Unifi : How do I save by paying more?

I have been using TM Streamyx RM66 package for about 5 years before switching to Unifi when I moved in to my new house early this year. At first, it is a no brainer decision to jump from RM66 to RM149 per month on internet fees.

How much does the Internet packages cost:

Streamyx Package (512kbps):
Internet Fees: RM66/month
Phone line rental charge: RM26
Taxes: (few dollars)
Total: ~RM100

Unifi (5Mbps):
Internet Fees: RM149/month
Phone line rental charge: RM0
Taxes: 0
Installation: RM200 one time (some lucky chap got it for Free during the promotion)
Total: RM149/month

From the price comparison, it appear that I am paying 50% every month on Internet.
Let's look at how I can save by spending more:-



What do I get from Unifi?

1. IPTV
2. 10 times the download speed and 20 times the upload speed
3. Unlimited Free Calls to landline and RM0.10/min to any Mobile operator.
4. DECT phone (worth RM100)

I used to pay about RM30-40/month on phone charge previously and it has gone down to about RM10/month now with the Unifi package. If you can live without Astro, then terminate your Astro subscription which is costing you RM100-150/month and use IPTV. If you find the channels in IPTV is limited, utilize the high Internet speed to download any show that you want from the net. My girlfriend used to pay RM30/month to Astro to watch the latest Hong Kong movie series with Astro on Demand and she is streaming it for free now with QVOD player on the Internet which is surprisingly very smooth. As for myself, I download HD shows and watch it on my 40" FULL HD LED screen which is way much better than the quality of Standard Astro subscription.

Having said all these, my Astro subscription still has to stay on as my media center (desktop) is too high tech for the old man to operate.

So, how much do I save?

1. RM30 for Astro on Demand
2. RM30 for phone calls
3. RM20 for Astro Beyond (for HD content)
4. RM150 on Astro (assuming I can terminate this)
5. TIME factor (faster Internet speed = more things can be done on the net at a shorter duration)
6. Less stress with faster Internet speed
   

Savings: RM230
Extra charge on Internet fees: RM50
Total Savings (230-50): RM180

Now, you save RM180 by spending extra RM50

How to install web management for HP P212 RAID controller

If you have bought a HP server with P212 RAID controller and installing CentOS, you will need to install HP System Management Homepage (SMH) to monitor your health status of your array from the OS. Else, you will only be able to know the RAID status by rebooting the server and look the boot up message.

Here are the steps to install HP SMH on CentOS 5.6:-

1. Login as root and perform all below actions as a superuser (either su/sudo or root login). To start, we create a directory called HP to store all our downloads:

mkdir hp
cd hp

2. Download the PSP now. We will also download the latest binary version of HP-ACU-cli and SMH. The PSP includes only the source RPM for an out dated version:

wget ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softlib2/software1/pubsw-linux/p414707558/v63381/hpacucli-8.70-8.0.noarch.rpm
wget ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softlib2/software1/supportpack-linux/p323971208/v66272/psp-8.63.rhel5.x86_64.en.tar.gz
wget ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softlib2/software1/pubsw-linux/p1507410135/v64330/hpsmh-6.3.0-22.x86_64.rpm

3. We now extract the PSP archive. Delete the outdated HP-ACU-cli and SMH RPMs.

tar zxvf psp-8.63.rhel5.x86_64.en.tar.gz
rm -rf hpacucli-8.60-8.0.noarch.rpm
rm -rf hpsmh-6.2.2-2.x86_64.rpm

4. Now we install the RPMs. Please note to keep the same order of installation, otherwise it might fail due to dependencies.

yum install net-snmp
yum localinstall --nogpgcheck hp-health-* hpacucli-* hponcfg-*
yum localinstall --nogpgcheck hpsmh-*
yum localinstall --nogpgcheck hp-snmp-agents-* hp-smh-templates-* cpqacuxe-* hpdiags-*

5. Configure SNMP to be accessible by HP System Management Homepage. It is necessary that you enter the passphrase for the Read/Write and Read-Only
access via localhost, otherwise SMH will not function properly. Also
set the snmptrap passphrase.

/sbin/hpsnmpconfig

6. Enable the ACU to connect and be accessible via the SMH. This is the RAID controller’s information.

cpqacuxe --enable-remote

7. Start all services:

service hp-asrd restart
service hp-health restart
service snmpd restart
service hp-snmp-agents restart

8. Secure your System Management Homepage installation to be accessible only by your IP address (replace 127.0.0.1 with yours):
/opt/hp/hpsmh/sbin/smhconfig --autostart=true --iconview=true --ip-restricted-logins=true --ip-restricted-include=127.0.0.1

9. Start the HP System Management Homepage service.
service hpsmhd restart
Visit http://Your-Server-IP:2301/. This should automatically start the HP SMH server and redirect you https://Your-Server-IP:2381/. Use your root user and password to gain access to SMH.

SSD vs SATA

This is my review after swapping the Hitachi 500GB SATA on my notebook with the Intel 160GB SSD X-25M. A picture paint a thousand words, so let's look at the images below:-

From the comparison, we can see that the SSD has an average read speed of 172.1MB/sec while the SATA can only write at 59MB/sec which is about a third of the speed of the SSD.

Battery life on my notebook has increased by about 20% to make it to 6 hours usage time from 5. On the weight, the SSD is lighter by a few grams.

Boot up time to the login screen on Windows 7 64bit was 44 seconds on SATA and it has been slashed to more than half at 20 sec on SSD.

I paid about RM700 for this X25M as it is an OEM unit which come with one month warranty only. You can get it from our most popular tech website at http://lowyat.net .The retail pack would set you back to around RM1400 which is double the price.

I don't see any reason not to upgrade to SSD if you can afford it. Cut down on the budget for your new notebook and use the balance to get the SSD. As SSD does not have any mechanical parts, I do not have to worry about dropping my notebook or knocking it on a hard surface when it is still operational.

Shopping for my new notebook

My current notebook, BenQ S32B has been serving faithfully to me for 36 months and it is time to change as I need to pass it to another colleague in my department.

It's time for new notebook shopping!!! My requirements are as below:-

• Light

• Long battery life (>4 hrs usage time)

• Fast

• With Dedicated GPU

• Priced at around RM3000 (USD1000)

With these new requirements, my first choice would be Mac Book Air 11”. It look good, light and the aluminium chassis is nice to hold. It was weekend and I decided to head down to the nearest Mac store to have a look a the real thing. The first impression was good as the Mac Air is really a looker. After toying it for few minutes, I realize that the screen is too small for daily usage, limited USB slot (2x), no HDMI out and no Ethernet RJ45 out! I know that we can purchase the Ethernet adapter and USB extender separately but I don't like the idea of having RJ45 Ethernet adapter externally. My job require me to perform a lot of network troubleshooting and RJ45 Ethernet adapter is important to me. On top of this, I can't play my favorite HD file on my big screen due to the absent of HDMI. The screen is just too small to my liking for daily usage. I need to have an external monitor in my office and at home if I decide to go with this Mac Air 11”. Out of budget for these extra gadgets and it's time for alternatives.

My colleague, Ben suggested that I have a look at Acer TimeLineX and my first impression was, “An ACER again? A student's notebook again?”. After looking for more information on the unit, my perception for Acer has changed once again. The TimelineX offer up to 8 hours of battery life, dedicated RADEON HD6550M 1GB GPU, an i3-380 processor and 2GB of memory and a 13.3” HD LED LCD. The weight is about 1.7kg with battery....Impressive and it's priced at RM2200 (USD750) which is very reasonable for the specs. The downside of this notebook comparing with the Mac Air is the absence of the fast hard drive, SSD. So, I've decided to replace the HDD with an Intel X25M 160GB at the cost of RM700 and upgrade the RAM to 4GB. After all these upgrade, it still cost me

I am a happy man now with a decently fast notebook at a reasonable spending :)

SSD review in on the way..............

iPad 3G, do I need this?

Due to the uprising trend and consumer interest towards Apple's gadgets, I have decided to get myself an iPad 3G 32GB last week to catch the wave and the decision burned a big hole in my pocket. I have included the Marware Evo-Cue and a matte screen protector in the package with a total cost of about SGD1200 (MYR 2800) before the 5.5% GST refund. It is selling like hot cake in Singapore with 300-400 units sold over the weekend from a single outlet.

Well, this is my first gadget from Apple as I have been using Windows and Linux all these while. At first glimpse, the iPad is a COOL product. Booting up was a charm, ohh wait...I think there's no boot up because it booted up instantly because it doesn't has a Hard Disk. The aluminium chassis made it feel "good" on hands and the screen is nice too (no complain on this). Setting up the iPad was a charm as most of the critical settings are easily accessible via the "Settings" tab.

My iPad is being delivered with the following pre-installed apps:-

• Calendar
• Contacts
• Notes
• Maps
• Videos
• YouTube
• iTunes
• App Store
• Safari
• Mail
• Photos
• iPod

After getting the iPad from the town, I was stranded in the airport for 4 hours due to a flight delay (Tiger Airways sucks). I've decided to burn the time with the new iPad. First, I try to connect to the available Wifi AP and none of them are offering free internet services :(

So, the iPad is pretty useless without an Internet connection as I do not have apps to play with.

Then, I tried to pair the iPad up with my phone (HTC Wildfire) over bluetooth. The pairing was successful but the it can't connect to each other...Gosh...I can't transfer the photos and videos from my phone to the iPad for viewing. There are so many issue with bluetooth on the Iphone and iPad. I attempted to pair the iPad to my friend's HTC HD2 but there was no luck as well (sad). The iPad was useless for the entire duration.

I managed to hook the iPad to the Internet when I reached home. It asked me to create an iTune account before I could download any apps whereas my Android does not require me to do this. Signing up the iTunes account is quite a pain as it require a lot of personal information (data mining). They should have make the signing process as simple as signing up on Twitter, that's the standard of today!

Done with iTunes account and I downloaded Skype and eBuddy, there were no iPad version for it so I have to use the iPhone version :( Sad.........the resolution and keyboard doesn't really fit the iPad.

Next, the Safari web browser. It was nice for the first page but not after you open additional tab as the iPad does not support multitasking :( The additional tab will open but the page will reload again whenever you switch back to the previously closed tab :(

The Mail is good for iPad. Setting up Gmail, Yahoo, AOL and exchange is easy as you just need to key in your username and password. The Mail will take care the rest for you. No complain on the Mail for iPad.

Conclusion:-

In my humble opinion, this is just an overpriced luxury gadget. It doesn't really help me much in work, so I will give low scoring on practicality but it will score high on the cool factor.

I would rather spend the money to buy a small and lightweight notebook which would offer much more functionality than the iPad.

I like:

- Cool factor

- Slim

- Light

- Fast boot up

- 10 hours battery life

- Nice display

I dislike:

- Overpriced

- No multitasking

- Almost everything need to be done with iTunes

- Need to jailbreak to get extra functionality but it will void the warranty.

- Money pit as you will spend a lot of apps.

- Feel like a bigger iPhone

- No card reader slot

- No USB slot

- Non-replaceable batteries

I will provide a new update if I decide to jailbreak it later.

Hardware RAID vs Software RAID

On the recent few server launches, we have acquired one of the latest hardware RAID card from LSI (LSI 3ware SAS9750-4i). So, it's time for a test.

Server specs:-
1 x Intel Xeon 5504
4GB DDR3 ECC RAM

RAID hardware: LSI 3ware SAS9750-4i
Configuration: RAID5
Hard Disk: 3 x 500GB WD RE3

[root@localhost ~]# dd if=/dev/zero of=test.img count=300 bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 106.22 s, 29.6 MB/s (writing speed)

[root@localhost ~]# dd if=test.img of=/dev/null bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 1.18725 s, 2.6 GB/s (reading speed)

And it's time to test the rebuild speed. HOT pull out one of the Hard Disk and insert it back to rebuild. The rebuilding time was about 2hrs for 500GB drive

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

RAID hardware: None, mdadm
Configuration: RAID1
Hard Disk: 2 x 500GB WD RE3

[test@localhost ~]$ dd if=/dev/zero of=test.img count=300 bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 30.1198 s, 104 MB/s (writing speed)

[test@localhost ~]$ dd if=test.img of=/dev/null bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 10.175 s, 309 MB/s (reading speed)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

RAID hardware: None, mdadm
Configuration: RAID0
Hard Disk: 2 x 500GB WD RE3

[user@localhost ~]$ dd if=/dev/zero of=test.img count=300 bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 13.5305 s, 232 MB/s (writing speed)

[user@localhost ~]$ dd if=test.img of=/dev/null bs=10M

300+0 records in

300+0 records out

3145728000 bytes (3.1 GB) copied, 1.0086 s, 3.1 GB/s (reading speed)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Comparison:

From the result, it show that RAID 0 has the best performance but the trade off is the reliability as it has a single point of failure comparing with RAID1 and RAID5.

Write performance is poor on RAID 5 due to the parity bit calculation and this setup is not recommended to host application which require intensive write operations. If you need good read and write performance with redundancy, consider RAID 10.

RAID1 is my favorite setup as it has the balance on all factors (space, reliability, performance) due to its simplicity, reliability and performance. RAID1 setup is recommended for simple and basic server setup.

iostat

One of the client's news portal has a surged of visitors due to a very interesting local news. The traffic doubled up overnight and the server was struggling to cope with it. The specs of the server is as below:-

Dual Xeon 5405

16GB DDR2 ECC RAM

2 x 320GB SATA 7200 (s/w RAID1)

I have tuned the webserver and mysql to allow more connections but the load was too high. The average load can go up as high as 40 during peak hours. The webserver can accept up to 352 concurrent connections now, up from 152 before the tuning. Memory usage should be still fine as only about 30MB swap being used as shown from "top" and "free".

The output from iostat is as below:-

Linux 2.6.26-2-amd64 (zz) 09/15/2010 _x86_64_

avg-cpu: %user %nice %system %iowait %steal %idle

23.95 0.00 4.44 0.80 0.00 70.82

Device: tps Blk_read/s Blk_wrtn/s Blk_read Blk_wrtn

sda 28.06 1000.72 1154.44 1459026910 1683138720

sda1 28.05 992.46 1154.38 1446969730 1683053488

sda2 0.00 0.00 0.00 4 0

sda5 0.01 8.27 0.06 12056864 85232

sdb 30.07 1078.20 1154.44 1571984044 1683138720

sdb1 30.04 1069.93 1154.38 1559927008 1683053488

sdb2 0.00 0.00 0.00 4 0

sdb5 0.04 8.27 0.06 12056720 85232

md0 163.84 1221.37 1143.97 1780718146 1667876624

md1 0.01 0.01 0.05 16216 79440

Is this bad? or normal for a 3 years old server and hard disk?

Is a hardware upgrade an imminent solution for this problem? I'm thinking of an upgrade to the latest Nehalem with SAS (Hardware RAID 10), what do you think?