NOC situations (monitoring) Graphics work (GIMP, Maya, etc) Coding (reference materials on one screen, IDE/terminals on another, debugging/output on another)
While I do game some, nothing I play has any worthy multi-head capabilities, so this is meaningless for gaming, at least for me.
You're right, they are plasma. It's just habit to substitute in 'LCD' for any display of the like, I suppose. But yes, it's gas plasma. A few of us gutted the existing boards and put in the best we could find that would fit. For the most part, this meant a K6-2/450Mhz.
While this topic is being discussed, maybe people can toss out ideas for this situation:
Analog (no DVI), minimum 4 sytems, maximum 8 systems. USB, dual-user, dual-head, and rackmountable features are a plus.
Exceptional video quality, though, is an absolute must. Minimum 1600x1200x85Hz in *perfect* video quality.
I have a nice Aten, but even with high-dollar cabling, I still get a lot of ghosting and blurring at 1600x1200x85hz. Besides, it's only a 2-system KVM, and I need a few more ports.
I don't know if this is funny or sad, but I actually have one of those, and one of the B&W LCD-based ones (a fair bit lighter and smaller, but still a luggable).
I just need to find a small color CRT to adapt in place of amber CRT in the first one. The LCD may be easier to find, though....maybe an LCD in each...hmm....
Oh, I definitely keep 11.0.3.3 and the dev 11.9.2/12.5/12.5.1 around. I'm working on supporting a personal website thought hat will need MySQL (very few OSS CMS apps out there support anything else, and few decent ISPs do either).
Eric_Cartman_South_P is right, SuperBanana. It was a half-joking reference to Fark.com, which I read regularly (I've read Slashdot regularly far longer than Fark, though.) The Fark.com equivalent of a Slashdotting is a Farking./hates explaining jokes to morons....
I'm actually not too concerned about SQL syntax. I'm interested more in the administrative aspect of the server software itself.
In other words, in creating a database you have to deal with creating the devices, managing segments, dealing with log space, tempdb, dumping/loading databases, etc.
From what I see so far, there isn't much equivalent to any of this so far. You create a database, and your server config determines where ig goes and (I think) the format/type used for the physical files.
(Admission: I just plain haven't taken the time to deal with it yet....I'm just trying to find a 'quick fix' reference aimed at someone like me in order to skip a few steps!)
Here's an 'embedded ask Slashdot' for everyone, as I haven't found such an animal online.
Is anyone aware of a quick guide/tutorial for MySQL that is aimed at Sybase administrators? It would definitely save me some time getting my act together with it...
If you read the article, it says that the head assembly is actually sealed in each cartridge with the disk. Buying a regular hard drive for 1/3rd the cost and putting it into a hot-swap carrier would be more reliable in this case.
That just figures. We nuke two Japanese cities, and they end up with all the coolest gadgets and 100Mbit wireless to their cell phones--probably included for free with standard service. Meanwhile, we are lucky to get 300bps wireless for less than $80 a month, on cell phones that weigh five times as much and can do one-tenth what the Japanese cell phones do.
Maybe we should let Japan nuke us next, so they can take their turn helping build us into the next technological superpower....
The last link (to the word count) was added by the/. guys--I never had that link in there. It is hilarious, though!
And yeah, the 'christened the maiden issue' bit was my attempt to add some creativity in hopes of acceptance.
Finally, the title was changed as well...I think I originally put in 'Linus on Linux -- One Decade Ago' or some such. The/. editors were right in changing the title; theirs was better!
I work for a large auto parts retailer (nope, not Auto Zone!).
Each of our stores has a Linux system in it, using Comtrol serial boards to run the serial terminal and printers in the store.
One of our stores decided to do some rearranging, and wanted to move the main counter a few inches. The counter isn't bolted to the floor, but it does run the full width of the store, and is pretty much permanently wired for electricity and serial connections where it is--it's not meant to be moved.
So, what did the store do? They moved the counter. With everything on it. With all the terminals and printers on said counter plugged in. And turned on.
The employees heard a few 'pop's and looked up to see smoke coming from all the terminals.
The best we can figure is the main power line running into the counter was punctured or otherwise shorted, shorting hot to either ground or neutral. Naturally, the terminals weren't on any sort of surge protectors. I doubt this would have helped, though, unless they had good Triplite or another good name-brand surge protector on it (which won't happen--too expensive--yep, the usual story).
The incident didn't just destroy the terminals on the counter, though! It made it's way through the serial lines and destroyed every piece of serial-connected equipment in the entire store.
The serial card looks like somebody took a blow-torch to it. I really wish I had a picture of it to post here, but I haven't taken one yet (it's hanging on our 'wall of shame' at the moment).
Amazingly--somehow--the PC is fine. I've had it running stress-tests for 3 weeks now, with no problems. There are scorch marks around the PCI connector and in the bottom of the case. Most of the ICs on the serial board were reduced to nothing but ashes instantly--the rest blew into pieces.
I already have a Sager NP4780 from PowerNotebooks.com. I think all of these are just rebranded Clevo D470V laptops (I know the Sager and Alienware one are).
For a little under $3k I got:
3.2Ghz P4/HT (I'd prefer AMD64, but...) 1GB RAM 60GB 7200RPM HD DVD-RW (2x) ATI Radeon 9600 Pro/128MB 802.11b Modem Gigabit ethernet 6-in-1 flash reader External USB floppy Car power adapter (as well as AC, of course)
Here's where we stand--I'm a Gentoo user.
Video: I can get video working okay with the ati-drivers under the 2.6 kernels, but any serious OpenGL use locks up the system hard (Enemy Territory, Postal 2 demo, etc). The system locks up hard whenever I try to insert the ati-driver modules under the 2.4 kernel.
Networking: Perfect under 2.4, useless under 2.6. The NIC ceases to work after a few megs are transferred.
Audio: Works great USB: Works great 802.11b: Everything loads, but I have no wireless networks to use it on to test it. Firewire: Untested Flash reader: Works great DVD-RW: Works great
WinXP: (Jesus christ, I can't believe I'm admitting this...)...works to the greatest extent you can hope anything M$ related can work
Simple. Just obfuscate it, and you can pass it around for people to help with formatting issues all you want. I've done that with payroll data plenty of times.
Just two lines or vi commands could have saved this guy so much trouble....
Try here for reasonably-priced rackmount rails. They aren't really quite proper for computers, though.
I also have a catalog from Hammond Manufacturing which sells racks piece-by-piece, including rail sets. Their catalog shows a lot of detailed schematics for their racks, as well. You can get a catalog free from their web site.
I use a couple old HP half-height racks (really using only 1 right now, 1 more sitting around). They aren't deep enough for proper cases, though, so I use shallow cases for now.
I'm planning to do the same thing as you, at some point. I've considered some $300 racks off eBay and the normal $250 shipping, but I'd rather build a nice wood-exterior cabinet that would look good in the home. Besides, I need something that is closer to 'normal' specs than the racks I have now.
Rack hardware: I'd stick to eBay. Shelves, blank panels, etc. are all much cheaper that way. I also bought a rackmount APC UPS--look for one WITHOUT batteries, and shop around online for replacements. You will pay less for shipping all around, and the batteries are usually crap anyway, unless it's a trustworthy seller who says they put new batteries in it.
For cable management, I prefer a simple lacer bar, unless you really have a ton of equipment. Of course, if I had money, I'd get rails and cable management arms...but I was doing good to buy the rackmount cases, as the rest was (mostly) free for me.
For rackmount computer cases, I've used Case Outlet for a while. They barely speak English, but they resale decent cases at decent prices. If you are using any kind of multi-drive enclosure or removeable drive racks, be sure to gett the DEEP cases! You can also try KRI Computer for rackmount equipment. I've never bought from them before, but I've heard good things about them, and they have good prices and a good selection.
Welcome to the world of Ultimate Geekdom!
That reminds me....I have my Nielsen rating 'diary' due back to them this week. Time to go hunting through the TV guide for all the stuff I like, but haven't watched recently (Futurama and Family Guy, for example...I have all the DVDs anyway, and VCDs for the stuff that hasn't been released yet)
First Farscape, now Family Guy...Now I just need to hear about Futurama returning, and I'll be set!
Stated off as a K6-2/450 w/256MB after I upgraded my main system. I added four 80GB Maxtor's to it running on an (original) 3Ware 6400, doing RAID-5.
I eventually upgraded my main system again. The fileserver became an Epox 8K7A+ w/Athlon 1.4Ghz and 512MB RAM. The drives stayed the same. It also inhereted my old GF2Pro, since I upgraded. Overkill, but I needed video, and had no other use for the card.
Then the Epox finally started popping caps (remember the stolen capacitor electrolyte formula?). Fortunately, Epox was kind enough to repair it (about $28 spent on shipping total), despite being out of warranty. I held back the CPU for it's return, but I needed the system up and running.
So, I picked up an NF2 board with onboard video, and grabbed an XP1700. I dug up some spare RAM I had around and made it an even 1GB. Again, same drives. The Epox, 1.4Ghz proc, and GF2Pro went into a new system for my sister.
Next step?
Next step, if I ever have money again (bah!), will be much more dramatic. I'll probably move to Opterons, and I may do so for the fileserver as well as my workstation, as my fileserver does FAR more than just that. I'm looking at the newer 3Ware SATA controllers, at least 8, maybe 12 ports. I'll get the best 'bang for the buck' SATA drives out at the time (currently, I think it's the 250GB Maxtor mentioned in the article). I'll do RAID-5 again, but maybe plan in a hot spare this time.
But Intel? Why are people still wasting money on this rubbish? Three hundred bucks for a CPU? I could have built an equivalent or superior AMD system, getting the MB, CPU, and maybe even memory all for what just the Intel CPU cost. What a waste of money.
Slashdot Mirror
General uses:
NOC situations (monitoring)
Graphics work (GIMP, Maya, etc)
Coding (reference materials on one screen, IDE/terminals on another, debugging/output on another)
While I do game some, nothing I play has any worthy multi-head capabilities, so this is meaningless for gaming, at least for me.
Hell, I couldn't care less about parallel processing for the video cards.
I want tri-head or quad-head video, but with at least AGP speeds. You can do it now, but only with PCI cards getting involved.
This is 2004, you should know by now not to open a file from an untrusted source.
This is 2004, you should know by now that Microsoft can't possibly have released Office 2004 this year.
You're right, they are plasma. It's just habit to substitute in 'LCD' for any display of the like, I suppose. But yes, it's gas plasma. A few of us gutted the existing boards and put in the best we could find that would fit. For the most part, this meant a K6-2/450Mhz.
While this topic is being discussed, maybe people can toss out ideas for this situation:
Analog (no DVI), minimum 4 sytems, maximum 8 systems. USB, dual-user, dual-head, and rackmountable features are a plus.
Exceptional video quality, though, is an absolute must. Minimum 1600x1200x85Hz in *perfect* video quality.
I have a nice Aten, but even with high-dollar cabling, I still get a lot of ghosting and blurring at 1600x1200x85hz. Besides, it's only a 2-system KVM, and I need a few more ports.
Thanks for any ideas anyone has!
I'll leave the grammar/spelling issue alone.
100U each side of the rack? These would be racks over FOURTEEN FEET tall. 1U = 1.75"
I've never heard of any racks over 50-55U tall.
I don't know if this is funny or sad, but I actually have one of those, and one of the B&W LCD-based ones (a fair bit lighter and smaller, but still a luggable).
I just need to find a small color CRT to adapt in place of amber CRT in the first one. The LCD may be easier to find, though....maybe an LCD in each...hmm....
Oh, I definitely keep 11.0.3.3 and the dev 11.9.2/12.5/12.5.1 around. I'm working on supporting a personal website thought hat will need MySQL (very few OSS CMS apps out there support anything else, and few decent ISPs do either).
Eric_Cartman_South_P is right, SuperBanana. It was a half-joking reference to Fark.com, which I read regularly (I've read Slashdot regularly far longer than Fark, though.) The Fark.com equivalent of a Slashdotting is a Farking. /hates explaining jokes to morons....
Farked...erm...I mean Slashdotted...at only 4 comments.
Figures. Hopefully someone grabbed a mirror of it before we turned his hard drives into his next cannon fodder.
Thanks for the reply...
I'm actually not too concerned about SQL syntax. I'm interested more in the administrative aspect of the server software itself.
In other words, in creating a database you have to deal with creating the devices, managing segments, dealing with log space, tempdb, dumping/loading databases, etc.
From what I see so far, there isn't much equivalent to any of this so far. You create a database, and your server config determines where ig goes and (I think) the format/type used for the physical files.
(Admission: I just plain haven't taken the time to deal with it yet....I'm just trying to find a 'quick fix' reference aimed at someone like me in order to skip a few steps!)
Here's an 'embedded ask Slashdot' for everyone, as I haven't found such an animal online.
Is anyone aware of a quick guide/tutorial for MySQL that is aimed at Sybase administrators? It would definitely save me some time getting my act together with it...
Thanks...hopefully someone knows of such a beast!
If you read the article, it says that the head assembly is actually sealed in each cartridge with the disk. Buying a regular hard drive for 1/3rd the cost and putting it into a hot-swap carrier would be more reliable in this case.
That just figures. We nuke two Japanese cities, and they end up with all the coolest gadgets and 100Mbit wireless to their cell phones--probably included for free with standard service. Meanwhile, we are lucky to get 300bps wireless for less than $80 a month, on cell phones that weigh five times as much and can do one-tenth what the Japanese cell phones do.
Maybe we should let Japan nuke us next, so they can take their turn helping build us into the next technological superpower....
Well, I finally got a story accepted. About time!
/. guys--I never had that link in there. It is hilarious, though!
/. editors were right in changing the title; theirs was better!
The last link (to the word count) was added by the
And yeah, the 'christened the maiden issue' bit was my attempt to add some creativity in hopes of acceptance.
Finally, the title was changed as well...I think I originally put in 'Linus on Linux -- One Decade Ago' or some such. The
Hey now, I had to come up with something a bit creative to finally get a story accepted!
Not your typical Sysadmin story...
I work for a large auto parts retailer (nope, not Auto Zone!).
Each of our stores has a Linux system in it, using Comtrol serial boards to run the serial terminal and printers in the store.
One of our stores decided to do some rearranging, and wanted to move the main counter a few inches. The counter isn't bolted to the floor, but it does run the full width of the store, and is pretty much permanently wired for electricity and serial connections where it is--it's not meant to be moved.
So, what did the store do? They moved the counter. With everything on it. With all the terminals and printers on said counter plugged in. And turned on.
The employees heard a few 'pop's and looked up to see smoke coming from all the terminals.
The best we can figure is the main power line running into the counter was punctured or otherwise shorted, shorting hot to either ground or neutral. Naturally, the terminals weren't on any sort of surge protectors. I doubt this would have helped, though, unless they had good Triplite or another good name-brand surge protector on it (which won't happen--too expensive--yep, the usual story).
The incident didn't just destroy the terminals on the counter, though! It made it's way through the serial lines and destroyed every piece of serial-connected equipment in the entire store.
The serial card looks like somebody took a blow-torch to it. I really wish I had a picture of it to post here, but I haven't taken one yet (it's hanging on our 'wall of shame' at the moment).
Amazingly--somehow--the PC is fine. I've had it running stress-tests for 3 weeks now, with no problems. There are scorch marks around the PCI connector and in the bottom of the case. Most of the ICs on the serial board were reduced to nothing but ashes instantly--the rest blew into pieces.
How about 420 au per lunar cycles in fathoms per attosecond?
I already have a Sager NP4780 from PowerNotebooks.com. I think all of these are just rebranded Clevo D470V laptops (I know the Sager and Alienware one are).
For a little under $3k I got:
3.2Ghz P4/HT (I'd prefer AMD64, but...)
1GB RAM
60GB 7200RPM HD
DVD-RW (2x)
ATI Radeon 9600 Pro/128MB
802.11b
Modem
Gigabit ethernet
6-in-1 flash reader
External USB floppy
Car power adapter (as well as AC, of course)
Here's where we stand--I'm a Gentoo user.
Video: I can get video working okay with the ati-drivers under the 2.6 kernels, but any serious OpenGL use locks up the system hard (Enemy Territory, Postal 2 demo, etc). The system locks up hard whenever I try to insert the ati-driver modules under the 2.4 kernel.
Networking: Perfect under 2.4, useless under 2.6. The NIC ceases to work after a few megs are transferred.
Audio: Works great
USB: Works great
802.11b: Everything loads, but I have no wireless networks to use it on to test it.
Firewire: Untested
Flash reader: Works great
DVD-RW: Works great
WinXP: (Jesus christ, I can't believe I'm admitting this...)...works to the greatest extent you can hope anything M$ related can work
:%s/[A-Za-z]/X/g :%s/[0-8]/9/g
Simple. Just obfuscate it, and you can pass it around for people to help with formatting issues all you want. I've done that with payroll data plenty of times.
Just two lines or vi commands could have saved this guy so much trouble....
Am I the only person who started to mis-read that as 'The mars rover rolls over,' and suddenly felt their stomach hit the floor?
Yes, it is ugly. However, I was only suggesting it for the bare rails themselves. You'd still want to build a nice wood cabinet for them.
Try here for reasonably-priced rackmount rails. They aren't really quite proper for computers, though.
I also have a catalog from Hammond Manufacturing which sells racks piece-by-piece, including rail sets. Their catalog shows a lot of detailed schematics for their racks, as well. You can get a catalog free from their web site.
I use a couple old HP half-height racks (really using only 1 right now, 1 more sitting around). They aren't deep enough for proper cases, though, so I use shallow cases for now.
I'm planning to do the same thing as you, at some point. I've considered some $300 racks off eBay and the normal $250 shipping, but I'd rather build a nice wood-exterior cabinet that would look good in the home. Besides, I need something that is closer to 'normal' specs than the racks I have now. Rack hardware: I'd stick to eBay. Shelves, blank panels, etc. are all much cheaper that way. I also bought a rackmount APC UPS--look for one WITHOUT batteries, and shop around online for replacements. You will pay less for shipping all around, and the batteries are usually crap anyway, unless it's a trustworthy seller who says they put new batteries in it. For cable management, I prefer a simple lacer bar, unless you really have a ton of equipment. Of course, if I had money, I'd get rails and cable management arms...but I was doing good to buy the rackmount cases, as the rest was (mostly) free for me. For rackmount computer cases, I've used Case Outlet for a while. They barely speak English, but they resale decent cases at decent prices. If you are using any kind of multi-drive enclosure or removeable drive racks, be sure to gett the DEEP cases! You can also try KRI Computer for rackmount equipment. I've never bought from them before, but I've heard good things about them, and they have good prices and a good selection. Welcome to the world of Ultimate Geekdom!
That reminds me....I have my Nielsen rating 'diary' due back to them this week. Time to go hunting through the TV guide for all the stuff I like, but haven't watched recently (Futurama and Family Guy, for example...I have all the DVDs anyway, and VCDs for the stuff that hasn't been released yet)
First Farscape, now Family Guy...Now I just need to hear about Futurama returning, and I'll be set!
Here's how my storage server 'grew up':
Stated off as a K6-2/450 w/256MB after I upgraded my main system. I added four 80GB Maxtor's to it running on an (original) 3Ware 6400, doing RAID-5.
I eventually upgraded my main system again. The fileserver became an Epox 8K7A+ w/Athlon 1.4Ghz and 512MB RAM. The drives stayed the same. It also inhereted my old GF2Pro, since I upgraded. Overkill, but I needed video, and had no other use for the card.
Then the Epox finally started popping caps (remember the stolen capacitor electrolyte formula?). Fortunately, Epox was kind enough to repair it (about $28 spent on shipping total), despite being out of warranty. I held back the CPU for it's return, but I needed the system up and running.
So, I picked up an NF2 board with onboard video, and grabbed an XP1700. I dug up some spare RAM I had around and made it an even 1GB. Again, same drives. The Epox, 1.4Ghz proc, and GF2Pro went into a new system for my sister.
Next step?
Next step, if I ever have money again (bah!), will be much more dramatic. I'll probably move to Opterons, and I may do so for the fileserver as well as my workstation, as my fileserver does FAR more than just that. I'm looking at the newer 3Ware SATA controllers, at least 8, maybe 12 ports. I'll get the best 'bang for the buck' SATA drives out at the time (currently, I think it's the 250GB Maxtor mentioned in the article). I'll do RAID-5 again, but maybe plan in a hot spare this time.
But Intel? Why are people still wasting money on this rubbish? Three hundred bucks for a CPU? I could have built an equivalent or superior AMD system, getting the MB, CPU, and maybe even memory all for what just the Intel CPU cost. What a waste of money.