2026-08-26 03:18:00
For a mobile 'mini homelab' project I'm working on, I wanted to use 5G Internet as a primary 'on-to-go' connection, but still have the ability to plug in another Internet connection when I put the mobile rack I'm building in a fixed location.
I'll have more on that project soon, but I figured this project was a good way to check out Ubiquiti's solutions, especially considering many of their smaller gear fits nicely within the dimensions of a mini rack (the 3U DeskPi RackMate TT is pictured above).
2026-08-20 22:00:00
The BOE TV070WXM-TV0 LCD used in the original Steam Deck can be had for around $30. It's a serviceable 7" touchscreen with 400 nits of brightness and a resolution of 1280x800 (for a sharp 216 ppi).
The specs are a lot nicer than the Pi 7" Touch Display, which costs twice as much, with giant bezels and half the resolution!
Until today, the Steam Deck LCD didn't work with a Raspberry Pi. But the folks at Scandent were trying to standardize on a mass-market touchscreen for one of their own devices, and built a Linux kernel driver for it which they intend to upstream.
2026-08-19 15:13:00
In the before-times, when Raspberry Pi CM5s were (relatively) affordable, I built a number of Pi clusters (example), and one of the most annoying parts of the build was flashing Raspberry Pi OS to all the Pis.
One, two, or even three Pis isn't a big deal, but once you hit 4+, the process of plugging the Compute Module into a carrier board, plugging that into a computer, managing Raspberry Pi Imager, and trying to match up details like a hostname, MAC address, and the physical Pi itself, gets annoying.
2026-08-07 22:00:00
Shortly after Apple launched the budget MacBook Neo, Dell announced their response, a new low-end XPS 13.
Matching the Neo's current pricing, it starts at $699, or $599 with an educational discount. That discount is currently set to expire on November 2, and with the current component pricing insanity, I'd be surprised if we don't see a price increase on both laptops by next year.
I ran the XPS 13 through my gauntlet of benchmarks, and published a review on my YouTube channel:
2026-08-06 00:50:00
Proxmox today announced their Proxmox Virtual Environment is now available for 64-bit ARM.
I tested it on my Ampere Altra Dev Platform—the same machine on which I've booted Windows on Arm the first time, messed with multiple GPUs, and most recently tested Houdini's native arm64 support.
Install was easy, as the Ampere Altra uses UEFI / ACPI for its hardware, meaning Proxmox didn't have to tailor its ISO to specific platforms, like you have to do with Raspberry Pis and most SBCs using a Device Tree setup.
2026-07-31 22:00:00
I've been using the built-in 10 Gigabit Ethernet on my Mac Studio for a few years. It works fine: I can edit 4K video straight off my NAS over the network, and run backups at around 1 GB/sec.
But... I want more. I upgraded my rack and my NAS to 25 GbE a couple years ago, and wanted to upgrade my main workstation, too.
