Category Archives: computer tips

ThinkPad P14s AI 9 XH PRO 370 w/96GB RAM & LLM benchmarks

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Running Big LLMs on a Little Workstation: My Adventures with the ThinkPad P14s Gen 6 AMD I’ve been experimenting with large language models (LLMs) lately, and I wanted to see how far I could push things using a (relatively) inexpensive laptop. Enter the ThinkPad P14s Gen 6 AMD—a slim mobile workstation that set me back about $1,600. On paper it’s not exactly a “supercomputer,” but with the right configuration (and my go-to tool, LM Studio), it turns out this little

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Etekcity Infrared Thermometer [REVIEW]

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Etekcity Infrared Thermometer – A Practical Everyday Tool That Just Works 🌡️ You ever need to check the temp of something quickly—whether it’s your grill, oven, HVAC vents, or even your gaming PC? The Etekcity Infrared Thermometer is one of those tools you don’t realize you need until you have one. Then, suddenly, you’ve got three—one for the kitchen, garage, and shop (ask me how I know). It’s simple, affordable, and reliable for checking surface temperatures without making contact—which is

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bad shim signature- you need to load the kernel first [SOLVED]

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Fixing “Bad Shim Signature – You Need to Load the Kernel First” When Installing Pop!_OS If you’ve ever tried installing Pop!_OS and encountered the frustrating “Bad Shim Signature – You Need to Load the Kernel First” error, don’t worry—you’re not alone! 🤯 This issue usually rears its head on systems with Secure Boot enabled. Luckily, there’s a straightforward fix to get you past this roadblock and on your way to enjoying Pop!_OS. Let’s dive in! 🐧 The Culprit: Secure Boot

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Complete Instructions for Creating Multi-Page PDF in Photoshop Using Artboards

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How to Create a Two-Page Duplex PSD/PDF in Photoshop for Double-Sided Printing Recently, I had to scan a duplex (double-sided) form, edit it in Photoshop, and then reprint it as a duplex document for mailing. The catch? I’d never made a “two-page” document in Photoshop before. 😅 After some trial and error (and a few cups of coffee ☕), I figured it out. Here’s the process I used—it’s surprisingly straightforward once you know the steps! NOTE: There are definitely better

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Resolving External USB HDD Mount Issues on Synology NAS (exFAT) (1813+ and others)

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Resolving External USB HDD Mount Issues on Synology NAS (exFAT) If you’ve recently connected an external USB HDD to your Synology NAS and encountered an error message like “System failed to mount external device [USB Disk 1] partition [1]”, you’re not alone. This issue often arises when the external device is formatted in the exFAT filesystem, which requires additional support on Synology systems. In this post, I’ll guide you through identifying the issue and implementing a simple solution using the

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Topaz Video AI 5 Mac Mini M4 benchmarks

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Topaz Video AI v5.3.6 System Information OS: Mac v15.01 CPU: Apple M4 32 GB GPU: Apple M4 21.333 GB Processing Settings device: 0 vram: 1 instances: 1 Input Resolution: 1920×1080 Benchmark Results Artemis 1X: 07.97 fps 2X: 04.57 fps 4X: 01.57 fps Iris 1X: 13.16 fps 2X: 02.89 fps 4X: 00.92 fps Proteus 1X: 08.80 fps 2X: 05.25 fps 4X: 01.54 fps Gaia 1X: 02.36 fps 2X: 01.70 fps 4X: 01.19 fps Nyx 1X: 01.49 fps 2X: 01.28 fps Nyx

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How to Reverse/Fix Scroll Wheel Direction on a Mac Mini M4 (and Pro)

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If you’re new to a Mac Mini M4 or recently switched from a Windows PC, you might find the default scroll wheel direction on macOS a bit counterintuitive. Apple’s “Natural” scrolling mimics the motion of a touch screen, which may feel odd for traditional mouse users. Fortunately, reversing the scroll direction is quick and straightforward. Here’s how to do it: Step 1: Open System Settings Step 2: Navigate to Mouse or Trackpad Settings The next step depends on whether you’re

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Combined two unallocated 2TB partitions into 4TB [SOLVED]

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Recently I started to repurpose a 4TB 2.5″ SATA SSD but ran into an issue utilizing the entire SSD. Specifically, even after deleting the existing partitions I could only allocate ~2TB and ~2TB (as shown on Disk1 below) Eventually, I realized that the issue was the drive had been setup as MBR instead of GPT. Here are the steps to remedy that and create a large contiguous 4TB partition. First the screenshot shows the steps, then the commands are listed

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