This is an excellent explanation. I’ve always wondered how it all worked, now I see the map data is separate from dynamic data.
Wish these mapping apps would explain that, so people would understand the apps are providing the updated/dynamic data with the map data coming from OSM.
Oh, I hear ya on the space issue - there’s almost no space in this SFF, but I like it’s form factor so I’m willing to compromise.
Anymore I don’t find RAID very useful, except for mirroring a drive. As I say this, I do have a NAS with 5 drives, but it’s used as one of my replicators as it’s too slow for anything else. I did run Proxmox with RAID for a while, that was pretty cool, I just don’t need all it’s capability.
These days I can get a large enough single drive for a box - I considered getting a 12TB but the price on the 8 was hard to beat and I won’t be filling it anytime soon.
My experience after 35 years in IT: I’ve had 10x more outages caused by automatic updates than everything else combined.
Also after 35 years of running my own stuff at home, and practically never updating anything, I’ve never had an outage caused by a lack of updates.
Let’s not act like auto updates is without risk. Just look at how often Microsoft has to roll out a fix for something an update broke. Inexperienced users are going to be clueless when an update breaks something.
We should be teaching new people how to manage systems, this includes proper update checks on a cycle, with appropriate validation that everything works afterwards, and the ability to roll back if there’s an issue.
This isn’t an Enterprise where you simply can’t manually manage updates across hundreds or thousands of servers, and tens of thousands of workstations - this is a single admin, small environment.
I do monthly update checks, update where I feel it’s warranted, and verify systems afterwards.
Two requirements stand out: Media streaming (jellyfin) and multiple hard drives.
In the video front, Jellyfin has documented what you want to look for if you’re building “new” (that is, not just using what you have lying about). Discrete video card is very much recommended for tranacoding (which will invariably happen). Check their docs here. They also cover which processor to use and why.
Let’s consider drives now: what’s the reasoning for multiple drives? I had this requirement too, then had a Dell OptiPlex SFF (Small Form Factor) fall in my lap. Because it can only handle 2 drives (in addition to the M2 OS drive), it made me rethink things. At first I added a 4 port SATA card and four 2.5" drives I had lying around. It worked, but what I realized was my media server needed enough storage to hold my library, but it didn’t need internal redundancy. So currently it has an 8TB drive for my library, and an M2 drive for the OS (which is how this machine comes anyway). That drive is duplicated to a NAS and two other drives on different machines (to protect against drive failure).
I run a monthly host OS backup to my NAS, just in case (but it’s a simple rebuild as my services/tools run in VM’s).
I had a cooling issue at first, then realized it was an old machine (2017), and the cooler paste was likely hard. Cleaned it off and put on new and the fan now runs quietly, even when converting. At idle it hardly makes any noise at all.
One nice thing is it has a relatively small power supply, so it peaks at 80w while converting, and idles about 15w.
It lacks a discrete video card, so when it does transcoding the quality suffers a little. I’ll need to upgrade the power supply to add a video card.
I’m really impressed with this little box - I’d buy another in a heartbeat.
Hahaha, that’s the point of a password manager. If remembering worked, we wouldn’t need any of this.
Also, I have 300+ unique logins.
Pretty much every car today IS AWD - a better version of plain old 4WD. So even your analogy doesn’t work.
Just use the OptiPlex for everything. The RPi lacks the horsepower, and storage capability.
I’m currently using a 7 year old OptiPlex SFF as a NAS, backup point, media converter, and media server. I’ve upgraded the storage drive to 8TB.
I do have another old NAS I use only to duplicate my data store locally (I keep 3 local copies of data, and a cloud backup).
The OptiPlex draws 15w at idle, about 85w when converting video. My NAS draws about 5w at idle. I initially tried serving media from the NAS, but it’s performance is frankly abysmal. Instead I run Media Monkey, Jellyfin, and another media server on the Dell, which has no problem streaming to my crappy Samsung TV (not using an app, just the crappy built-in DLNA client) It works even better with decent devices, like my phone, laptop, iPad.
Your biggest concern with that Dell is the power consumption. As I said, mine happens to draw 15w at idle - I got lucky
What are the specs on your OptiPlex? Is it a mini tower or SFF? That would help more than just telling us the model.
Depending on your sensitivity to failures (drives die) I’d get 2 data drives for the Dell and mirror them, using the current drive just for the OS.
You’ll need to direct that port for the given service in the router control panel.
For your current server you have a port forwarding for that port already. Just add a port forwarding rule for the new service.
Plus it just seems like a network cable. A bit of security obscurity.
Easier to link am article than write one myself.
I only glanced through this one, it may not be 100%,but it gets the salient points.
The problem mostly exists on Windows Home versions, since they’re not managed by am orga izatkom. Plus during initial setup it makes it seem like a Microsoft account is required, which means MS collects a lot of activity data about you.
I only run Pro, and disable many of these unused services with tools like O&O Shutup and setting specific registry keys.
Exactly.
Honesty and transparency go a long way. If we know what’s going on, we can choose to help if we have time (say it’s for a portfolio).
These days I try to do both, but recognize it’s an on-going thing that will never be done.
Sometimes folder structure can be a challenge because of extensive metadata. Where do parts of a compilation go, for example. At least with metadata, music players can show the tracks correctly.
Plus if they’re links, how many still work?
You understand the value of risk management.
Nah, it’s 2 different things.
I could add pictures in the shopping list app, I just don’t want them there.
Instead I slowly took pictures of everything I own. And when something new comes in, I take a pic of that. I have a folder for inventory photos.
Those photos are only a just-in-case for insurance.
There’s also the insurance angle.
Heaven forbid you have a fire or flood from a water line break. Insurance companies aren’t your friend and will shaft you if they can - I’ve seen it happen with friends.
So now I have an inventory (and pictures). I have about 4x the stuff in my place than the average person in a house this size, so the defaults from insurance would make me lose lots of money. Once they see an exported spreadsheet with counts and dates (plus the pictures), they’ll cut a check and not argue.
Plus the inventory helps me keep track of what I have so I don’t buy it again.
I have 800+ items in my home inventory list. Lots of different tools, household stuff, seasonal, and cooking stuff.
I used to be able to keep track just by having a few containers, but then I started forgetting what container something was in.
Now containers are labelled with a container name and list of what’s in it, my inventory app (just a shopping list app) indicates the container name.
Edit: You’d be surprised how much stuff you actually have until you start inventorying it. It’s a tedious task.
All that power was a huge driver for me - my old desktop that I used as a server was pulling 120w constantly.
Now between the SFF and NAS it’s about 35w. That’s a significant difference, plus the office doesn’t get as hot.
And I’d love to run ZFS again, kind of hard to beat it for redundancy and failure resistance. Maybe the next NAS I build will be Proxmox again.