Linux Weekend - After Action Report
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Sorry if you've already mentioned this somewhere, but have you tried using Ndiswrapper to use Windows drivers for the wireless networking on your Acer laptops? I t's been a while since I've used ndiswraper, but it helped me out a couple of times in the past when I had a laptop with an obscure wireless card that didn't normally work under Linux, but that had a Windows driver available.
It ain't that important to me. Besides, if I decide to change distros in the future, i'd probably have to do the ndiswrapper thing all over again, and I would prefer that all of this be really low impact. I'm essentially the laziest redneck you'll ever meet with regards to this kinda thing.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
It ain't that important to me. Besides, if I decide to change distros in the future, i'd probably have to do the ndiswrapper thing all over again, and I would prefer that all of this be really low impact. I'm essentially the laziest redneck you'll ever meet with regards to this kinda thing.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013Fair enough! The ndiswrapper stuff is definitely a pain to have to re-do. I've had good luck with this wifi adapter under Linux: https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-TL-WN725N-Wireless-Adapter-Miniature/dp/B008IFXQFU[^ It's small enough that it barely even sticks out of the USB port. Range isn't quite as good as one that's bigger with a larger antenna, but for use around the house it's been more than good enough.
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It still doesn't have enough ports for the number of drives I have, and USB3 still doesn't match up to a direct SATA connection. I think Pis are severely lacking in hardware, but they want to keep the price low. I personally think that's false economy. They need to up their hardware game.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013the new generation of boards has independent pcie data output path (from the network or USB one) that can be adapted to a sata port. Of course they may not be able to handle multi large disks well or at all ...
Find more in V-NET: connects your resources anywhere[^].
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It was a struggle, but I got my two OpenMediaVault machines stood up and initially configured. One is a media server and has six analog hard drives for a total of 11.5 terabytes. The second box is for network-wide backups and has four analog hard drives for a total of four terabytes. Before installing OMV, I had to take all my NTFS media drives, copy them to a temp drive, re-partition/format the media drive, and copy the media files back to the newly partitioned drive. This took THREE DAYS (probably because the temp drive was a USB drive). The OMV struggles involved the motherboard BIOS settings. I fought those issues all day yesterday. Any distro I installed would boot fine, but OMV kept saying that all the drives failed the soft reset. I must have rebooted the machines 100 times in the process of getting it resolved. I think I figured out what to do with my extra RaspBerry Pi - using it as a network monitor. I haven't decided what software to use yet, but right now, Pandora FMS[^] is looking pretty good (they even have a Pi image). Tonight, I'll be configuring my HTPC box to get files from the OMV media server. I also started writing a Linux migration article for like-minded individuals. It includes everything from minimal hardware specs to dealing with configuring OMV, and handy command line items so you don't have to go googling it like I had to.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013So...what does OMV give you that Samba does not, anyway? That Pandora dealie looks more like a NOC syslog-type tool (like Solarwinds Orion) than a network security monitor. If you're looking for traffic monitoring, you should take a look at [Security Onion](https://securityonion.net/) or [ROCK NSM](https://rocknsm.io).
"Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity." - Hanlon's Razor
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So...what does OMV give you that Samba does not, anyway? That Pandora dealie looks more like a NOC syslog-type tool (like Solarwinds Orion) than a network security monitor. If you're looking for traffic monitoring, you should take a look at [Security Onion](https://securityonion.net/) or [ROCK NSM](https://rocknsm.io).
"Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity." - Hanlon's Razor
OMV is more than just a samba sharing mechanism. I just wanted to put my spare Pi to work, and I figured network monitoring would be cool. I have no real need for it.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
I've switched to using 8TB drives for my backups. The existing 2TB and 5TB drives are now the "live" drives holding my collections. I have a catalog search program I wrote myself that allows searching selection and playing of any of the live media in most rooms in my house (I have a power-line network that goes everywhere). I now have 40TB of live disks and 40TB of backup disks.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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Yeah... right. It's not easy, nor intuitive. I found out how to "make it go" simply by chance. None of the media drives were mounted by default. This seems kinda bizarre to me, given that it's a NAS setup. They refer to drives/partitions as "devices", but don't really mention that anywhere (that I found). Until the partitions are mounted, you can't create shares, which makes sense, but as I said before, they don't mention that partitions are called "devices" in their app, and you must select a "device" to share. At this point, I have shares setup, but I don't yet know if it's enough, at least not until I try to get Kodi setup. I am on an adventure of discovery, and so far, resisting the urge to go back to windows. On a semi-related note, I still haven't GOTTEN wireless working on the older Acer laptops. I think I'm just gonna give up and get a USB wireless dongle and call it a day. I have to research the various dongle offerings and pick the one that presents the fewest problems in Linux. In the process of trying to get that working, I installed Linux Mint Cinnamon on the Laptops. I think I prefer that distro over Ubuntu because it's more Windows-like (and I suspect SWMBO will be happy about that).
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote:
I installed Linux Mint Cinnamon on the Laptops. I think I prefer that distro
I recently installed that on a tablet. While, there are some features that don't work very well on the tablet. It looks great, and performs well.
Common sense is admitting there is cause and effect and that you can exert some control over what you understand.
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Forogar wrote:
40TB of backup disks.
How do you have that setup?
Common sense is admitting there is cause and effect and that you can exert some control over what you understand.
I have two file servers with a couple of USB 3.0 hubs each. USB externals drives plugged in and and a big scheduled batch job to run Robocopy each night. Simples! For some important files I backup copies to two or more locations.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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I have two file servers with a couple of USB 3.0 hubs each. USB externals drives plugged in and and a big scheduled batch job to run Robocopy each night. Simples! For some important files I backup copies to two or more locations.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
Forogar wrote:
I have two file servers with a couple of USB 3.0 hubs each. USB externals drives
The most reliable backup solution I've had was one I put together in a similar fashion. I've now owned a couple of 'NAS' devices, and been disappointed in their performance and features.
Common sense is admitting there is cause and effect and that you can exert some control over what you understand.
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Forogar wrote:
I have two file servers with a couple of USB 3.0 hubs each. USB externals drives
The most reliable backup solution I've had was one I put together in a similar fashion. I've now owned a couple of 'NAS' devices, and been disappointed in their performance and features.
Common sense is admitting there is cause and effect and that you can exert some control over what you understand.
I looked at NASes and decided they weren't worth the money. They were upwards of $600 each for the number and capacity of drives I wanted and gave me really nothing more (that I needed) than a decent, powered USB 3.0 hub with 7 outbound connections for $14.99 each. The external drives were basically the same price as naked drives so... nothing to see here, move along! Over the last 5 years I have been using this system I have lost 2 x 2TB and 2 x 1TB drives that I had to replace as they wear out. I haven't lost a single byte of data. File recovery is super easy.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
