Finally Cleaned My Desktop PC After 4 Years!
by | posted in: pc, tech | 0

I finally cleaned my old desktop. Has been my main gaming rig for quite some time.

This build is really old, it is way back when RGB and Tempered Glass isn’t yet a thing. But this rig has served me well.

Quick specs:

CPU: Intel i5 – 2500k Sandy Bridge Overclocked to 4.6 GHz
GPU: Zotac GTX 970
RAM: G. Skill20 GB RAM (8+8+4 one of the slots is broken)
PSU: EVGA 500 Watts
Motherboard: Asus P8P67-LE
Cooling: CoolerMaster Seidon 240M
Case: Antec GX700

Has been around 4 years wheen I cleaned this PC up, the last time was when I upgraded the CPU cooler from Hyper 212 to the CM Seidon 240M.

Time for some photos!

Here’s a photo of before cleaning.

 

Let’s take a look at the radiator / cpu block.

 

That’s alot of dust!

Now the GPU. We will be dismantling the GPU for a cleaning and repaste.

 

Let’s clean everything up using these tools!  A detailing brush and a vacuum / blower.

All clean! (Clean enough)

Let’s clean the GPU for repasting. I will be using some Cooler Master X1 Extreme Fusion I have lying around.

Let’s put her back together!

 

I will be taping off the side fan area of the case. Unfortunately I do not have a fan to fill it with, I will put a fan in there once the one I ordered comes in.  Since my airflow is negative pressure, I want most air coming in in the front which is filtered.

I will also be sealing off the top part of the case where the radiator doesn’t quite meet the edges of the top fan area of the case.

And we are done! Time for some testing!

Testing performance

Before I tore down the PC, I did some benchmarks with the intent of comparing the results between the super dirty PC and a clean one.  Both will have the same configuration where the 2500K is overclocked to 4.6 GHz at +0.80V voltage offset.

Cinebench

Before
Before
After
After

Same CPU scores but higher FPS for the dusty PC?!? Probably just margin of error.

Userbenchmark

Before
Before
After
After

The results are pretty much the same in this one.

Uningine Heaven

Settings: D3D11 | Ultra Quality | Extreme Tesselation | 3440×1440 8xAA

Before
Before
After
After

Now there’s a clearer gap between the two.  Since the benchmark stresses the components more, generates more heat and lasts longer.

3DMark Firestrike

Before
Before
After
After

Similar story here.

TL:DR

Regularly clean your PC! Dust buildup will interfere with cooling, decreasing your thermal headroom and making you reach the throttling temperatures.

 

 

Macbook Pro (A1278) SSD and 16 GB RAM upgrade
by | posted in: mac, tech | 0

Old Mac

I’ve recently needed an iOS development machine for a couple of projects, and while I could use a hackintosh or a macOS inside a virtual machine (VM), I thought that I could use an old MacBook Pro we have lying around.  After updating the macOS X Lion to Sierra and installing XCode, the hardware started to show its age.

The device is a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011) A1278.  It has the following:

CPU : 2.4 GHz dual-core Intel i5 processor with 3MB L3 cache

RAM : 4 GB 1333 MHz DDR3

Storage : 320 GB 5400 RPM SATA HDD

 

Time for an upgrade!

I considered getting a new one but for the cost and I generally just don’t like the newer macbook pros, it might be worthwhile to just upgrade this one.

Usually with these older laptops, you can easily get massive performance boost by upgrading the RAM and the storage device.  And its a no brainer since its one of the few user serviceable parts in a macbook pro.

I went to Lazada PH and checked if there’s RAM compatible for this old macbook pro, also looked for an SSD drive, and I found the following:

RAM : Gskill FA-1333C9D-16GSQ 16GB DDR3 1333 Mac Compatible Memory 2011 Series

SSD : SanDisk SDSSDA-480G 480GB SSD PLUS Solid State Drive

 

Upgrade Process

To proceed with the upgrade I needed two screwdriver types:

  • 00 Philips screwdriver
  • T6 Torx screwdriver

The following photos are the steps that it took me to replace both those components.

Here’s the RAM and SSD.

Turn it around and remove the screws using the philips screwdriver.

I arrange the screws the same way as I removed it as a practice so I do not forget.

Remove the top cover, pull from the backside near the hinge for the screen.

Disconnect the battery to be on the safe side, I used a little plastic to push it up.

Now that the battery is disconnected, time to remove the RAM, push to the side those rounded notches.

First RAM stick popped out.

Here goes the second.

Forgot to take photos, but just slap in the new RAM where the old ones were.

Put the old RAM into the new RAM’s packaging just in case I need it in the future.

Next, the HDD to SDD upgrade.

Loosen those screws that secure that black plastic bar that secures the HDD in place.

Remove that.

Pull this plastic pull tab to remove the HDD. Note how you have to remove it this way, so you know how to put the new one in.  There are screws attached to the drive that goes in the notches of the drive bay

Here’s the old HDD.

Remove it from the SATA connector.

The old HDD has these screws.

Remove them with the T6 Torx screwdriver, picked this Torx screwdriver set at All Home hardware.

Here are the screws.

Transfer those screws to the new SSD drive, transfer the pull tab as well.

Reseat the new SSD and secure it in place.

Done!

 

Isuzu MU-X Detailing Session After a Long Drive to the North
by | posted in: auto | 0

My Isuzu Mu-X has been left really dirty since I recently attended a hacker conference, Hack The North in Tuguegarao and I had to pickup my wife in Baguio on my way back to Manila with a bit of a side-trip to Subic free port zone for a quick shopping trip.

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That added up to approximately 28 hrs of driving and 1193 km total distance travelled. Manila > Tuguegarao > Baguio > Clark > Manila

Before

Here’s the photos of the car before the detailing.

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Isuzu Mu-x detailing

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Isuzu Mu-x detailing

 

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It was really dirty. So to start the detail, I did rinse with pressure washer > foam cannon > rinse pressure washer. Was curious how much dirt I can remove without touching the car.

Isuzu Mu-x detailing

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It was still dirty, and I noticed that I did sustain a clear coat scratch. Probably got it when I brushed against a tree/shrub.

On our side-trip to Subic, did pick up Meguiar’s paint restoration kit. I have some clear coat scratches and swirl marks that I have got when I still have no idea to take care of my paint, so I thought it might be a good use for Meguiar’s Ultimate compound. Though I will be using it with Black and Decker kp600 instead of a polisher, better than applying it by hand!

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I used all of those with the exception of Gold Class car wash as I used Meguiar’s M62. I also used Crisscross (generic brand) cleaner and degreaser for the wheels, and Microtex tire black for the tires.

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After using the cleaner and degreaser on the wheels then rinising it, I was quite surprised that it got the majority of the dirt out even without touching/brushing it. The second photo shows some of the contamination of the paint on one of the panels that the Meguiar’s clay bar got out.

After

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Cleaned the windows with Glass Science Rain Clear Dual Action Cleaner and waxed using Meguiar’s Ultimate Liquid Wax, then I layered it with Meguiar’s Gold Class wax.

And those were the results.

via GIPHY

via GIPHY

World of Warcraft Legion Collector’s Edition
by | posted in: wow | 0

I am a little bit late to the party but here it goes, I bought World of Warcraft’s latest expansion, Legion.

Luckily the Datablitz (our version of Gamestop here in the Philippines) nearby has the Collector’s Edition in stock, this post will be to share what’s inside. Oh, and they give out a free WoW Legion posters. It costed me PHP 4995 (appx USD $110).

The collector’s edition also contains the goodies from Digital Deluxe Edition, more about that here.

I haven’t played it yet but I do hope it will not bore the hell out of me as WoW’s last expansion, Warlords of Draenor.

The Collector’s Edition Box

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Slides open!

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Artbook of Legion

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Mousepad

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Illidan vs. Gul’dan

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Soundtrack and Behind the Scenes

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Behind the Scenes

It has Blu-ray and DVD version.

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Audio CD of the Soundtrack

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

The Game DVD

The game code to be redeemed at your battle.net account is inside.

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Freebies

The Collector’s Edition contains the ff codes:

  1. WoW Guestpass
  2. Heroes of the Storm – Jaina hero code
  3. Hearthstone – 3x card pack code
  4. 25% off for Blizzard gear

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Empty!

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

The soundtrack CD

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

The Art of Wow Legion

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Some of the artwork inside

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

Everything

World of Warcraft Collector's Edition

XBOX One – Can’t retrieve information from Xbox Live. Try again later. 8016a04b
by | posted in: xbox one | 0

I recently purchased an Xbox One with the game The Division and two weeks worth of Xbox Live Gold membership. Then the 1 yr subscription to XBL Gold went on sale from $60 to $40 which I purchased thinking I might be able to use it later when the free two weeks expires.

When it was the time to use it, I went to the XBL site to redeem the code and all I get is this error message :

Can’t retrieve information from Xbox Live. Try again later.

I contacted their support to get the issue fixed. That’s when they told me that the issue was that my account’s XBOX 360 region setting is in Philippines region and XBL Gold does not support it yet. You can move your account’s XBOX 360 region to different one but the thing is that you need 90 days to set it again. I created my account using the create account option in the console and it defaults to US or maybe the region where your XBOX One is set. I had it on US since Philippines is not in the choices.

So what I have is:

  1. Xbox account set in Philippines Region – I recently moved regions so I can add my Philippine bank issued credit card.
  2. Xbox set in US region

The solution they told me is to move back the account to US region when the 90 day restriction expires, not gonna happen as I do not have the patience to do so. Another is that I create a new account and redeem the code on the new account, not gonna happen neither as I do not want to lose my progress and I want to retain my gamertag! (Add me guys frostfenix08)

So here’s what I did:

  1. Created a new account
  2. Redeemed the XBL Gold on that new account
  3. Added my old account to the family of the new account. (All Settings > Account > Family)

That should “share” the xbox live gold to the old account and that allowed me to continue with my progress with The Division.

 

Let’s Encrypt + Virtualmin + Ubuntu 14.04.4

Let’s Encrypt + Virtualmin + Ubuntu 14.04.4
by | posted in: tech | 0

Intro

SSL/TLS makes your website secure by ensuring that data travels to and from your website encrypted.  Good thing there is Let’s Encrypt to make things easier (no more pesky CRSs) and free!

I will also cover here how to get an “A” grade rating for your SSL where we do not have weak cipher suites, we have forward secrecy and we do not susceptible to attacks like POODLE.

This will be useful for people who host their own sites using Webmin + Virtualmin.

 

Getting Started

For this I have my WordPress website (frostfenix.com) hosted on an Ubuntu 14.04.4 with latest version Virtualmin, standard configuration minus Bind DNS server and FTP.

 

Install Let’s Encrypt

Run the following commands to install Let’s Encrypt:

$ git clone https://github.com/letsencrypt/letsencrypt
$ cd letsencrypt
$ ./letsencrypt-auto –help

You should see something like this:

letsencrypt installation

Optionally you may want to move lets encrypt to another location, I moved mine to /usr/local/bin

 

Add Let’s Encrypt to Webmin

Sign in to your Webmin Console

Go to Webmin > Webmin Configuration > SSL Encryption > Let’s Encrypt

let's encrypt virtualmin webmin

Click on Module Configuration

let's encrypt virtualmin webmin

Add the path of where letsencrypt-auto script in the text field given like so

let's encrypt virtualmin webmin

 

With that Webmin can now call letsencrypt-auto script from your web GUI.

 

Create and Install Certificates

Go to Virtualmin then select your virtual server where you want to install a certificate from Let’s Encrypt.

After that, proceed to Server Configuration > Manage SSL Certificate > Let’s Encrypt then click on Request Certificate

let's encrypt virtualmin webmin

That’s it! Your website should now be protected with an SSL certificate from Let’s Encrypt.

 

Improving Security

For testing our SSL/TLS configuration, we will be using Qualys’ SSL Test. You can use that tool and it will grade your SSL/TLS configuration for your website free of charge.

If you use it now, you will get a grade of “C”. This is because you have weaker cipher suites enabled, SSL Compession enabled, or you have older versions of SSL (version 2 and 3) enabled, these are configurations will make you susceptible to vulnerabilities like CRIME, HEARTBLEED, POODLE and many more.

 

Disable Older Versions of SSL/TLS

For frostfenix.com I will only enable TLS (all versions) and disable all versions of SSL (v2 and v3).

To do so, go to Services > Configure Website for SSL > SSL Options > tick TLSv1, TLSv1.1 and TLS1.2

let's encrypt virtualmin webmin

 

Disable Weaker Ciphersuites and Disable SSL Compression

We will now disable weaker cipher suites and SSL Compression

Go to Services > Configure Website for SSL > Edit Directives

Then add or edit the the following directives

SSLCompression off
SSLCipherSuite EECDH+AESGCM:EDH+AESGCM:AES256+EECDH:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:AES256+EDH:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA:EDH-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA:AES256-GCM-SHA384:AES128-GCM-SHA256:AES256-SHA256:AES128-SHA256:AES256-SHA:AES128-SHA:DES-CBC3-SHA:HIGH:!aNULL:!eNULL:!EXPORT:!DES:!MD5:!PSK:!RC4

 

 

Test your TLS Configuration

As I have previously mentioned we will use Qualys’ SSL Testing tool. Here are the results of frostfenix.com where we got a score of “A”.

letsencrypt virtualmin webmin

 

There we go, we have used a free certificate from Let’s Encrypt for a website that is hosted using Virtualmin on Ubuntu 14.04.4. If you have questions, comments or violent reactions. Please leave them on the comment box below.

M4A Lag
by | posted in: csgo | 0

I HATE LAG!

 

Online gamers hate lag. Period. It brings out the worst out of anyone.

In this video, for some reason I was lagging really hard I even thought It was something to do with my sensitivity. But what the heck, I was just using my pocket wifi (crappy mobile internet).

 

FrostFenix learning Twisted Fate (TF) Pt. 3 – 7
by | posted in: lol | 0

This will be a video dump!

I have been really really busy since last October, so I haven’t been able to play alot of LoL and I have forgotten to publish my Twisted Fate videos.  These videos have been recorded about last October and I can say that I got a hang of playing Twisted Fate to a decent level.
So here goes the video dump!

 

I don’t know how TF plays now and how the itemization will be in the latest patch, I haven’t even played LoLPH this year. Hopefully when my schedule clears up I will be able to play again.

 

Twisted Fate pt. 3

 

Twisted Fate pt. 4

 

Twisted Fate pt. 5

 

Twisted Fate pt. 6

 

Twisted Fate pt. 7

 

Now, I don’t really think someone will watch all of them, but I am hoping these videos will demonstrate that picking up a new hero and becoming decent with that hero is possible. Also, as much a possible, do play with your friends! It makes the game fun on a whole new level, even if you are getting your butts handed back to you.

 

If you guys wanna play with me you can add me on the following:

LoLPH : FrostFenix

Steam : frostfenix08

Battle.net : frostfenix#6771

CS:GO P2000 CT handgun round choice
by | posted in: csgo | 1

USP or P2000? I prefer P2000.

Why? Because of the ammo capacity. While I do agree it is hard to quantify the utility of the silencer of the USP-S and it can be useful for ninja playstyle of some players, I just can’t use it consistently. There will be games that I will be trigger happy and run out of bullets.

 

With P2000 however, I can be trigger happy from time to time and still have the accuracy if needed.

 

And for those who want to see the numbers / stats, here’s the comparison table of P2000 and USP-S care of strike-counter.com.

p2000usps

 

As you can see, both of them are identical in terms of damage and armor penetration.  While the P2000 wins by a small margin in other aspects, I think the ammo capacity is the deal breaker. Having more bullets will help you stand toe-to-toe against Terrorist that have Gloc or Tec-9s.

 

Here’s a video of me playing using P2000 and winning the pistol round for our team: Gameplay video

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