/Uses

Well, since everyone else seems to have a cool /uses page, I figured I might as well put one up myself.
So while I do have a macbook pro that is used very often, I’m running Debian on it. So most of my applications that I tend to use are either Linux or Windows based. Sorry not sorry (though if you were to donate a new M3/M4 I’d be willing to make the switch).

Computers

• MacBookPro 11,1 (2014?)

  • 8GB DDR3
  • Intel Core i5-4258U x 2
  • Mesa Intel Iris Graphics 5100 (HSW GT3)
  • 250gb HD
  • Debian 12 Bookworm w/ Xfce DE (with the Plank dock becuase I love it)

• My Gaming/Workstation PC

  • ASUS Prime Z590-P Motherboard
  • 11th Gen Inten Core i7-11700K @ 3.6GHz
  • NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080Ti
  • 64GB ddr4 (2x 32GB)
  • 2TB NVMe
  • 27" Asus ROG PG278Q (2560x1400 @ 144hz) - for play
  • 24" Dell S2421NX (1920X1080 @ 60hz) - for work.
  • Windows 10 Pro

Applications

• Terminal w/ oh-my-zsh running gruvbox theme for linux + WSL
• Terminal w/ oh-my-posh running gruvbox theme & Terminal Icons for Powershell
• Alacritty with Oh my Zsh and Tmux for the laptop.
• Spotify w/ Spicetify mod - It makes the app so much better.
• Steam - Gaming
• Discord - Gaming and keeping in touch with friends/community
• EarTrumpet - Best windows sound manager ever and it’s free.
• Git CLI - local Gitea for private stuff, github for everything else
• VSCode w/ you guessed it, the gruvbox theme.
• Obsidian - I use this religiously, with templates and plugins you can do literally anything with this free software.
• Raindrop.io - One of the best bookmark apps around…free as well.
• FreshRSS - RSS Feed Reader
• Firefox w/ uBlock Origin, Bypass Paywalls Clean , Multi-Account-Containers , Raindrop.io and 1password.
• ShareX - Best screenshot app out there (and it’s free).
• Flow Launcher - Great keyboard shortcut/launcher/task-master for windows (also free)
• Qbittorent - for linux isos of course.
• Figma & Affinity Designer 2 for design/mockups
• Gimp for photoshop needs
• ProtonVPN - For when I’m out and about
• ProtonMail - recently switched off of my google workspace plan and have never been happier.
• 1Password - Been using them since they first came out and they’ve only gotten better.
• Docker

Mobile

Iphone 15 Pro

• ProtonMail
• 1Password
• Firefox
• Authy - I regret having used this as it’s one of the few apps you can’t export your accounts from in case you want to move to a different provider.
• Carrot - It’s a weather app with an attitude, also pretty damn accurate.
• Signal - End to end secure communications
• Ice Cubes - Mastodon client
• NetNewWire - To connect to my FreshRSS setup

Sound/Music

• Sennheiser 599 Open back
• Linsoul Kiwi Ears Quintet IEM
  - SMSL D10 Pocket Portable Headphone Amp (this and the Linsoul Kiwi are my everyday carry)
• Spotify, SomaFM , ReListen for all the grateful dead on archive.org and then my own instance of Navidrome

Homelab

• EliteDesk 800 G2 Mini - 1TB SSD, 500GB NVMe, 32GB DDR4 Ram

  • Running Proxmox which hosts:
    • Navidrome - Lightweight multi-user music streaming to any device
    • Radarr, Sonarr, NzbGet, ruTorrent, Overseerr, Plex - Media Aquisition
    • ChangeDetection.io - Monitor any webpages to see if any part of them change and get notified.
    • ActivePieces - Free open-source Zapier replacement
    • FreshRSS - So many feeds!
    • Homarr - Customizable homepage for easy access & stats on all my self-hosted docker containers
    • Gitea - local git (But I want to try Soft-Serve )

• Raspberry Pi 4

  • Pi-hole - network ad blocking & DNS server.

Hosting

• Porkbun - I use to own a LOT of domains and have used many registrars but Porkbun right now is the best in my opinion, great customer support, they’re US based (Oregon!), a working API and constant deals. Plus they haven’t had any of the issues that other big registrars have faced regarding locking people out of their accounts, getting social-engineered or straight up hacked. Plus they’ve made little piggie icons for their popular domains.
• ZeroSSL - All the same benefits of Let’s Encrypt but with no rate limit, a working API and you can verify via email
• Hetzner - Not only is their cloud offering on decent equipment, but fast and cheap. Why rely on 3rd party services when you do it yourself?
• IOFlood - One of the best bare-metal dedicated server hosts in the US. They only do one thing, bare-metal servers. And they’re a no bs, here’s the testing/Passmark scores on this rig, honest type of guys. Plus they have servers in various configs. 10Gbps connections out of Phoenix, AZ.
• Cloudflare - CDN/DDOS protection on the cheap (free depending on your needs)
• BackBlaze - $6 per TB and they free egress if downloading through one of their partners like Cloudflare.
• Fastmail.com and Protonmail - Both cheap, secure and have great support for teams/small biz. I’ve used both.

I’m skipping a bunch of categories and most likely leaving a bunch of stuff out but if you have any questions, especially about self-hosting or home-networking in general feel free to reach out! I love talking about FOSS and DIY setups.

Cheers,

~Brent