Jim and Allan disagree on how new hard drive tech is likely to work, more on storage and compute in the same box, and how we set up disk encryption on laptops.

Plugs

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OpenZFS Monitoring and Observability

News/discussion

Western Digital doubles the performance of hard drives with dual-actuator High-Bandwidth, with path to 8X performance increase — Power-Optimized HDDs will reduce power by 20 percent

Free consulting

We were asked about how we set up disk encryption on laptops.

A quick-start guide to OpenZFS native encryption – Ars Technica

Keeping Data Safe with OpenZFS: Security, Encryption, and Delegation

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Notepad++ falls victim to a state-sponsored attacker, AI agents talk nonsense to each other on an insecure vibe coded social network, and backing up a laptop properly.

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ZFS vs Btrfs: Architecture, Features, and Stability

News/discussion

Notepad++ Hijacked by State-Sponsored Hackers

AI agents now have their own Reddit-style social network, and it’s getting weird fas

Hacking Moltbook: AI Social Network Reveals 1.5M API Keys

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We were asked about backing up a laptop properly.

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Outlook’s autodiscover feature is leaking data again, our thoughts on the cycle of cloud and on-prem (centralised and local computing), and why you probably shouldn’t use NMVe to SATA adapters.

Plugs

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ZFS in Production: Real-World Deployment Patterns and Pitfalls

Modern VDI on Proxmox: ZFS Reliability and GPU Acceleration at Lower Cost

News/discussion

Why has Microsoft been routing example.com traffic to a company in Japan?

Free consulting

We were asked about SATA to PCIe adapters.

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Why you might not want your Windows encryption keys to be backed up to Microsoft, some Bluetooth devices are vulnerable to snooping and tracking, a lesson in the need for backups,  and the best practices and stack for setting up a mail server.

Plugs

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Klara’s Expert Perspective on OpenZFS in 2026 and What to Expect Next

Modern VDI on Proxmox: ZFS Reliability and GPU Acceleration at Lower Cost

News/discussion

Microsoft Gave FBI Keys To Unlock Encrypted Data, Exposing Major Privacy Flaw

How to encrypt your PC’s disk without giving the keys to Microsoft

WhisperPair: Hijacking Bluetooth Accessories Using Google Fast Pair

When two years of academic work vanished with a single click

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We were asked about the best practices and stack for setting up a mail server.

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The last method to activate Windows without the Internet has gone away, malware that tricks users with a fake blue screen of death, and recovering from bad RAM with ZFS.

Plugs

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Understanding ZFS Scrubs and Data Integrity

News/discussion

Windows activation by phone is seemingly dead

How Fake BSODs and Trusted Build Tools Are Used to Construct a Malware Infection

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We were asked about recovering from bad RAM with ZFS.

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Cisco network gear fell over when it shouldn’t have, yet another security flaw is found in Microsoft Copilot, the US military is letting Grok into all its networks, and managing LVM snapshots.

Plugs

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Unwrapping ZFS: Gifts from the Open Source Community

A New Year, A New ZFS: What 2.4 Brings to the Table

News

Cisco routers knocked out due to Cloudflare DNS change

Reprompt: The Single-Click Microsoft Copilot Attack that Silently Steals Your Personal Data

Musk’s AI tool Grok will be integrated into Pentagon networks, Hegseth says

Free consulting

We were asked about managing LVM snapshots.

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The many reasons why email shouldn’t be trusted. Plus how to stop your kids accessing inappropriate content online, and why the answer probably isn’t a technical one.

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What We Built: Top ZFS Capabilities Delivered by Klara in 2025

Discussion

Please STOP trusting email

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We were asked about blocking adult content at the network level. 

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Why you should probably keep paying for your old domains, the perpetual problem of typo squatting, a machine learning expert’s take on BS from LLMs, and whether to separate compute and storage in a home setup.

Plugs

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Can You Have Too Many VDEVs? A Practical Guide to ZFS Scaling

News/discussion

Digital Trust in Danger: When Authorities Forget Their Old Domains

Most Parked Domains Now Serving Malicious Content

LLMs are bullshitters. But that doesn’t mean they’re not useful

Free consulting

We were asked about whether to separate compute and storage in a home setup.

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The one bit of advice we’d give to someone wanting to become a professional sysadmin. This is a short episode because Joe is having a break for the Christmas period.

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Apple deletes a person’s entire digital life, PornHub Premium user data is leaked, Mozilla’s new CEO wants to ruin Firefox, Tech Force in the USA is alarming, and fine tuning storage for databases.

Plugs

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Is DWPD Still a Useful SSD Spec?

News/discussion

20 Years of Digital Life, Gone in an Instant, thanks to Apple

PornHub extorted after hackers steal Premium member activity data

Mozilla’s next chapter: Building the world’s most trusted software company

Rest assured, Firefox will always remain a browser built around user control

Tech Force

Trump administration launches Tech Force hiring push

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We were asked about fine tuning storage for databases.

See our contact page for ways to get in touch.