The first USB drive system is ready to be downloaded. The Must Have Utilities System submitted by OnePiece is a nice compilation of freeware and open source applications that, in general, make your day to day life more bearable.
In this system, there is a photo editor, file archiver, web browser, process manager, personal information manager, and even an electronic version of Sudoku just for when you need a break! The entire system is run by the new DCoT Menu system for ease of use and convenience.
Also as a reminder, I am working on a number of other USB drive systems that will be appearing as I get them built.
There are a couple of great USB drive menu systems available online and I wanted to know more about how they worked. I find that one of the best ways for me to learn something new is to jump right in with both feet and get my hands dirty. I decided to write my own USB drive menu system.
The results of this experiment are documented in USB Drive Menu System. You can download and freely use this application on your USB drives that creates a menu system that resides in your system tray. It is completely customizable.
One other things about DCoT Menu is that it does not need to be shut down. It is “USB aware” and will close itself whenever the USB drive is removed. Just pull your USB drive and go!
Nate is finding that FreeNAS, actually, any NAS is really slow on his system and is looking for help. Nate write:
Hello!
I just found your website not too long ago, and have really enjoyed it! I’m in IT by hobby and trade, and I have found many many useful features on your site, and everything is well documented and easy to follow, not to mention interesting!
I just recently went through your FreeNAS guide and got the system up and running on an old Compaq system I had lying around. I had been having issues with a store-bought Western Digital NAS, and was hoping to try an alternative as well as learn something in the process.
What I did find however, is the same problem, so I am hoping you have some suggestions for me. I know that you are not offering tech support, and you surely get tons of needy email, but I thought I would at least throw it out there for ya, and with any luck you have some knowledge and free time that you toss some clues my way.
Both my FreeNAS system and my Western Digital drive are extraordinarily slow. Like, dog slow.
They ping back with less than 1ms response, so that looks good, and my router indicates that everything is wired in and running at 100M.
That said.. the web interface on both is very slow. Copying a 1.24GB file to the WD system, took 20 minutes exactly. Not exactly speedy. I have similar speed issues with FreeNAS.
Any ideas? Some protocols somewhere? or some authentication errors that may be causing lag? I don’t even know where to start looking.
Thanks for any advice you have. Either way, I look foward to all your future work, and am anticipating your 32MB FlashDrive articles!
-Nate
First, Nate, thanks for the compliments. I’m always glad to hear that people are getting something out of the website.
Now, as for your speed problem. There are several things that it could potentially be but the one that comes to mind is an issue that I had myself a number of years ago.
I had deployed a new network with a server and a number of workstations. Everything worked fine and the network connectivity was there but everything was painfully slow. All the network applications took forever to come up and file transfers were ridiculous. After about two weeks, I finally discovered the problem.
When I created the images for the workstations, I built the image with the network card set to a speed of 100 Mbits and full duplex. At the last minute, we switched from a managed switch to an unmanaged switch. Most unmanaged switches have their speed duplexing set to autonegotiation. It was at this point that I made a bad assumption.
I assumed that since the network cards on each workstations were hard coded to 100/full, the switch would automatically recognize this and set each port to 100/full as well. In reality, I had created a duplex mismatch. Essentially, the network cards were looking for a 100/full link on the other end of their patch cable while the switch was expecting an autonegotiation session. Neither got what they were looking for and trouble ensued!
The long and the short of it is that you have to be sure that what is on one end of a patch cable is the same on the other end of the patch cable. That also goes for autonegotiation. Both devices need to be set to autonegotiation. If only one is set that way, then you will experience all types of network slowdowns! So remember:
10 to 10 100 to 100 1000 to 1000 half to half full to full auto to auto
So, Nate, knowing what little I do about your network, this is the first thing that I would check. Make sure that all of your speed and duplex match on all of your devices. To change the speed and duplex in FreeNAS, click on the LAN item under the Interfaces (Assign) menu.
In this page, you will see a General configuration section near the bottom. Two of the options are Speed and Duplex.
Set these two options to match that on your switch and then click the Save button. With any luck, this will resolve your speed issues!
The other option is to set the speed on the switch. But, this is sometimes not possible, especially if it is an unmanaged switch.
Now, this is only my opinion. So, let’s put this out there to the DCoT readers. What do you think is causing Nate’s speed issues? Let everyone know in the comments.
Just imagine. It’s Christmas day and all of the toys have been unwrapped. You are ecstatic because you finally found your son that perfect gift and he couldn’t be happier! Suddenly, you are paid a Christmas visit by Murphy and your son’s new favorite toy breaks! What do you do? Christmas is about to be ruined!
If you are a faithful and dedicated DCoT reader, you break out your homemade fabber! Within a few minutes, you “print” a new part, fix the toy, and save Christmas!
This is a concept that I have been enamored with for quite some time. I love the idea of being able to go to the internet, download a file, and then “print” the object right from my computer! This type of technology has been around for almost ten years but it has always been cost prohibitive with systems starting at $15,000 (and that is considered to be cheap!).
In comes Fab@Home. Their idea is to create an open source fabber (or fabrication system) that will allow you to create several different objects from various materials. From their website:
The goal of this project is to offer an open-source, low-cost, personal SFF system kit, which we call “Fab@Home”. The aim of this project is to put SFF technology into the hands of those same curious, inventive, and entrepreneurial citizens. In addition, through this Wiki web site we hope to inspire users of Fab@Home to exchange their ideas for applications and their improvements to the hardware and software with us and each other. Several machines are already in use.
According to Fab@Home, you should be able to build their fabber for about US$2200. They also have a number of objects that you can download and then create.
Another project along these same lines is RepRap. RepRap is not as far along as Fab@Home but it appears to have more potential. The concept behind RepRap is to be able to create a device that can then be used to recreate itself (Can you say “Replicators“?). From the RepRap website:
RepRap is short for Replicating Rapid-prototyper. It is a practical self-copying 3D printer.
RepRap will make plastic, ceramic, or metal parts, and is itself made from plastic parts, so it will be able to make copies of itself. It is basically a three-axis robot with a glue gun. If it was making a plastic cone, it would lay down a quickly-hardening 0.5mm filament of plastic, drawing a filled disc. It would then raise the plastic extrusion head and draw the next layer (a smaller filled disc) on top of the first, repeating the process until it completed the cone. Conductors can be intermixed with the plastic to form circuits - in 3D even!
This process is called fused deposition modeling; machines that do this are called 3D printers, rapid prototypers, or fabbers. They are very useful. Unfortunately they are also very expensive - $20,000 US or more - and existing models don’t self-replicate. The RepRap build cost will be less than $400 US for the bought-in materials, all of which have been selected to be as widely available everywhere in the world as possible. Complete instructions and plans are published free on this website so, if you want to make one yourself, you can. Also, the RepRap software contains nothing that can’t work on all computer platforms for free.
We hope to announce self-replication in 2008.
I can’t get over the coolness factor if these two projects. Imagine being able to build absolutely anything that you want for yourself! It’s a geeks dream!
If I find some time, I’m going to see if I can work on the Fab@Home project (even though I like the RepRap system better). If I move forward with this, I’ll be sure to keep everyone posted.
The first USB drive system is ready to be downloaded. The Must Have Utilities System submitted by OnePiece is a nice compilation of freeware and open source applications that, in general, make your day to day life more bearable.
There are a couple of great USB drive menu systems available online and I wanted to know more about how they worked. I find that one of the best ways for me to learn something new is to jump right in with both feet and get my hands dirty. I decided to write my own USB drive menu system.
Nate is finding that FreeNAS, actually, any NAS is really slow on his system and is looking for help. Nate write:
Just imagine. It’s Christmas day and all of the toys have been unwrapped. You are ecstatic because you finally found your son that perfect gift and he couldn’t be happier! Suddenly, you are paid a Christmas visit by 