Can someone help me why would this Merkury smart plug downloading insane amount of data? I have isolated it to my guest network but this seems very suspicious.

Yes i still do

Hey guys, I just picked these up off of Facebook Marketplace on an impulse. Always wanted to tinker on them when I was younger, but mining doesn't do much anymore. Unfortunately, these 16x slots only have 1x connectivity, so bandwidth for AI isn't really existent here. I'm struggling to come up with useful project ideas, any suggestions?

So I'm in a conundrum. I have the benefit of building a new house. I was excited to wire the house with ethernet. My electrician said he does this all the time, only I guess he doesn't because he didn't ask me where I wanted my Ethernet to terminate so he routed everything to the exterior of the house. I need some options (that aren't "call the electrician back"). My partner would really prefer I not put a huge hole in the wall opposite this. The small window to the side is access to the crawlspace, which is lined and easy to get into. I'm only novice level familiar with network architecture but it's a helluva time to learn.

I've aquirred a stack of chromebooks from a school where my daughter works. These chromebooks are still in the management system of the school so the first task is getting all the serialnumbers. But after that, anybody got an idea?

Sure I save a few for the kids and neighbours, perhaps repurpose some as thin cliënts, but then what?

These are HP 11 G7 EE and a few Dell 3100 chromebooks.

Selling them could be an option but then again they where given to me to propperly dispose of. The ones that are broken down, like bad screen, bad battery will be completely torn down and recycled but the working ones...

Any fun or usefull ideas?

I feel like my media needs are completely met now unless there's something I'm forgetting about. I've been able to replace all of the audio and video streaming services I used to have. I've also been able to replace google photos, so I have basically eliminated most of my subscruptions apart from my ISP.

What other containers are worth adding now? I'm happy that I can now sit and enjoy what I've built, but I still have 20GB of memory available, so I want to add more.

I am considering tailscale so I can check on things while at work if there are any problems, or access my streaming services remotely when needed.

I bought this rather mysterious little card and a Xeon platinum processor from a local flea market for about $5, they were clearly from the same source so maybe part of some decommissioned cloud server of some sorts.

As far as my research took me it looks like it is some kind of FPGA card used in something related to Azure but no clue if it could be of any use or just some neat collectible since I have zero knowledge on FPGA. The CPU was a nice find but damn the Motherboards for that platform are hella expensive so it will probably not be used for a long long time.

I'm building my first home server using an old PC with an i3-3220 and 4 GB of RAM. I'm planning to leave it running 24/7 with some cool self-hosted services and a few of my own web apps.

The thing is, this PC is at least 10 years old, and I'm not sure how much I trust it running unattended.

I often have to be away from home for a while, and I'm a little worried about leaving it on while nobody is there. What if something shorts out or, in the worst case, catches fire?

I know modern-ish PCs have protections against things like overheating, thermal throttling, etc., but still... it's an old machine.

Am I worrying too much? Is there anything I should check or replace before trusting an old PC to run 24/7 unattended? I'm currently monitoring it with beszel. I have a budget of 20$.

This has been going on for days but some bot keeps repeatedly scanning my website for hidden directories and the like. Anyway to counter this ?.

What is this? What’s it for? It looks like it’s just 2 switches connected together a bunch but what’s the point

I am looking to start a home server for my photos and to hoard movies, games, etc. I also want to degoogle and all that. I am curious how can I utilize these drives, I have a small pre built PC I plan on using as my server, but have no way of installing drives in it, they would need to be connected externally. Is my only option to get an expensive NAS? these drives are only 1-2tb each so even if I got a 4 bay that would only be 8gb, not entirely sure how this stuff works so I'm still learning and just looking for some general advice.

Hey everyone,

I just saw a Mac Pro Late 2013 for sale near me for about $200 (~270,000 KRW) and I’m kind of tempted to grab it for a homelab machine.

Specs are:

• Xeon E5 8-core 3.0GHz

• 64GB RAM

• Dual AMD FirePro D500 (3GB x2)

• 256GB NVMe SSD

My current “server” is just a Mac mini 2014 (2-core i7 / 16GB RAM), which works but starts to struggle once I run too many containers.

What I’m thinking of running on the Mac Pro:

• Docker containers

• n8n

• Immich

• maybe Ollama for small local LLMs

• backend dev environments

• possibly Linux / Proxmox if that works well on this hardware

A few things I’m curious about from people who actually used these:

1.  Is the power consumption reasonable for a machine running 24/7?

2.  I’ve heard about the D500 GPU failures on these trash cans — is that still a common issue?

3.  How noisy are they if used as a server?

4.  Does the 8-core Xeon still hold up for container workloads today?

I know it’s a 12-year-old machine at this point, but 8 cores + 64GB RAM for $200 seems kind of interesting for homelab use.

Is anyone here still running one of these in their setup?

If yes, what are you using it for nowadays?

Curious if this is a fun cheap lab machine… or just a shiny e-waste trap

As the image can clearly show, I am building my homelab and pretty darn new. I am looking for some semblance of software or something to help me plan out the logical side of the network/services. Currently I have a spreadsheet with some notes of the different vlans, ports, static IPs, and some firewall rules but I am hoping there is some premade things that can help me keep it all together in an easier to read form. Any suggesstions?

I recently picked up 6 Lenovo ThinkCentre M910q Tiny desktops for $100 total, and I’m trying to figure out the smartest way to integrate them into my setup.

Each unit has:

• Intel Core i5 vPro
• 16GB RAM
• 1TB SSD

I already have a main home server running Ubuntu that’s handling my core services. These M910q boxes would be additional nodes, not my primary server.

With 6 identical mini PCs, what would you recommend as a good starting approach?

Im a complete beginner so any tips would help!

Im downloading proxmox but dont really know what i should do next.

The hp prodesk g3 specs are:

- i5-7500

- 8gb ddr4

- 256gb nvme ssd

Alright fellow nerds, I’m looking for some advice here because want my server to work. I’m not sure whether I’m being unreasonable or if Crucial/Micron is screwing me over.

I had a Crucial Pro 128GB (2x64GB) DDR5 kit fail. I went through their warranty/RMA process like normal.

On July 1st, Crucial approved the RMA and told me to send the RAM back. Their email specifically said:

“Once the product is received, your replacement should arrive within 14 to 21 business days.”

So I shipped my RAM back to them.

Then on July 28th, after they had my RAM, I received another email saying:

“The replacement order #611240225 has been created for you.”

They even told me it would ship express and that I would receive tracking once it went out.

Okay. Great. Warranty handled.

Except... nothing shipped.

I followed up on August 15th asking what was going on.

On August 17th, Crucial responded and basically said:

Sorry, we shut down the Crucial consumer business, we're out of RAM, and we're not shipping your replacement.

.....W T F!!

Instead, they offered to refund the original purchase price of $259.99.

The problem is that I don't really care what I paid for the RAM last year. I sent them a defective 128GB kit under warranty, they accepted the warranty claim, took possession of my RAM, and then actually created a replacement order.

Now they're telling me that because they decided to wind down their consumer business and don't have inventory anymore, my only option is $259.99.

An equivalent Crucial Pro 128GB DDR5 kit currently costs substantially more than that, so $259.99 does not actually put me back where I was before the product failed.

I pushed back and said “If you can't fulfill the replacement order you already created, I think you should compensate me for the reasonable current replacement cost of an equivalent product.”

Their response was basically:

Company policy says refunds are based on the original invoice price. We don't have inventory. We won't reimburse current replacement cost. Take the $259.99.

And that's where I'm at.

I'm especially annoyed because they had already accepted the RMA and told me a replacement order existed. If they had said from the beginning, “We can't replace this anymore, your only option is a refund,” at least I could have made that decision before sending my hardware in. Might I mention that 1 of the 2 sticks were working and was in my server.

Instead, they now have my RAM, the replacement they promised isn't coming, and they're offering an amount that doesn't come close to buying the equivalent kit today.

Has anyone else dealt with Crucial/Micron warranty claims since they started winding down the consumer business?

Is there any realistic escalation path above normal Crucial customer support? Micron corporate/customer relations? Executive escalation? BBB? State consumer protection complaint?

And more importantly, from a warranty standpoint, does the fact that they accepted the defective product and subsequently created a replacement order give me any additional leverage, or can they simply switch the remedy to the original purchase price whenever they want?

I'm not looking to make money off of them. I don't expect some ridiculous payout. I just want to be able to replace the 128GB of RAM that I sent them under their warranty without having to come significantly out of pocket because Crucial decided to close the consumer side of the business halfway through my RMA.

TL;DR: Crucial approved my 128GB RAM RMA, took the kit, and created a replacement order. Now they say they’re out of stock and will only refund my original $259.99, which isn’t enough to replace it today. What would you do?

 Here is the link to the kit I RMA.DDR5-5600_PC5-44800_CL46_Dual_Channel_Desktop_Memory_Kit_CP2K64G56C46U5-_Black)

Here is a much cheaper listing of the same ram.

UPDATE: (Same day) The body of their reply to me asking for my RAM back.

"We understand your request to have the original memory kit returned to you, particularly since one of the modules was still functional when it was sent back.

At this time, I have reached out to our warehouse/RMA team to check whether your original memory kit is still available. If the product has not yet been processed or disposed of and is still available, we will let you know as soon as we receive an update from the team.

Please note that if the original kit is still available and you would like it returned to you, you will be required to provide a prepaid return shipping label for us to arrange the shipment back to your address.

Once we hear back from the team regarding the availability of the product, we will update you accordingly."

Ill keep you updated.

Update: Friday 8/21/2026 After I asked them to send my original ram back to me.

"Thank you for contacting Crucial Support.

We have received an update from our internal team. RMA #02387618 has already been processed, and the returned parts were disposed of in accordance with our standard RMA procedures. As a result, we are unfortunately unable to return the items.

At this time, the only resolution we can offer is a refund of the original purchase price.

https://www.crucial.com/warranty-home#accordion-a9baf2885e-item-b344afb3dd

Please let us know if you agree to proceed with the refund. Upon receiving your confirmation, we will initiate the refund request.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

If you have further questions, I welcome your reply. You can also visit our Contact page for other ways to reach us."

Update 8/24/26

"Thank you for contacting Crucial Support.

We have received an update from our internal team. RMA #02387618 has already been processed, and the returned parts were disposed of in accordance with our standard RMA procedures. As a result, we are unfortunately unable to return the items.

At this time, the only resolution we can offer is a refund of the original purchase price. The refund value will be  $259.99 credited via prepaid debit cards / gift cards.

https://www.crucial.com/warranty-home#accordion-a9baf2885e-item-b344afb3dd

Please let us know if you agree to proceed with the refund. Upon receiving your confirmation, we will initiate the refund request.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

If you have further questions, I welcome your reply. You can also visit our Contact page for other ways to reach us."

I recently setup an old desktop as a media server and game streaming host. I changed my SSH port, setup no-password with and fail2ban. My sever gets thousands of brute force attacks everyday. Bot nets trying logins like root, Ubuntu, user, ect. My fail2ban memory usage was almost 500MB today. This is crazy, do I just firewall all of china and Russia? That’s where they are all coming from.

A lot of people are suggesting using a VPN like tailscale. I can't do this because I SSH into my server remotely from my client that is using a VPN. I can't run the tailscale VPN and my actual VPN at the same time.

I can’t afford it but in today’s standards is this a good deal?

F U Altman

FU

I picked up a bunch of drives before things went crazy. But didnt get RAM. Now the kit I was eyeing went from $4k to $15k.

So here you go. Up yours. You and your gddmn mthrfkng chatbot