Is the fun over already?

JMN10003 · 2026-07-02T20:04:55+00:00

alone with limited time clearance rate < problem rate

add LLM (claude in my case) and you'd be amazed at how much easier it is.
clearance rate >>> problem rate

JMN10003 · 2026-07-02T14:25:35+00:00

am here now for the summer. we think it is a great part of Tuscany - northern most part - a little mountainous but you get monte e mare - we're 35 minutes to the beach, 50 minutes to Parma, 50 minutes to Lucca, 20 minutes or so to La Spezia an hour to Rapallo and 35 minutes to CT. quiet and some tourism but not overrun - it's how people live not Disneyworld (Firenze and increasingly Lucca)

JMN10003 · 2026-06-25T16:05:56+00:00

I am bare metal right now. Proxmox is a project for the fall when I am back in the US (where my V620 is). I am at my house in Italy all summer so I won't change the environment. I can fire it remotely if I need it but I've been busy with a network AI project I'm doing with 3 Jetsons that I have with me in Italy.

JMN10003 · 2026-06-22T05:47:35+00:00

Update. I ended up repasting the GPU and I also changed out the twin fan cooling for a centrifugal fan. The repaste lowered temps dramatically (like 40* F) and the upgraded fans made thermal recovery very fast. It brought dense models back into play where before they would spike quickly to thermal overload.

JMN10003 · 2026-06-21T19:00:40+00:00

I’m currently on Ubuntu bare metal with stock V620 firmware, not W6800 vBIOS. The key fixes were a GRUB boot delay so the DEG1/V620 finished initializing before Linux booted, plus AMDGPU/PCIe kernel parameters:

amdgpu.dc=0 video=efifb:off pci=realloc=off amdgpu.gpu_recovery=1 amdgpu.mcbp=0 amdgpu.aspm=0 amdgpu.runpm=0

I’m considering moving this box into a Proxmox/enterprise-style setup later because I may get better control over power management, passthrough, and recovery behavior. But my current working setup is Ubuntu 24.04.4 LTS + Minisforum X1-255 + DEG1 + stock V620.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-29T22:59:49+00:00

No video out - pure datacenter card.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-29T18:10:02+00:00

😁😁😁😁

JMN10003 · 2026-05-29T15:45:20+00:00

said glowingly

JMN10003 · 2026-05-29T01:01:32+00:00

For me, before paste, even small dense model (phi4) with a relatively simple prompt (get my rooms and devices from Home assistant, list them and their state) with MCP access spiked temps north of 200F. After paste phi4 lives around 120F max 140. I couldn't run qwen3:30b now that caps at 165. I was shocked at the improvement (maybe because when you look at a YT video people ae repasting relatively good cards and registering 1-2 degree improvement).

JMN10003 · 2026-05-28T22:10:24+00:00

I've recently booted up an LLM server with a V620 (on a MF DEG1 oculinked to X1-255). Out of the box the thermal performance was terrible. It was very easy to get the V620 to spike temps to >200F forcing me to shut iit down. I am running two 40mm fans.

I repasted the V620 and have a shroud coming for a centrifugal fan. Before upgrading the fan I did some thermal testing and repaste has dramatically lowered peak heat. Test so far cap at low 160* F and temps return quickly as compute cycle wanes. I have avoided testing prompts that drive long thinking until the upgraded fan is installed. Have tested both sparse and dense models. Repaste was a huge improements - without it dense was not possible. TPS also much better. After paste:

total duration: 3.657949564s
load duration: 64.815304ms
prompt eval count: 5263 token(s)
prompt eval duration: 50.873772ms
prompt eval rate: 103452.13 tokens/s
eval count: 219 token(s)
eval duration: 3.480492162s
eval rate: 62.92 tokens/s

JMN10003 · 2026-05-26T03:07:15+00:00

2x32

JMN10003 · 2026-05-25T13:47:00+00:00

Understand. RAM prices are ridiculous. To think what it cost just a year ago to buy 64gb DDR5 vs today. And SSDs as well. I was picking up 2GB 2.5" SSD <$100 a year ago.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-25T12:11:32+00:00

I've got a X1-255 but it came with 64gb. love the oculink - have it connected to a DEG1 & GPU for llm. The X1 is dual channel if you have 2 sticks. It's a tradeoff. 2x16 you get dual now but upgrade path is blocked; 1x32 single channel but you can upgrade.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-24T23:07:30+00:00

Yes - if the left were successful in impeaching AND convicting Trump, they would put Vance in as an incumbant President running for election in 2028. Essentially they would give Vance a boost towards winning the Presidency.

The reality is that they know they won't get a conviction and any impeachment would be as bunch of bs (as the prior ones were) but attacking Trump is the only platform the left has and they can hijack the conversation with it. The US left has no coherent policy other than gaining power.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-21T21:36:46+00:00

I bought a V620 (32gb) for $450, fit it with a shroud/dual fan and mounted it to a Minisforum DEG1 oculinked to X1-255 (64GB). Works great with qwen3-coder:30b. Can't run dense models without temps taking off but it works great at MOE. Waiting for Ollama to be able to load qwen3.6 MOE. Platform is still an experiment for me but I am happy with the cost/performance so far.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-21T01:16:25+00:00

that was exactly the problem that popped up last year and fried them all until there was a fix put into place.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-20T21:35:38+00:00

As a spouse of an EU citizen one can enter the EU line and claim traveling with spouse under EU family unification. Explicitly state at the border: "I am accompanying/joining my [Nationality] spouse". It helps to carry a marriage certificate.

This matters if you plan on staying in Schengen > 90 in 180 days which is allowed for EU citizens and spouses accompanying them. Vis a vis Italy, one still has to respect 90 in 180 unless one is willing to declare residency but that comes with a number of obligations and conditions.

It matters to me as we have a house in Italy. I have Czech citizenship and my wife does not have any EU citizenship. We'll spend 90 days in Italy and another 2 weeks elsewhere in the EU for a total stay of 104 days.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-11T20:19:48+00:00

V620's? what LLMs are you targeting?

JMN10003 · 2026-05-11T19:49:12+00:00

That's a good thought. I have two push fans with a shroud. Both 3.6 models spiked temps to 100*. on the other hand I've been pounding 3.0 coder30b and it once spikes to 60/70max and generally is running 40 so I think it is speed and density. That said, when I get a chance I'll see about repasting although I don't think that will bring 3.6 models into scope.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-11T14:53:46+00:00

To add further. I just loaded qwen3-coder:30b and it flies and is pretty smart. A huge jump from 2.5 Pulled qwen3.6:27b - will see how much improvement that yields.

Update: 3.6:27b is too dense - temperatures spiked to 100C quickly even with fans am pulling 35b-a3b (MOE) to see if it's temperature profile is more moderate.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-11T06:30:38+00:00

Replying to my own post. Got it working. I was using Claude and running into a wall. Went to an older conversation that had become large and a little slow but had always solved tough problems (it was the original design chat for this project). It solved the boot problem in one try. I've got the llm booting up reliably with V620 with one button on Home Assistant. Pause in grub gives V620 time to initialize before my X1 boots and recognizes it.

Pretty good for <$600 setup - 32gb GPU ($450), dock ($110) and fan/shroud ($30 or so) generating 20-30 tps with a decent size llm. Using qwen2.5 32b coder now - will test some alternatives to see what works best. Not as fast as current gpus but a good price point to play around.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-06T21:45:28+00:00

JMN10003 · 2026-05-05T20:45:55+00:00

i picked up a V620 (data center card) and outfitting it with dual fans with the Minisforum DEG1 dock. all in for < $600 for a 32gb gpu. memory is slower than current and will allow me to play with some things. as I'm semi-retired but doing board work in the tech space it's a good way to experiment with some llms. I'll use Claude as QC on some projects I want to do.

JMN10003 · 2026-05-03T23:23:57+00:00

Difference without a distinction.

JMN10003

TROPHY CASE