The 4th server upgrade. Now powered by Ryzen 5950X.

(2022 onwards)

System:        Distro: Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm)
           
Motherboard:   Manufacturer: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
               Product Name: X570 AORUS MASTER
			   
CPU:           Description: CPU
               Product: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16-Core Processor
               Vendor: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD]
			   
Graphics:      System Card:  NVIDIA Quadro P2200
               KVM Card: AMD SAPPHIRE Radeon RX 6800
			   
Network:       WiFi: Intel Corporation Wi-Fi 6 AX200
               Gigabit Ethernet: Intel Corporation I211 Gigabit Network Connection
               2.5 Gigabit Ethernet: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8125 2.5GbE Controller
			   
Drives:        System MAIN: Kingston FURY Renegade NVMe 2TB
               System SECONDARY: Samsung 870 QVO 8TB
               RAID 5-1: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               RAID 5-2: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               RAID 5-3: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               RAID 5-4: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               RAID 5-5: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               RAID 5-6: Seagate IronWolf Pro 18TB
               HDD (Temp): WD Gold 16TB

localhost

#tools

• Virtualization KVM
• Share platform Samba
• Production environment Docker+Docker Compose
• VPN OpenVPN+NordVPN

#fun

• TV gaming (GPU Passthrough)
• PCWzone.com community growth

WEB Services

@host:

• Server administration: CLI
• Server live stats: Netdata, Glances, Ntop
• Monitoring Stack: Prometheus+Telegraf with Grafana
• Elastic(ELK) Stack: Elasticsearch+Logstash with Kibana
• Docker management: Portainer
• Reverse proxy: Traefik protected by Authelia and OAuth

@aronmgv.com:

• Blog: Ghost
• Email server: Mailcow
• Local DNS: Pihole
• Private cloud: Nextcloud
• Git/CICD: Gitlab
• Media Server: PLEX, EMBY, JELLYFIN

@pcwzone.com:

• Voice server: TeamSpeak+SinusBot: TS.pcwzone.com
• Forum Discourse: FORUM.pcwzone.com
• Online chat RocketChat: CHAT.pcwzone.com
• IRC client The Lounge: IRC.pcwzone.com
• Counter-Strike 1.6:
  • PUB1.pcwzone.com
  • CW1.pcwzone.com
  • CW2.pcwzone.com
  • CW3.pcwzone.com
  • CW4.pcwzone.com
  • CW5.pcwzone.com

FRONT:

MAIN CHAMBER:

REAR CHAMBER (STORAGE):

RGB:

While building...

Yesterday (13.3.2019) many folks around were complaining about attachment delivery issues on different platforms. Those platforms had something in common which not everybody realized - Facebook as their parent company. What might these problems imply??

Such platforms were acquired for money never seen in tech industry before! And for what? Your privacy! Nowadays it has big value for anybody around you and you may not even know when its going to be crucial in your life your privacy remained protected.

Just to put into numbers.. In 2012 Instagram was acquired at 1 billion US$. At a time Instagram hold accounts of 30 millions of users - so here Facebook paid 33$ per user account. However 2 years later something much bigger happened. Platform of 450 millions active users was acquired by Facebook at the price of 19.3 billions US$!!! This is 43$ per user. Just wow! Nowadays Zuckerberg claims WhatsApp platform has 1.5 billion users and sees 60 billion messages sent per day.

Back to the point. Such a technical complication heavily implies Facebook created something common for these platforms. Some central point (mostly per region) which is between yourself and other end of your message. Many would think something spying related. But we will never know for sure. However we can speculate - because this unit yesterday encountered some technical problems - thus attachments on all these platforms were not able to be delivered until they were "cached". Basically here Facebook himself is the man in the middle of your privacy today. If your fine by this - your call, but let me please spare some time for next paragraph.

There were cases where insurance companies revoked e.g. life insurance for no apparent reason. Your privacy can be bought! For example cases from Britain or US prove your medical record is accessible at a certain price.. A medium they are accessible through is so called "black market" or "deep web".. Here anonymously figures individuals who are most likely direct employees of the entity where are your private data. Nurses, doctors, accountants, tech engineers, lawyers etc. who provide sensitive data in exchange for the money. With virtual currency is now almost impossible to track back to the "leak" source.. Price varies per country. A page from your medical record goes in Britain from 150£ to 250£. For the insurance company this is significantly cheaper then risking paying off 2 mortgages to your family in case you die of cancer for example. You might be lucky that nobody with the access to your medical records figures at such platform.

However what about your "virtual" privacy? Is it safe?? Your private conversations, shared images, and apps itself with read access to your phone storage/contacts/call log/GPS/etc.. We are at the era you can trust no one online! Having such an app like Whatsapp for example in your phone gives Facebook access to your location at any time your phone is turned on. Through different platforms they can get all different kind of information from you and offer this as a package deal to anybody who is willing to pay. Suddenly visiting oncology clinic for a couple of days? Sharing emotions about your dad health issues to friends through Instagram? I might be paranoid that somebody is scanning through all this.. maybe, but what about BOTs? Their existence have grown dramatically in past years and with AI getting smarter every year it could be not that difficult to understand whats going on with your life every day. Companies witch such power and infrastructure have definitely huge potential.

What you can do about it? Get rid of those platform entirely - which can be difficult from one day to another, but at least you can remove "native" apps from your phones.. There are plenty alternatives which offer you an access to such medium while not being tracked directly by the app owner.

Me personally am still member of the Facebook network. However I am taking some extra steps to access it. Definitely not having original apps installed in my phone. Since they started blocking messaging via your phone browser I am using a third party app which combines your feed with messages. On the desktop my Facebook tab is in isolated environment (browser extension: Facebook Container) and I never ever upload sensitive pictures/documents through it. Everything you decide to share through it is their property! You wouldn't like to see your newborn cute baby in the magazine of some anti-vaccination movement.

What about messaging? Neither your private email from your private account is today safe. On the way to its destinations at different level in infrastructure we have different interceptor. Edward Snowden even confirmed it is enough to send from your Gmail account email to hospital private one and all gets to the hands of NSA.. Thus it is essential to put your own encryption layer over everything you want to keep private. Or at least choose a trustworthy medium..

There are alternatives! - and they are even better!

Again, it might and it will be difficult to go through such a change, but the least you can do is to register your phone number there - so when somebody else from your contact list will join such a network, will see more and more friends there.

Two completely standalone and not yet acquired by any gigant are Signal and Telegram. You can check out reviews and comparisons of these services, just Google it and you’ll get a lot of interesting results. I  decided to write this post as a collation of most reviews I’ve read  myself, and some information I got from the websites of both Signal and  Telegram.

Signal

Signal is a completely open source, free, secure, and private instant messaging platform, just like WhatsApp (apart from the fact that it’s open, secure, and private). Signal has apps for Android, iOS, and your desktop as well (an in-browser app). Like any other modern instant messaging service, Signal supports text, images, videos, voice and video calls, and documents. And just like any other messaging platform today, it supports group messaging.

The most important thing to note here is, there’s end-to-end encryption for both text and voice messages. Signal, or anybody else, can’t see what’s in your messages. And Signal promises to keep it that way.

There’s a feature where you can configure certain messages or threads to destroy themselves after a set interval of time. So if you think that a message should be in your recipient’s inbox for only five minutes, you can make that happen, and the message will be automatically deleted after five minutes. There’s nothing the recipient can do about it, or stop it from happening.

One more awesome feature, at least to me, is something called as Screen Security. You can go to your privacy settings and enable Screen Security, which will essentially block other apps on your phone, or yourself, from taking screenshots of your chats on Signal. This way, you can be sure that even if there’s an app which is keeping tabs on your activities on your phone, it can’t capture what’s happening inside your Signal app.

Each time you call somebody on Signal, some really cool magic happens behind the scene. The two phones talk to each other and come up with a secret code that nobody else could know, even if they’re monitoring the internet traffic and intercepting all the messages being exchanged. The apps then convert this secret code into two words. These two words will be shown on the displays of both the phones. You can tell each other these two words and make sure they’re the same. If not, then something is wrong with the encryption. You drop the call, switch to a different internet network, and try again.

The common practice here is, when you answer the call, you say the first word out to the caller. Then the caller verifies that it’s the same word on their phone, if not, drop the call. If it’s the same word, the caller will speak out the second word. Now you verify if it’s the same on your phone. If it is, nothing to worry, carry on with the conversation. If not, as already said, drop the call, switch networks, and try again.

Signal also promises that there won’t be any ads, at least for now. WhatsApp had similar promises in the beginning, but that changed after Facebook acquired it. For the foreseeable future, that might not happen with Signal, because it is an open source project. It’s very difficult to monetize an open source project with ads.

So, in a nutshell, Signal is an awesome option for an instance messaging service if you’re concerned about your security and privacy, which you should be. Now, let’s take a look at Telegram.

Telegram

Telegram is similar to Signal in a lot of ways. It’s APIs and protocol are open sourced, but the core part of Telegram, the server-side services, aren’t. This could potentially be a privacy concern. We’ll talk about this later.

Telegram has apps for almost all your devices, Android, iOS, web, Windows Phone, Mac, PC, and even Linux. So no matter what device or desktop environment you use, you’re covered. Similar to Signal, messages on Telegram are encrypted end-to-end. And the service also claims that:

Telegram delivers messages faster than any other application.
https://telegram.org/

The service’s servers are spread across the globe, which means that the messages could, in theory, be delivered to the recipients faster, as the actual physical distance from the mobile device to the server could be less compared to other services.

One feature which sets Telegram apart from other instant messaging services is that Telegram has no limit for the size of file you can share on the service (edit: according to one comment to this post, there is actually a limit for the file size, and it’s 1.5GB, which is a lot if you ask me). So, for instance, you could share a file which is several GBs in size with your peers on the service. WhatsApp and Signal (as far as I know) don’t have this feature, they both set a limit on the file size.

Telegram will be attractive for another genre of users as well, those who want to have loads of people in a single group. This is because Telegram allows for up to 100000 people in a single group, and that’s a huge number.

Similar to Signal, telegram also features messages that self-destruct after a set amount of time. This means you can easily send messages to people that wouldn’t be available after a certain amount of time.

Now, earlier, I mentioned that Telegram also features end-to-end encryption. While this is true, it should be mentioned that this isn’t available by default and for all messages. There’s something called a Secret Chat, and unless you start your conversation in this mode, your messages aren’t actually completely encrypted. So you should keep this in mind.

One more thing to keep in mind is, as I already mentioned, the back-end services of Telegram aren’t open sourced. So we can’t really tell what’s happening to our messages once they reach Telegram’s servers. Its also true that we can’t assume the messages are stored in plain text on their servers, but there is a possibility that Telegram, if need be, can actually go through our messages.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t trust Telegram. For now, there’s no issue with Telegram and there’s no reason to believe that they’re lying to us. They are a non-profit after all, and I don’t see why they have to lie to us, for now. So let me reiterate, I don’t mean that you shouldn’t trust Telegram, you sure can do. But facts are facts, and their back-end is closed.

Conclusion

To be frank, there’s nothing you can trust on the internet. To be a 100% sure that nobody’s going through your data and that it’s 100% secure, you’ll have to go through each line of source code in all the clients and services of these instant messaging services, download the source code, compile and build it yourself, and use those executable files on your devices. Almost nobody does that (a few people do). So, the only thing we can actually do is go through the terms and conditions, FAQs, and other literature we have of these services, and make an informed decision as to which service we should be using. Or at least have yourself registered there so others will see it might be worth to switch now.

Anybody with knowledge deep enough into internet security would urge you all guys to have a look at the alternatives to WhatsApp and especially Facebook Messenger.

Main glacier Presena (3026m)

The Adamello-Presanella Alps Alpine group is a mountain range in the Southern Limestone Alps mountain group of the Eastern Alps. It is located in northern Italy, in the provinces of Trentino and Brescia. The name stems from its highest peaks: Adamello and Presanella.

The Adamello-Presanella Group is separated from the Ortler Alps in the north by the Tonale Pass; from the Bergamo Alps in the west by the Oglio valley (Val Camonica); from the Brenta Group in the east by the Campo Carlo Magno Pass and the river Sarca; to the south it continues towards Lake Iseo.

Lake Iseo

(on a way back to the airport)

Windows license REFUND

(70-80€ BACK)

As topic describes there is a way to return windows license back to Micro$oft and get it fully refunded. Easy task right? However not that simple to understand the process and go through it. So here you have the process to get it done in a week time!

Nowadays roughly every laptop comes with preinstalled windows license - mostly hated 10thish version. If you are a simple user and don't really care for 70-80€ every time you get a new laptop you might be safer to stop right here and enjoy your guaranteed privacy. But what if you already own another windows license or just wanna go opensource and don't want to spend extra money on something you don't want but are forced to buy anyway?

Problem:

Laptop manufactures have deals with M$ where they burn windows key directly to the motherboard of the laptop which will conflict with any other windows license no matter the version. Such a trend disallows to use any other user owned windows license (transparent one or from previous laptop). So you are basically forced to use the license witch came with the laptop. This is against the EU law where the end user should be free to choose system to his personal preference.

There is a significant lack of knowledge between the sellers thus they cannot inform buyers about possibility to return windows license and get money back.

Solution:

I have summed up the process into 5 steps. You may encounter troubles or lack of willingness or even "not possible" scenarios, but you must be certain and strict. They will try to stop you during the process multiple times,.. just don't fool for it.

1. Buy laptop according to your preference. Once you have it, don't even bother turning it ON! You will encounter a license agreement (EULA) page which cannot be declined by any button! You can just forcibly shut down the PC - no other way around it! Once you agree - you are doomed!
2. Find closest service based on the manufacturer - mine was Acer. Deliver or go there directly with whole package.
3. Describe them you don't want preinstalled windows and want the key from the motherboard removed and money refunded. They will bring the form, you will need to sign. They might try to scare you stating: "By signing no further warranty for any software related issues will be provided!" - in my case it was bold at the bottom. Still to that point I didn't know the amount of money I will be refunded. They were bullsh<>ng it is roughly 10-15€ (seriously lol). Anyway, good thing is they have 5 days to clean the key and another month to refund money back to your bank account you stated in the form. So, the customer still has another 5 business days to test the laptop with his operating system and still return within 14 days "no reason" warranty.
4. You will probably get called in 2-3 days it's done. If you can come to pick it up, do it. Otherwise they will charge you for the delivery. This happened by accident when I came to pick it up and Acer was refunding me less of 12€ because of the shipment.
5. Install your system and enjoy. Didn't have any issues with the drivers neither under my transparent windows license or Ubuntu. Everything worked flawlessly (also touch screen and function keys). In about 2-3 weeks you will get your money. In my case of Windows 10 Professional it was almost 80€. In case of Windows 10 Home it's around 70€. However your final price can vary a bit, since it is based on the deal between the manufacturer and M$..

Hopefully I have helped you to overcome the fear of big corporates and save you some extra money e.g. for extending your warranty as I did.

Feel free to let everybody know what was your refund in the comment section ;)

MGV

Legacy setup (from Jun 2014 - April 2017):

Computing System:

• Processor Intel N2930(quad core, 1.83 GHz, up to 2.16 GHz)
• System Memory 4GB

Graphic:

• Graphics Engine Intel HD Graphics
• Video Output HDMI,
• DisplayPort

Storage:

• WD Red HDD 1TB 2.5"

CARADHRAS

Present setup (from May 2017 - Now):

System:        Host: caradhras Kernel: 4.9.0-8-amd64 x86_64 (64 bit) Console: tty 7
               Distro: Debian GNU/Linux 9 (stretch)
           
Motherboard:   Device: desktop Mobo: ASUSTeK model: PRIME H270M-PLUS v: Rev X.0x serial: 161190041600326
               UEFI [Legacy]: American Megatrends v: 0319 date: 11/08/2016
			   
CPU:           Quad core Intel Core i7-6700 (-HT-MCP-) cache: 8192 KB
               clock speeds: max: 4000 MHz 1: 3700 MHz 2: 3700 MHz 3: 3699 MHz 4: 3700 MHz 5: 3700 MHz 6: 3700 MHz
               7: 3699 MHz 8: 3700 MHz
			   
Graphics:      Card: NVIDIA GM206 [GeForce GTX 960]
               Display Server: X.org 1.19.2 drivers: nouveau (unloaded: modesetting,fbdev,vesa)
               tty size: 130x32 Advanced Data: N/A for root out of X
			   
Audio:         Card-1 Intel Device a2f0 driver: snd_hda_intel Sound: ALSA v: k4.9.0-8-amd64
               Card-2 NVIDIA Device 0fba driver: vfio-pci
			   
Network:       Card: Intel Ethernet Connection (2) I219-V driver: e1000e
               IF: enp0s31f6 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: 2c:4d:54:56:3f:cb
			   
Drives:        HDD Total Size: 18259.6GB (39.9% used)
               ID-1: /dev/sda model: WDC_WD20EARX size: 2000.4GB  		[HDD]
               ID-2: /dev/sdb model: WDC_WD40EFRX size: 4000.8GB 		[RAID5]
               ID-3: /dev/sdc model: Samsung_SSD_850 size: 256.1GB      	[system]
               ID-4: /dev/sde model: WDC_WD40EFRX size: 4000.8GB  		[RAID5]
               ID-5: /dev/sdd model: WDC_WD40EZRX size: 4000.8GB  		[RAID5]
               ID-6: /dev/sdf model: WDC_WD40EFRX size: 4000.8GB  		[RAID5]
			   
Partition:     ID-1: / size: 92G used: 67G (78%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/dm-0
               ID-2: /boot size: 922M used: 66M (8%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdc1
               ID-3: swap-1 size: 10.49GB used: 5.31GB (51%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sdc5
			   
RAID:          Device-1: /dev/md0 - active raid: 5 components: online: 4/4 - sde1 sdb1 sdd1 sdf1

Sensors:       System Temperatures: cpu: 29.8C mobo: 27.8C
               Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: 0
			   
Info:          Processes: 610 Uptime: 10 days Memory: 30280.8/32181.3MB Init: systemd runlevel: 5
               Client: Shell (bash) inxi: 2.3.5

What it's running:

Network:

• 100/100 Mbps

System configuration:

• LVM, RAID5
• NGINX - as reverse proxy and loadbalancer
• Docker with Docker-Compose

System services:

• FTP/FTPS
• SSH/SCP/SFTP
• DNS
• OpenVPN

Private services (Locally or via VPN):

• LAN Shares [Samba]
• Git [GitLAB]
• Cloud [Owncloud]
• Mediacenter/DLNA/IPTV [Plex/TVheadend]
• Virtualization [KVM]
• Health/Sysinfo [Glances]

Public services & Community:

• Emails server [Mailcow]: https://mail.aronmgv.com
• Emails client [Mailcow]: https://mail.aronmgv.com/SOGo/
• Blog [Ghost]: /
• VoiceServer [TeamSpeak]: ts.pcwzone.com
• Forum [Discourse]: https://forum.pcwzone.com
• Speedtest: https://speedtest.aronmgv.com
• Counter-Strike 1.6/Global-Offensive servers

FUN:

• Porting games to TV: KVM + GPU Pass-Through
• PCWzone.com Community growth
• Air-Conditioning remote controll

TODO:

• Backup ISP
• Primary ISP upgrade to 300/300
• Private Docker-HUB
• OpenVPN profile remote automatization
• Dockerize everything!

Final result:

Build process: