon time of day, or the blinds which track the sun.
Its all automated using an NTP time signal. Hook me up if you get stuck.
Had some cat 6 installed at home. And it doesn't work, sigh. Had to buy a cheap cable tester. Missing connection on one of the strands. Sparks will be back next week to sort it.
Nothing madly exciting but a Samsung 860 EVO SSD of 500giggles and cables to suit.
The game SSD on my home PC is completely full of one flight sim (DCS World) and the updates were failing. Can't have that.
An Nvidia GTX1080 Ti 11Gb. That'll make Zwift fly!
A little Bluetooth nuggle for my headphones. I was just going to buy some wireless headphones but they seem to waver between cheap and likely shit and ouchingly expensive. I lose headphones at a rate of about once a month which could promise to be an expensive habit very quickly and I'm happy with £30ish Sennheiser earbuds (I buy a couple of pairs at a time, may as well be prepared). Plus, if the batteries die, I can plug them directly into the damn phone.
And it is little. I'm not sure what was in the small car-sized Logitech box that used to pipe Blueteeth into my stereogram.
Ta!
Ta!
By-the-by, it works but sounds a bit shit* which may be a case of you get what you pay for, it ain't a £160 pair of earbuds. Probably fine for a noisy train.
*seems to over-amp and distort a little. Ironically the bluetooth box that used to plug into my stereo did the opposite, it was so quiet you had to turn the stereo up to 35 (eleven is so passé) otherwise it was like being serenaded by mice.
You don't have a hissing box of reproducing cables: (http://www.greenbank.org/misc/IMG_0033.JPG) ?
An Ethernet cable cover is shirely the boot that stops the tab snapping off the RJ45 when you wrestle it from the other hissing cables...
An Ethernet cable cover is shirely the boot that stops the tab snapping off the RJ45 when you wrestle it from the other hissing cables...
Also good for rebooting and wiping the configuration of your Cisco switch inadvertently when you plug a cable into port 1.
(https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/support/docs/field-notices/636/fn63697_01.jpg)
I hope Cisco took whoever put the mode switch in that position on the front of the chassis out the back and gave them a serious seeing to.
That one caused me and network engineers all over the world much pain until someone noticed what was going on.
I thought of taking a picture of my office, but TBH there's no way I can compete with Kim's Teetering Tower of Tech.
I thought of taking a picture of my office, but TBH there's no way I can compete with Kim's Teetering Tower of Tech.
I think there's a 5.25" floppy drive somewhere in the lower levels. And some 700c inner tubes.
There was a DEC VT320 in my attic for years until Mrs Pcolbeck made me dispose of it a couple of years ago :~(
Wait a sec, you needed to buy an ethernet cable?
I thought of taking a picture of my office, but TBH there's no way I can compete with Kim's Teetering Tower of Tech.
I think there's a 5.25" floppy drive somewhere in the lower levels. And some 700c inner tubes.
There was a DEC VT320 in my attic for years until Mrs Pcolbeck made me dispose of it a couple of years ago :~(
There was a DEC VT320 in my attic for years ...Feh! Modern rubbish. You want a VT-100 or, if you're a skinflint, a Plessey PT100. :)
Quote from: pcolbeckThere was a DEC VT320 in my attic for years ...Feh! Modern rubbish. You want a VT-100 or, if you're a skinflint, a Plessey PT100. :)
Got an APC C5-650 UPS from my dad when visiting last week, he'd rescued it from a skip so it was free. Battery looks in good condition so no idea why it was thrown away. Will test it out when I'm in long enough to keep an eye on it.
I bought a laptop today which runs Windows 10.
Will I die horribly?
TIA.
I bought a laptop today which runs Windows 10.
Will I die horribly?
TIA.
I bought a laptop today which runs Windows 10.
Will I die horribly?
TIA.
Install Classic Shell. It doesn't change anything under the bonnet but it hides the nasty Fisher Price GUI and makes it behave (mostly) like pre-hated versions of Windholes.
The random whiny fan noises being emitted by that PC over there ^^^^ are slowly but surely making me Very Cross. Would someone please tell me that it would be a terrible waste of a thousand of Missis Kwin's pounds to buy one of Messrs Quiet PC's silent offerings?
Just received and set up my new iMac. For my old one started running slowly and intermittently restating and then just stopped.I bought a Macbook Air about a year ago.
It was 7 years old so bought a new shiny 27" model. The screen is amazing. Setup was very fast. Once through the network, language stuff installing MS Office and a few other things was blisteringly fast!
Its 2012 27" predecessor is DEDD.
Apple durability and fixability is 'disappointing'.
Though it highlights the problem with all-in-one computers. If part of the computer fails, or just becomes obsolete, need to replace the whole thing.Its 2012 27" predecessor is DEDD.
Apple durability and fixability is 'disappointing'.
Lasted almost a decade; that is not too shabby.
Though it highlights the problem with all-in-one computers. If part of the computer fails, or just becomes obsolete, need to replace the whole thing.Its 2012 27" predecessor is DEDD.Lasted almost a decade; that is not too shabby.
Apple durability and fixability is 'disappointing'.
Monitors usually last much longer. Or if you do want to upgrade to something bigger/better, can use the monitor with an old computer, or TV, or games console, or give it away.
A Mac Mini plus a monitor of your choice wouldn't take up much more desk space.
Though it highlights the problem with all-in-one computers. If part of the computer fails, or just becomes obsolete, need to replace the whole thing.
Though it highlights the problem with all-in-one computers. If part of the computer fails, or just becomes obsolete, need to replace the whole thing.
Which includes laptops, though unlike iMacs, they come in 'cheap and low-spec' where that sort of thing's less offensive.
Shortages and scalping are making building a new pc very problematic atm.
Looks like webcam are back in stock and the prices have subsided a little too.
I've ordered one for the FiL which will be delivered on Thursday. Apparently.
So I went down the mechanical keyboard rabbit hole, and and now have a Keychron k2, small form factor wireless keyboard with brown switches. The wife complained about the noise about 2 minutes into me setting up the keyboard, and requested that I don't use it at home. The brown switches are supposed to be relatively quiet compared to the blue and green switches that I had been considering. The rest of the team are going to love me hotdesking in the office tomorrow.
Indeed. I have a 2009 vintage monitor which is working perfectly. It was ex-display when bought, & was used with the main household desktop until that was relegated to reserve last year & the monitor went with it. Still used whenever Mrs B & I both want to use a computer.Though it highlights the problem with all-in-one computers. If part of the computer fails, or just becomes obsolete, need to replace the whole thing.Its 2012 27" predecessor is DEDD.
Apple durability and fixability is 'disappointing'.
Lasted almost a decade; that is not too shabby.
Monitors usually last much longer. Or if you do want to upgrade to something bigger/better, can use the monitor with an old computer, or TV, or games console, or give it away.
A Mac Mini plus a monitor of your choice wouldn't take up much more desk space.
This post brought to you from my new laptop :thumbsup:
Decided it was high time to pension off my teeny-weeny clockwork Asus laptop and aThis reply is typed on a refurbished Dell Latitude 5491 laptop with an i5, 8GB & 500 GB . . . . oh, & running Open Shell. Purchased a mere two moons ago.shiny newrefurbished Dell Latitude with an i5/8GB/512GB will be mine all mine shortly :thumbsup: Then we can play a game called “Copy Stuffs to New Toy”.
Edit: if I start copying Stuffs to a network drive now it might be finished by the time the replacement arrives…
Ah, I do need to buy a fingerprint reader, as I utterly detest having to "sign in" to an OS on my own PC in my own office in my own locked house whenever I start it. So far managed to convince this PC to stay sans login, but failed with the laptop when I had to rebuild it, and I gather Windows 11 insists.