Lenovo L540 Review

The Lenovo L540 is a workhorse laptop for around the $1000 mark. These are i5 4GB of RAM, 500GB HDD, 15.6" machines. I purchased 4 for a client (as you can see) and in the back right of the picture you can see one is experiencing sadness. These are quite nice notebooks for a no-nonsense work machine. The screen is clear and readable, and I especially like the keyboard - the keys have a wonderful return and solid feel to them - far better than my Dell notebook. I find the touchpad to be clunky though - the movement of the click isn't refined and the travel seems quite large.

Interestingly, these machines all came with Windows 7 Pro pre-installed - a preferred option for our business clients unwilling to make the jump to Windows 10. We are certainly not foisting Windows 8 off onto people we like - ti's an awful operating system that needs to die as quickly and quietly as Vista did. These run Windows 7 quite happily and once Symantec and a lot of the other Lenovo bloatware is removed the operating system is quite happy - except for the machine there at the back. Something went wrong when installing patches and I ended up having to restore it from scratch. It was a bit of a head scratcher, but the recovery process was surprisingly quick and painless. The tendency for Windows 7 to take ages to first do patches was fixed with a Microsoft Hot Fix - and I think this is what splattered it last time. It only takes something small and the day goes south quickly.

I also purchased docking stations for these laptops, proper drop in docking stations. The mechanisms are easy to use and lock in quite happily. The end users seem to really like them, and they are not technical at all, so I call them a winner. 

All other activities - installing of Office etc were handled quite promptly and it all worked well. These are a solid, unassuming notebook and I recommend them for end users who are looking for a machine with a simple basic function required. That being said, I'd happily use one of these in my day to day work. Lots of capabilities there indeed. It should be noted that while I sell Lenovo stuff, they (sadly) don't pay me to advertise their gear. I've been a fan for a while - the solid construction, great keyboards and relatively functional software (apart from that little issue with spyware a while ago) is really worth considering.

This is ripped from the Lenovo website: Lenovo L540 Tech Specs

ThinkPad L540 LaptopTech Specs

DESCRIPTION	THINKPAD L540 LAPTOP
Processor	Intel® Core™ i3-4000M Processor (3M Cache, 2.40 GHz)1 Intel Core i5-4210M Processor (3M Cache, up to 3.20 GHz) Intel Core i5-4300M Processor (3M Cache, up to 3.30 GHz) Intel Core i7-4600M Processor (4M Cache, up to 3.60 GHz)
Operating System	Windows 10 Home 64-bit Windows 10 Pro 64-bit Windows 7 Professional 64-bit preinstalled through downgrade rights in Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
Display	15.6" HD (1366x768), anti-glare, 220 nits, 500:1 contrast ratio 15.6" FHD (1920x1080), anti-glare, 300 nits, 500:1 contrast ratio
Graphics	Intel HD Graphics 4600 in processor, supports external analogue monitor via VGA and digital monitor via Mini DisplayPort; supports dual independent displays; max. resolution: 1920x1200@60Hz (VGA); 3840x2160@30Hz (DisplayPort via Mini DP cable)
Memory	16GB max (2 SO-DIMM slots), PC3-12800 1600MHz DDR3, non-parity, dual-channel capable
Webcam	Integrated 720p HD Camera
Storage	500GB 7200 RPM 1TB 5400 RPM 128GB SSD SATA3
Optical Drive	DVD +/-RW MultiBurner
Dimensions (W X D X H)	HD: 377 x 247 x 28.8-34.05 mm  FHD: 377 x 247 x 31.0-36.25 mm
Weight	6-cell, HD: 2.54kg 6-cell, FHD: 2.60kg 9-cell, HD: 2.70kg 9-cell, FHD: 2.76kg
Battery	6-cell Li-Ion battery - 57+ (56Wh) 9-cell Li-Ion battery - 57++ (99.9Wh)
Battery life2	6-cell, Win7: up to 11 hours 6-cell, Win8: up to 7 hours 9-cell, Win7: up to 19 hours 9-cell, Win8: up to 12 hours
AC adaptor	65W
Keyboard	ThinkPad® Precision Keyboard with NumberPad
UltraNav™	TrackPoint® pointing device and 5-button Mylar surface touchpad
Fingerprint reader	Optional
Audio support	HD Audio, Realtek® ALC3232 codec, Dolby® Advanced Audio™ v2 / stereo speakers, 2W x 2 / dual array microphone, combo audio/mic jack
Wireless LAN	Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 (2x2, 802.11ac/a/b/g/n) with Bluetooth® 4.0
Wireless WAN (optional)	Wireless WAN upgradable Ericsson N5321 Mobile Broadband HSPA+1 Sierra Wireless EM7355 (4G LTE/HSPA+/EVDO/GSM/GPRS/EDGE, GPS)
Ports	1 x USB 3.0 (AlwaysOn) 3 x USB 2.0 ExpressCard Smart Card reader (optional) Combo audio/microphone jack Ethernet (RJ45) 4-in-1 card reader (MMC, SD, SDHC, SDXC) Dock Connector VGA Mini DisplayPort Security keyhole

Starting to diagnose DFS issues

One of my client's server pairs seems to be intermittent in its syncronisation of data. Here are a few commands to test the sync. 

Using an elevated command prompt ( right click, run as Administrator ) execute the following:

C:\Users\ryv> dfsrdiag.exe backlog /SendingMember:ServerX /ReceivingMember:ServerZ /RGName:RepGroup /RFName:"Data"

So what does this do? The initial part of the command is dfsrdiag.exe - the program to run the diagnosis. The switches are as follows:

/SendingMember:ServerX - this is the server pushing data to the replication partner

/ReceivingMember:ServerZ - and this is the server receiving the data

/RGName:RepGroup - DFS Management has servers in groups so it will want the group name

/RFName:"Data" - DFS is capable of managing different folder groups with different sync settings so you have to specify the folder. 

If all is going well the result from this command should come back with something like: 

No backlog - member <ServerZ> is in sync with partner <ServerX>

Operation succeeded.

If it doesn't come back with this then the fun begins. Once I have a good example I'll post that. 

Ubiquity UAP-Outdoor+ Review

Recently for a motel client I rolled out 12 of these little babies. The UAP-Outdoor+ is a compact, apparently weather resistant access point. The website details are here: https://www.ubnt.com/unifi/unifi-ap-outdoor/

I chose these for a number of factors:

• they are designed for the outdoors
• 183M range (apparently)
• 300Mbps speeds
• 802.11b/g/n with plenty of bandwidth and a wide frequency band
• price point was pretty good (compared to other products)

While not strictly producing a meshed network, the UAP-Outdoor+'s have a zero config handoff, so end users won't know as they move around through network range. 

Configuration of the access points was really quite easy - Ubiquity has a great bit of software called UniFi v4.7.6 Controller for Windows. Installing this on my laptop, and connecting it to the same network as the first access point got things up and running really fast. UniFi Controller allows you to configure SSID's, guest network information and everything else about the access points. Love it! Great bit of kit and it made the work of configuring all 12 access points very quick. Ongoing management is excellent too - it shows you information about the clients connected, the data they're using, the most heavily used access points - all sorts of stuff. It also allows you to play with the network topology. In this particular instance, three of the access points are not cabled in - they are "uplinked" via other WAPs. As testing went on, it appeared that my original plan to link certain APs together wasn't as good as the actual data suggested. So I modified it and moved the wirelessly linked access points to other master WAPs. Really excellent and I was very pleased with the rollout. All in all, the budgeted hours for the install were far over the actual hours - always good for the customer and the bottom line.

The range exceeded our expectations significantly and allowed us to push the coverage out to other parts of the property that were designated for a later stage. Needless to say, people were quite happy about the whole thing :-)

I look forward to using the Ubiquity gear again in the future. As for now, I can happily recommend the UAP-Outdoor+ access points!

OTRS 5 Review and Thoughts

Recently I upgraded our several years old OTRS install to version 5. The upgrade procedure is exactly like all the others have been. It was straightforward and I actually found that the documentation was better this time around than it has been in the past. After backing up, upgrading and testing, I like, mostly, what I see. There are a couple of things that are a bit annoying though.

When closing a ticket, the previous version would automatically put in subject in the closure note. Likewise, in the Owner Update note it doesn't do it either. So each time, I have to update it. Not a problem if you're only getting a few notes every now and then, but we are changing and closing tickets in some large numbers at times.

Also, I have about 50 statistics generated monthly via a script I run. The syntax for doing this.

From: /opt/otrs/bin/otrs.GenerateStats.pl -n number -blah blah etc

To: /opt/otrs/bin/otrs.Console.pl Maint::Stats::Generate --number number etc

(from: https://otrs.github.io/doc/manual/admin/stable/en/html/statistics-module.html#stats-managing-the-module)

I like the speed of the updated system and the cosmetic changes are nice too. The menus have changed slightly and they are more dynamic with drop downs. The layout is a bit nicer too but generally the speed of the system is better.

Upgrade to version 5 if you have the chance - seems to be a winner!

The struggle towards productivity

Anyone working in the IT sector knows how hard it is to get a flow going without interruptions. Working in a small business and supplying support for everything in IT to our clients, the phone rings constantly (desk and mobile) and email never stops pinging in the background. Add to this our obsession with multiple screens, a billion web pages open, Twitter, FaceBook, Instagram etc and there is a huge amount of data overwhelming us.

We also get jobs logged from our other staff members, clients can create their own and the phone calls / emails generally generate work to be done. Keeping up with all of this is hard, and the hardest part is keeping all the tasks straight and on point. We use multiple systems - OTRS and another, non-cool job management system for our tasks. This is a nightmare too - jobs coming in to both, keeping them updated and trying to remember if you've actually updated the job or not. Plus trying to keep on track with a complex task long enough to get the thing done.

I've been working with my guys on being task oriented and not worrying too much about time. If they are working on a task for a client, and it's all billable, then move onto the next task and do it, then their time is being used productively and everyone is happy. This seems to be the best way to work with tasks.

I have also found that when the pressure is on, I leave my dual monitor setup and take my laptop off somewhere to work, usually the boardroom with no direct extension and leave the mobile phone on my desk. The more I do this the more I wonder if having dual monitors is a hindrance and paying attention to my multiple mobile devices is worth doing. I read research that suggested after a break in concentration it could take up to 20 minutes to get the focus back on what you were doing.

We have been aiming to have 90 min stretches working on a single task, then a break for a bit, then back into it. It's incredibly hard, but getting the other staff around us on board is making it easier. With a bit of luck we can continue to push this forward. Leave a message in the comments if you have productivity tips that work for you!

XenServer physical moves - traps for new (and old) players

Recently one of our clients relocated their main office and we moved their servers for them. Upon arrival, racking and cabling the XenServer hosts all powered up immediately. The HP StoreEasy NAS with all the data on it also started up.

We noticed that our XenServer hosts had no IP addresses - no data was showing and they seemed to have lost their configuration. Uh oh.... we had a huge bet on getting this thing going by the end of the day with the managing director. There were beers involved and we were pumped to make it work.

After fiddling around with the XenServers and trying to get it working and swearing a *lot*, I turned them all off then back on. Lo and behold they came up and it took a bit to figure out what had gone wrong.

The answer was simple - the XenServer hosts are big, fast machines with a lean install on a high speed SAS drive and the NAS is slower - running Windows Storage Server 2012 and RAID'ed disks. The hosts had come up first, looked for the storage repository and then failed when they couldn't find it. Odd given that I thought the hosts retained most of their settings.

So in future - NAS up first, then start the hosts and all will be happy. The rest of the move was spectacularly successful and we had plenty of beers to drink as a result!

OTRS 5 Review

I've been using OTRS for about 10 years now, starting when I was doing desktop / server support at uni. Since then it's changed a lot in the way it looks, but fundamentally it has remained the same. The great things about OTRS are:

• creating / modifying / updating and closing tickets is easy
• the interface is relatively straightforward
• creation of tickets from emails is easy
• reporting is straightforward
• open source and robust

Since the early versions it's ticked all these boxes and I was very interested to see what OTRS 5 was going to bring. The interface is still the same, updated here and there with a prettier graph showing closed / opened tickets but generally the same. Fonts are still nice and readable and its good for what it does.

We use it for our clients that have a maintenance agreement with us. We have them create tickets that we then update and put minutes against. OTRS has never had a parts component and we have always used a secondary system for that. It does a good job too of keeping tickets together - I can't recommend using the master/slave system enough. Merging tickets has always worked flawlessly too.

The upgrade process is well documented and relatively straightforward. Just be aware of what user you are accessing the system as when you're doing it - sometimes you need to be root and other times it's important to be the OTRS user. All in all, it took about 45 minutes with backups, testing and checking before I let the boys go wild on it.

So while the interface is prettier there are a couple of things that annoy me right off the bat. When I add a note I now have to put something in the title - before it would simply put "Note" in there. Likewise for closing a ticket or changing ownership - this one extra step is annoying because I do it so frequently. Also, we have queues that are underneath a top level queue and that needs to be manually expanded out each time now instead of it sitting out like it always has. Minor annoyances it's true, but annoyances nonetheless.

I suspect most of the changes in the system are in the back end and I'm noticing that it is running more smoothly. We are using a fairly archaic IBM server to host it on an Ubuntu Linux Server platform with about 10K tickets give or take. MySQL is our database of choice and the backups run at around 1 GB in size. Thus far it has all been good. I'm looking forward to seeing how it travels over the next few weeks. I have noticed that the iPhone package is no longer supported - apparently the interface scales with the mobile platform - we will test this further. 

Enjoy :-)