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  • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
    30 minutes end to end wouldn't work here unless you're within, say, 7 or 8 miles, and both places are right on the transit stop. 30 minutes would cover my walking time. :/
    Yeah, my PT connection is pretty much optimal. Tram stop in front of my house with 5-minute headway, 3 minutes ride to nearest train station, layover basically consisting of 5 minutes to walk down the stairs to another platform, then 20 minutes on a commuter train, and after arrival around 2 minutes to walk a single block straight off the platform to get to my workplace.

    By car the same would consist of 2 miles to get to the highway, then 9 miles on the highway, and another 2 miles to get into town. About 10 minutes each for any of these three components under normal conditions, during rush hour you can easily double that to an hour though. As for parking: We do have an underground parking garage. The waiting list for a spot in there is currently 2 years, and the cost is the same as my network pass for public transport last i checked.

    Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
    So couples starting to have kids will frequently move to the suburbs to get into one of the suburban school districts.
    We get that with people moving within a city - or trying to use tricks to pretend to have done so (which usually don't work). It's less pronounced partially because we only have tied school districts for elementary school, i.e. the first four years, and afterwards you can cart your kid halfway across the state if you want to. Most kids from the suburbs do go to schools in the cities for secondary too, even if they sometimes have one-hour commutes due to that. That's both because there's a lack of schools in the suburbs and because those that are out there for secondary at best have an average reputation.

    We do have that "moving out in the suburbs once you have kids" movement too, though that's more based on it being impossible to find a rental apartment in the cities for a family. And, up till 15 years ago, the government was subsidizing that move to the suburbs too with various incentives. Property taxes over here are so complicated (and ridiculously low - offhand around 0.07-0.10%) that no one really considers them.

    Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
    More companies are moving towards Work From Home, which makes a lot more sense than daily commuting to begin with...
    If you buy a new-construction detached home around here in the suburbs (in the middle section, think 600-700k houses), the marketing now actually tends to include one room in the house marked as an office for work-from-home.

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    • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
      On the topic of old tech being better than new tech: I do like my reel mower. I have a pretty small lawn, but the reel mower is light as a feather and takes up almost no space in the garage. It can be hung up along with the shovels and the rakes. Plus, it makes no noise and requires virtually no maintenance, and it always, always, always starts!
      I used one of those when I was a live-in handyman from 2013-2017. A Craftsman model from the 1950s, I kept it sharp with a sharpening stone and it did a perfect job. That house probably had ten changes in ownership since the 50s, but the mower must have come with the house and been passed down from owner to owner.

      The lawn was perhaps 15 feet deep and 60 feet wide. So, the reel mower was perfect for it.
      Last edited by Ironduke; 20 Jun 18,, 01:00.
      "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

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      • Originally posted by Oracle View Post
        What encryption applications do you use? Please PM me if you can't reply here. Free applications I suppose.
        Veracrypt.

        https://www.veracrypt.fr/en/Home.html

        Very easy to use. Takes about a minute to boot with 256-bit encryption. If you want to go 512- or even 768-bit, it takes longer. I use it to protect my laptop in case it gets stolen.

        There's nothing anybody can really do to keep a determined adversary out of your computer once you're connected to the internet. But that's what the encrypted partition within the full-disk encryption is for. I don't keep any files on my Windows partition, just applications. If somebody wanted to hack my personal files, they'd have to do it when I decrypt the encrypted partition. In which case they'd make off with my resume and a copy of a professional license.
        Last edited by Ironduke; 20 Jun 18,, 01:35.
        "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

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        • I can second Veracrypt. We use it professionally.

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          • Originally posted by Ironduke View Post
            Personally, I do 256-bit full disk encryption on my laptop. Once my hard drive is decrypted and Windows is loaded, all of my personal files are on a 256-bit encrypted partition, so it is 256-bit within 256-bit.

            I have two personal files on the encrypted partition. A copy of a professional license, and my resume. If somebody hacked my computer, it would be like that time Geraldo Rivera opened up Al Capone's Vaults.

            Best practice for information security is to not create the information in the first place if possible, and don't keep it any longer than one needs it. All other files that come into existence on my computer are deleted as soon as they no longer serve any purpose. Which usually ranges from minutes to days, at most.
            If you were to say remove the hard drive from your laptop and connect it to a PC. How would you access your files ? can they be decrypted again or is it tied to the system it was on

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            • Originally posted by Double Edge View Post
              If you were to say remove the hard drive from your laptop and connect it to a PC. How would you access your files ? can they be decrypted again or is it tied to the system it was on
              I'm not a cryptographer, but my layman's answer would be that they can't be accessed if the SSD/HDD were to be simply dismounted from the laptop and mounted in a PC. There are other ways of booting an encrypted HDD/SSD, or recovering files, but these involve other means, some of which are moderately sophisticated.

              If the SSD were placed in the same model laptop, one could get the prompt for credentials. Much like how HDDs with an OS installed can be swapped between more or less identical computers and still boot. But lacking other means, one would still need the credentials to decrypt the SSD/HDD and load the OS.
              Last edited by Ironduke; 20 Jun 18,, 14:02.
              "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

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              • Originally posted by Ironduke View Post
                I'm not a cryptologist, but my layman's answer would be that they can't be accessed if the SSD/HDD were to be simply dismounted from the laptop and mounted in a PC. There are other ways of booting an encrypted HDD/SSD, or recovering files, but these involve other means, some of which are moderately sophisticated.

                If the SSD were placed in the same model laptop, one could get the prompt for credentials. Much like how HDDs with an OS installed can be swapped between more or less identical computers and still boot. But lacking other means, one would still need the credentials to decrypt the SSD/HDD and load the OS.
                My point is say the laptop develops a problem for any reason and requires the hard drive to be swapped to another. How do you provide the credentials to access your data in this situation ?

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                • Originally posted by Double Edge View Post
                  How do you provide the credentials to access your data in this situation ?
                  The encrypted hard disk itself includes a bootloader which is the one that asks you for the credentials before decrypting the disk and launching any operating system on it. So, basically, once you install the drive in another system it'll pop up the same bootloader before it does any decryption.

                  Occasionally a physical transfer includes in this bootloader no longer loading; from within the working system you have had the option of creating a boot disk with a backup of the bootloader and decryption key that will work with the password at the time of the disk's creation. Should you do that though that boot disk should go straight in the safe.

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                  • Originally posted by Ironduke View Post
                    Veracrypt.

                    https://www.veracrypt.fr/en/Home.html

                    Very easy to use. Takes about a minute to boot with 256-bit encryption. If you want to go 512- or even 768-bit, it takes longer. I use it to protect my laptop in case it gets stolen.

                    There's nothing anybody can really do to keep a determined adversary out of your computer once you're connected to the internet. But that's what the encrypted partition within the full-disk encryption is for. I don't keep any files on my Windows partition, just applications. If somebody wanted to hack my personal files, they'd have to do it when I decrypt the encrypted partition. In which case they'd make off with my resume and a copy of a professional license.
                    Originally posted by kato View Post
                    I can second Veracrypt. We use it professionally.
                    I used Truecrypt a long time back and then it dropped off my radar. So, Veracrypt seems to be the new version of Truecrypt.
                    Politicians are elected to serve...far too many don't see it that way - Albany Rifles! || Loyalty to country always. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it - Mark Twain! || I am a far left millennial!

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                    • Originally posted by Oracle View Post
                      I used Truecrypt a long time back and then it dropped off my radar. So, Veracrypt seems to be the new version of Truecrypt.
                      Yes, VeraCrypt forked from TrueCrypt in 2013. TrueCrypt was discontinued in 2014.
                      "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

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                      • Originally posted by kato View Post
                        Half? The fridge i bought last year is 165 liters and consumes under 20W (the manual states average 160 kWh/year). Bought that one after the previous East-German pre-mid-80s unit i had didn't survive me stabbing it.
                        Did you accidentally stab the coolant line defrosting it with a metal tool?

                        I did that once. Thought I'd speed up the defrost and use a knife to chip out the ice in the small freezer compartment. I accidentally stabbed the gas line that carries tetrafluoroethane and immediately pulled my shirt over my mouth, opened the window, and put a fan in the window to blow the gas out.

                        Luckily, it was a free mini-fridge I got from someone who had moved out of the place I lived in. I got a replacement for free from the next person who moved out. One of the fringe benefits of living on a college campus. You never have to purchase any household items. At my alma mater, college students throw out or abandon millions of dollars worth of perfectly good things at the end of every academic year.
                        Last edited by Ironduke; 22 Jun 18,, 01:54.
                        "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

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                        • Originally posted by Ironduke View Post
                          Did you accidentally stab the coolant line defrosting it with a metal tool?
                          Yep, except it was a screwdriver driven in with a hammer.

                          Was chlorotrifluoromethane in my case, banned around 1986. Semi-plugged the hole, then let it stream out controlled over the next 24 hours and since it's heavier than air it just rolled down into the basement anyway.

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                          • College student stuff is great second-hand for the bachelor lifestyle, but good god that stuff is crap for us married suburban couples. Dishware and silverware, fine: we had close to 80 pilfered dishes and something like 200 forks/knives/spoons. But the minifridges, cutting boards, chef's knives, dressers? I'd pitch all that. My clothes dresser I've had since I was 8 has held up better than the IKEA shit my wife got when she was 25.

                            You can also up the cookware. All-Clad beats the hell out of the non-stick garbage that college students usually beat to hell. Which reminds me, speaking of old-tech, the trusty cast iron skillets last forever and require minimal maintenance. I've got 3 and I'm looking for a 4th, 6-incher to make some skillets in the morning. The 10-12 inches are just a bit ridiculously large to make a skillet for 1.5 people.
                            Last edited by GVChamp; 22 Jun 18,, 14:48.
                            "The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood"-Otto Von Bismarck

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                            • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
                              My clothes dresser I've had since I was 8 has held up better than the IKEA shit my wife got when she was 25.
                              Don't knock Ikea, half my stuff is from them - although none of it quite in original state but sooner or later reinforced or cut apart and reused otherwise. Comes with having a carpenter as an in-law.
                              My whole kitchen furniture for example, appliances excluded, cost me 100 Euro. Cheapest cupboard set available at Ikea plus some proper wood and a can of paint.

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                              • "Addtional reinforcement needed" in addition to "some assembly required"! Not a ringing endorsement in my book!

                                The furniture I need is in desperate need of a revarnish, and the dresser needs some new metal pieces, but the actual wood is in absolutely solid shape and the structural integrity is sound. Our various IKEA products are mostly in a worse state of repair, althought the wall mount thing is in good condition. Everything else is going to get tossed at some point (Except maybe the sofa table, because it sees minimal use.
                                "The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood"-Otto Von Bismarck

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