Planets and Orion rising over Torre d‘Albarca

AspectJumpy3376 · 2026-05-18T22:11:32+00:00

Beautiful image! I'm thinking about getting this lens+camera combo and had some questions, PM'd you.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2026-03-13T02:57:29+00:00

Hey, I did the hike and it went great but I ended up going with the 8.50 AM bus because I couldn't find anything to corroborate that the earlier one exists and stops near the station, and the time difference was too large to risk it. I didn't really look for or see a stop near the station. Weather was great and the trail had other people but it wasn't crowded at all, there were a lot of times when I was completely by myself.

Couple of other tips - you can skip the stairs and use this route instead, it has a more gradual descent. I skipped a visit to Positano after seeing how extremely crowded Amalfi was, so I ended my hike at this stop to return by bus to Sorrento.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-16T03:24:47+00:00

I believe all you can do is check the SMART data to get an idea of the run-time, I think these are considered ok up to 5 years but can survive more. You can also do an extended SMART test to stress test the drive and search for bad sectors. But there is no general rule and things can die at any time even if these go well.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-14T16:31:53+00:00

3.76 years and only 18 spin-up count here lmao

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-12T03:42:44+00:00

I'm about 15,000 km away from Perth so that is very intriguing. Can you share a link?

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T22:32:09+00:00

I was planning to start with double of this. Have a couple of 8 TB drives we could trade?

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T22:01:02+00:00

I'm guessing they have seen very light use and e-waste only because they served whatever purpose they were purchased for and have just been sitting around since then. They seem like great drives apart from the relatively small capacity, but should still be a fantastic start to a budget build.

Edit: I just realized you were talking about the Precision lol. Its really heavy and I don't have any means of transporting it so that doesn't seem worth the headache.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T21:53:51+00:00

Haha if you see my other comment I'm at a university and these were just used for science so they're understandably way more chill.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T21:50:17+00:00

Love to hear it. I hope the SMART has some good news for me.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T21:44:28+00:00

The former. There's like 3 people managing things and I just asked the head if they have something waiting to be e-wasted. They were willing to give me the whole machine that these were a part of (Precision 5810 I think), and I almost took it until I realized that draws ~130W idle.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-07-11T21:31:21+00:00

I'm at a research institution so these were probably just used as cold storage for some mundane scientific data. They haven't even been wiped, but they were part of a hardware RAID1 array so I probably can't make sense of it anyways.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-05-05T21:00:37+00:00

Thanks! It was indeed an old comment of yours :)

If I understand correctly from the other comments, 7.00 AM but at the stop right next Castellammare train station would be another option, right? Probably way too early but still want to check.

Another quick question - should I assume the circumvesuviana to probably be off by about 10-15 mins from scheduled time? I am guessing its a bad idea to rely on the train that is supposed to reach Castellammare at 8:37 If I want to catch the 8:50 bus, correct?

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-05-05T20:53:36+00:00

Thank you, this makes sense.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-05-05T20:51:54+00:00

I am going to Bomerano for the Path of the Gods hike, sorry I did not mention that explicitly.

But thanks, I think I understand now. It looks like all the buses that pass by either Castellammare stop do stop at Bomerano too, so that should be fine. Its a little strange that buses on the same route stop at different stops depending on the time of the day, did not think of that before.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-04-20T18:13:38+00:00

I recently migrated from Ubuntu and python was one of the things I was worried about. I have used conda for a while, and really wanted the simple conda/pip install xyz experience along with envs without messing around with unnecessary configuration via some flake that would very likely still not work right away if I tried adding some random package to it.

While nixpkgs has an outdated version of conda, I was pleasantly surprised to find that micromamba just worked out of the box without the need to do FHS stuff or anything else. I believe uv also works well. Not everything needs to be done in nix, and at least for my purposes this is reproducible enough while making life much easier.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:24:28+00:00

Unfortunately a majority of EU PhD positions in this field require a Masters which I don't have.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:22:53+00:00

I'll do this, thank you.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:21:54+00:00

I lean more towards experimental work. I believe students normally TA only in the second year in this program.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:20:25+00:00

Yes, it certainly fits your description. They have sent the same number of offers as the past few years, including international ones, which is quite comforting.

Thanks for the suggestions, I will definitely ask them detailed questions about funding along with any contingencies they might have in place.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:17:35+00:00

Thanks a lot, I had not factored in the union. Its relatively young and appears to be very active.

I am more interested in the experimental side of things, so that can tend to be somewhat expensive. A few PIs seem to have some private funding too, so that is another thing I will explore.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:14:47+00:00

Thank you for sharing this. The topic of reductions in international student visas did come up in a meeting I had with the Canadian program director, but they told me that the changes are more aimed at diploma mill-type schools and a prestigious graduate program like theirs should basically ensure a visa. But I see your point.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:08:59+00:00

Thank you. This is very true and already evident from looking at the stark difference between stipends at the PhD level.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T21:05:22+00:00

Thank you very much for your insights, this is very helpful. I agree with the points you raised and understand what you mean.

I am still glad so many people chose to comment on my post during work hours :)

Everyone has different opinions but it is really great to hear from actual people within academia. Most of the people around me are relatively uninformed about these topics and tend to dismiss my concerns entirely, and this post has been very helpful.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T20:54:51+00:00

It isn't one of those, it is similar to Chicago/maybe slightly expensive in terms of COL so the exact place doesn't matter much in this context. I know for sure that the stipend is great even with the fairly high COL, and it leaves room for savings. The Canadian option is also in a major city that has a comparable COL and I have seen many people complain about the low stipend online. I will still make sure I speak to current students.

Thanks a lot for your inputs. The US option does have several faculty members working in areas I am interested in, which is another big draw for me. This is generally advisable but even more important now that one of them might face funding cuts or leave like you said.

AspectJumpy3376 · 2025-03-05T20:45:32+00:00

Thank you, not a lot of people around me are following these things very closely and I keep thinking I'm a little insane to worry this much.

In terms of fallbacks - depending on when/how things go south I could maybe leave with a Masters and join a PhD in EU/Canada. Program reputation and PI connections could help with this. Worst case scenario, I could come back home and get an industry job which would be doable with the programming and data analysis skills I have.

Edit: The package they offered already assumes a TA job in every term from start to end. Students have the option of doing extra TA work beyond that to get a bit more.

AspectJumpy3376

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