There are various mobile screens you can take with, and if you have a big enough tablet you can even use that as an additional screen.
I agree it's generally less productive, I use virtual desktops and at the bottom line for the most part it just requires a swipe or 2 keys to move between them so it's not that bad, I do use ultra-wide monitors at my home office though so ultimately my laptop screen just can't show as much info but that's also not too big of a deal.

It really depends on what you do. If you're doing day trading or coding (or even drawing), a small monitor is definitely not a good idea. But if you're primarily writing articles (eg, reporter) it is certainly possible. You can use multiple monitors or as another poster pointed out, several desktop layouts. It all really depends on the kind of work you do. As an example, a large part of my job now is cloud-based. I could use two monitors, however if I can't, it just means I have to be a little slower (eg, when comparing code). But, as always, YMMV

I have a 13" MacBook Pro and as a developer, it works okay for me. I do use whatever macOS calls their virtual desktop implementation quite a lot, though, and bumped up the display resolution as high as the default OS will let me go (I haven't tried any of the hacks that would let me go higher).

That all said, I'm considering going 16" next time around for the separate GPU, but it also depends on whether I hold out long enough for an ARM version of the 13" to become available (and how well its GPU performs).

For me, starting at a 13" screen all day would definitely hurt my eyes. If I "zoomed" in, then I'd have less real estate to use and that's precious as it is on a single screen. Wouldn't matter what OS I'm using. That said, mobility-wise, a 13" laptop is probably a good one if you want to change locations regularly. I don't think Starbucks or McD would be too pleased to set me set up a 17" laptop (or 15") with a 15.6" secondary monitor on one of their tables.

As for the ARM version or not, depends on your lifetime with a given laptop. They said it will take 1-2 year transition everything to Apple silicon, but I would assume a 7-8 year support lifetime for the laptop (at least OS-wise). At least that's what they have done in the past. App vendors would likely give it at 5-7 years to support both Intel and ARM versions (that or risk pissing people off who invested huge amounts of cash into their macs)... since you have a MacBook, I don't think you're likely to be in a rush to buy a new one (depend on age of course). If I were to advise my friends, I'd say wait to see if they have a 13/14" MBP come closer to the end of the year. If they do, then decide between the recently refreshed MBP (which should have come down in price) or get the new MBP...

At least that's how I would do this.

From this article, it sounds like Apple killed PowerPC support in the OS three years after the first Intel machines came out. Assuming they use a similar trajectory, Intel support will likely end 3-4 years after the last Intel Mac in their lineup is replaced with an ARM version. However, they may also keep Intel support around a lot longer this time for environmental reasons, people going a lot longer between hardware upgrades, etc.

Personally, I've replaced machines every three years in the past and the current one is going to be at the end of year 3 in October. (I tried to go past 3 with my last one, but an inopportune LCD failure before an international trip forced a replacement during year 4 since I couldn't source a new/refurbished LCD in time.) Since then, of course, Apple laptops have become more of a challenge to fix for the average person. Considering that and the questionable long-term reliability/support for the butterfly keyboard, I'm thinking I'm going to replace not long after the 3 years are up this time. The question then ends up being, how long do I want to be able to run x86 stuff, either in macOS or booting to Windows or Linux--or whether being able to run x86 stuff even matters.

On the other hand, I also try not to buy first-gen anything from Apple due to the inevitable issues that come up. And there probably will be issues given such a major change. Then again, the tighter integration might help (plus the fact that they're giving out developer Mac Minis to get enough ARM ported apps out there at launch, so it's an opportunity to find major bugs before consumers get hardware).

In the meantime, I'm kinda tempted to replace my laptop now since having to use a Surface 3 as my primary machine (while my MBP has been at some Apple repair depot for over a week and counting) is starting to get a bit annoying--especially if it goes for more than another week or so. In that event, if I end up replacing with another x86 MBP, I figure I can buy an ARM Mac Mini for ARM development too whenever it comes out.

Getting back to the thread topic, over the weekend I attempted to set up a Wireguard server and connect my phone to it. I couldn't get it to work, though. I have an existing OpenVPN setup that works fine, so there's no real need for Wireguard...just wanted to try it out. It's pretty slick and once Ubiquiti includes it in their router firmware by default I'll probably switch over.

I hope Ubiquiti includes a GUI to set it up as well. They never included one for OpenVPN as far as I know.

Nope, there's no GUI for OpenVPN. The command line is pretty easy, though, and there are lots of walkthroughs on setting up OpenVPN in EdgeRouters. I had had one set up since back in the days of using Tomato for routers so it helped that I was already familiar with how it worked. Wireguard is much simpler...I'm sure I was just doing something dumb.

I was bored, so after reading this, I replaced my OpenVPN with Wireguard via PiVPN. All went well apart from Wireguard requiring SecureBoot to be enabled. This meant I had to enter a password on the first boot - which was hard as it's a headless server :)

So, I had to dig out an old monitor, an HDMI->VGA adaptor, and pull the server from behind the couch. All to enter a pesky password.

Anyway, it's all working now and integrated well with PiHole.

Yes, very happy. They have 4 inputs - if your computer supports 4 monitor outputs you can hook it up like that and treat each quadrant as its own screen. The disadvantage to this is you lose 4K, and things that would span two of the "screens" don't always line up perfectly.
I run them in 4K mode. With Win10, you can "snap" a window to each corner and it automatically sizes it to that quadrant. You still keep 4K this way, less cables, and more flexibility. It's a much better solution. DisplayPort is preferred for 4k 60hz mode.

My laptop driving 1 of them is a 13" screen. It's great for being light when on the road and basic email, etc. - but any time I am in an office I usually try to snag an extra monitor for the week. In hotel rooms, keep in mind you can HDMI out of most laptops into most TVs - boom - 2nd/larger screen.

I've also been looking at going to spend a month or two in Mexico and working remote through this. It's certainly doable on the price side - just need to get a few of my friends to also go and I'd be set. Again, the TV in a place would be the life saver as my 2nd screen.

Back to thread theme
 

WIFI dead zones. Installed eero. No more dead zones. Wife happy...I'm happy.

Don't laugh too hard, but I have a 3Com 3C905 10/100 NIC in one of the office routers. I believe it dates back to 1996 and replaced a circa-2012 NIC which failed. Kind of wild to think it is older than some of our new hires and is still working beautifully. Our internet connection is ~500Mbps, BUT I've never seen us even come close to 100Mbps, so no reason to mess with it for now.


Does learning how to operate this beast count as techy stuff?
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...9187c12520.jpg

In normal times I'm almost never home, so being 'grounded' due to COVID and the restrictions was getting to me. I've been driving past this airport on the way to the office and have been jealously watching the planes flying around. Screw lay-flat seats, lounges, and points -- at this time I'd be happy to be in anything airborne, even a hot air balloon. I'm currently studying the ground portion now, hoping to get the Written/Knowlege test done by month-end. Shooting to have the PPL sometime in the fall, but it's more important for me to truly understand the concepts than just passing the test. If everything goes to plan I'll be able to visit my relatives for the holidays without the pitfalls of airline travel today.

Not sure where it'd fit, but I would be interested in a separate thread just to document your journey. I've always been curious about this.

I went to flying camp when I was a kid, and flew with a friend from Chicago to Champaign several years ago after he got his license. It's a lot of fun but flying those little planes is also a lot of work! You've got to constantly scan around for traffic, adjust course as the wind continually blows you off course, check a rotating range of instruments...it's really tiring! But fun.

I'm normally a rather private person, but I do feel strongly that anyone with even the slightest hint of wanting to fly should at least try a discovery flight. If you can think of the right place to post it, I'll do it.

There isn't a better time than now to learn how to fly. The USA has the lowest costs to learn how to fly compared to other countries, so much that Florida alone accounts for 20%+ of the *world's* flight training. That doesn't include AZ/NV/TX/CA, which also have numerous flight schools. These schools have many (mostly?) foreign students. Due to COVID, these schools/CFIs are desperate for business. Similarly, AVGAS prices are at an all-time low. There's a ton of availability for rental aircraft. Honestly, there hasn't been a better time to do this.

A LOT has changed since then. Practically-speaking, ADS-B-out is required to fly in most of the USA now. This means every plane, not just the airlines, is pinging away it's altitude, heading, and speed every few seconds. Anyone with a tablet & Raspberry Pi can receive these, along with weather radar in the cockpit and see them on a moving map display. You still need to be looking around, but it's a nice second set of eyes. GPS makes a huge difference too. And, I'm much more confident in the other pilots than I am the drivers around Florida. I'm not entirely sure why, but the skills of Florida drivers have been absolutely terrible this year.

Haha. That made me laugh! ;)

I got my laptop back from being repaired and it turns out that my Time Machine backup is corrupt. I'm currently running fsck_hfs on it now but if that doesn't work, at least my FreeNAS box has ZFS snapshots of the Time Machine backup all the way back to January that I can try.

If you can believe it, since the lockdown started, FL drivers are at least a whole order of magnitude worse than before. I do hear you though, it's bad out there.

After a lot of struggling last night, I found out a couple of things about Time Machine. The main thing is that Apple apparently was backing up to a folder on my FreeNAS server called "[computer name].backupbundle"; Apple went back to using .sparsebundle as the extension at some point so both Migration Assistant and the "install from Time Machine" option in recovery mode didn't see the backup at all (and didn't produce any errors or other popup message either).

Second, the most recent backup was in fact corrupt, and multiple attempts to repair it didn't seem to work. (This was the first assumption I had made when the system wasn't seeing any backups.) Fortunately, I only needed to revert back to the snapshot taken the day before the laptop's SSD died to find a backup that it's okay with; now we wait for Migration Assistant to finish restoring.

I have a place on Marco, and drive up 75 to RSW a lot (well I did). Worst bit of interstate on the east coast, imho.

Only if it had a Garmin G1000 unit

How about the world's slowest USB cable?

The fastest it can go is 57,600 baud.

(It's really a USB to serial cable, a null modem and another USB to serial cable. It provides a "serial" port on two computers that can communicate. It's just a test rig for the real thing which will be a USB to serial cable that connects to a piece of machinery.)

I migrated our home network from Netgear routers running FreshTomato as my gateway and repurposed as APs with a wired network using unmanaged switches to a pfSense box as the gateway, managed switches, "real" APs with a controller, and VLANs/subnets for segregating devices into separate classes. Extensive firewalling including GeoIP fencing.

For fun, learned to set up a PXE boot server that can serve up various versions of Windows and Linux to devices that support PXE boot

Latest...

Last year, my Synology DS918+ NAS died. 3 drives had gone bang a few months prior, and it finally got just a "bad beep of death". Trying to get a fix or replacement from Synology was an exercise in futility, so I pulled out the drives (which were still OK).

I decided to build get a decent spec i5 based "server" tower that enough room for the 4 drives. I got everything up and running and turned it into my own cloud server as described above. I set the 4 drives up as a 24TB Windows Storage Space, and all was well. Until...

About a month ago, I got a notification of some sort of corruption on the storage space. I sorted that out by deleting a couple of files. Then I got a notification that the storage space had gone read only, again with some corruptions. I didn't know what to do at this stage, but I needed to get rid of the storage space if it was unreliable.**

After contemplating for a while (I'm unemployed :) ), I bought another Synology DS918+ :eek: I then needed to get everything onto that somehow, whilst transferring the disks from the existing server. There was only about 4TB of data on the storage space at the time, so my plan was :-

- Remove one drive from the storage pool and set it up as a standalone drive, giving me about 5TB to play with. This took about 2 days.

- Copy everything from the remaining 3-drive storage space to the orphaned drive. This was quite quick and uneventful.

- Remove the 3 drives that made up the storage space, and put them into the NAS, and build a SHR array. After a quick download of the latest firmware, the NAS was up and running and available on the network. I set up a couple of shares and users and set the correct permissions.

- Copy everything from the server to the NAS. Again, this was quick and uneventful.

- Set up the NAS to backup to iDrive.

- Pull the remaining drive from the server and put it into the NAS. As the NAS was still doing its initial low level parity check, it wouldn't let me add the drive. It took about 2 days for this to finish. After that, I was able to add the drive to the array, and after another 3 days of parity checks, the extra space was available.

So, I now had a nicely working NAS and the server connected to it. Except...

The server was actually huge, and had a noisy/whiny CPU fan as well as an overly-beefy power supply. There were now no physical drives in there, so I considered getting a smaller case with a silent power supply.

But then, I happened to see a review of a 10th Generation Intel NUC. I went onto eBuyer, and found it would cost £500 for the NUC and 32GB of RAM and I could use the 1TB NVMe from the server. The "Good-DYKWIA" was saying "step away from the keyboard" (I'm unemployed :) ), but the "Bad-DYKWIA" won out (I got paid a redundancy payment), and I ordered it for next day delivery.

It was easy to set up, and after downloading the various drivers I had a replacement for the server. It seems to run just as quick as the previous 9th generation i5, and I've had a couple of VMs running.

Both the NUC and the NAS now live in a small cupboard in my office - and are effectively silent. I sold the old server for £400 on Facebook the very next day.

** I later found that I was not alone with Storage Space issues. It appears that Microsoft has introduced some sort of a bug in their Windows 2004 update :-

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/...ting-to-window

The great advice they offer is to make the storage space read-only to stop corruption. :mad:

I'd also like to introduce Bad-DYKWIA to the AMD Ryzen Renoir Asus PN50 https://liliputing.com/2020/07/asus-...processor.html which is available for pre-order in the UK. I'm waiting for it to be available in US.

It was a busy spring
 

Never have I done so much "techie stuff" in such a short period of time:

1) bought a 2nd Thinkpad off eBay for use with distance learning/working from home. Upgraded its memory (8 -> 16 GB) and SSD (256 GB -> 1 TB), replaced the WiFi card, and purchased a sleeve for it. While doing the memory upgrade, I found that a bad SIMM had been sent and exchanged it.
2) broke the screen on my laptop, which I then replaced. Thankfully, this happened after the Thinkpad arrived.
3) replaced my Securifi Almond+ wifi router (bought off a Kickstarter) with an ASUS RT-AC68U running Asuswrt-Merlin firmware. The home network also got an upgrade to its TP-Link Powerline adapters, new Ethernet cables, a new switch, and better electrical organization.
4) did some repairs and upgrades to my 2006 MacBook Pro (runs Snow Leopard!): new charger, replaced the hard disk with an SSD, replaced the suddenly broken DVD drive, and upgraded to TexLive 2020.

And that was just March-June.

I also did some non-techie home appliance repair, replacing a shelf and the condenser fan in our refrigerator.

I'm currently contemplating replacing my 21.5" iMac with a 27" 4k monitor and a decent spec Mac Mini...

I've found some employment, so my justification is that I'll be working from home, so a decent sized monitor is beneficial. The iMac looks quite dated now with the huge bezels - it's probably bigger than the 27" monitor I'm looking at.

If you really want to use a 4K resolution for work, you might want to look at a bigger screen, I have one at home connected to my MBP and while the text is still readable (chrome, iTerm etc.) it's very tiny so I had to scale down the resolution.

Oh yeah, I won't actually be using the native 4K resolution, it will be scaled. My 21.5" iMac is a 4K version, so that's scaled already.

27" is about as big as I can get in the home office space.

In that case, you can also consider getting a QHD monitor

Perhaps get the monitor upgrade and wait to see if there's a decent sale on Mac Mini or home equipment stipend? Many of my team mates in WFH mode have chosen to upgrade ergo gear like chair or standing desk followed by network gear. Not that many have chosen to upgrade their work or home computers, though that's possibly influenced by kids remote-school tech gear costs and upcoming PS5 release.

My 27" iMac which was used as a target display (pre-retina) was ghosting quite a bit so I went to an i5 Mac mini for home use and Dell 27" 4K monitor which switches over to work laptop via usb-c displayport. Self upgraded the ram on the mac mini to 32GB and also stalked inventory trackers for a brand name webcam. I'm looking at getting a USB audio receiver Topping MX3 or perhaps active bookshelf usb speakers and usb switch for audio so the software volume control works. My tech refresh is around $2,400 so far including the splurge targets of a nice monitor arm and MSRP (but not former pre-COVID price) high end web cam.

ETA: Also recently bought a usb-c to DP cable because I was tired of having to reset NVRAM after encountering "No Signal" after booting up the mac mini with HDMI mac mini out to HDMI monitor https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250715830 as recently as last month.

That's exactly what I'm looking at! The Dell Q2720U and an i5 Mac Mini. I can get a refurbished Mac Mini with 16GB / 1TB SSD for a little more than the standard 8GB/512GB model. I might upgrade the RAM, but 16GB should be enough.

What scaled resolution are you using (if any)?

How do you connect the Mac Mini? Via HDMI, or do you use the USB-C and then switch it to your laptop when needed?

Edited the my post but it is currently mac mini usb-c male to DP male and macbook pro retina 15" 4 port (2017?) via usb-c male to usb-c male 3ft DP-alt (comes with this cable). There's 3 inputs on the Dell Q2720U. I think I bought the Belkin usb-c DP cable. I was using HDMI 4k certified monoprice cable (2 pack which I also use with my older non-4K tv) but ran into the "No Signal" issue every week or so. I do pretty much live on one electronic device or another, though, so prob. boot up the mac mini every day. Yes, I still shutdown my devices which probably shows my age.

I'll need to check the resolution each system is set at tomorrow. It's set pretty close to the same resolution at 60Hz on both machines but honestly, it seems to drop down into 30Hz at times (con of restarting systems, I guess). It may need more than 16GB memory without eGPU to watch YouTube 720p or 1080p in a full window. Will double check when I lookup the resolution settings.

I don't feel Mac Mini fan temperature management is as good as the iMac and would probably get a quiet 200mm usb powered fan like Noctua or AC Infinity if my area wasn't headed towards mostly cooler weather though similar caveats also apply to the MBP 15". Overall, I don't feel it is as nice of machine as the non-retina iMac, a little more iffy, but also the less expensive option if you want to connect more than one machine via hardware to a single display on your desk and near term if you want an Intel processor. The more expensive one would be a MB laptop or Mac Pro.

Thanks - seems like a not too stable setup. Maybe I'll wait until the rumoured new almost-bezel-less iMacs appear :D

Yup. I'm happy enough with the stability after changing out the cable to the mac mini but I wouldn't suggest it to my non-techie family members as I'm one of the tech supports. I didn't have a "No Signal" issue with USB-C DP alt to the MBP and I doubt they'd really notice 30Hz refresh. The iMac rumors seem to fit their use-case a lot better.

Dell Q2720U also has a less than stellar design/manufacturing defect along the bottom bezel which leaves a gap https://slickdeals.net/f/14160827-de...16#commentsBox My bottom bezel isn't flush. If these times were not these times and/or I had purchased it closer to suggested retail price, it would have been returned. My unit didn't have any dead pixels, light bleed, or other defects so I decided not to gamble with it. I do like the USB-C and USB-A ports on the left hand side which edges out a similar LG without this feature.

Well, I doubt anyone has done anything as impressive or as technical as this: I bought a second hand X1 Carbon (due to impending retirement) off ebay for the princely sum of £160 and fitted a laptop camera sliding cover that cost about £1.98 for 3 (including delivery) from a well known auction site. I also managed to keep the edges square to the laptop cover. I know you are impressed. :)

All bow before thee, the prince of technology!

Oh yeah... Just realized I had something to contribute here though not that "exciting"
Upgraded 3+ family iPads to "latest" models (the 3+ one's were 6+ years old)
Setup two laptops for kids online school.
Dealt with connection problems on said laptops (See, https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trav...ting-fios.html )
Began installation of whole house Wifi mesh system.

Memory used watching YouTube in Chrome, video in theater mode. Total of 5 tabs open including YouTube; terminal with top pid watch in the background. Browser Inner Window size 2422 x 1514.
Stats from Activity Monitor:
Hope this helps.

Video watched: www.youtube.com/watch?v=qecQ3RD0Nng

I have replaced the old Dell I picked out of the recycling bin at work to use with UniFi Video with a UniFi CloudKey Gen2+. I had previously setup a Debian machine but UniFi Video is done for come January.

Had the Dream Machine Pro supported RAID I probably would have sprung for that, for the moment I am still running the UniFi controller on a Raspberry Pi because I have the cameras in the DMZ.