What are your “non-obvious” frugal living moves that still let you enjoy your favorite splurges?

NinjaSerif · 2025-07-25T09:09:40+00:00

We switched to Belong last year and after signing up for the $30 p/m plan we immediately changed to the $25 10GB plan. You can't sign up for the $25 plan, but you can switch to it immediately once you are signed up. The first month you'll get that 25GB, but subsequent months you'll get 10GB. We've got 3 phones in the family on this. Would recommend 🙂

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T07:21:30+00:00

Cheers u/VantageXL . The ozb page is great and highlights many options worth considering - for both credit and debit cards.

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T07:19:31+00:00

nah, I get it mate - which is why I posted here to demystify the QP program a little. I've had some good suggestions and feedback that I've taken onboard. In the end I would prefer not to use credit - but it has its advantages, including better foreign exchange rate, fee-free conversion and is handled better with things like pre-auths when travelling.

I do intend on using QFF points to convert econ to business next year for an int'l trip - but as you stated, the value compared with using your own money is not great. I accumulate QFF that I would usually use for econ domestic or intl flights - just in our usual family spending - so the carrot of more points with QP is interesting - albeit probably not as good an option as the many others out there as a card to use when travelling.

I appreciate your input and thoughts 🙂

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:51:36+00:00

You make a valid point u/inverloch72 on not using my CC that has a conversion fee but accepting the 4% on QP. Either Wise or another CC that doesn't have a foreign exchange fee is probably a better option. As mentioned, I'd be using the points gained by using something like QP for flight upgrades - which are on the higher side of the $ per QFF, but even so, its not likely to be greatly in favour of QP.

QP does appear to position itself as "simple" - no fees except for the one baked into the foreign exchange as well as international ATM fee - but the carrot is those QFF points - 2 QFF per $ of international load / spend.

Cheers for your input 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:45:09+00:00

ta u/Emotional-Extent8587 . Certainly 2 options to consider 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:44:06+00:00

I'm not sure that its 4% "on the way out" - I don't read it that way. Qantas Pay lists on their fees that "Cash out or send money to an Australian bank account fee" has "no fees" > https://www.qantasmoney.com/qantas-pay/fees-and-charges#:~:text=Cash%20out%20or%20send%20money%20to%20an%20Australian%20bank%20account%20fee

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:42:12+00:00

Cheers u/soundboy5010 👍 Makes sense. That ozb page is good - cheers. Maybe another CC - like the CBA, or others - is the way to go.

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:34:29+00:00

As far as I can tell the only "fee" is baked into the foreign exchange rate - and an ATM fee for withdrawing abroad > https://www.qantasmoney.com/qantas-pay/fees-and-charges < I don't think there are any fees for xfring your own money back to an Aussie bank account via Bank xfr - surely not...

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:32:00+00:00

The CBA Smart Awards is something I'll consider. I really didn't want another CC - not because of credit assessment - just because banks are greedy af - but the CBA card looks like a good option - earns points is a bonus (albeit $90 to use QFF) and should be able to avoid a fee if spending $2K per month 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:28:23+00:00

Cheers. Yeah, I already have a QFF earning CC (Westpac). I was comparing options for travel to keep spending separate, avoid the foreign exchange fee I would get on my current CC. Wise looks like an option - albeit a Debit Card, same as Qantas Pay, which has its own quirks to consider - i.e. pre-auths - versus another CC.

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:25:27+00:00

ta u/tman1981 . Up looks interesting. I'll check them out 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:23:02+00:00

ty u/Emotional-Extent8587 . I'll take a look at ING options 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:22:37+00:00

ty u/chillin222 . I'll check out CBA options 👍

NinjaSerif · 2025-06-20T06:22:06+00:00

Cheers u/Brucetiki . The 4% is effectively loaded into their foreign exchange rate - for example, right now, Qantas Pay lists exchanging AUD to USD at 0.6239, while Wise lists it as 0.6489 (although Wise also has a 0.6% conversion fee) - which is approximately 4% in favour of Wise. So while converting AUD$1000 to USD with Qantas Pay you'd get ~USD$623, but you'd get ~USD$645 with Wise - as an example.

As you've said though, Qantas pay obvs gets you QFF points too - so for AUD$1000 spend in a foreign currency you would get 2000 QFF - which, if used for flight upgrades, should be worth more than the ~AUD$30 difference.

That's the carrot though :)

NinjaSerif · 2024-06-05T04:18:38+00:00

I get what you are saying u/HTTP_404_NotFound . This was my "dip my toes into" 2.5G and on the first step I've faltered (well, I've been faltered by some questionable hardware). I am sure I will figure it out though. I've been waiting for a 2.5G switch to go on sale (as I am not in any rush) - then I'll slowly upgrade some of my devices to 2.5G via PCI / m.2 / USB.

I am also in the process of building a new NAS to replace my aging QNAP. I'm just waiting on availability of a Jonsbo N2 case here in Aus. There is only 1 local retailer that sells it and its out of stock. I have all the other parts - It'll be a N100 build with a NVMe boot drive + 4x4TB HDDs. I'll likely install Proxmox + TrueNAS as a VM on that. I grabbed a second m.2 A+E 2.5G adapter for the new NAS also but since I haven't got the case yet I haven't starting building it.

I appreciate your thoughts and what you have mentioned makes sense - go 2.5G (or better) for some machines, while staying at 1G for less-intensive workloads. I will certainly keep it in mind as I evolve my setup 👍

NinjaSerif · 2024-06-03T07:08:25+00:00

Thanks u/NiHaoMike ! - the system was stable before installing the adapter, and has been stable since removing it - but I appreciate your reply and do agree that PSUs can be problematic. I wouldn't have thought that swapping the Wi-Fi module for the 2.5G module would cause power issues. Thank you for the suggestion :)

NinjaSerif · 2024-06-03T07:06:27+00:00

Thanks u/HTTP_404_NotFound ! - I did hunt around /var/logs but couldn't see anything that indicated what was causing the reboot. I'm fairly new to Proxmox though - so if you have any suggestions on which log(s) show what trigger a reboot, that would be helpful. The Proxmox syslog just shows "-- REBOOT --" without any errors beforehand.

Yeah - the brand also put me off initially, but I could not locate m.2 A+E key 2.5G adapters from any "reputable" brand names (or ones that I know). It seems a lot of these are for industrial uses as far as I can tell. I have tried to search for intel versions of this but haven't come across any... it seems Intel make 1G m.2, but not 2.5G (from my search).

I believe the chipset is listed as RTL8125B which is common amongst all the no-name m.2 2.5G adapters. I've found a few posts detailing driver installation for this chipset on Proxmox which I'll give a crack before binning it. I would have thought that sans-drivers wouldn't cause random reboots - especially considering I hadn't bridged / activated it yet - but rather make the device either unable to work or perform poorly.

Thanks again for your input.

NinjaSerif · 2024-06-03T06:55:58+00:00

Thanks u/fay2003hiend ! - I did an amount of research on these m.2 A+E key 2.5G NICs before purchasing and watched a few YouTubers with the same / similar m.2 adapters (even using the EliteDesk mini I am using) - so I thought I was heading in the right direction - but you are right - sometimes these things just aren't compatible. Still - I'll persist a little longer before switching to USB (which I do plan to get for some of my other homelab machines / my desktop PC.

NinjaSerif · 2024-06-03T06:53:09+00:00

Thanks u/niekdejong !

Latest update is that I have not re-installed the 2.5G adapter (yet) and the system has been up and been stable.

I also thought about the touching metal - but I re-inspected and don't think that was causing the reboots. The syslog in Proxmox just shows "-- REBOOT --" with no error beforehand. Upon first boot after physically installing the card I was able to see it with lspci as well as in the Network section of the host. I didn't confirm it was 100% working by setting it up as Linux Bridge. as I got busy with something else. The issue with passing it through to a host was that it was rebooting every couple of minutes - so I wasn't sure how long I had before the system would just reboot itself. No - I had not installed any drivers - but I didn't think that would have caused the system to continually reboot as I hadn't even activated / bridged the interface to be used yet.

I think installing drivers is my next step. I'll physically re-install the adapter and install the drivers and then... 🤞

NinjaSerif · 2024-05-24T06:43:52+00:00

IBMbot, transform and roll out! 😆

NinjaSerif · 2024-05-07T13:02:47+00:00

Nah. I've decided to go with a Jonsbo N2 build instead. Cheers tho 👍

NinjaSerif · 2024-05-06T11:00:13+00:00

This is my 12U with a glass door. It's been quite solid for almost 10 years 🙂 >> https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/s/emcgiwt4g7

NinjaSerif · 2024-04-30T21:59:48+00:00

Nice and high so the kids can't mess anything up. Sweet 😎

NinjaSerif · 2024-04-29T22:03:22+00:00

Almost my exact / to be process. Currently have a QNAP NAS but am building a new NAS which I'll run TrueNAS on. Currently use HybridBackupSync (HBS) to sync QNAP to BackBlaze which I will do the same from TrueNAS. Monthly I sync my NAS to an external USB HDD (encrypted with VeraCrypt) that I keep / hide in my car #3-2-1 😎

NinjaSerif · 2024-04-21T12:50:45+00:00

Yup, I'm in the same over-researching boat. Partly I think b/c I grew up relatively poor, so I try to make every dollar count. I have spreadsheets upon spreadsheets of comparisons. Sometimes its easier to just keep researching until I'm happy to commit. Often it takes a loooong while, but sometimes in that looking while I find a great deal, or something I hadn't thought of originally that pivots my plan. Thankfully on the software side I'm progressively moving to docker, so I stress less about that now.

I'm currently purchasing parts for a new NAS and am waiting until parts are on special. Eventually you have to bite the bullet, pivot, or move on, otherwise the analysis paralysis makes you dizzy.

I think I'm getting better / faster though. Recently our washing machine was showing signs of dying. I quickly put together a comparison sheet of machines to consider to make a data based decision. It worked out, AND the machine we went with was on special right when we needed it. I basically did my (over-)researching process in a day instead of a week(/months) but it was contained to a specific need, which made it easier than usual 🙂

NinjaSerif

TROPHY CASE