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My first job was IT support for on-prem systems and, as I battle my containerized deployment scripts this morning, really miss those days. Probably just nostalg

by exdsq 5y ago

My first job was IT support for on-prem systems and, as I battle my containerized deployment scripts this morning, really miss those days. Probably just nostalgia but I had named them all after superheroes and it was just way more fun when you got to spec a server and install it, fix them (physically) when they had issues, and panic when the AC broke. Edit: Also I was way more fit from climbing around a building all day cabling stuff. Genuine question - does anyone know what sort of IT jobs require physical work? I miss those days a lot!

VTimofeenko 5y ago
> does anyone know what sort of IT jobs require physical work? I have seen a few positions in the US for datacenter technicians. Those positions had explicit requirements(probably because of ADA) to be able to lift over X lbs as part of day to day activities.
marvinblum 5y ago
Hetzner would probably be the perfect working space for you. They build all of their servers by hand on custom racks. You can move around in 14+ buildings in Falkenstein, manage cables, fix servers, work on their cloud offering, ...
- teloli 5y ago
  AND you would get to live in Falkenstein, one of the most exciting places in Europe.
  - mellavora 5y ago
    which does indeed sound like a good home for servers named after superheros.
imadethis 5y ago
COVID has probably changed this, but networking jobs tend to require a lot of racking and cabling work, especially if you’re fitting out a new work area. Even with the majority of your infrastructure moved to the cloud, you’ll still need APs or Ethernet jacks wired into a LAN for the end users.
jdavis703 5y ago
I did IT support for a federal agency headquartered between two buildings with multiple floors and was on my feet all day. About once a week I’d actually have to run as someone was experiencing a time-critical hardware issue with only minutes to spare, heh. I kind of miss it. But the pay is nowhere close to what I make as a SWE.
- exdsq 5y ago
  Haha that's the issue - I work as an SWE and it has killed so many fun options purely because I can't imagine such a sharp pay decrease.
throw1234651234 5y ago
Building crypto mining racks.
- 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
  is it really profitable to get in like now?
  - Nextgrid 5y ago
    Due to how the difficulty system works, the real-world price of the reward for mining will always be equivalent to the cheapest energy price in the world. If the price suddenly increases, more miners get in, which pushes the difficulty up and now you have to expend more energy for the same reward - similarly if the price drops, miners who can no longer make a profit go offline, lowering the difficulty - in the end it's an equilibrium. I don't think it was ever profitable unless your energy prices can compete with what industrial-scale miners get in favourable locations (right next to a power plant in an area with too much surplus power, etc).
  - throw1234651234 5y ago
    What Nextgrid is saying is a common, incorrect stereotype. "Is it really profitable to get in, like now?" Yes, but... Long version: Yes, you will make your money back within 2 years almost guaranteed on a new mining rig. There is a minimum cost to get in. For example, at a minimum, you will need a good card at 3k+, which puts you at 3.5-4k just for price of entry. However, you will make that back within a year. Now the heavy BUT: 1. No one knows what will happen once ETH switches from mining to proof of stake in 2022. Mining profits may go to 0. 2. If BTC price goes to hell, so do your profits in the long run. This is price-risk, regulatory-risk, etc. 3. There are heavy tax implications and a lot of management. For example, you won't get the returns mentioned if you don't properly account for equipment costs. 4. Once you want to make more than $10 a day, there are heavy, heavy set up costs - cooling, proper power supply, etc. Finally, profitability of mining is back because China is actively banning crypto mining, so other areas can compete now. "I don't think it was ever profitable unless your energy prices can compete with what industrial-scale miners get in favourable locations (right next to a power plant in an area with too much surplus power, etc" This is simply not true Nextgrid, see https://whattomine.com/ https://whattomine.com/ for roughly-valid numbers. Note that BTC is not anywhere on the GPU list - you do need extremely expensive ASICs to mine BTC. You also need to order them from China, pay a 25% import tax, and overall risk quite a bit. Final note - if you could get GPUs at cost or MSRP, you would be in pure profit in less than a year. The problem is that a $2000 GPU is marked up to about $3500 atm.
chickenWing 5y ago
Get a job for Cisco or Juniper. You'll be moving and wiring up a lot of physical routers.
adamcharnock 5y ago
Start a rural Wireless ISP. That’s what I did. Network cables and chainsaws :-)
- exdsq 5y ago
  That sounds awesome! Can you share any more info on that?
  - adamcharnock 5y ago
    Sure! I’m about to go to bed, but I was inspired by https://startyourownisp.com/ https://startyourownisp.com/ It won’t make you rich, but it will keep you busy and get you meeting people in your area. Our website is https://gardunha.net https://gardunha.net Feel free to get in contact if you want to chat more.

by exdsq 5y ago

VTimofeenko 5y ago

> does anyone know what sort of IT jobs require physical work? I have seen a few positions in the US for datacenter technicians. Those positions had explicit requirements(probably because of ADA) to be able to lift over X lbs as part of day to day activities.

marvinblum 5y ago

Hetzner would probably be the perfect working space for you. They build all of their servers by hand on custom racks. You can move around in 14+ buildings in Falkenstein, manage cables, fix servers, work on their cloud offering, ...

teloli 5y ago
AND you would get to live in Falkenstein, one of the most exciting places in Europe.
- mellavora 5y ago
  which does indeed sound like a good home for servers named after superheros.

imadethis 5y ago

COVID has probably changed this, but networking jobs tend to require a lot of racking and cabling work, especially if you’re fitting out a new work area. Even with the majority of your infrastructure moved to the cloud, you’ll still need APs or Ethernet jacks wired into a LAN for the end users.

jdavis703 5y ago

I did IT support for a federal agency headquartered between two buildings with multiple floors and was on my feet all day. About once a week I’d actually have to run as someone was experiencing a time-critical hardware issue with only minutes to spare, heh. I kind of miss it. But the pay is nowhere close to what I make as a SWE.

exdsq 5y ago
Haha that's the issue - I work as an SWE and it has killed so many fun options purely because I can't imagine such a sharp pay decrease.

throw1234651234 5y ago

Building crypto mining racks.

2Gkashmiri 5y ago
is it really profitable to get in like now?
- Nextgrid 5y ago
  Due to how the difficulty system works, the real-world price of the reward for mining will always be equivalent to the cheapest energy price in the world. If the price suddenly increases, more miners get in, which pushes the difficulty up and now you have to expend more energy for the same reward - similarly if the price drops, miners who can no longer make a profit go offline, lowering the difficulty - in the end it's an equilibrium. I don't think it was ever profitable unless your energy prices can compete with what industrial-scale miners get in favourable locations (right next to a power plant in an area with too much surplus power, etc).
- throw1234651234 5y ago
  What Nextgrid is saying is a common, incorrect stereotype. "Is it really profitable to get in, like now?" Yes, but... Long version: Yes, you will make your money back within 2 years almost guaranteed on a new mining rig. There is a minimum cost to get in. For example, at a minimum, you will need a good card at 3k+, which puts you at 3.5-4k just for price of entry. However, you will make that back within a year. Now the heavy BUT: 1. No one knows what will happen once ETH switches from mining to proof of stake in 2022. Mining profits may go to 0. 2. If BTC price goes to hell, so do your profits in the long run. This is price-risk, regulatory-risk, etc. 3. There are heavy tax implications and a lot of management. For example, you won't get the returns mentioned if you don't properly account for equipment costs. 4. Once you want to make more than $10 a day, there are heavy, heavy set up costs - cooling, proper power supply, etc. Finally, profitability of mining is back because China is actively banning crypto mining, so other areas can compete now. "I don't think it was ever profitable unless your energy prices can compete with what industrial-scale miners get in favourable locations (right next to a power plant in an area with too much surplus power, etc" This is simply not true Nextgrid, see https://whattomine.com/ https://whattomine.com/ for roughly-valid numbers. Note that BTC is not anywhere on the GPU list - you do need extremely expensive ASICs to mine BTC. You also need to order them from China, pay a 25% import tax, and overall risk quite a bit. Final note - if you could get GPUs at cost or MSRP, you would be in pure profit in less than a year. The problem is that a $2000 GPU is marked up to about $3500 atm.

chickenWing 5y ago

Get a job for Cisco or Juniper. You'll be moving and wiring up a lot of physical routers.

adamcharnock 5y ago

Start a rural Wireless ISP. That’s what I did. Network cables and chainsaws :-)

exdsq 5y ago
That sounds awesome! Can you share any more info on that?
- adamcharnock 5y ago
  Sure! I’m about to go to bed, but I was inspired by https://startyourownisp.com/ https://startyourownisp.com/ It won’t make you rich, but it will keep you busy and get you meeting people in your area. Our website is https://gardunha.net https://gardunha.net Feel free to get in contact if you want to chat more.