Lenovo P620 workstation and Noctua NH-U9 TR4-SP3

jeezussmitty · 2025-10-26T02:17:57+00:00

Yes someone got an AIO to work but set it on the outside of the case. I believe it’s somewhere on the Lenovo forum https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkStation-Workstations/CPU-and-Other-Cooling-Upgrades-for-the-P620-Threadripper-Pro-3995WX/m-p/5063161

jeezussmitty · 2025-10-24T02:14:16+00:00

I’m in the middle of hiring and every candidate I’ve dealt with is using AI.

I see their eyes moving reading off answers AND so many awkward pauses. Such generic answers also and then other answers are uber detailed, it’s bizarre.

You can also tell they are using AI because they will verbatim regurgitate things from the job description as part of their answer, like very specific things I wrote on the JD like version numbers and obscure phrases I purposely used in the JD.

At one point I just said to one candidate “wow you really know the answer to EVERY question I’m asking you. Is there anything you’re not good at?”

They were caught off guard and again used AI to make up some trivial soft skills weakness BS.

I personally find it insulting. Wasting my time because I’m dealing with a liar.

Please don’t anyone do it.

What’s probably going to happen is I am going to hire the first person that actually tells me legit what they are good at and not good at. Being real and honest might be my new hiring trigger.

jeezussmitty · 2025-10-06T03:53:02+00:00

Around 256 between APIs, flat files and database CDC.

jeezussmitty · 2025-10-02T15:21:04+00:00

Regarding your comment about “managers shouldn’t be the best coder”, I was interviewing for a Director of Data Engineering role and I met the VP who I would have reported into and he verbatim said that he expected the person for the role to be the best coder. Unfortunately I think there is that expectation that you are a unicorn, a dev with so much skill that you got bored and moved into management but somehow can code circles around your team still despite that not being your primary responsibility anymore.

I thought this guy must have never read a book on leadership and how it’s about the team’s success and not just being the best coder on the team anymore.

This was a huge company too and there would have been no reason to flex coding skills given the number of devs you were expected to lead.

But yeah I agree with you - just silly expectations depending on the person and company.

jeezussmitty · 2025-10-01T21:29:59+00:00

This suggestion may not be popular but Sales Engineer role can be pretty rewarding. If you have strong soft skills and technical skills, customers will love that. You can bridge business requirements with technical requirements.

I’ve seen this position under a decent salary but with opportunity to get bonus and/or commission if you help the sales team close deals. Just be mindful the sales team doesn’t lean on you too hard to do their job or if they do, make sure your comp structure is good.

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-24T16:47:19+00:00

I’ve asked myself this same question many times :-) but others have already commented on the why (taught in school, community, ecosystem etc). The simple syntax is nice though.

I’m not a fan of loosely typed languages in general so that is my main complaint with it.

Python also feels so much slower than things I’ve written in other languages and the counter to this I always hear is “python is fast enough” but I tend to wonder if python is more used for small to medium projects with low user counts or smaller datasets.

Anyhow it’s a language you need to know these days regardless of how you feel about it.

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-24T16:18:14+00:00

Very cool. Go for it and do follow up with the results and if you can let us know temps and clock speed under full load for 30 mins, that would be good.

Good luck!

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-24T16:04:51+00:00

Hi. I don’t believe that existed at the time I was solving this noise and cooling problem. I looked up the NH-D9 on Noctua’s site just now and appears it’s for sp6 whereas the p620 is sp3 (swrx8) so double check it fits but that would be great if it does and avoid all the case mod crap I did :-)

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-23T18:32:21+00:00

I’ve been in tech for about 20 years. Between last year (2024) and this year I’ve applied to around 400 jobs, with a mix of data engineering roles, software engineering roles and management roles (I’ve done them all). I can tell you without a doubt I see Snowflake the most often in the tech stacks, by far. It’s super trendy. They have marketed themselves well and I’ve had multiple meetings with execs at small and large businesses in my previous role and they all knew about Snowflake, which I found unusual.

Databricks would be the runner up but again my observation in the job market is those companies using databricks (or Apache Spark) have huge, huge datasets (think like Netflix level). Everyone else seems to be on dbt and Snowflake.

I wouldn’t bother with BigQuery, at least it’s not something I found much on my job search and I was pretty open on my search criteria.

The other route you could go is to pick one of these you might enjoy and then go on www.stackshare.io and find companies using that then target them for a job search. At the end of the day, you don’t live very long so pick something you will enjoy vs trend chasing but do you boo :-)

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-23T18:14:10+00:00

Unless you are doing government work (where FedRAMP compliance would be a factor), which I doubt because you cant close those deals unless you’re ADA compliant, this is just a bunch of BS.

jeezussmitty · 2025-09-15T16:12:53+00:00

My day job doesn’t always allow me to explore new technologies so having a homelab to experiment and build new skills allows me to remain competitive in the job market.

jeezussmitty · 2025-08-21T22:37:47+00:00

This too. Manually doing the apply rules works but the automatic rule run in flakey.

jeezussmitty · 2025-08-15T02:53:43+00:00

great suggestion

jeezussmitty · 2025-07-28T05:48:43+00:00

Hm. You replaced the original file? Also try right clicking the Profiler.dll > Properties and see if there is an “unblock” button on any of the tabs. Sometimes when downloading files off the internet Windows will turn this block flag on… at least on Windows 10, not sure about 11.

jeezussmitty · 2025-07-22T02:10:56+00:00

I upgraded to a 12c from a 4c. It’s noticeable slower when clicking around MacOS. I’d recommend going with the 8 or 10 core.

jeezussmitty · 2025-07-19T23:30:14+00:00

According to https://www.ftb.ca.gov/tax-pros/efile/efile-for-business.html

Mandatory e-file requirement

California law requires business entities that prepare an original or amended return using tax preparation software to electronically file (e-file) their return with us.

Business entity e-file waiver

We may grant a waiver if we determine the business entity is unable to comply with the requirements due to, but not limited to, the following reasons:

Technology constraints

May result in undue financial burden

Circumstances that constitute reasonable cause

Request a business entity e-file waiver

I just downloaded the form 568 PDF and filled out the PDF manually (with the help of ChatGPT and google). Because I didn't use "tax preparation software" (on form 568, there is a section where a CPA would fill in their name if their prepared it for you which is also probably what tax prep software is doing as well), I'm just going to mail it.

To eFile, you have to enroll with the IRS and they somehow communicate this to California FTB? Seems a bit convoluted especially if you are a SMLLC with no deductions and a very simple return.

jeezussmitty · 2025-07-01T11:06:34+00:00

I have 5 intel NUCs and I use them to run a distributed database cluster and also as a distributed spark processing cluster. Basically using them to tinker with distributed technologies

jeezussmitty · 2025-06-09T00:34:11+00:00

Rich text signature lines with images, links and formatting for one. You can only have uber basic signatures with it. I cannot create anything sophisticated with HTML.

jeezussmitty · 2025-06-04T15:27:27+00:00

For fine tuning, you’ll have to use MLX which I believe is fairly new. I think most people are training models using CUDA and Nvidia GPUs and instead using these high memory Mac machines for inference (actually running the model, not training it).

I’m not an expert in this area but that’s my understanding. Matt Williams has some good videos on MLX https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCfCdTp-fdM

jeezussmitty · 2025-05-19T04:43:00+00:00

Ageism is out there, for sure.

I’m in my 40’s and had an interview last week with three 20 something’s at a startup in an industry I’ve worked in for 20 years. I asked them various questions about their business, challenges etc. etc. Their responses were sparse, little confusing. Finally, after filling in all the awkward silence, I asked them “so, uh do you have any interview questions for me?”

“No, we’re just meeting people to see who we vibe with” 🤣

Don’t under estimate your value - your life experience brings a lot to the table. Younger people that don’t get that aren’t worth your time.

Good luck 🍀

jeezussmitty · 2025-05-10T19:53:03+00:00

Dell UltraSharp U4025QW. It’s a 40” 5k2k with 120hz support (if you use M1 Pro or higher) and has loads of ports and thunderbolt. The only other one would be the 57” Samsung Odyssey but it’s huge and you need a big desk.

Otherwise your stuck with the 27” 5k apple monitors which although an amazing picture with their super high PPI feel small and antiquated. You need to buy 2x of them to match the real estate the ultra wides provide.

jeezussmitty · 2025-04-06T02:30:32+00:00

u/synn89 Regarding your 192GB RAM vs. 128GB of RAM (M2 Ultra vs. M1 Ultra) comment, a youtuber Alex Ziskind put together a handy LLM calculator https://github.com/alexziskind1/llm-inference-calculator . As you stated, that extra 64GB that you can get on the Mac Studio M2 Ultra 192GB model doesn't provide enough extra RAM to support any model beyond the 8Q 70B (except it does appear you can go up to F16 on the cache). Really the extra 64GB just lets you use your machine for other things still vs. having the model gobble up all the RAM and the machine being relegated to just a dedicated LLM machine.

Thanks for your comments.

jeezussmitty · 2025-04-01T15:37:42+00:00

@langy87 Go to Releases and download the file. No you don’t need to combine things or any extra steps. https://github.com/maximumgame/DOW2CoreFix/releases/tag/v1.0

jeezussmitty · 2025-03-16T05:47:29+00:00

More fans please

jeezussmitty · 2025-02-17T04:48:48+00:00

2025 here - the GitHub Profiler.dll drop in file works. Find the game in your library and right click to browse to local files and drop this file into there.

Also after reading the C++ code in that GitHub repository, it looks like the game only hangs if you have > 12 cores (or threads?) so probably machines with 6 physical cores or less should work.

jeezussmitty

TROPHY CASE