Recent content by Dalis

Hi all – I've always been dumbfounded by CPU cooling fan setups. They seem like they're oriented wrong, like they're pointed down onto the PCB instead of blowing directly across the CPU. Like this setup from the STH article on a QNAP server. Can someone explain where the air is flowing there...

Hi all – I've been reading reports of how overly hot switches cool down dramatically if you flip them into a vertical orientation. Typically it's a 10+° C drop for a device that was running in the 60s or 70s. Ubiquiti example here. Have you observed this? What explains the drop in temps? With...

Thanks. I didn't know about the square holes and cage nuts deal. I want at least a medium-depth rack, probably 24 - 30 inches deep, four post, 8 - 12U. I want it to sit on top of a custom steel shelf unit, probably 30 - 36 inches tall, then the rack sits on that. The steel shelf foundation would...

Hi all – Say I buy a homelab rack that uses 12/24 or M6 screws. What's the matching screwdriver size? It doesn't seem like "12/24" or M6 mean anything on the driver side – apparently they don't determine or constrain the head size, and the screwdrivers are using different codes. For Phillips...

Thanks all. I'm a little bit confused by statements like "Untangle uses Snort." and "pfSense uses Snort." and "Untangle can use Suricata." I thought Untangle, pfSense, Snort, Suricata, Sophos, etc. were all similar applications. In what sense do Untangle or pfSense "use" the others? Are you...

Thanks. I wish there was a clean binary format. These text log formats are so wasteful and bloated, they'll use a ton of disk. For example, an IPv4 address could be encoded as four bytes – four 8-bit unsigned integers – instead of potentially 15 bytes of ASCII or UTF-8 (12 bytes for the numbers...

Hi all – Is there a standard log format that appliances and firewall software like pfSense, Suricata, Snort, Untangle, Sophos, et al use? In my research I'm not seeing much mention of the actual log format these systems use. Are they still emitting syslog-style logs? What about rsyslog and...

Thanks. That's interesting about rules. I didn't realize they were commodities or saleable goods, worth lots of money. I don't have a visual on what these rules are all about. Are they super complicated, like a sort of fingerprinting? Why is your Talos link going to Snort? Is there some...

Hi all – What are some good solutions for firewall and IDS/IPS that can help prevent or mitigate IoT exploits? I want to get more insight into the traffic and behavior of smart home devices on the network. I'm especially concerned about cameras and security systems, scenarios like the recent...

What's HiveOS like? Searching on it is dominated by a cryptocurrency mining orchestration platform also named HiveOS. Is HiveOS a typical Linux-based deal like MikroTik's OSes, Ubiquiti's, etc.? The prices I see are enormous, $1,500 for the AP650: Extreme Networks AP650 Access Point |...

You're getting bad advice from the pros who don't know anything about Wi-Fi 6, ignoring your requirements. You're on the right track to be focused on Wi-Fi 6 since it's becoming common on new computers and smartphones, and 6E is even more promising. The ASUS AX5700 is pretty good. It has a 2.5...