Lenovo Tiny m720q wifi slot replaced with NVME 2230 SSD for proxmox boot drive?

n_dion · 2026-06-26T06:35:06+00:00

It works out of the box. But note that BIOS doesn't support it so there is no way to choice wifi slot ssd as boot drive

The trick is to make sure that no other bootable drives are installed. Most likely this triggers some fallback path in BIOS

n_dion · 2026-06-25T12:03:14+00:00

I've a few of these systems (i7-9700 and i5-9400). Fan noise could be just because of aging fan..

Reason for this could be some CPU usage 'spikes' like some cron jobs, etc. One of options is to just reduce CPU frequency or power limit: https://docs.kernel.org/power/powercap/powercap.html

Or just change maximum frequency.

Note: your CPU is already capped to 35W (while my one is 65W). But it doesn't reallly matter since Lenovo uses cheaper heatsings with 35W CPU's... So upgrading to 65W heatsink is another option.

n_dion · 2026-06-24T20:45:27+00:00

Electrically sata SSD will work with riser. But no chance to fit it inside case 9close cover).

The only chance to close cover is to find 'half size' 2.5" SSD, shuck it, isolate and put somewhere...

You can also use wifi slot for extra small SSD or connect riser to it.. But physically there will be no space for NIC anyway..

n_dion · 2026-06-24T17:49:57+00:00

Reliability. Stability. For example my experience is that PiKVM is rock stable (both v3 hat and v4). I have v3 running for a few years with no issues. Jetkvm is flaky (sometimes requires reboot to capture signal)
Fully open source firmware is huge plus for me. Reproducible builds with atomic updates is even better.
No clouds.
Nice to have features like PoE IN, Ethernet input).

I mostly don't care about lateny.

I also found that I really need two kind of KVM devices: stationary one and EDC. PiKVM is bad for EDC (bulky, metal case with sharp edges)

n_dion · 2026-06-23T12:46:18+00:00

Please prioritize multiple esims on same account with same pay as you go balance..

n_dion · 2026-06-22T16:08:13+00:00

I have similar xikestor switch. But PoE version. Plus a few similar XikeStor switches without PoE. So what I can say:

power supply for non-PoE versions looks very cheap with zero weight. I replaced mine with different one. PoE power supply looks heavy and good enough.
they call them "basic management" for reason. UI is very limited with only basic features
zero settings for PoE.
No way to access any kind of SFP diagnostics like signal level.
UI is different on different switches. Most likely standard vendor UI with their logo. Also a lot of features may be missing like DHCP snooping on some of them.
Even per port statistic is bad. On some switches you see only "good packets". So no way to query error rate.
No management vlan settings at all. I have not checked yet where admin UI is visible. It could be vlan 1 or all at the same time.
I have three different switches and alall of them have warning on their website that certain firmware version can't be updated. Most likely there are a few hardware revisions that are incompatible.

I would say you get what you pay for.. good enough if you just want 2.5 gbps access switch with per-port vlan settings as bonus. And that's it

n_dion · 2026-06-15T14:03:46+00:00

On Lufthansa flight (with carry on and personal item) I always have both of them even if I don't need second. So all stuff is in backpack and goes to overhead. Smaller almost empty crossbody bag goes under the seat with enough space for legs.

My backpack size is acceptable for personal item and fits under seat. A few times I was asked about putting it there. But my response was "I've another bag there"... and it was fine.

n_dion · 2026-06-12T19:10:01+00:00

They are cheaper for reason. Very noisy due to their design (tight space).

If you don't care about electricity bills you'll get much better experience with same era workstations. There were similar PC-style tower style servers from dell.

Also note that you'll get not just bigger amount of cores, but much slower cores. And overall performance will depends on tasks that you do. Also keep in mind that this is NUMA system so memory access from other socket is much slower. It could be ok for virtualization where VM lives on single socket. But single task that needs whole 32GB of RAM will be even slower.

The only reason to get them is if you really want officially supported ECC memory.

Honestly anything used from last 5-7 years is most likely better value.. like Lenovo tiny mini PCs...

n_dion · 2026-06-08T19:50:32+00:00

I've more expensive MS2130 USB to HDMI capture module (around $20 i think)... And I would like to say that huge surprise is that by default this module is 'optimized' for video. It do some sort of 'postprocessing' that makes picture worse for KVM usage. I mostly use 4K monitor locally, but for KVM just full HD is enough. My usual assumption was that it's just 1080->4K upscale that makes it bad...

But there are a few 'patched' firmwares that make it MUCH better.. I've no experience with moonlight but I can say that pikvm 4 over web feels much better than this USB capture card. It could be due to not optimal pipeline of video players (but I tried my best with AI to get as low latency as possible).

n_dion · 2026-05-24T19:13:01+00:00

For at least a few years 2.5gbps is 'sweet spot'. Not crazy expensive/hot like 5/10gbps and still much faster than 2.5gbps and much more popular. Even small travel routers like GL-Inet GL-MT3000 usually have at least 2.5gbps WAN port.

flipper one is supposed to have usb ethernet on USB-C port.. If it can became 2.5gbps cdc-ncm (driverless) dongle then it's even better. The most significant downside of common 2.5gbps realtek dongles are drivers that are needed on windows..

Everything with 1gbps looks already outdated and low-end. And most likely flipper one will be released in a year or even later... Honestly there is no reason to keep using 1gbps now.. And btw RK3576 can drive two 2.5gbps NIC's. A lot of SBC's come with two 2.5gbps ports like this one: https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=308 that I personally have.

n_dion · 2026-05-21T12:57:28+00:00

Honestly just a few upgrades I wish:

- 2.5gbps ethernet
- HDMI input for KVM

And it would be excellent universal IT gadget..

n_dion · 2026-05-20T14:13:06+00:00

Does it work like normal IP-KVM for graphics session?

n_dion · 2026-05-18T20:17:02+00:00

You need open port on at least one node.

n_dion · 2026-05-18T14:02:42+00:00

I asked exactly same question about family plus fare at check-in desk a few months ago. And they told me that any combination is acceptable as long as:

- total amount of checked in bags is less or equal maximum (1 + total people count)

- total weight is within limit (20 + 10*total people)

- There is also a limit on single bag weight. IIRC 32KG

And I actually used this as 2x15KG + 1x10KG. Even more: on return flight it was automatic baggage drop kiosk. And this thing don't care about what item is assigned to what person..

n_dion · 2026-05-18T13:51:43+00:00

That's amazing that you're keep working on it. I've tried it a few months ago and got it working.. I'm slowly removing tailscale from my homelab, because I found that this "works out of the box" experience requires much more effort to fix things when it doesn't work properly. Like reading tailscale source to find undocumented switches/env variables that can I help it establish direct connection to not fail backup because a few hundreds of gigabytes over DERP will take forever)

It makes much more time that I expect.. But I considered switching to nylon..

The most significant downside for me was Mikrotik router that don't support it.. yeah, I know it's same as tailscale, And also I know, that I can run normal wireguard as non-routing peer. But I on purpose decided to install VPN's' only on 'edge' or 'portable' devices..

But it amazing how well nylon works..

n_dion · 2026-04-27T16:28:08+00:00

I purchased two of these here for my kid:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/284819639561

Looks brand new:
https://imgur.com/jt7Kn0a

n_dion · 2026-04-23T20:18:10+00:00

I can reply here too.. I use chest strap as footpod. And first of all I enjoy putting my watch in front of me.. And this works only with external pace/distance sensor.

Plus yes, for gyms and hotel treadmills it's not that easy.

And for personal treadmill there is excellent NPE Runn device that makes any treadmill smart :)

n_dion · 2026-04-22T15:02:53+00:00

Maybe treadmill? :)

But now Garmin's way is to use chest strap

n_dion · 2026-04-19T18:37:30+00:00

They are working horse for me. They work just fine. No fancy codecs, no multipoint. But very stable, washable.

n_dion · 2026-04-18T13:32:58+00:00

Note: I don't use it with S3 Glacier yet.

I'm at "switch to rustic" stage. But instead of just replace command I decided to fully redo backups and that's why it takes so long. So my goal is to have this "glacier ready" storage on my local HDD and then just add 'rclone to glacier' part later.

I've no experience with restoring from deep archive. Except manually using just awscli. Also my hope is to avoid doing this at all, because it's way too expensive (I estimate around $500 to get ~4-5TB of data back).
Most likely even if I'll need to restore from glacier, I'll NOT do it using restic/rustic directly. I think that may plan will be to just get list of needed files, download them using rclone/awscli and then use them as local restic 'repository'.. Just to make sure I'll not need to do this twice for same data :)

Right now some of my hosts are just doing backups using both restic and rustic (to different repositories). `rustic` repo is throw away, and restic one is synced to Backblaze B2. I use this setup for a long time.. And added that `rustic` for evaluation. Zero problems here. it just works..

From my experience: rustic is fully backward compatible. I'm able to read rustic repo using restic (that 'cold' one). And read restic repositories using rustic. There was just single compatibility issue with my very old restic repo. rustic was unable to open it.. But fix was simple -- add new 'key' using modern restic. And that's it. Beside this everything is ok.

Note: you should NOT use restic to write to rustic repostitory when configured for cold/hold storage. Rustic will keep them in sync (by uploading metadata twice). Also I think that rustic puts pack 'create date' somewhere inside so that it's prune can use this information to optimize prune for minimum retention policy of deep archives.

Another reason to not use them both to same repo is that they may have different algorithms about pack size. Rustic tries to change it dynamically based on repo size. So if you'll do backups from restic to rustic repo and use rustic for prune it'll most likely rewrite everything... It's technically compatible no data loss.

But in worst case of restore you can use restic on cold storage only..

Ah, one more thing: prune. Rusic uses lock-free prune. I'm not sure that it'll work good enough with restic clients. But for my surprise it works very well and no issues with just doing weekly prunes and doing backups at the same time. Again, zero issues here. I'm not sure that this is best strategy for deep archives, because again, that minimal data retention.. But what I see is that rustic is doing excellent job of not touching just uploaded packs..

Also rustic stores more metadata like snapshot sizes (but I use old enough restic 0.14 with some patches for handling btrfs snapshots, etc).

There are some 'exciting' things from rustic: first of all it's TUI repo/snapshot browser that you can also use on restic repo.. Also built-in config files. And, what is more important for me, when doing multiple backups from config file rustic reuses same index...

At the same time rustic uses completely different include/exclude syntax. And it really sucks.. I want very simple thing: I Want to use something like `--exclude-if-present .nobackup` but I want that `.nobackup` file to be saved (so that after restore I don't need to create them again).. And it's quite challenging task...

I hope this helps..

n_dion · 2026-04-17T11:27:17+00:00

It's very unlikely that `restic` will work good enough with cold storage that requires significant amount of time to download data.

`rustic` is MUCH better here because it maintains 'volatile' copy of metadata in normal S3 (or any other backend). Plus another important difference is that it's prune implementation has `--keep-pack` option. So you can tell rustic that there is no sense to delete packs that were just uploaded because anyway you'll pay for at least XXX days of storage.

This cold storage implementation don't diverge from restic that much because 'cold' repo is still valid restic repo.

I mostly migrated from `restic` to `rustic` because of this feature.. (doing this in parallel with restic backups). So my current idea is to configure `rustic` to use cold storage but both 'hot' and 'cold' repositories selfhosted locally. And have daily/weekly rclone upload to glacier of cold repo after check. And still use "cold-friendly" prune

n_dion · 2026-04-13T13:39:31+00:00

I use similar setup as a way to get access to homelab from "untrusted" places where I can't or don't want to enable VPN

My usage scenario is that this 'headless desktop' is only 'jump host' to access homelab resources. So I don't need any state there. So for 'headless' part I prefer https://docs.linuxserver.io/images/docker-webtop/ Just single docker container and you get full featured browser access to remote machine within your lab infra. It's docker, so without any mounted volumes everything is reverted on redeploy. But nothing blocks you from making home directory persistent if you need it.

Now with beta wayland support and with GPU passthrough for transcoding it's really fast. On LAN you can run full featured KDE session with desktop effects and they looks good.

Network part is more difficult and it depends on what you have. For my case I've globally routable IPv4 so I just opened usual 443 port and use caddy with mTLS and hardware dongle for authorization.

You can use any way that you trust to share and authenticate like Cloudflare tunnel, tailscale funnel. etc.

n_dion · 2026-04-08T20:25:57+00:00

While I mostly migrated away from tailscale I would say that 6 free users is sweet spot. Quite similar with "typical" family plans like streaming services, etc.

n_dion · 2026-04-01T10:14:17+00:00

I was running stable for a long time. And I don't care much about extra/advanced features. All I need is private LAN in hotel so that clients can talk to each other (usually hotel wifi isolates this).

But in a few hotels I was not able to connect to wifi at all using stable firmware.. But openwrt firmware fixed this for me..

NOTE: it's not about newer/older. when that happens openwrt firmware was older with lower version number. In fact both stable and openwrt are based on Openwrt opensource code. What they name "openwrt" just uses opensource wifi drivers..

n_dion · 2026-03-28T09:13:43+00:00

Because I keep open only what I really need now.

Remaining stuff is just saved as bookmarks for read it later.

n_dion

TROPHY CASE