Technically minded Weblog

Ok, so another year has passed and I didn’t even have time to make a “happy new year post” 🙁

Lot’s of things have changed during last year, too many for a single post.
First of all, my current setup:
Main system:

i7 2600k @ 4.0,
MSI MB w/ P67 and USB 3.0,
8GB DDR3 RAM (+8GB RMAed, awaiting replacement),
Saphire HD6950 2GB Toxic Edition (not unlockable, arghh!),
2x500GB (WD and Hitachi) + 1x640GB Samsung + 160GB also Samsung (for Linux) + 2TB USB 3.0 (Seagate inside) + 500GB NAS, Corsair TX850 PSU
Same old Antec 900 case.

Secondary: Athlon 2 2.8Ghz, Gigabyte Board w/ some ATI 700 series chipset, 4GB DDR2 RAM, ATI HD4670 for video, 2TB Samsung + 500GB Seagate for storage.

Funny thing is that I initially had only 8GB RAM (2x4GB Corsair) in my main PC and no plans for an upgrade. But one stick went bad and I had to RMA both sticks because this was a kit.
The shop said that they will be sending the RAM back to manufacturer for replacement and it will take about 10 days for the replacement to arrive.
Because I simply couldn’t afford to wait 10 days due to work, I was forced to buy 2 new modules to replace the ones I have RMAed.

Network:
Linksys WRT150N (DD-WRT) for main router, Belkin F73402 (also DD-WRT, custom build) router as Torrent, Samba, lightppd web server and some other apps box.
An old P3 1Ghz with 512MB of RAM for home server.
Some interesting things about the second router.

DD-WRT refused to support this thing due to it having a modem (which I don’t need, because I already have a modem), so had to build my own kernel from sources (it does not work OOB, you need to patch the broadcom flash driver or it will not detect the filesystem offset at startup) and use a FS from a working build to run DD-WRT. I used hacked Belkin build tools to build the final binary.
Everything works fine (well the LED indicators don’t work, but I don’t care about them) , except I had to use a serial cable for initial configuration, but now it configures everything at startup.
I also added a heatsink for the CPU, because it was getting too hot to touch.

Device Specs: BCM4718 SoC 533Mhz MIPS (underclocked to 453 MHz), 64MB DDR2 RAM, 8MB Flash, 4xLAN, Wireless N, USB 2.0, some proprietary Infineon modem (w/ 8MB of it’s own RAM), some custom Linux for firmware.

I can upload DD-WRT for F7D3402 firmware file (and some initial configurations) if you need it.
(be aware that using DD-WRT disables the modem part as it’s unsupported)

With DD-WRT and a little bit of configuration, this thing can be made into a nice WiFi hotspot and/or a BitTorrent/Samba box.

Enough for now, going to sleep, will post more later.

After having been down for quite a while, my weblog is back online and has a new home.
I have used the most recent backup I have found, done just after the new year (my previous host died before I could make a more recent backup).
Maybe, if I will find a more recent backup, I will update the site.

The main site seems to be working but I need to check some things to make sure everything is in place.

Lesson learnt: Cheap hosts are unreliable. You get what you pay for.

Will post an update later. I have a lot of unposted news.

So, another year is over.
Lots of things happened in 2010, too many to remember (you can read the archive here).
In overall, 2010 was a good and peaceful year for me.

I hope 2011 will be yet another good and peaceful year to me. And I wish the same to you.
But who knows ? Maybe 2011 will be a special year for me (and/or you) ? Only time will tell.
Anyway, every year is a special year in some way.

Happy new year everyone !!

All seems to be in order now. Posts open as they should and ReCaptcha for the comments has been fixed.
Also, any old links to ddscentral.co.cc should now redirect to ddscentral.org.
My new email also appears to be working properly.

So, the transfer to a new domain is now officially complete.

My new domain, ddscentral.org is now live.
There are still some issues (like posts not opening and comments not working) but they will be resolved soon.

Note regarding my email:
dds@ddscentral.co.cc will still remain active but will forward to dds@ddscentral.org (my new email).
same applies to the junkbox@ddscentral.co.cc.

Will update when the issues are resolved.

My new domain is now registered but it will take a while to setup the site to use the new domain.
The site might be offline for up to one day.
Sorry for the inconvenience.

I’ve finally made a decision to get a proper second level domain (instead of co.cc).
The new domain will be “ddscentral” under one of the major TLDs:
no, not ddscentral.com (already registered, but without any IP)
no, not ddscentral.net (not my kind)
so, it will be ddscentral.org.

So, if domain registration goes smoothly, the blog will soon have a new location (and I will have a new email).

I also plan to create a new (second) blog in my native language (not English).

I’ve just recently noticed that my web services domain (ws.ddscentral.co.cc) resolves to an incorrect IP address.
I’ve already fixed the problem by updating the DNS record, but it will take some time for the updated record to become live.

Pingbacks and Trackbacks have been disabled due to spam. Until I will find a solution to prevent pingback/trackback spam they will remain disabled.

Weblog’s DNS records have been updated. Now our weblog can also be accessed using www hostname. Address www.ddscentral.co.cc is now functional.