Best posts made by PhlipElder

@JaredBusch said in DHCP Question...:

@Kelly said in DHCP Question...:

@JaredBusch said in DHCP Question...:

The DHCP range is always the full subnet. That is standard, even if Windows lets you do stupid shit.

Here is my home router.
Instead of visibly showing ranges to exclude, outside of windows, you typically tell it hat range to pass out. I'm passing out .31 - .254
Primary DNS is my PiHole on .4
Secondary DNS is the router on .1

Can you clarify something for me @JaredBusch. You stated that DHCP range is always the full subnet, but yours is from .31 to .254. I feel like I'm missing something.

DHCP always serves the entire subnet it is defined on.

If you tell it the scope is a /24, it serves .1-.254 always.
You then subsequently define which part of the scope you want it to hand addresses out on.

In windows that is done by "excluding" things.
On most other platforms, it is done by telling it what range to supply to clients that ask for an address. Hence the .31 through .254

But regardless of what you specify, either as a range to use or range to exclude, DHCP still serves the entire scope.

This is why you can make reservations outside of the listed range as in my .7 printer and .10 phone.

When we define the DHCP Scope we can set the delivery IPs define it to 10.100.10.31 - 10.100.10.225 or the like. One does not need to define the scope according to the full subnet whatever that may be.

Side note:

I've been renewed in the Microsoft MVP Program! :0)

@scottalanmiller said in Uptime Kuma - Self Hosted Monitoring:

If you want a dashboard, Netdata does that out of the box. If you want a pretty dashboard for Zabbix, then that's when Grafana is going to shine. Build an amazing sexy dashboard for your Zabbix data on Grafana to make management happy about a monitoring solution.

I've had some fun with Grafana, Telegraf, and InfluxDB but it's been a while.

The above were done during one of our SMB S2D cluster proof runs. Grafana was great for helping to pinpoint what was going on while it was happening. We were able to do some pretty good tuning to pull off great IOPS and Throughput numbers from a little Intel Xeon E3 single socket platform with SATA SSDs for cache and SAS HDDs for capacity.

@momurda said in Interviewing Candidates for a Jr. IT Systems Administrator Position- Good Questions to Ask?:

@phlipelder said in Interviewing Candidates for a Jr. IT Systems Administrator Position- Good Questions to Ask?:

In candidates watch out for this one that they may ask: "What PSA do you use?"

We avoid script jockeys at all costs.

What is PSA in this context?

Professional Services Automation software. It allows a support person to ask questions and follow a queue path through to an answer as one aspect.

@Jimmy9008 Parenthood 500 and above level courses.

Repeat after me: There is no such thing as free. There is no such thing as free. There is no such thing as free.

In Windows Server:
In Elevated CMD:
wmic.exe computersystem where name="SERVERNAME" set AutomaticManagedPagefile=False
wmic.exe pagefileset where name="c:\\pagefile.sys" set InitialSize=8192,MaximumSize=8192
shutdown -r -t 0

Then in an elevated PowerShell:

Set-ItemProperty –Path HKLM:\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl –Name CrashDumpEnabled –value 1
Get-ItemProperty –Path HKLM:\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl –Name CrashDumpEnabled
Set-ItemProperty –Path HKLM:\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl –Name FilterPages –value 1
Get-ItemProperty –Path HKLM:\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl –Name FilterPages

From https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/clustering/2015/05/18/windows-server-2016-failover-cluster-troubleshooting-enhancements-active-dump/

We do the above on all servers we deploy since they all have a 128GB or 256GB at the most host OS drive and it's not uncommon to be deploying over a Terabyte of RAM.

@Dashrender said in Why IT certifications are worth more than you think...:

@Emad-R said in Why IT certifications are worth more than you think...:

@Florida_man

Not really, I'm severely lacking in IT certs but I'm doing fine in Canada, Toronto nearly 100K salary range.

Just be walking portfolio, and have projects that you can demo and ace the interviews like I have a domain with a lot of my work publically available, and I tell them if they want to research me go to ML and read my posts

Also Im new to Toronto, been here for 4 months

And the vibe im getting is they want people with experiance and not certs, but hey i follow SAM ideas and concepts closely, so he said this many times when you have family or friend that has IT thing make project out of it and document it and mention it, get your hands dirty you know, but credit that. That said Im the type that go home and work on my shit and experiment with new tech nearly everyday or week at least. So YMMV

This works only if you can get past the HR goons. Which is the world that Scott and his level of experience gain him. His skill/knowledge is that that he's often being recruited, he's not sending in resume's looking for a job.. so I don't consider his experiences the norm.

Being public and social with one's experience makes for a great CV (Curriculum Vitae).

Certs do help. Acknowledgements, like the Microsoft Most Valued Professional in my case, or VMware Guru, or Veeam Vanguard, and so on also show a distinct experiential knowledge over anyone else that may be applying for a position.

The better one gets at something, with the knowledge on full display, the more folks will indeed approach to ask for help. BTDT

As far as handing over knowledge prior to an interview? No way.

Without thinking about it, that happened once where the RFP made a specific request for details from us. I knew we were the initial contact and the only ones in the running a that time and did not clue in. Never again.

Details = Consulting = Pay Me. Period.

@pete-s said in VM host: dual CPU vs single CPU - same CPU performance rating:

Thanks guys.

I decided to go with the single 10-core CPU in this case as it would leave open the possibility of adding another CPU and set of memory if needed.

No licensing to consider in this particular case.

Keep in mind that the SL code of the existing CPU should be recorded as when it comes time to add the second CPU the same SL code CPU would need to be acquired.

There's a reason why Tier 1 charges huge coin to add a second CPU at a later date. They need to keep them on the shelf.

Started the blog in 2007 because I just could not keep track of all of the stuff I was learning. It was more for me than anything at that point.

Wrote my first exam on Small Business Server 2008 sometime in 2009 and passed much to my surprise. No studying, just working with the product inside and out.

Wrote my first, and only book, on SBS 2008. An 800 page tome that nearly burned me out.

The Microsoft MVP came in 2009.

The Microsoft Small Business Specialist designation came in late 2009 with most of our clients responding with, "So, our rates going up?" Yup.

I wrote and passed the Small Business Server 2011 exam.

That was the last exam I've written.

We're usually bleeding edge with everything we do, so when the exams do come up we're already moving into the next product version.

Oh, I've done a few sessions in Redmond on the exam creation team. That was fun.

I'm fortunate that I get paid to do what I love.

Oh, and I get to play.

AMD EPYC Rome single socket 2U 12x LFF platform. We have two of them and a pair of 7502 CPUs provided to us by AMD. RAM, M.2 PCIe AiC adapters, TPMs, and some other bits and pieces showed up today.

Aim is to be one of the first to Azure Stack HCI certify a native Rome platform.

Cavium over Chelsio any day if considering iWARP RDMA. Intel would be a distant second to Cavium.

The RJ45/SFP+ really depends on needs. If there are enough fibre runs to complete the setup then SFP+ would be the direction for top of rack (TOR) and/or aggregation.

For non-RDMA enabled networks we use RJ45 based setups for the NICs (Intel X540/X557 10GbE). For RDMA we use RoCE 10GbE/25GbE/40GbE/50GbE/100GbE via Mellanox NICs and switches which are SFPx based.

Intel 7xx series NICs utilize iWARP and SFPx and may be an option depending on server vendors and switch setup.

Performance wise, depending on network type and whether RDMA is present or not 10GbE should be around the numbers mentioned by @NashBrydges.

@Jimmy9008 said in Why IT certifications are worth more than you think...:

@PhlipElder said in Why IT certifications are worth more than you think...:

Parenthood 500

Ha!

Seriously though.
Questions to ask those we work with and to look at ourselves:

• Am I a dyck to work with?
• What can I improve? Constructive criticism please.
• Do I give someone the benefit of the doubt? Especially if it's "third party" pointing it out?
• Do I compliment/acknowledge the folks around me for the work they do?
• Do I take the time to ask folks how they are doing? Genuine ... not fly-by questioning.
• Am I able to listen?
• Am I able to pick the right hill to die on but mostly walk away?

I'm not "nice". I know my boundaries and when someone has crossed them. I expect folks to respect them as do I to theirs. I don't play well with predators, back-biters, and gossips.

I also know that someone that takes credit for my work is also going to burn when they can't answer to the details so I wait for it. That trust bridge is only burnt once.

The above doesn't come in a course .Though, I'm sure I could generate our retirement fund putting one together.

@scottalanmiller BTDT

Back in the day the general sentiment was that RBL "services" were no more than extortion rackets. IMNSHO, that has not changed much.

With the advent of SPF, DMARC, and DKIM their relevance will become a lot smaller which is a happy.

We ask. Most of our clients are accounting firms on our MSP side and contractors and their clients.

All it takes is a bit of coordination to make sure we're not infringing on any large projects they may be running. As a rule, tax season is off limits for obvious reasons.

I did a write-up of what happened here: http://blog.mpecsinc.ca/2018/09/warning-edge-sync-ate-all-favourites.html

Make sure to back up the Favourites in Edge after a solid day of adding links.

@black3dynamite said in Do you ask for permission...:

What time do guys normally schedule reboots? During business hours? Early mornings? Late evenings? Weekends only?

Cluster nodes can be run pretty much anytime during the day.

For servers running roles and services we schedule an outage and run with it.

Methodology is straightforward:

• Reboot the server if running longer than 60 days
• Back up
• Install the patch and reboot
• Verify services

If the patch fails restore.

We use Veeam and ShadowProtect to back up with.

@dave247 said in Need some help with SQL Server 2016 Standard licensing (price confusion):

@phlipelder said in Need some help with SQL Server 2016 Standard licensing (price confusion):

@dave247 said in Need some help with SQL Server 2016 Standard licensing (price confusion):

Hi friends.

I am working on building a new physical server to replace one which is running older versions of Windows and SQL server, plus it is almost out of storage space so this needs to be done sooner than later.

This SQL server is running a 3rd party application and they currently only support up to SQL 2016, so that's what I have to install - not 2017. And it's going to be SQL 2016 Standard Edition running on Windows 2016 Server Standard with 16 cores.

I spent a while researching SQL sever licensing to try and get an idea of how much it's going to cost. I haven't dealt with SQL server licensing yet.

First, I assumed that I would still have to purchase SQL Server 2017 core licenses with downgrade rights. So looking on the SQL Sever Pricing page, it looks as though Standard - per core price is $3,717 (2 pack). So if my server has a total of 16 cores, this is going to cost about $29,736 to cover SQL licensing.

Then I checked over on CDW just to get an idea of prices and things and I had the idea to search "SQL 2016" when I found this: SQL Server 2016 Standard - license - 16 cores - with Server 2016 Standard for like $1,900.

Is this even applicable to what I'm doing or am I missing something? It does say in the technical details "BIOS locked (Lenovo)" but I have no idea what that refers to. But other than that, it looks like it's licensing SQL Server 2016 for 16 cores and bundled with Windows Server 2016. Surly this can't be correct... or is it? If it is actually what I would need to be covered, I would purchase it, of course.

Otherwise, can someone help me get an idea of what I should be paying for SQL Server 2016 Standard Edition for 16 cores if not the cost I initially calculated ($29,736)? And I don't think we'd do the server + cal licensing as we have about 80 users and 100 or more systems which would connect to the SQL server.

Simple rule of thumb to ask your Microsoft licensing rep for the following:
First option is license + CALs that allows internal access only with unlimited instances on the server and unlimited cores:

• SQL Server Standard License
• SQL Server Standard User CALs (80 Users)

Second option is per core with a minimum of 4 to purchase:

• SQL Server Standard Per Core 2-Pack (2x)

In the Per Core scenario we can license for the number of physical cores to use and delimit that in SQL Studio Management. When it comes to audit, a snip of that setting that only allows the four threads should be just fine.

I did not realize that the license + CAL route allowed unlimited instances and/or cores. And we actually have a few other SQL Server 2008 R2 servers that need to be refreshed soon (a few are virtual and two are physical).

I could check with my Microsoft partner, who is actually also our Dell VAR... so I'm probably in need of finding a separate person who is solely a MS Partner and not a salesman.. unless I mean something other than partner.

A SQL Server License covers installation on a given physical server or guest.

This is a good place to start: http://mla.microsoft.com/

Run through Open with no SA to get a base cost for both options.

@scottalanmiller said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

@Pete-S said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

@travisdh1 said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

@Pete-S said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

@JaredBusch said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

@Pete-S said in Flicker-free LEDs?:

Take your finger or a pen and wave it under the light source.
If you see more than one finger/pen then it's flickering.

I can wave my finger in front of my face outside in daylight and see that.

Nope, you can't. You need a stroboscopic light source for that. And the sun ain't that.

If you can see individual fingers it's because the light is going on and off and on and off etc. If you try under the sun you will just see one blurry finger.

Unless someone is getting a headache from the things, who cares?

I am, so I care. Some people (most?) don't notice.

It was the same with CRTs. Some people could work fine with 60 Hz refresh rate. I though it was freaking horrible.
With LCDs it's the backlight that might be a problem on some monitors. Not so much anymore though.

I'm in the group with you. I can see the flicker at 60Hz and it is horrible. Most people can't see it and think it isn't there. I can hear lots of electronics that other people can't hear either. I often walk into a room and wonder why everyone has left on electrical equipment that I can hear the instant I am there, but no one else can tell is powered on.

That reminds me ... we moved into our acreage about six years ago.

The folks that lived there prior to us had these mouse tweeters all over the garage and house. Sonic deterrents I think they are called.

They drove me absolutely nuts as they seemed to tie right nicely into the tinnitus I have.

The kids wanted kittens. I'm highly allergic. A trip to Vegas for client work a few months after moving in and when I came back there was a box by the door into the house that was not there before. Three little kitten heads popped up. They had picked them up that day or the day before I don't remember.

I was not pleased as I knew the ordeal that was to come for me to get at least moderately tolerant to their presence so the jury was out on whether we would keep them or not.

When I came out to head in to work on Monday morning there were seven, yes 7, dead shrews strewn about the man door and the porch obviously killed by the kittens.

We kept the kittens and all of those fake sonic tweeters went into recycling.

It was a fair trade.

Oh, and here we are into our second batch of cats six years later and they still don't eat the shrews. They'll eat everything else such as field mice, Richardson's Ground Squirrels, and even Pocket Gofers but they won't touch the shrews. Weird.

@scottalanmiller We use this script to check user activities as we're not always updated when users are gone in high churn environments among other uses:

Mohamed Garrana's script here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/216fe6ec-84de-4516-9110-12cc0a7ea9b0/is-there-a-way-to-add-the-last-login-timedate-in-ad-to-an-excel-column

EDIT: Just saw the lack of AD. Peer-to-peer makes this a challenge.

@DustinB3403 said in Random Thread - Anything Goes:

https://preview.redd.it/j6lb7h8kdmy21.jpg?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=0805398624c3e4d967da59970c30dafa8bc4276a

We home school. This will be a hit with our kids!