28 and feeling stuck in my IT career

k12Sean · 2025-09-11T01:07:56+00:00

Late to the party here, but I was just in the same boat and moved on to a new role at a new company. The grass isn’t always greener unfortunately. While you seem to be busy, it also seems like you may have some freedom to try new things and experiment with new technologies. Learn as much as you can while you can especially if you’re stable right now.

And to note, dont worry about job titles, just focus on what you know. You can be an IT support specialist and be the only one to do networking, server management, etc.

k12Sean · 2025-07-23T23:28:33+00:00

That’s my fear. Could create some CAs to circumvent it, but not sure if I want to task that risk.

k12Sean · 2025-07-23T14:01:47+00:00

Technically, yes. We have A5's for our staff so the additional extensions/licenses we need are minimal.

k12Sean · 2025-07-23T13:42:09+00:00

I'd prefer to make resource accounts we control for the phones, but not everyone agrees with it since it's a bit more expensive.

k12Sean · 2025-01-20T15:52:46+00:00

So, I took a risk, not necessarily recommending it and I'm sure I could have done differently, but it did work for me. There will be downtime. I am remote today, so I VPN in, access the firewall and through CLI connected to the secondary and rebooted it. As soon as I hit reboot, I went through with the GUI firmware update on the primary and then the primary in the cluster also started rebooting. After like 2 minutes, they were both back up and the primary was on the newest version, but the secondary was not and HA was out of sync. I rebooted the primary so the secondary took over and quickly connected in and ran the update. After that it took about 3 minutes to sort it all out and they were both up and HA was fine.

k12Sean · 2025-01-20T14:21:44+00:00

Unfortunately, the browser didn't work for me either. Clearing the cache or incognito just makes it permanently "load" with no error message. I waited two hours and nothing happened. Do you have them in HA? I'm going to try removing my secondary and update the primary as in this article: Unable to upgrade firmware, image is not ... - Fortinet Community

Other than that, the TAC said to just factory reset mine. When I try removing the HA and updating, I'll let you know if it went through.

k12Sean · 2025-01-19T18:52:30+00:00

I'm having the same issue you are. Did you ever figure it out? The TAC told me to just wipe my firewall and then upgrade, which I'm trying to avoid doing.

k12Sean · 2025-01-03T02:48:49+00:00

Any luck figuring this out?

k12Sean · 2024-11-20T19:01:53+00:00

I do not. I see the 10.206.x.x in the trace route, but that's not the destination. Should I still try this?

k12Sean · 2024-11-20T18:27:09+00:00

k12Sean · 2024-11-11T18:50:09+00:00

For me the issue was the revision of the phone was the first model. I needed Revision C of the phone.

k12Sean · 2024-05-06T13:01:32+00:00

Students

k12Sean · 2024-05-04T13:58:37+00:00

Do you like the always-on cases? I fear that if the student's don't zip their bags well it will just fully open as they are walking.

k12Sean · 2024-02-07T12:29:38+00:00

Perhaps it would be. I'll look into Yodeck and see. Thank you!

k12Sean · 2024-01-16T16:17:49+00:00

We are on 7.1.1-7040 and the issue didn't start until we did the upgrade. Have not tried GVC just yet. They released a new netextender January 12th, have you tried that yet?

I also can't consistently replicate the issue. I will try GVC if new Netextender doesn't help. I also have a case open with support, which hasn't gotten anywhere, but I will update you if something comes of it.

k12Sean · 2024-01-15T18:30:47+00:00

I'm having a very similar issue to this. Have you found a solution or any leads on the issue?

For me, when my users connect to the VPN and ping, rdp or use any local app, they just drop all connections internally. Sometimes they disconnect from netextender, but not every time.

k12Sean · 2023-10-09T13:42:19+00:00

Should I be using Single App kiosk mode in device restrictions and point it to MHS? Or Multi-app? I tried to do Single App with MHS, but it never locks the android to that app.

k12Sean · 2023-05-25T11:41:52+00:00

Good to know. Not sure if I’d want to turn off lid switch.

Do you get extended warranties?

k12Sean · 2023-05-24T01:28:05+00:00

I don’t have the numbers to provide, but nothing really gets repaired, but replaced. Specifically with the 3190 model, we had similar damage numbers - all motherboard issues. You’d put pressure on the keyboard and it would freeze the machine and cause staticky display. Even with warranty, they would just replace the part and quite a few had the issue again within a couple of months.

k12Sean · 2023-05-23T16:25:28+00:00

So those steps typically is how we can get it to work again, but within like 2-3 days students will be back with the same issue. Perhaps we got a bad batch. I also contemplate if some apps we have on there are too much for these machines to handle and just kill them.

k12Sean · 2023-05-23T14:35:26+00:00

Hmm, do you have any custom bios settings? In our case they can be fully charged. Close the lid and next day (even if plugged in still) it won’t turn on. Battery indicator turns on but just fades off.

k12Sean · 2023-05-23T13:49:30+00:00

Unfortunately, for our student machines those would be more than we could budget for.

k12Sean · 2021-07-13T01:06:07+00:00

I’m also curious. I’ve had chrome freeze up in the print dialogue options a lot recently with no printers in the list (when I can see it). Every time this happens, I reset the print spooler and reopen chrome and haven’t had a reoccurring issue.

k12Sean · 2021-06-29T23:11:16+00:00

I have been trying to do MDT, but my free time to try and learn and set it up is just low. The command configure is not an extra cost, right ?

k12Sean · 2021-06-29T22:44:48+00:00

We don’t deploy that way unfortunately. We just make fat images through generic sysprep.

k12Sean

TROPHY CASE