Calling ricedg

[JayCeeDee]

Found one from Dave’s link HERE. Bonus was they took PayPal!! Less than 5 minutes later, I’ve got the Key.🙂

[JayCeeDee]

HERE is a great place ( and method ) to get the latest W10 iso.  It showed 21H1 as the latest, but actually it gave me 21H2 from November 2021.👍👍

[Dave Rice]

I used Aclab myself again the other day, always reliable.

[JayCeeDee]

Dave Rice wrote:

I used Aclab myself again the other day, always reliable.

Had a bit of a problem activating the W10Pro key from them, but they persevered. The first key they sent had been used 30 times, according to the  MS phone activation line, after it blew out the online activation. But give them their due, they sent another straight away…… which also failed online. Emailed the guy back and it was third time lucky, but it took me best part of that day!!

The computer is up and running and it is a beaut!!👍👍 I ended up going with 32Gig of ram, due more to the fact that I upgraded the stock Intel cooler to an Arctic Freezer 34 e Sports as the stock was still loose after several attempts – plastic push pins 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️- so I opted for one that bolted through the Mobo. Well pleased with it, but went for the extra ram so that there would be no more fiddling about close to it.

The case I think is brilliant for the build. It’s a bit chunky regarding overall size but very, very well laid out cable and placement wise. Bonus was the back of the CPU was accessible for the cooler upgrade, without taking the mobo out.

I went for the B560 Torpedo as it has dual ethernet ports and my son is buying me a DS220j NAS for a special birthday/Christmas present, plus I liked the look.

My main intent was to improve the multiple browser/tab situation and it has done it very well indeed.

Three browsers pages open with 10, 15 and 20 tabs on them previously used ( Task Manager Stats )  15 – 50% CPU and 75 – 90% ram, but still needing the pages to re-load when you click on their tab. New one with the same pages and tabs open use 3-10% CPU and 27 – 30% ram. Also even after left on for three days, the tabs including YT pages are still loaded and ready to go. Result!!

As Dave has said, the NVME drive makes things very much ‘click and do’, the initial loading of fresh browser pages seems to be the only hold up and that’s minimal with my 75Meg line, but just a bit more noticeable with everything else around it flying.

The only thing I’m missing is my dual monitor set up as there’s one to each for the time being. When the desk comes in four weeks time I’ll go dual again and set the old computer as a spare running to the TV in the front room, for those occasions when there’s a need!! You married guys know what I mean!!’😆🤣

[Dave Rice]

That gives me a clue over how they are obtaining their keys as I’ve not had that happen to me. I suspect they are bought in batches, so if they underestimate demand before extending the current one or buying a new lot… They probably have several on the go. As I’ve mentioned before, MS licencing is a real convoluted beast with so many routes in, I probably only know a fraction of them.

I let my daughter have my R5 over the holidays, so it’s been the 6th Gen i5 laptop with 12GB ram and an SSD. Yeah, OK, #firstworldproblems but there is a lot of difference.

The Torpedo & Mortar mobos are very good. I’ve used a few this year. As for NVMe I let my daughter have the R5 with a spare SATA M2 and whilst it’s still very quick, you can tell – especially at boot up.

If you need help setting up the Synology just shout. I would accept the default apps even if you think that you won’t use them. They take up little space and are easily removed, plus I’ll bet after a while you will be interested in them.

[JayCeeDee]

Dave Rice wrote:

If you need help setting up the Synology just shout. I would accept the default apps even if you think that you won’t use them. They take up little space and are easily removed, plus I’ll bet after a while you will be interested in them.

Cheers, Dave. I’m looking at THIS from Broadband Buyer – not much difference to the cost of the bare NAS then buying and fitting the drives, plus keeps it simple for returns/warranty. Possibly bigger than I need, but it’s a PITA getting a ‘just fit’ size, then running out and upgrading!!

Dave Rice wrote:

The Torpedo & Mortar mobos are very good. I’ve used a few this year. 

It was great for ease of assembling and fitting, but MSi themselves have been dire. EBuyer had a Cashback offer for MSi products, extra back if you bought an intel CPU at the same time. It was £20 off the mobo and £15 off the CPU.  MSi’s webpage to upload details kept going back to an empty front page after filling in all the forms, serial numbers, pictures of serial numbers, copy of Invoice, Bank details etc, etc, and hitting Submit. So far, I’m up to 35 emails with their CS team!!

[Dave Rice]

It’s dead easy to fit the drives, but yeah, I let BB do it. It was more the software setup I was thinking of.

1. Take the default settings and offer of what software to install, even if you think you won’t use it.
2. For the moment leave it on DHCP and have the router reserve an address if you want.
3. Create a Synology Account, this is required for lots of useful features.
4. Enable QuickConnect and use quickconnect:to/myservername to access it. You’ll find you really don’t need a fixed IP.
5. Set up DDNS using Synology’s service, this will let you easily create a Lets Encrypt security certificate (but note this will only work on external access, i.e. from outside your LAN).
6. Run the Security Advisor and resolve any issues – it will tell you what you need to do.

Backups is a subject in itself for another day. Rather than map a drive I use Synology Drive for a Dropbox like experience, but again for another day.

Drop me an email if you need any help.

[JayCeeDee]

Much appreciated, Dave, I will do. For the time being, I’m ticking over with the new PC, still running in parallel with the old. Once the desk arrives mid Feb, I’ll know it’s stable and reliable enough to swap over main duties to it.

At that point I’ll go back to my dual monitor setup and start on the NAS, which I’ll have by then. 👍👍

 

[JayCeeDee]

Well, MSi finally came through, authorising the Cashback – but what a palaver!!

@ricedg – Dave, NAS has arrived and I’m going to do things gradually, but hopefully in the right way!!😄😄

First question – I know my folders are full of duplicates, files and photos, down to my methods of copying old folders onto new computers, plus a mish mash of back-up practices along with OneDrive, Google Drive, Google Photos etc. I’ve looked online and it seems that the old DSM6 Moments could manage duplicate photos, but the latest DSM 7 Synology Photos cannot. Should I rationalise my photos into a new folder and then add it to the NAS, or drop everything in and then sort the NAS folder. Looking at Visipics and Awesome Duplicate Photo Finder to sort out folders. Any experience or thoughts??

—————————————————-

Actually just had a doh moment!! If I clean the NAS, but then use it as a back up, all the old carp will then go into my newly cleaned folder. Please ignore dumbass question.

Thought I’d leave it on for anyone who is going to do similar to me.

Should we open a new Topic to cover setting up the NAS??

Cheers

John

 

[Dave Rice]

DSM will find duplicate files for you via a Storage Analyzer Report. You have to set these up but it’s all pretty obvious with sensible defaults. You can run them on demand, which is probably what you’ll want to do whilst you’re sorting things out, but they can also be run to a schedule and even emailed to you.

You can also find the largest files, most recently modified and least recently accessed. The reports are interactive when viewed on the Synology itself, and you can delete duplicates from the interface. So I would just dump it all on there and use the reports.

 

[JayCeeDee]

Cheers, Dave – that clarifies the file side of things.

Presumably hold fire on the backups then, or will deleting the duplicates on the NAS remove them on the PC too??

I’ve been sorting out the photos into albums on Google Photos, still a lot to do, so that may make it easier with those.

It’s looking like the NAS is the PC equivalent of the tumble dryer/dishwasher. You never really appreciate how much you needed it until after you actually get one!!👍👍

[Ed P]

Be careful of weeding out duplicate photos. I still have some scars of fifteen years ago when I did just that but unfortunately a number of the photos had corrupt headers (possibly from the copying or recompression process). I would now be inclined to look at the piles of duplicates and go through them before actually deleting anything.

[Dave Rice]

As Ed says, caution! You will be copying them to the server so can leave everything on the PC until you’re sure.

Backups: the easiest way is via an external USB drive, I use the Toshiba Canvios almost exclusively as I’ve found them to be very reliable in this role. Plug them in, go to External Devices and format it EXT4.

Open up Hyperbackup and click the + to create a new Data Backup task. Destination is Local & USB then in Backup Destination click the drop down and change it to usbshare1. Change the Directory name to something more meaningful if you want.

In Data Backup, tick the folders you wan to backup, then in Application Backup I’d select the lot (it backs up settings rather than the apps). In Backup Settings change the Task Name to something meaningful, keep Compression on and then choose your Schedule and Integrity check times.

In Rotation Settings you get to decide how long to keep your backups, I usually go for 31 days and From the Earliest Versions. Smart Recycle is only really useful if you do multiple backups a day, which I have done on certain folders when working on big quotes.

You can also do all of this to the Synology data centre in Frankfurt via the C2 service.  It costs €34.99 a year for 500GB or €99.99 for 2TB. I use it for important files, multimedia I backup to a USB drive.

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