Adding Bluetooth to a VW RCD 300

I own a basic VW Caddy MK3 (2009) which was equipped with a RCD 300 head unit. It did not come with the aux function/connectivity and this post explains how I added Bluetooth connectivity. This was a very simple installation with no requirement for VCDS coding; the Bluetooth adapter replicates a CD changer. At the time of writing this article, I was able to purchase this adapter on Amazon UK for ~£35 – https://amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0773P8HM5 ...

18 June 2021 · 3 min · Tom

More RTX 3060 Nicehash overclocking

Note: NVIDIA has since patched the RTX 3060 hash rate limiter across multiple driver versions. The developer driver 470.05 used in this article is no longer available from NVIDIA. Crypto mining on consumer GPUs is generally no longer economically viable. This is part 2 from my previous post on RTX 3060 Nicehash overclocking settings. I don’t want to edit the previous article because the content still stands to be accurate for the hash rate I achieved. However, I have since learned even more about the card and managed to improve my Nicehash quick miner hash rate by a further 10%! ...

7 April 2021 · 3 min · Tom

RTX 3060 Nicehash mining overclock settings

Note: NVIDIA has since patched the RTX 3060 hash rate limiter across multiple driver versions. The developer driver 470.05 used in this article is no longer available from NVIDIA. Crypto mining on consumer GPUs is generally no longer economically viable. I recently managed to buy a Gigabyte RTX 3060 without lining the pockets of a scaler, lucky me! I recently discussed how I was able to circumvent the Nvidia crypto mining limitations: Unlock RTX 3060 mining hash rate (that post also includes access to the driver). This doubled the RTX 3060 Nicehash mining rate using the ‘unlocked’ Nvidia beta driver – going from ~22MH/s up to ~40MH/s. Impressive! ...

2 April 2021 · 3 min · Tom

Unlock RTX 3060 mining hash rate

Note: The developer driver 470.05 referenced in this article is no longer distributed by NVIDIA. NVIDIA subsequently re-introduced and then re-patched the hash rate limiter across multiple driver generations. This article is kept for historical reference. There has been lots of news coverage around the recent mistake made by Nvidia with their RTX 3060 driver allowing uninhibited mining hash rates: a great round-up from The Verge. A developer driver inadvertently included code used for internal development which removes the hash rate limiter on RTX 3060 in some configurations. The driver has been removed, but there are lots of copies in circulation. ...

21 March 2021 · 3 min · Tom

Honeygain docker-compose setup

So Honeygain has finally arrived as a Docker container and this article will give you everything you need to build your own docker-compose YAML file for faster deployments. You can see the docs provided by the Honeygain devs on the matter here: https://honeygain.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018979919-How-to-run-Honeygain-on-Docker-Linux- However, they do not provide a nice way to deploy time and again from a docker-compose file, scroll down for a template! At the time of writing, you are permitted to run the service on two devices per public IP. Unfortunately, the docker image doesn’t currently support the content delivery feature ...

4 March 2021 · 2 min · Tom

Unraid USB Controller Passthrough - VM hot swap USB

For the longest time, I have been running VMs on my Unraid server and had the need to passthrough USB devices. I will be the first to admit that I have too many computers and a shrink might classify it as an addition. Coupled with my quest for a clutter-free desk, I have been faced with the issue of swapping USB devices like a keyboard and mouse, from one machine to another Unraid virtual machine (vm). ...

3 March 2021 · 3 min · Tom

Collect bitcoin price data with python and Coinbase

Cryptocurrencies have been back on the popular agenda lately, thanks mostly to the surging value of Bitcoin. I have been interested, but not massively invested in cryptocurrency for many years. If I had the courage to buy and hold all those years ago, I might be writing to you from a beach – I assure you, this is not the case! I have been getting into InfluxDB lately and its fantastic ability to store heaps of time series data. Well, using python and Coinbase, I am going to show you how to collect bitcoin (and other crypto assets) price data and store it in InfluxDB… then we are going to make some neat panels in Grafana to help us realise our data. This is going to be a longer write up than most, so here is here are links to each section: ...

2 February 2021 · 6 min · Tom

Writing to an InfluxDB server with Python3

A quick GitHub gist for anyone looking to write to an InfluxDB server with Python3. This is a generic function that accepts three inputs; as an example, I am using temperature data in degrees Celsius. Turning DHT11 readings into beautiful graphs in Grafana Once you have your data in influxDB, a great way to visualise it is using Grafana. I hope to bring you more posts in the future about visualising your python data with Grafana. ...

19 January 2021 · 1 min · Tom

Fortigate: AP-Bridge with a hardware switch

Following on from a previous post on how to setup a VLAN on a Fortigate hardware switch, this post is going to explain how we can link an AP-bridge SSID to a hardware switch and VLAN. For the most part, the only reference material you will need to complete this configuration can be found here: https://docs.fortinet.com/document/fortiap/6.4.0/fortiwifi-and-fortiap-cookbook/252439/configuring-the-fortigate-interface-to-manage-fortiap-units. However, if you have been working with Fortigates and by extension FortiOS for quite some time, you may be wonder where the CAPWAP option vanished to? Fortinet adopted this into the security fabric naming convention. CAPWAP has even been replaced in the CLI by ‘fabric’. ...

17 January 2021 · 3 min · Tom

Fortigate: Add a VLAN to a hardware switch

In this post, we are going to discuss how to add a VLAN to a hardware (sometimes referred to as physical) switch or interface on a Fortigate. It is worth noting that I actually do my testing on a FortiWifi, so I can assure you that this also applies there too. I will be focusing on the configuration which is relevant to FortiOS v6.0 and above, so your millage vary between versions. However, you need can usually be found over at the Fortinet Handbook: https://docs.fortinet.com/product/fortigate/6.0. ...

9 January 2021 · 4 min · Tom