ChimeraOS black screen when idling

 It's a common scenario that folks left ChimeraOS (Steam OS-ish Linux bistro) idle while waiting for games to download. However, one might have encountered that it went black screen when you check in 15-30 mins, and downloads wasn't going.

The reason is that Gnome decided to suspend your system. This cannot be set from the Steam interface, and needs to be done on the Desktop environment. Just go to Settings -> Power and disable "Automatic Suspend". 

Related link: https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/gnome-suspends-after-15-minutes-of-user-inactivity-even-on-ac-power/79801

(P.S. This one had me scratching my head until I see that "Gnome is suspending the system" pop up while Steam was downloading games.)

So-called GMT watches vs real GMT watches

 I've been scrolling on the internet to find a proper quartz GMT watches that won't fetch as much as an automatic ones (ummm... Grand Seiko.... ). 

I found the MWC and Luminox (Bear Grylls series) which claimed to be a GMT/dual-time watch.

They do have a fourth hand pointing to 24-hour marking, but it's far from the truth in usage.

For a dual-time travel GMT watch (e.g. Rolex Explorer II or GMT Master-II) which I call them "real", you adjust the 24-hour hand by the second detent and it will move together with the 12-hour hand when adjusting. And the first detent allows you to move just the 12-hour hand hour-by-hour alongside the date. Hence when you travel, you just need to adjust that without messing with the minute hand.

For the MWC and Luminox "GMT" watches, you also adjust the 24-hour hand by second detent in the same way. However, the first detent will adjust the date when scrolling up, and _smoothly_ adjust the 24-hour hand without any notches. That is a big problem because a slight misalignment can make that 24-hour hand useless as it doesn't sync with the 12-hour hand. It would be possible to adjust that on an o'clock or maybe half-hour but not anywhere else where you risk misrepresenting the time on 24-hour hand. That alone is the deal breaker as it requires one to adjust the current time to a full hour, adjust the 24-hour hand and then readjust the current time. 

Enough rent. If I have time, I might post a video for a comparison.

Windows 11 Local Account during setup

People said that Apple has done it for a long time...

The problem with Microsoft Account in Windows is that it brought a lot of bloatware with it - Microsoft Teams for my gaming PC, really? And keep nagging me for installing some "shiny new feature" that I don't want... The account association from MacOS is less intrusive at least, and prevent thefts from happening that often (you can remotely wipe or lock activation). The Microsoft one probably can do that too but it doesn't seem to be as effective...

Here are 2 ways to skip that.

During the stage where you are asked to connect to internet:

1. Shift-F10

2. In the command prompt, type OOBE\BypassNRO.cmd (you can use tab for auto-complete)

This will reboot the setup and then you have the option to select not to connect to internet and use local account again.

Since early Jan, 2024, it seems like the latest Windows 11 installation doesn't allow Shift-F10 anymore (cough.... Lenovo....). Here's a still-working way to bypass that (likely used by Software QA in MSFT):

1. Connect to internet

2. Enter this account: 1@1.com; Password: test

3. It will say "there's something wrong..." and allow you to proceed with local account

Lenovo laptop quirks

Legion Pro 7i Gen 8 

This generation doesn't support VMD in the BIOS. Even though the option can be unlocked by SREP, there's no way to disable or manage the array since the UEFI setup utility doesn't have that section at all. You will end up with VMD enabled but working in JBOD mode, which is useless. Oh, you cannot disable VMD after enabled as that option will disappear, and the "Load Default Setting" won't touch VMD/Intel RST configuration either. 

Thinkpad P1 Gen 6

This generation would support 96GB (48GBx2) of RAM if you bought it from Lenovo as they use different chips. The ones from Crucial will NOT work if you force-shutdown or blue-screened. The "memory calibration" will simply not end and the laptop won't boot. The only way out is to install a supported module (e.g. 32GB or 16GB modules) to boot, and then change it back to 96GB after that. 64GB will work though. (Ref: https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile-Workstations/P1-Gen6-with-96GB-RAM-2x48GB-SODIMMS-Dead-after-BSOD/m-p/5257870)

Do not choose OLED if your eyes are sensitive to PWM light intensity modulation. All Lenovo laptop uses OLED panels that adjust brightness via PWM.  

Thinkpad P15 Gen 2 and P53

This is likely the last generation that supports 3x M2 NVMe with a top-end graphics card (A5000 was the top available). P53 is likely the last generation that supports 3x M2 NVMe + 2.5" SATA.

Installing Roon on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS Server

Just a quick dump of what I did, from fresh install of Ubuntu 22.04 LTS Server. 

cd ~

wget https://download.roonlabs.net/builds/roonserver-installer-linuxx64.sh 

chmod +x ./*.sh

sudo apt update 

sudo apt install lbzip2 sudo apt install lbzip2 libasound2 ffmpeg cifs-utils 

sudo ./roonserver-installer-linuxx64.sh

If you want to copy files from a SMB share (or commonly known as "network share") on a NAS/server

sudo apt update

sudo apt install smbclient

# This lists out all shares available on the NAS

smbclient -L --user=<username on NAS> //<NAS name>

# 1-time setup to create a mount point

sudo mkdir /mnt/network_mount

# To mount the smb share

sudo mount -t cifs -o username=<username on NAS> //<NAS name>/<Share name> /mnt/network_mount