I’ve been happy with whc.ca for hosting…been using their pro account for years. I generally use canspace.ca for domain registration, and have done so for more than 10 years without issue.

If it were me and there was no way to have an additional drop installed from the exterior, I would still consider running a single cable through the living space to your desired location, as discreetly as possible.

It’s difficult to suggest exactly how to do so without pics or a floorplan, but I would try to match the wall or trim color and keep the cable tucked close to the floor and/or ceiling throughout the run.

Once in place, the cable will quickly disappear into your surroundings and you’ll be left with rock solid reliable networking.

Our Smart TV is offline 99% of the time, so I rarely see the smart features. We’ll sometimes have company stay over and they’ll connect the Ethernet to use the built-in streaming apps with their own credentials, so it’s a nice option to have and it doesn’t impact us otherwise.

JF’s UI hasn’t really done it for me for whatever reason…I have it running in an LXC already and mostly use it at my workstations.

I have a JF instance running on Proxmox as well, but it hasn’t won me over yet. Still, I know a lot of folks do prefer it to Kodi and others so there must be something to it.

As others have said, just buy a TV that meets your A/V needs and don’t connect it to the internet.

I know everyone talks about Jellyfin these days, but Kodi is an excellent option too if you don’t need streaming to multiple devices. I use Kodi via LibreElec on an rpi4 and it’s been great. All media is stored on my home server and shared over Samba, but you can easily store it locally on the box if you don’t have a server.

For music streaming, I run a separate instance of miniDLNA on my server, since I like to browse-by-directory for my music instead of relying solely on metadata. This also allows you to stream to any DLNA-friendly device on the LAN.

I’ve digitized my disc collection and just keep the physical media as a backup. The local library has a huge selection of media too…and if we don’t use it, we’ll lose it.

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That sounds like a time saver for sure. I imagine that some of those elements (grammar rules) are widely available everywhere, while others (practice dialogues, activity suggestions focused on the use of language) would require a fairly specific training model.

Thanks for sharing! I’m probably too set in my ways to ever utilize AI for things like this. I never use virtual assistants like Alexa or Google either, as I like to vet and interpret the source of information myself. Having the citations would be handy, but ultimately I’d want to read them myself so the IA/VA just becomes an added step.

If a layman may ask, what are folks even using AI/LLMs for mostly? Aside from playing around with some for 10-15 mins out of simple curiosity, I don’t have a practical use for platforms like ChatGPT. I’m just wondering what the average tech enthusiast uses these for, outside of academia.

Quite a lot of apps cease to provide real-time notifications/messages, if they work at all, when Google Play components are not installed under GOS. At the very least, Google Services Framework is required for many mainstream apps.

Not OP but I think they’re just saying they’re not invested in Android as an ecosystem.

For what it’s worth, GrapheneOS includes neither Google Play nor Android Auto. Like nearly any Android-based OS, it allows you to install apps of your choosing, but it does not include either of those. It is a FOSS project through and through.

Yep, this is how we’ve kept ours for over 20 years. Even if you don’t use the command line, most graphical file browsers will search through text files without issue.

One of these days I’ll get around to setting up my own email server, but in the meantime I just take advantage of introductory offers on shared hosting plans. I purchase the 3-year plans and end up paying about $3-4/mo (CAD). When the plan is nearing expiry, I take my data and move on to the next web host. Been doing this for about 28 years now.

Yep. My only real goal is to reduce the amount of advertising I’m exposed to on a daily basis, and to that end it’s working…for now.

No cable, no streaming services, no broadcast radio, automated downloads of media, ad blockers everywhere, DNS sinkhole, etc. Thankfully, it’s all low maintenance once in place.

Radicale on the home server, which syncs contacts and calendaring for us. Thunderbird on the desktop. Fossify Calendar on Android, synced to Radicale via DAVx⁵.

I think you’ll be out of luck for 3 slots, but you could always use the native slot for OS and dock the other 2 via USB with RAID capability in something like this.

I’m a big fan of the Intel NUC platform, coupled with a fanless case and all-SSD/NVMe drives. They’re low-powered, fast enough for most common tasks, and completely silent.

I have an NVMe drive for the OS (currently Proxmox, soon to be Debian again or Fedora), containers and VMs, and an internal 8TB SSD for data storage (whole disk encrypted). This may not meet your needs if you’re intending to be a data hoarder, but I have a sizeable movie and lossless music collection accumulated over 25 years and I’m not even using 4TB yet.

You can of course still use a similar setup but keep even larger storage on a NAS device, or simply use a USB dock with a couple of 16TB drives. It’s really down to whatever your needs are.

I love that the server, router, modem, and switch use such a small footprint and are able to be powered for up to an hour by an equally small and inexpensive 600VA UPS.

Depends on your power needs. My home server is an Intel NUC, so I’m able to keep it, the modem, router, and main switches running through most power outages with an APC 600VA UPS for about $80 USD.