Dying switch
29 Dec 2005I don’t know if I’ve blogged this before or not. Probably. Basically, my switch (network connecting thingy) that is screwed onto the wall from when we moved in is dying.
It’s bugging me. Lots.
It’s always made these high-pitched noises (kinda like “dying-capacitor”, but without the “essence-of-dying-capacitor” smell, so I always figured it was okay), which have traditionally denoted fluctuations in speed if not in connectivity. Of late, connectivity has become the principle benefactor (involuntarily) of these noises.
To the point that I just heard the sound and was turning around thinking how delightful it would be to punch its dinky, plasticy, 8-ports of junk through our dinky, plaster-board-y, cardboard-thickness external walls. There was a rare synergy in design between the two, there. I’m inclined to think the switch is dying/dead because of the fact that it’s bolted straight onto a wall that effectively acts as a big heatsink (think heating, not cooling). But whatever, it sucks.
It was saved by the fact there’s a moderate size solid piece of furniture in front of it (that’s the one I think I lost an Access Point/router behind) and I’m sleepy and I would have hurt myself if I’d tried. Probably would have felt better, though.
Anyway I’m probably going to buy a new switch tomorrow, coz this is driving me nuts. It’s kinda good, though. I decided it wasn’t worth trying to stay online and do stuff before, so I went and read [at home, here] for a bit. “At home” is kinda a big deal, because I only read when I’m away/on public transport and not completely zorked out to the world. Cool, though.
I also got a fileserver setup a night or two ago (only 11 months overdue!), ironically because the ‘net connection had been so pathetic I’d actually had time to think about what I was going to do. Woo, Samba for the masses! *dances* Yeah, sorry, joke that had to be made. For the record, I’m pretty cold on the idea of career journalism, so I’m allowed to make cliched to-be-expected-from-IT-journos-of-the-late-90s comments like that and get away with it. Uh huh. Smile, nod, keep walking.