Dial up modem upgrade 56kbit X2 to 56kbit K-Flex

Back when people primarily used dial up to connect to the internet, I had a 56 Kbit X2 US Robotics X2 modem. Unfortunately my Internet Service Provider (Etisalat in the UAE) only had  K-Flex modems. This meant that I could never really connect faster than around 33kbits /sec.

Since we were billed based on the number of hours of usage, I decided that upgrading to a K-Flex modem would give a potential speed increase up to 52kbits /sec. Not a huge increase, but it certainly did improve performance and a 10 megabyte download which previously took 41 minutes would now take 26 minutes.

Experimenting with Cacti and SNMP on my cisco router

I am trying to measure and graph interface speeds as well as router cpu usage, so decided to use Cacti and SNMP. The interface speeds seem to be working OK, but I am still having difficulty with the correct values for cpu usage.

I will post the graphs when I get a chance.

Why I stick to Futurehosting when it comes to VPS services ...

Futurehosting is a VPS (Virtual Private Server) That provides high quality, low cost VPS systems through any one of their 5 data center locations at present.

Support queries are usually answered within minutes and unscheduled outages are few and far between.

There are a few quirks with their DNS system for example when adding an MX record, you cant specify a host for which you want that MX record, it defaults to the domain zone you are in. Meaning if you wanted to add an MX record for a subdomain, you need to first create a corresponding zone then add the respective MX record.

I have also had trouble with their ipv6 AAAA records as the interface has it as an option, but doesnt accept any values for the records.

They presently do not have any ipv6 offerings either. Something that ARP Networks provides by default. They actually give you a /48 which you can chop up an use as you wish.

Another cool thing about ARP Networks is that they let you install your own OS. Simply provide the iso URL to them and they will insert it into your VPS, from there you can login over VNC and install the OS with your own customizations and options. 

VPS woes

I have been having issues with VPS provider DirectSpace. It started when I tried to ping a host on their network, but found that it was down. On creating a ticket with their support, they said they suffered a hardware failure with their power strip, but had not replaced it and experienced fragmentation on the drive which now needed a FSCK and would be back within a few hours.

The next day, the sites were still down and information from the support tickets said that a hard drive had failed. They mention that they have RAID 10 on their systems, so ideally a single drive failing should still leave them operational.

Upon further investigation, they reveal that the RAID is actually intact but the file system in fragmented. Also since this is an unmanaged service, there is no expectation of any kind of backup. They still assure me that they should be back in a couple of hours.

Approximately 3 days later they announce that their restore operations had failed and 3 out of 4 drives in their RAID had failed,  (I find this highly unlikely) resulting in total data loss and they had to re-provision my VPS accounts. In doing so they changed the root passwords without providing them to me. This was the last straw.

I terminated the accounts, requested SLA credits (Which they have refunded in full 100% of the monthly cost, which for 2 VPS was $20)

I now intend to move to ArpNetworks and am currently in the process of having the VPS provisioned.

First attempt at RIP

In this diagram, R1 was to act like a switch providing direct connectivity between R8 and R6. RIPv2 was turned on on all routers: R8, R10, R6, R7 and R9. 

Initially I had issues as I had not enabled Version 2. I also received a twitter suggestion from @packetmaniac to use no auto-summary.

I was using GNS3 and Dynamips to configure the above routers, and R1 was using the  NM-16ESW module, which from my understanding is just like having a switch within a router.

Advertising - or lack thereof

In the past, I have always created blogs with the sole purpose of generating revenue. This was to the extent that even before I had any decent content, I added advertising. Over the years the amount of revenue generated from said advertising was really minute.

So here is a new blog, and a new commitment: No Advertising on this blog. Ever.

Mansoor

First DNS Post

This is my first of many posts dedicated to DNS or the Domain Naming System. I have always been fascinated with how this interesting system works, delegating responsibility of particular domains to certain administrators and certain servers.

The beauty of this system is that its so great that most end users have little to no knowledge of the intricacies of this system as it just works.

One thing that people who register a new domain, or migrate a domain from one host to another might deal with the idea of propagation. This is basically the time it takes for information about the domain to update all over the internet and get back in sync. This can vary from nearly instant to 24 / 48 hours or even 72 hours in some rare cases depending on which DNS server you are connected to.

One resource that really helps in this situation is the toolbox offered by DNSstuff.com I would really recommend checking them out if  you deal with domains or need to test if the domain has been configured correctly.

CCNA 640-802

This is the first step in whats probably going to be a long and challenging journey to becoming a Network / Internet Administrator.

I have gotten a hold of a few CCNA textbooks, and setup a virtual lab environment using GNS3 / Dynamips.

Return to Google / Blogger

When I first started a few blogs, I did so at Blogger. Since then I moved on to shared web hosting and Wordpress blogs. I then took blogging to the next level and moved to Virtual Private Server solutions. Recently that has become a pain doing my own backups and Wordpress upgrades.

Which brings me back to Blogger, but this time around I plan on using my own domain.

I am striving to be an Internet Administrator / Consultant, hence the ia subdomain.

http://ia.mnathani.com