Enabling Extended Attribute support in a Thecus N2200-EVO
In a related post to my notes on enabling extended attribute support for the Synology DiskStation DS212j, I've managed to accomplish the same task somewhat more elegantly in the Thecus offering. As compared to the Synology 2-bay unit, the Thecus is about the same size and price and offers similar functionality, with the added benefit of hot-swappable drive bays (though the "hot-swappable" part remains something to be proven to me; let's jet say that they are front-accessible, without screws to remove to extricate the drive caddies from the chassis). Getting EA support was considerably easier than with the Synology, as well.
How not to update the BIOS on a newer (post 2009) Intel desktop board
Still in the thick of the system migration involving the virtualization of the previous W2K install. I procured the hardware to build the new workstation, which is based on an Intel DZ77GAL-70K desktop board and an i5-3570K CPU. (I won't go into detail here concerning my choice of the K series CPU and the matched desktop board, but I will provide some references below 1.)
- Intel: About Intel® Processor Numbers
Corsair Blog: A look at Intel® K Series Unlocked Processors ↩
Enabling Extended Attribute support in a Synology DiskStation DS212j
As small NAS devices go, the Synology DiskStation offerings are quite good. On the bang-for-the-buck scale, they rank well near the top, offering a diskless, 2-drive-capacity enclosure for right around $200 street price. I won't go into a litany of features here, and truth be told, Rosenthal & Rosenthal is not a Synology business partner, so I have no great axe to grind insofar as additional sales of these units is concerned. Detailed information on the hardware and software may be found on the net in various places. The focus of this post, however, is on getting support for EAs (extended attributes) on this device.
CRTs vs LCDs in 2011/2012
An interesting thread cropped up on the eComStation Technical mailing list on Yahoo! in the past few days. One of our list members was inquiring about the ability to set refresh rates in the Panorama video driver. Short answer: you can't (well, at least, not yet). This is covered in the VESA FAQ. Apparently, the original poster has a CRT which requires proper tuning of the driver for his monitor's refresh rate. One of the first responses to come back to him (aside from the correct answer, pointing him to the FAQ) was the obvious question: "Why are you still using a CRT?"
I suppose what has amused me the most about this little exchange was the assumption that by now, CRTs have become yester-tech, and that *all* truly modern systems (this was a fresh install of eComStation 2.1) should be outfitted with LCD monitors.
I was going to jump into the post, but instead, I'll just migrate some excerpts here, and include my own commentary at the end.
Installing Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 on the HP Proliant DL380 G4
Just some quick notes. Hopefully, these will help someone else at some point in time.
(N.B.: I' ve had this sitting in drafts for a few months, now, waiting for me to follow up. I don't want this to wait, so I'm renaming this "Part 1," and will follow up with subsequent notes as time permits. The server is up and running - painful, but I finally got it - so I'll provide as many of the gory details in time as I can.)
Most of you who regularly read my blog know that I'm no fan of the Windows operating paradigm. It seems that with every release, the OS gets more bloated and performs more slowly. Server 2008 is no exception.
A former tech of mine extolled the virtues of 2008, particularly 64-bit. I am unimpressed.
The strangest laptop repair I’ve ever done
Those of you unfortunate enough to have purchased notebooks (and video cards) with so-called "high performance" video in recent years with some Nvidia (and other manufacturers', I would guess) chips have my deepest sympathy. We spend (spent) a good deal of money for the "upgraded" video, only to find that truly, the light that burns twice as bright burns half as long, and typically, just outside of the 3-year warranty (in the case of the ThinkPad T-series), we get not only a BSOD, but garbled output on an external display, as well.
Nvidia's problem has been quite well documented on the net (for examples, see here and here and here).
Well, my wife's T61 was no exception, and about a month out of warranty, sure enough, after some fanfare (intermittent BSOD, hangs, etc.), it finally went black (well, mostly). Connecting to an external display proved that the system was indeed running, but that the video was unreadable.
I considered attempting to purchase warranty service after the fact, as recommended by the Lenovo rep quoted in the third link, above, but after reading more in that particular thread, I decided to try reflowing the solder myself.
It took me about an hour to strip down the machine to pull the system board (hint: if you do this, be sure that you take your time, and prepare for the reassembly of the machine, particularly insofar as keeping your removed hardware in order and obtaining a supply of thermal grease for the reinstallation of the heatsink & fan assembly). I noted that the board fit perfectly in our Black & Decker toaster oven, so I pre-heated the oven to ~385℉, fashioned three support "balls" of aluminum foil (each approximately 1" in diameter), and placed the board face up on the supports. When the oven was at temp, I put the board in for about 7 minutes.
Remember that the burning point of paper is 451℉ (like Ray Bradbury's book!), so the labels didn't even singe. I did not remove any of the plastics on the board (the insulation sheets), nor did I remove the VGA connector (which has a plastic insert).
Contrary to all of the warnings by the aforementioned Lenovo employee (Mark) in the forum, I had no trouble with this procedure (hey, the warranty was up, anyway; a new system board for this model runs about $600 from IBM/Lenovo - yes, some have reported factory repair quotations of less than this; I suspect that those repairs only include properly reflowing the solder for the GPU, and not a complete board replacement). The board shows no sign of being subjected to any heat beyond the normal range one would expect after 3 years of continuous use. I did not shield any parts of the board with aluminum foil, as some youtube videos seem to indicate is necessary when using a heat gun for the procedure (I figured it would be better to evenly heat the board in an oven, than to blow hot air on it "in a circular motion," subject to the ambient temperature).
After an hour to cool down, I began reassembling the machine. This procedure took me about two hours; I cleaned as I went. After that, I had to scare up a power supply (I had a replacement unit in stock which didn't seem to be working; however, upon re-seating the battery, I found that the adapter did actually apply power to the notebook). I pressed the power button, and almost fell out of my chair (up to this point, I pretty much gave the whole thing about a 50/50 chance of success). The screen was bright & beautiful, with no sign of its previous trouble.
How long will it last? Who knows! Could I offer this as a service to my clients? Absolutely not. The risk of failure, I suspect, is not worth the time and effort to try (I don't mind wasting 3 hours on my own junk, but spending 3 hours on someone else's, with no result, either yields an unhappy customer or an unhappy me).
Anyway, if you're seeing similar issues with your ThinkPad T4x-series or T6x-series machine, and you're out of warranty with a few hours to kill on a Sunday afternoon, at least you know that it worked for me. 😉