Jumbo Frames and Switch Support

Hi folks! So you’ve decided to install a new iSCSI based SAN in your environment and realize your existing switch doesn’t support jumbo frames. What do you do?

Well you could just go out and buy a new switch to support just the iSCSI or you can stop and think for a second. You see you can buy two kinds of switches. Ones that support jumbo frames but it’s set on a global basis, or ones that support per port jumbo frames.

What’s the difference? Well if you want to use the switch for other things, you want a switch that supports per port jumbo frames so you only have to turn it on for the ports that are belonging to your iSCSI vlan.

If your switch is completely dedicated to iSCSI then a switch that only supports jumbo frames globally is fine.

One of my favorite per port supported jumbo frames switches is the HP ProCurve 2910AL. This switch does everything I need for iSCSI and is also layer 3 capable. If you only need layer 2 capability then you can go with the HP ProCurve 2510G.

-RP

The importance of firmware updates

Hi folks, more often than not I see people deploying new network equipment or servers without firmware updates. What’s up with that?

As a good best practice it only makes sense to update the firmware on devices. These firmware updates usually patch lots of security holes and other bugs. People tend to be quite religious about doing windows updates but then forget about doing firmware updates to their network hardware.

Believe it or not, doing firmware updates to your firewall or switch can save you in the long run from some sort of crazy exploit. You should always keep up to date on the latest updates in firmware available for your equipment and adopt a policy to keep these devices up to date.

If you have devices that can’t go down due to firmware updates then it’s important to architect your network so it’s redundant so these firmware updates can still happen regularly.

-RP

USB to Serial converter for laptops

Hi folks, for those of you that do a lot of switch and router configuration, you’ll notice that new laptops nowadays are lacking serial ports.

So what do you do? Well you can go and buy a usb to serial converter but they aren’t all created equally. It’s hard to find a reliable converter out there these days. I personally use a product from Gold-X (gxmu-1200) that works great.

I have used it for years and it works in Windows 7 and even works in VMware workstation. You can check it out here.

-RP

Jailbreaking legal with iPhone in US now

Hi everyone, unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, you’ve heard that there is an exception in the DMCA that jailbreaking is now legal.

This is great news for iPhone users. You are no longer restricted to using a device that you paid for with your hard earned money the way Apple wants you to use it.

Now don’t get me wrong here, i’m not advocating piracy or anything like that. What i’m talking about is the ability to use your iPhone for legal uses like the ability to have one touch access to turn on and off your bluetooth or wireless without having to drill down through multiple menus.

By jailbreaking your phone becomes a lot more usuable in my opinion. You can jailbreak using Limera1n and away you go!

You can now jailbreak your iPhone 4 with iOS 4.1 using Limera1n!

-RP

Battery life on the iPhone

Hi folks! So last but not least on my review of the iPhone, is battery life. So far battery life has been great and it allows me to use it as both for apps and as a phone without killing the battery completely.

However, there is one point I want to mention. Many iPhone 4 users aren’t use to the multitasking and are leaving apps open. They don’t know how to close the apps and they are all running in the background. This continues to happen even through reboots of the iPhone.

This ends up causing the iPhone to run down it’s battery extremely fast and get very hot to the touch. This is because the iPhone ends up running literally every app that the user has ever clicked on and has forgotten to close. So how do you close these apps?

Double click the iPhone 4′s home button and it will bring up a task bar with icons. These are icons of every app that is currently running. To close them, select an icon by touching it and holding your finger there. This will cause the icons to start jiggling around and a minus sign in a circle will be displayed next to the icon. Then just click on the minus sign and it will close the app. Do this for all apps you don’t need running. I would encourage you to close all apps all the time and only leave them running if you are using them.

This will extend your battery life for quite a while!

-RP

VoIP on your iPhone

So one of the many services my company provides in IT is Voice Solutions. We provide both Cisco and Asterisk VoIP solutions. So imagine my happiness when I found this great soft phone app for iPhone!

The app is called Bria and it is just great. What it allows me to do is login to my phone number in our Asterisk VoIP system on my iPhone and then I can make and receive calls using my business number instead of my cell number.

Because the iPhone multitasks, it will even ring when the app is closed. I found the app was great in terms of voice quality but it did drain a lot of battery power. We’ll have to see how it evolves. But for now I would have to say it’s completely usable and it even works on 3G not just on wireless.

You can read more about it here.

-RP

Facetime on the iPhone

Hi folks! So I finally had a chance to try out Apple’s version of videoconferencing called facetime. I have to say it’s not bad.

One of the limitations is that you can only use it on wireless. However despite that I have to say it’s quite good. The downside? You can only use it on Apple. Oh well, that was to be expected. I’d like to see them develop a version that works on 3G at lesser quality, that would be quite good.

Now is this something I’m going to use on a daily basis? No. I don’t really want people to see me when i’m talking all the time. However I might use it once in a while. I’m tempted to get an iPhone 4 for my wife now just because of facetime.

-RP

Microsoft Second Shot is back

Hi folks! So if you didn’t know this already, Second Shot is back! What is that you might ask?

Second Shot allows you to retry an exam if you fail it the first time for a reduced cost. Microsoft likes to do this every once in a while to encourage people to do certification exams.

I highly recommend if you haven’t done the 2008 training to get into it. You can register for Microsoft’s second shot here.

-RP

Running network wiring

Hi everyone! One of the things our company does is run network wiring. It’s one of those things that you just can’t get around in IT , you need it and can’t go all wireless all the time.

Now one of the things that people always seem to forget is to decide on how many drops they want and end up short changing themselves.

You see when you run a drop, you might as well run two to your faceplate. Why? Because if one fails, you have the other one to fall back to without having to re-run. Especially if you are wiring a new building. It’s easy to do this before all the drywall goes in.

More often than not I have seen other people just run one drop, put the walls up and then regret it later. Then you end up with people plugging in switches into the walls of their offices which can cause all sorts of other problems.

So don’t be chintzy, run two drops!

-RP

EPIC Technology Day is here again!

Hi everyone, my company’s twice yearly IT conference event is here again. EPIC Technology Day consists of us putting on a bunch of presentations throughout the day by various IT vendors.

You can learn a lot at these sessions and most people say they always come away a little more knowledgeable. I highly recommend you attend if you are going to be in Winnipeg, MB, Canada during this time.

You can register for the event here. It is free to attend and we provide breakfast and lunch, as well as cocktails after the event at the end of the day.

-RP