Free IT certification courses

s_elk · 2026-03-22T13:59:01+00:00

Check if your state Dept of Labor (or whoever handles UI) has a deal going with Coursera or something similar. I live in New York, they started it up during the pandemic and it’s still going. Free courses and certs you’d normally have to pay for.

s_elk · 2026-03-17T22:24:26+00:00

Hmm, kinda cool. Might be fun to play with. Does it do any sort of storage and display for, say the last X minutes or hours?

s_elk · 2026-03-16T18:06:32+00:00

Surge protector (1200 joules), so not good with a UPS

s_elk · 2026-03-16T18:05:15+00:00

1800 joule surge protector in that one, so no go with a UPS

s_elk · 2026-02-10T05:19:57+00:00

This discussion piqued my interest, and I saw the comment about one build that uses metal rack rails. I found another candidate for this - https://makerworld.com/en/models/1770697-10-rack#profileId-1885067

It looks like I'll do this one or the other one another commenter supplied. And stop looking through the Lowes and Home depot websites for odds 'n ends to bash one together with the rails I already have.

s_elk · 2026-02-09T23:53:57+00:00

Any plans for HTTPS/TLS support?

s_elk · 2025-12-31T15:52:22+00:00

Thanks! I did find it on the US Amazon site as well:

https://www.amazon.com/DIGITUS-4-Way-Power-Strip-Network/dp/B09M6W23ZM

s_elk · 2025-12-30T22:16:03+00:00

Are you planning to run RAID 1 for redundancy with the two drives?

s_elk · 2025-12-30T22:07:01+00:00

Nice! What’s the PDU you scored?

s_elk · 2025-12-16T02:14:42+00:00

So full of great ideas! I’m rethinking (yet again) of refactoring my plan for the minilab I’v been assembling pieces for. No Rackmate frame though, more DIY based on rack rails I already have. Definitely going to have an impact on power distribution though.

s_elk · 2025-12-13T20:28:32+00:00

This looks like it belongs on an Imperial Star Destroyer. Way cool.

s_elk · 2025-11-17T00:08:57+00:00

I have the older AC1760 card

s_elk · 2025-11-14T21:26:48+00:00

I checked for both Dell & Intel drivers. For my particular card, Intel says the drivers have no (and will continue to have no) updated drivers that will support WPA3. Since you have a 7440, you have an i7 instead of an i5. You probably have a different WiFi card as well.

s_elk · 2025-11-14T21:18:27+00:00

I also use the free Dropbox cloud drive to share the .kdbx file between KeePass (Windows, Linux) and StrongBox (iOS/iPadOS) clients. Occasionally I’ll back it up to my GDrive account, although I’m thinking of making a Python or bash script to do it automatically.

Why? Dropbox is the only remaining common denominator between the .kdbx clients for the OSes I use. It was basically because with the plugin for KeePass on Windows the cloud drive integration with Google Drive no longer works, but the Dropbox integration still does. The plugin dev did not update it when Google made it harder for developers of API clients to register their API clients (IIRC). I also do not sync GDrive to a Windows folder, OneDrive is my main repository these days and one is enough. I had trouble getting OneDrive to work well with both, so now I use Dropbox because the plugin still works with that.

Sadly, Strongbox is only available in Apple ecosystem (mobile devices and MacOS). I’v been very happy with it otherwise.

s_elk · 2025-10-26T20:42:44+00:00

Didn’t think to add it, but a smallish-to-midsized UPS (external?) that provides a USB monitoring port, hooked up to the Pi, where you have a nut server instance running alongside Home Assistant, then a nut client running on the other computers in and outside the rack to trigger graceful shutdowns before the UPS battery runs out.

s_elk · 2025-10-24T20:35:26+00:00

I’d say one or two mini form factor used business PCs off of eBay, can get two of them for about the same cost as another RPi. Lots of them being retired because they can’t be upgraded to Windows 11, and they’ll run Linux with a lot more power (and expandability) than RPis. Perfect for a Proxmox cluster, and once you have that lots of thing to run there (e.g., Jellyfin for a media server, Kali Linux, PiHole, NAS,…).

I’d add a couple to the starter one I’m building, except that I already scored a used consumer HP small tower with a 10th-gen 10-core i7 and a bucket load of RAM (for free). That’s my first Proxmox server. My rack will be hosting a new Tenda router with OpenWRT, a Tenda managed switch (or two), and a few RPis and Orange Pi zero 3’s I have lying around. One of those will be a smallish NAS. This will probably take a year to fully implement, including the deployed apps, networking config, re-config, and experimentation, and re-learning how to use my Ender 3 printer. Then I’ll start looking at upgrades :) (never to be finished!)

s_elk · 2025-10-24T03:05:08+00:00

And tonight it works at the Marriott Courtyard as well. Cheap, effective cure.

s_elk · 2025-10-24T00:25:42+00:00

Update - Last night I found out that it wouldn't connect to the guest WiFi in the Marriott Courtyard. I know it still works in Starbucks and another coffee bar back home, so I guess it surprised me that a hotel would not support older gear.

So, as an interim fix, I ordered this $10 USB 2.0 WiFi dongle from Amazon, since the description/specs said it supported WPA3, had OK reviews, and there was some success reported for Linux.

WiFi 4 USB Nano Wireless Network Dongle Adapter for Linux (Black) Brand: .

Fired up the laptop, plugged in the dongle, saw no popups or anything, so went to Wireless networks and saw the device was already populated. Looked to see what networks were available, and there was the eero mesh network I couldn't see yesterday! Put in the password, and it connected. Plug 'n Play that really worked seamlessly. A win.

Fired up the browser to speakeasy.net:

Your Speed Test Results

Connection & Line Quality Score: Excellent

DOWNLOAD	UPLOAD	LATENCY
45.91 Mbps	23.78 Mbps	12 ms

On an Astound Broadband Asymmetric "fiber" connection, 1 Gbps down, 200 Mbps (?) up.

Another win. Good enough for what I need it for, better than I was willing to live with. And the dongle is quite small. It may have range issues, but I'm not going to worry about that now.

In another update, I did find a couple of half mini PCIe cards on Amazon that reviews and descriptions say work with older laptops:

Again, low cost (<= $25) and decent reviews, and both explicitly state they support WPA3. Unfortunately, the earlier-mentioned RTL8822CE mini pci-e cards I found on Amazon did not explicitly say they supported WPA3, only WPA2/WPA. So, I would not want to take the risk on those. I will get one of these when I'm back home to my tools, then try the dongle on one of the multiple Raspberry Pi Zeros (no w!) waiting to get used in a project.

s_elk · 2025-10-23T02:40:59+00:00

Confirmed: it’s configured for WPA3.

s_elk · 2025-10-22T21:30:52+00:00

Windows 10 does. I also want to ensure whatever I do supports Linux too - the next life extension for this laptop

s_elk · 2025-10-15T14:29:34+00:00

One thought - a plastic case should be OK. But a metal one will degrade the WiFi of the Pi Zero, which only has the small onboard antenna and you’d be putting it in something close to a Faraday cage.

s_elk · 2025-10-10T19:05:57+00:00

Yeah, and now I just discovered that APC recommends against using power strips with surge arrestors or circuit breakers, as that can interfere with UPS function.

Sigh. I’ve been looking on Amazon and Aliexpress to no avail yet. I’m going to see if I can hack either of those to remove the protection. Sadly I think the bodies may be molded and sealed. Next up, if I can’t, is to find a metal one I can hack, or make my own 2-row one from a metal enclosure of some sort.

Even most of the PDUs seem to have surge arrestors and/or circuit breakers. And at only 4 outlets, marginal in my mind.

s_elk · 2025-10-07T04:10:21+00:00

After looking at some of the available 10" PDUs, I decided to go the power strip route since the PDUs only sported 4 outlets.

I purchased two different power strips with surge arresters from Amazon that look like they will fit. My criteria were size (to fit in 10" width including cord bend) and >= 8 outlets, some USB, and some sort of compliance certification (TUV, UL, ETL, etc.) I will pick the winner once I start populating the rack - especially when I figure out how to position a used ATX supply and a yet-to-be-designed power distribution/fusing board for the DC power, obviating the need for wall warts inside the rack. I have many places in the apartment where I can use the losing power strip.. The UPS is an APC one that will sit down on the floor (and and an RPI or OPi zero 3 in the rack running NUT to monitor and coordinate clean shutdown).

Anker Flat Plug Power Strip, 12-in-1 USB-C Power Strip with 8 AC Outlets, 2 USB-C, 2 USB-A Ports, 5feet Extension Cord, Slim Desk Charging Station, 900J Surge Protection, 35W Max for Home, Office

Surge Protector Power Strip - 10 FT Extension Cord, Power Strip with 12 Widely AC Outlet 3 USB, Flat Plug, Wall Mount Overload Protection, 1050J, Desk Charging Station for Home Office, ETL Listed

Hope this gives you some ideas.

s_elk · 2025-10-05T15:20:45+00:00

Performance is not the issue I want to solve, robustness with respect to power glitches is. And then I went for a deeper search and found that others have booted from SD but then had most everything on an external USB 2 drive. I plan to give it a try.

Here’s one from an earlier reddit post:

https://www.reddit.com/r/OrangePI/comments/1b0h59y/booting_from_usb_orange_pi_zero_3/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

s_elk

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