Posts made by 1337

When running debian (as a guest) in a virtual environment, it's a good idea to install the debian cloud kernel.

It's an official kernel flavor optimized for a virtual environment and compiled without features you can't use in a VM.

That makes it:

• use less memory
• run faster (as it can skip certain code)
• boot faster

Debian is pretty lean as-is but with the cloud kernel, memory usage is getting into realm of the ridiculous.

Debian 11 minimal installation running under KVM with the standard kernel. Uses 70MB RAM which is great.

After upgrading to the cloud kernel.
Uses only 54MB RAM.

How to install

Run as root:

apt install linux-image-cloud-amd64
reboot

After reboot verify with:

uname -r

On debian 11 (bullseye) it should now say:
5.10.0-19-cloud-amd64

This is the official cloud kernel so updates and everything will work as you'd expect.

If you are running debian on a public cloud, you are almost certainly using a cloud kernel already.

@Yonah-S said in Alternative to never in stock Ubiquiti EdgeMax line:

@Pete-S first time I am hearing that . Interesting.
I mean - they make a great product but their customer and channel support service has always been non-existent. That model can only work for so long.

It's common to see in companies that are not actually the real designers behind their products.

They buy an already designed product from an ODM manufacturer (Original Design Manufacturer). The buyer can make minor customizations to the product and have it labeled however they want but it's the manufacturer's design and intellectual property.

A tell tale sign is when models doesn't have a unified look through out the product line. It's because the products are designed and manufactured by different companies.

Anyway, the company can only make a half assed attempt to support it because it's not designed in-house. After a while they'll find another product from another ODM manufacturer and go with that instead. So no continuity.

I don't know if that is the case with Ubiquiti but some products in their line sure looks like it.

Looking at the number of employees working at Ubiquiti versus their revenue, also suggests that (most?) of their products are not designed in-house. That's just speculation of course.

@Yonah-S said in Alternative to never in stock Ubiquiti EdgeMax line:

BTW... Ubiquiti just reported they are cancelling that whole line..... and cancelling open PO's I have for customers of mine going back over a year and a half........sigh.............

Didn't the guy that was the engineer behind the edgerouter OS quit two years ago or something, and all major development work more or less stopped after that?

@gjacobse

OK, I checked now and the GX420T and GX430T is the same printer but with different dpi print heads.

If you can tell the application that prints to print differently depending on which printer you are printing to, everything will be fine.

If you can't, you have to replace those two GX430T printers with GX420T models.

Or put another way - if you want to have printers that are drop-in replacements for each other, you need to buy just GX420T printers (or other 203 dpi models).

@gjacobse

OK, I for sure think your GX420T printer is 200 dpi and the GX430T is 300 dpi.

Zebra printers uses ZPL and works with dots, like pixels. So if you just take the same print data and send it both to a 200 and a 300 dpi printer, you get different size prints. Your 300 dpi printout will be 2/3rds the size of the 200 dpi printout.

The print driver or print application need to recalculate the print data it sends, from inches to dots, depending on what dpi your printer has.

@gjacobse said in Zebra GX420t/430t configuration:

We use a number of Zebra 420t430t printers for charting. On occasion they need to be replaced and it seems we are at that stage of things.

I normally only need to program the network and print quality, however I have recently unboxed two printers that are not printing with the expected font/size.

I have cycled through all the settings using the Zebra Setup Utility but the replacement still has a smaller font/size.

Does anyone have experience with this model of label printer?

Does it print with different sizes when it's printing from the application as well?

I'm asking because normally there is information in the print data that is sent to the printer what font and what size to use.

Otherwise it might just be a difference between firmware versions.

Another difference could be that you have different models. 200 dpi print heads and 300 dpi print heads.

On Zoho you can assign a default signature to an email alias. I'm sure all major email providers can.

If you have multiple domains you have one inbox but you can send and receive mail using:

• [email protected]
• [email protected]
• [email protected]
• etc

To each of these you create an email signature. And then set it up so that the correct signature is assigned to the correct email adress.

Email signatures can easily be copy pasted manually. And that is the right choice if we are talking about 10-20 employees with a handful of aliases.

If it's more sure, you can write scripts that does it. But are you a developer? If not, I'd search for 3rd party solutions to this problem.

First hit I found just to get you an idea:
https://workspace.google.com/marketplace/app/email_signature_management_for_gmail/64634722053
And here is a service that does it for you:
https://www.signaturify.com/
And another one that works with different email providers and also CRMs:
https://www.signitic.com/

@WrCombs said in Standardize Email Signatures?:

Okay I found it, I know how to do it now, but the problem is they have like 10 child companies they want to be able to have different signatures for. which isn't possible using Append Footers.

Footer and signature is not the same thing.

Footers are usually disclaimers and that sort of thing. Same for everyone.

Signature is, well the signature and unique for everyone.

@scottalanmiller said in ssh to new cloud instance?:

@Pete-S said in ssh to new cloud instance?:

If you add another admin in the cloud control panel, is an account for that user created on all cloud instances that person can access?

In Vultr, there aren't users in the cloud panel at all. There are keys that you can choose to deploy at deploy time for root. Other than that, if we wanted to deploy keys (as an example), we'd do that through our management system (script, Salt, Ansible, etc.). I would not want the cloud platform to be touching my users.

OK, got it.

Does that also mean that only one person can have access to the actual Vultr account as well? I'm guessing it's multi-user.

I'm trying to figure how things work at a large scale but have limitied experience how it's done by common cloud operators.

So how are aws, azure, gcp etc handling ssh logins to new cloud instances?

Are they using:

• ssh passwords?
• ssh private keys?
• ssh certificates?
• something else?

If you add another admin in the cloud control panel, is an account for that user created on all cloud instances that person can access?

@Dashrender said in Windows 11 versus 10:

@stacksofplates said in Windows 11 versus 10:

@Dashrender said in Windows 11 versus 10:

@scottalanmiller said in Windows 11 versus 10:

@siringo said in Windows 11 versus 10:

I just hate these bloody upgrades or whatever you want to call them.

When I was younger it was exciting/interesting, now it's just a PITA.

I hate them because I know they will move or make you have to do something unimportant, that you have always done, be done differently. Where's notepad? Oh it's called Scribbler now. Where's Windows Explorer? Oh it's called File Finder.

Why do we have to learn new names for the same old crap.

Imagine doing that with cars. Press the accelerator, oh it's called the Make it faster button now!

I don't care about the new tech tricks and improvements, I just want to use my PC and get my work done so my day is as stress free as possible.

Old grumpy bastard complaining, yeah, probably. Don't worry, it'll happen to you.

Really only a Windows thing. They rename to distract from the lack of innovation.

my question is - do they need innovation? Other than performance improvements - is windows 10/11 any better than windows 7? performance is an under the hood thing...
This is a business tool - not some stupid home gadget - Windows doesn't need flashing lights.

Is this what people said when windows 95 came out and replaced 3.11? I don’t get the hate from people for changing the looks. As time goes on, people find better ways to interact with systems esp with touch screens being prevalent and the ever changing landscape of screen sizes.

Sure - things definitely were easier in Win95 compared to Win3.11 - but I would say that things aren't any easier today than they were in Win11 vs Win95.

I've used a Mac literally like 3 times - I have no clue if their interface has become more efficient over the years. and the same from a desktop POV on Linux based systems (though I would love to see some examples how the Linux desktop GUI has made things better workflow wise over the past whatever timeframe you like).

Windows 95's big UI change was the introduction of the start menu and taskbar.

The guy who did the UI work back then said that he was unimpressed with Windows 10 because he thought nothing had changed in more than 20 years.

@stacksofplates said in Windows 11 versus 10:

Is this what people said when windows 95 came out and replaced 3.11?

Basically yes. Every version of Windows has been a very small incremental update from the users perspective.

The overlapping windows user interface was established with Windows 2.03 and to be honest, it worked pretty much the same then as it does today.

Sometimes there has been under-the-hood changes but usually also very incremental. With the notable exception of Windows NT which was a completely different OS under the hood.

Windows 95 didn't exactly replace 3.11 because Microsoft replaced 3.11 with Windows NT 3.1 for business users and Windows 95 for consumers. Different kernels under the hood.

@Dashrender said in Another new server question:

@siringo
Bay1 and 2 show SSD, Bays 3-5 show HDD, are you sure those are Solid State Drives?? I mean I see the QLC (I assume quad level cells), but it's worth confirming!

It's SSD because it says SSD on the same line

It's actually these: https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1223-thinksystem-5210-entry-6gb-sata-qlc-ssds

Micron 5210 SSD drives with Lenovo stickers and maybe firmware adjustment for Lenovo.

@siringo Looks good all in all but the 5210 1.92TB SSDs are a peculiar breed.

Normal read intensive SSDs have a write endurance of around 1 DWPD - which means you can write 1.92TB new data on a 1.92TB drive every day of it's warranty life. And can write about 28K IOPS - so 28 thousand 4K blocks of data written to disk per second.

The Micron 5210 SSDs are specifically made to replace 10K HDDs at a very attractive price point. So while they are superior to 10K drives, compared to other read intensive SSDs they have low write performance (2K versus about 28K IOPs) and low write endurance (0.2 to 0.8 versus 1.0 DWPD).

If those drives are a good pick or not depends on the workloads you are running on the hypervisor. If you're running an SQL server or something you might want to pick another 1.92TB SSD.

Did Lenovo have other 1.92TB SSD options at a similar price point?

@JaredBusch said in Windows 11 versus 10:

@Pete-S said in Windows 11 versus 10:

Or is it just the usual make-a-new-version-so-we-can-market-and-sell-upgrades?

You know they haven’t sold windows upgrades for years now right?

Sure but I didn't mean that. New OS often requires new hardware which means a new oem license for MS and also new opportunities to sell M365 and other services. I'm sure they have this down to a science.

I haven't had time to run Windows 11 yet.

From a sysadmin's perspective, what is the difference between these OSes?

Or is it just the usual make-a-new-version-so-we-can-market-and-sell-upgrades?

@Dashrender said in Another new server question:

@scottalanmiller said in Another new server question:

@Pete-S said in Another new server question:

@siringo said in Another new server question:

Thanks everyone for the thoughts and advice.

This server is going into an environment where what is chosen will, eventually, attract criticism, not formerly, but by way of passing comments.

I would be better to suggest a server with bells and whistles rather than one that did the job and cost less. But with that said, putting in place an overspec'd server would also be criticised.

If I were to select Dell as the vendor, that would be acceptable, Lenovo possibly less so.

I'll use the info from this post and go and take another look at what I can get my hands on.

I think I'll look for something with all SSDs that gives me 4TB of useable space, that's all I need, with some type of disk redundancy.

64GB RAM and a single CPU.

It will run Server 2022 with the Hyper-V role and house around 6 VMs.

I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks again.

CPU

Only needing 64GB of RAM suggest getting an E-2200/2300 series Intel CPU.

That's what used to be the called the E3-1200 series. Entry-level servers with Xeon CPUs that are similar to their desktop i7 equivalent. Up to 8 cores, max 128GB RAM (E-2300).

You pay for 16 cores with Windows so get what you feel is appropriate for the VMs running. But 6 cores is probably good enough.

RAM

• 4 x 16GB is probably your best bet
• 2 x 32GB will also work fine with 100% performance but might be more expensive

SSD

4TB options:

• 2 x 4TB RAID 1 (lower failure rate with only two drives)
• 3 x 2TB RAID 5

If you can get a good deal go for that - whatever combination.

Dell adds 200-300% on their SSD prices though. IMHO only enterprise customers get a fair price from Dell.

SSD price 3.84TB SATA enterprise drive

• Manufacturer $600-$700 (Samsung PM893)
• Lenovo $1,180 (maybe it's a special offer - I don't know)
• Dell $2,172

Server

Dell

• R250 is their entry level range (R240 old model)
• R350 has the same CPU range (R340 old model)
• R6515 (AMD Epyc) if you need more CPU or fast NVMe SSDs

Be aware of backplane configurations. Hotswap ability and backplanes is standard on high-end servers but not on entry level servers.

Lenovo SR250 seems to be their entry-level but it has more advanced option compared to Dell's R250.

I looked quickly but this all seems solid. I'd concur.

The number of RAM modules will depend more on the channels used by the CPUs - assuming you don't want to gimp yourself.

Xeon E-series has only two memory channels, so it just needs two RAM modules (UDIMMs) for maximum performance. And can't handle more than four UDIMMs in total.

Higher end server CPUs have more memory channels and use a different type of RAM module (RDIMM) which can handle more modules per channels.

@JaredBusch said in Another new server question:

I would get the 8 core processor.

It's may be surprising to see but Pentium CPUs have been around a long time as server CPUs.

They're low power, dual core, but still high frequency and most importantly has ECC support (which normal desktop CPUs like i3, i5, i7 don't).

Not a good choice for a virtualization server but a good choice for a single purpose physical server that has no use for lots of cores - like a file server, a backup server or similar.

@siringo said in Another new server question:

Thanks everyone for the thoughts and advice.

This server is going into an environment where what is chosen will, eventually, attract criticism, not formerly, but by way of passing comments.

I would be better to suggest a server with bells and whistles rather than one that did the job and cost less. But with that said, putting in place an overspec'd server would also be criticised.

If I were to select Dell as the vendor, that would be acceptable, Lenovo possibly less so.

I'll use the info from this post and go and take another look at what I can get my hands on.

I think I'll look for something with all SSDs that gives me 4TB of useable space, that's all I need, with some type of disk redundancy.

64GB RAM and a single CPU.

It will run Server 2022 with the Hyper-V role and house around 6 VMs.

I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks again.

CPU

Only needing 64GB of RAM suggest getting an E-2200/2300 series Intel CPU.

That's what used to be the called the E3-1200 series. Entry-level servers with Xeon CPUs that are similar to their desktop i7 equivalent. Up to 8 cores, max 128GB RAM (E-2300).

You pay for 16 cores with Windows so get what you feel is appropriate for the VMs running. But 6 cores is probably good enough.

RAM

• 4 x 16GB is probably your best bet
• 2 x 32GB will also work fine with 100% performance but might be more expensive

SSD

4TB options:

• 2 x 4TB RAID 1 (lower failure rate with only two drives)
• 3 x 2TB RAID 5

If you can get a good deal go for that - whatever combination.

Dell adds 200-300% on their SSD prices though. IMHO only enterprise customers get a fair price from Dell.

SSD price 3.84TB SATA enterprise drive

• Manufacturer $600-$700 (Samsung PM893)
• Lenovo $1,180 (maybe it's a special offer - I don't know)
• Dell $2,172

Server

Dell

• R250 is their entry level range (R240 old model)
• R350 has the same CPU range (R340 old model)
• R6515 (AMD Epyc) if you need more CPU or fast NVMe SSDs

Be aware of backplane configurations. Hotswap ability and backplanes is standard on high-end servers but not on entry level servers.

Lenovo SR250 seems to be their entry-level but it has more advanced option compared to Dell's R250.

@AdamF said in Alternative to never in stock Ubiquiti EdgeMax line:

@scottalanmiller Any recommendations for your new "go to" product(s) for this? MicroTik? Pfsense/Netgate? Something else?

Pfsense, opnsense, vyos and other x86 firewalls are not in the same price range as a cheap edgerouter - when you factor in needed hardware.

You're in the $200-or-more range for these options with the lowest grade hardware. $1000 and up, if you want rackmount enterprise grade hardware.

I've used this kind of Supermicro hardware for pfsense on many occasions. It uses Intel's low power CPUs, so TDP like 15-20W. Easily mounted in a network rack next to switches, patch panels and whatnot.