The iPad Pro is such a neutered device

I have had a long & complicated history with various devices in the iPad lineup over the years. Don’t get me wrong, the iPad is a fantastic device for what its made for. Is just not made for some of the things I want to do; which is making it work like a real computer.

What it is good at

After using iPads (Mostly Pro versions) over many years, I have realised that the iPad is good at:

  1. Media consumption – Great for watching movies, TV shows on the go, browsing through photos. The mini-LED Display is great with high contrasts and peak brightness.
  2. Reading magazines and newspapers.
  3. Sketching stuff & taking hand-written notes.
  4. Looking at websites.
  5. Photo and Video editi…

I love the sexy slab design and the folio cover. But spending this amount of money just for the above items doesn’t make sense (at least, to me).

What it is bad at

Again, not blaming Apple. The iPad can do exactly what Apple claims it can do. The fault is squarely on me for expecting the iPad Pro to act and behave like a real computer.

Why did I even have these expectations? Because I assumed that surely a device this expensive would be able to do some of the things that a computer can do. Why else would you put an M4 processor or 16GB RAM in a tablet? Also, after Apple bought Stage Manager to the iPad, I hoped they would bring more features. Obviously, I hoped wrong.

Over the last year, my frustrations kept mounting till I felt compelled to write this post.

Virtual Machines

You can read about my tryst with UTM SE here. The powerful CPU/GPU are so severely crippled by iPadOS that a 27 year old OS runs slower on it, than it used to, back then.

Again, this is not what the iPad is built for, so my fault for expecting this.

Mouse/Keyboard

The iPadOS technically does support mice, but the experience is severely crippled (stupid round shaped pointer, jumping from element to element, no pointer acceleration).

My frustrations with the external keyboard experience on the iPad is unrivalled. It would keep capitalising the first alphabet of each new sentence, even for things like URLs etc. You can disable this globally, but then it also gets disabled for the on-screen keyboard.

Correction – I found a way to disable this, just for the hardware keyboard.

Disable Auto Correct for Hardware Keyboard on iPad
Disable Auto Correct for Hardware Keyboard on iPad

Web Browsing

Every time I try to scroll up to the top of my WordPress post compose page too fast, it refreshes the whole page and I lose gobs of data. Strangely, this problem didn’t exist on the Magic Mouse 2.

Many websites are not optimised for Safari on iPad. Eg. WordPress hyperlink popup doesn’t show the save option (Is hidden below the window).

Wordpress hyperlink popup on Safari, iPad
WordPress hyperlink popup on Safari, iPad

Wordress also frequently gets stuck on saving a post with the page unresponsive and the button greyed out.

Wordpress stuck autosaving, Safari iPadOS
WordPress stuck autosaving, Safari iPadOS

Basic Text Editing

I discovered this one when recently trying to make a small change to an HTML file. To open an html file from files, you need a 3rd party option and there are no good free ones. They either all require you to pay or have loads of intrusive ads.

Don’t blame developers for this, they have to go via Apple’s App Store and hence pay fees to Apple, why should they release apps, even basic for free?

Eventually I settled on the excellent Runestone Text Editor.

GitHub

I know, I know, the iPad is not meant for application development. But all I wanted to do was upload my website landing page, some 200 files in different folders.

I was horrified when I found out that there’s no support for uploading multiple files and folders to GitHub from the files app. GitHub’s iPad app is just a glorified mobile app, not the Desktop equivalent.

Working Copy to the rescue, which is paid, but very powerful.

Proper File Management

Recently I transferred 400GB of data from mega to my NAS. Although the Files app does have basic file management, I couldn’t find a way to get all 400GB to my iPad to further transfer to the NAS.

Mega (Like most other file sharing apps) does support the connector in the files app, but the experience is buggy at best and times out after a few GBs and needs to be started from scratch.

Eventually, I had to use my daughter’s notebook to get it done. She laughed at me.

Proper Photos management

The only reason I got the 512GB variant of the iPad was because I wanted to store all my photos offline and in case Apple terminated my account for some reason, I would be able to export everything out. However, the only way to export all the photos from the Photos app is to start selecting photos and hold your finger at the bottom of the app for more than an hour for it to select all the photos.

The fun part? Even when you manage to do that, export fails and it knocks you out of the selection mode to start again from scratch.

What, then?

Switch to a Macbook? Even that doesn’t tick all the boxes.

TaskiPad ProMacBook
Reading Books/MagazinesExcellentPoor
Watching VideosExcellentAverage
Virtual MachinesPoorExcellent
Mouse/KeyboardPoorExcellent
Web BrowsingAverageExcellent
Text EditingAverageExcellent
File ManagementAverageExcellent
Photo ManagementAverageExcellent
DisplayExcellentAverage

I really don’t want to also buy a Macbook to complement or replace the $2000 iPad Pro.

My opinion is that if not for the Pro Motion (120Hz) Display, the iPad Air is perfectly sufficient for most purposes and there’s very little market for the Pro model.

I can just hope that iPadOS matures enough to do some basic computing tasks in the future and makes use of the powerful hardware.

Mickey 17

My Expectations : 6/10
My Rating : 7/10

Mickey 17 (2025) on IMDb

The most recent movie I watched is Mickey 17. I had read the reviews, so walked in with low expectations.

Robert Pattinson plays Mickey Barnes, a dumb loser who cannot do anything right. He joins a space colonisation mission organised by a cult leader Kenneth Marshall (Mark Ruffalo), in a bid to escape debt collectors. In the mission, he has the role of an expendable, which means he is assigned increasingly dangerous and fatal tasks. When he dies (mostly in very painful ways), his body is 3D printed and his memories restored from backup.

Each of his clones, till Mickey 17 are identical to the previous Mickey incarnation. However, when they print Mickey 18, assuming Mickey 17 is dead (he’s not, just left for dead), the consciousness of the 18th iteration diverges. Unlike the Mickeys before him, Mickey 18 is assertive and strong-willed. When they both come across each other, hijinks ensue.

Mark Ruffalo’s character as a genocidal cult leader is a bit over the top and hard to digest. Naomi Ackie as Nasha Barridge, Mickey’s girlfriend was my favourite character from the movie. The remaining characters are all forgettable.

Overall, even though the premise of the movie is interesting, the story does not feel coherent with random things happening; a far departure from Bong Joon Ho‘s most well-known work, Parasite. Most characters are not very well fleshed out and often do contradictory things. Pattinson’s acting is not notable.

However, there are still fun moments in the movie, like when Nasha tries to to initiate a threesome with both the Mickeys. Marshall’s wife’s obsession with creating the perfect “sauce” based on increasingly bizarre ingredients is also noteworthy.

Overall, I can’t recommend this to anyone except Sci-Fi fans.

Cloudflare

I had dabbled with CDN before (LiteSpeed, Jetpack), but a recent requirement around my NAS required me to move my DNS service to Cloudflare. So I thought, why not use their CDN, too and compare the before and after performances?

For web traffic, you can use Cloudflare in two modes

  1. DNS only
  2. DNS plus Proxy

As the names say, the first option uses Cloudflare servers as your authoritative name servers, but your traffic goes straight to your original server. There’s no caching and there’s no CDN.

Turning on the proxy is where the real benefits are supposed to be visible. I used their free plan for testing.

As you can see, I used various tools to test the difference in performance.

Network Latency

Being a network engineer, the first thing I tested was network latency difference between my web server and Cloudflare’s proxy.

I tested from Thailand, and as expected, Cloudflare’s proxy has significantly lower latency compared to my web server, which is based in the US. The benefits may be lower if tested from the US itself.

Pings to domain resolving to web serverPings to domain resolving to Cloudflare’s proxy
Web Server vs Cloudflare proxy Proxy Ping Results

Average 224ms latency vs 36ms.

This means that my users can experience better Round Trip Times to my website globally by connecting to their nearest CDN, instead of all focusing on one server in the US.

But ping is only part of the story. For real-life results, I used the below tools.

I ran all the tests raw with Cloudflare paused and WordPress plugin disabled. Then I re-ran the tests again, one day after enabling both.

Google PageSpeed Insights

Google PageSpeed Insights is an important tool, especially because Google uses this score as a metric to calculate its search engine Page Rankings. It is a bit simplistic, as in it doesn’t let you select a source server. But it does show results for both mobile and desktop.

Google PageSpeed Insights Mobile RawGoogle PageSpeed Insights Mobile Cloudflare
Google Pagespeed Insights Mobile, Raw vs Cloudflare
Google PageSpeed Insights Desktop RawGoogle PageSpeed Insights Desktop Cloudflare
Google Pagespeed Insights Desktop, Raw vs Cloudflare
Google PageSpeed Insights Desktop RawGoogle PageSpeed Insights Desktop Cloudflare

As you can see, there’s a minimal performance gain, which makes sense because Google’s servers are likely in the US, similar to mine.

DebugBear

DebugBear is similar to Google, but also shows a helpful graph of the different activities happening during your page load. Again, only US is available as a location for free.

DebugBear Mobile RawDebugBear Mobile Cloudflare
DebugBear Mobile, Raw vs Cloudflare
DebugBear Desktop RawDebugBear Desktop Cloudflare
DebugBear Desktop, Raw vs Cloudflare
DebugBear Mobile RawDebugBear Mobile Cloudflare
DebugBear Desktop RawDebugBear Desktop Cloudflare

As you can see, there’s an insignificant decrease in the load score for mobile, although desktop being perfect to begin with couldn’t be improved on.

Solarwinds Pingdom

Pingdom has an advantage over the last 2 tools in that it allows you to select a server location to test from. I chose Australia, being far from USA.

Pingdom rawPingdom Cloudflare
Solarwinds Pingdom, Raw vs Cloudflare
Pingdom rawPingdom Cloudflare

As you can see, there’s an insignificant amount of decrease in Pingdom’s score, but the load time and the number of requests are down significantly.

Wattspeed

Wattspeed’s lighthouse tool allows you to test for Desktop and Mobile separately, but doesn’t let you select a source server.

Wattspeed Lighthouse Mobile RawWattspeed Lighthouse Mobile Cloudflare
Wattspeed Lighthouse Mobile, Raw vs Cloudflare
Wattspeed lighthouse desktop RawWattspeed Lighthouse Desktop Cloudflare
Wattspeed Lighthouse Desktop, Raw vs Cloudflare

Significant increase in scores for both Desktop and Mobile.

Overall Verdict

Test ToolRaw ResultsCloudflare Results
Google PageSpeed (M)80/10084/100
Google PageSpeed (D)99/10099/100
DebugBear (M)71/10091/100
DebugBear (D)100/100100/100
Pingdom75/10074/100
Wattspeed (M)82/10099/100
Wattspeed (D)76/10084/100

The verdict is clear, in most cases, Cloudflare provides significant and measure-able improvements in page load times. Considering that the service is absolutely free, it is a no-brainer to use it.

However, performance benefits are not the only advantages

  1. Cloudflare will stop DDoS attacks on your website.
  2. Cloudflare allows you to set up firewall rules to block certain traffic to your website (eg on the basis of geolocation).
  3. Even if your website ever goes down, Cloudflare can continue exposing your website from its cache.

Retro Computing: Epic Fail!

Continuing from the last post, we continue with my attempts to host Retro Computing VMs. However, there has been a change around how I host my VMs.

As I mentioned before, the performance running VMs on UTM SE sucks balls. No fault of the app itself, the problem is around the artificial limitations imposed by Apple on iPadOS. So I decided to find another way to run them.

Microsoft Azure Dv3-Series

I recently found out that service like Google Compute Engine and Microsoft Azure support nested virtualization. Basically you can run VMs inside the VMs they provide you. Due to my aversion to Google, I chose Azure.

Signing up for Azure’s free tier was pretty painless (If you don’t count opening each link within their portal in a new tab). Although, a few terms are a bit technical and require doing a bit more research.

I chose the below starting specs for my parent VM:

Zone: Asia Pacific (Central India)
OS: Windows Server 2022 Datacenter Edition
CPU: 2 vCores
RAM: 8Gb
Disk
: HDD 32Gb, 500 IOPS, 60Mbps

*I chose Central India as the Datacenter, because I also wanted to use this VM to access Indian websites, geolocked outside India.

It was a bit technical getting Nested Virtualization enabled.

I used the Windows app to remote-in to the parent VM and installed Oracle Virtual Box to host my child VMs. Luckily, the Windows app supports transfer of files from the iPad to the VM, but it is painfully slow (400-700 KBps).

Slow file copy via the Windows iPad app
Slow file copy via the Windows iPad app

Eventually, I ditched this approach, because

  1. The on-going costs were more than I was willing to spend on this project (Especially because there is no way to accurately predict how much you will be charged)
  2. There was no sound emulation

Synology Virtual Machine Manager

Synology Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) is Synology’s (mostly) free Hypervisor that can be installed on its DSM platform. Since my newest NAS now supports this, the next step was to run my Retro VMs on it.

The software is quite powerful and except clustering, almost all the features are free.

However, the Hypervisor doesn’t seem to be optimised to run such old OSes. I could get the Windows 98 installation to complete, but I couldn’t get the OS to boot however much I tried.

It was safe to assume even older OSes like Windows 95 and Windows 3.1 would never work. So I gave up.

My Retro Computing plans are on hold for the time being.

Synology DS224+ NAS

I know, I know. I got the Synology DS223j just a month ago. However, I ran across a pretty un-surmountable roadblock with it. It can’t run Virtual machines, which I really want to do. So I returned it and got a Synology DS224+ instead, even though it meant having a device with an Intel Processor.

The first thing I noticed moving from the DS223j to the DS224+ is how much uglier it is.

While the DS223j was beautiful and elegant, the DS224+ is an ugly block which has no business being on a living room shelf.

Anyway, function over form. And functionally, the DS224+ is superior to the DS23j in almost every way.

The first thing you will notice is that the DS224+ is entirely tool-less. No need to open the entire chassis to plug in the hard disks. The front cover pops out and you can just slot the hard drives in. Also, the drives are hot-swappable.

I think not opening the chassis is good in a way that you don’t accidentally nick critical components fiddling around its insides with a screw driver.

The second big upgrade is that you can bump up the (2GB) RAM by an additional 4GB, bringing it up to 6GB. The additional RAM allows the Synology to run VMs, among other things.

While the RAM utilisation on the DS223j was always hovering between the 60-80% marks, the DS224+ mostly stays below 20% with my standard applications (DSM, Plex, HomeBridge, Download Center etc) running.

The NAS also comes with an extra USB 3.0 port, an additional ethernet port (10/100/1000) and a one touch USB copy feature, none of which I care for.

My biggest surprise was that I found the DS224+ to run cooler than the DS223j (Based on the un-scientific measure of the warmth of air exiting its backside). Especially, because going from an ARM processor to an x86/64 processor, I expected exactly the opposite.

A quick comparison on Synology’s website confirms that not only does the DS224+ consumes less power, it also emits less heat under load.

But why is that? Isn’t the ARM architecture known for its power efficiency? A Quick Look at the processor specs doesn’t make things any clearer.

NASCPUSpecifications
DS223jRealtek RTD1619B12nm process, 5W TDP
DS224+Intel Celeron J412514nm process, 10W TDP

Clearly, the ARM CPU is manufactured using a newer process and has half the TDP of the Intel. This means that either the remaining power consumption is from the other NAS components or that the software is not as optimised for the ARMv8 architecture.

Or that the Realtek chip is actually quite inefficient and running closer to its TDP for the same loads.

Either ways, I tried a few days, but couldn’t get used to how ugly the DS224+ was, so I returned it and went back to DS223j.

Bumrungrad Race to Heal 2025

Continuing my series, this is about my first race of 2025, in an event called Bumrungrad Race to Heal 2025. All the proceeds from this race went to charity, so I was keen on participating.

I was quite excited for this race because having done a sub-1 hour 10k before, I wanted to see if I could do it again.

I left home by grab bike at 5:00 AM. The race was in the beautiful Queen SiriKit Park at Chatuchak, Bangkok. The park has long, winding running tracks and beautiful lakes. It was a treat watching the sun rise here.

This race was comparatively small scale compared to most others I have participated in.

I was able to maintain a decent sub-6 minute pace for most of the run. Unfortunately, I forgot to start & end the run on my watch on time, so couldn’t gauge my performance immediately. However, I checked the official race records after I got home and was pleased to see that I had improved my time further.

Bumrungrad Race to Heal 2025 10k finisher certificate
Bumrungrad Race to Heal 10k finisher certificate

With each passing race, I feel fitter and more confident.

I came home by MRT. Overall, a great start to running in 2025.

Wanderlust: Day trip to Saeng Chan Beach

Continuing my series, this is my latest road trip, to Saeng Chan beach in Rayong province.

It was my birthday and after a rough month on the personal front, I seriously needed a break. What better to relieve sadness than a motorcycle trip to the beach?

Total Distance: Approx 380 km

Phrom Phong, Bangkok to Saeng Chan Beach, Rayong
Phrom Phong, Bangkok to Saeng Chan Beach, Rayong

The initial part of the ride is nothing special, same as Pattaya which I have already covered here and here. Industrial highway with lots of traffic and a different stink every kilometre.

I left at 4:30 in the morning and it was dark, cold and miserable.

I made good time and saw the sun rise somewhere in Chonburi.

By the time I reached Rayong, the sun was out. The area around Saeng Chan beach is surrounded by beautiful canals.

The beach was mostly deserted at 07:00, so I spent some time in peace.

The beach has a unique shape, forming moon-shaped pools every few meters.

Unique shape of Saeng Chan Beach
Unique shape of Saeng Chan Beach

Spotted a nice lighthouse.

I needed to be back home by noon, so I left soon to grab a coffee at this cafe.

On the way back, I drove in a more leisurely manner. I spotted this interesting resort with different sections in different aeroplanes.

As expected, I took a wrong turn and accidentally entered Motorway 7, the enemy of motorcycles and had to back-track the wrong way.

All in all, a decent and relaxing trip.

Synology DS223j NAS

Recently, I had been looking to move my pirated media away from the Mega + Infuse combo (Mega had been throttling transfers, causing choppy videos). Additionally, I was paying monthly subscription fees for both. So I decided to move everything to a NAS. My main requirement was for the NAS to not be based on x86-64 architecture and especially not an Intel processor. After a tight battle with the TerraMaster F2-212 and ASUS Drivestor 2, I decided to go with the Synology DS223j.

Even though the TerraMaster and Asustor provided more value for money and in some cases more features (Hot swappable drives, 2.5Gbps ethernet expansion), Synology won me over with their superior software and cloud-based backend.

Overall, few weeks later, I don’t regret getting the Synology DS223j at all.

NAS doing NAS-ing
NAS doing its NAS-ing

Storage

The first action after ordering the NAS was to order the drive(s).
I didn’t need much storage space, but I did need redundancy, so I went with 2x2TB drives.

DriveCapacitySpinR/W SpeedCache
Seagate IronWolf
S2000VN003
2TB5400 RPM180MB/s256MB
WD Red Plus
WD20EFPX
2TB5400 RPM175MB/s512MB

Following best practice, I got 2 drives with similar performance numbers, but different models, as I didn’t want them to fail around the same time. This happens especially if you buy 2 drives of the same model from the same batch.

The DS223j does not support hot swap of drives, you need to open up the NAS chassis and install the drives using screws.

For redundancy, I chose Synology Hybrid RAID, which works well enough.

Synology DSM 7

Synology DSM is a web based interface to access your NAS. It is extremely intuitive and powerful. The first time it needs to be accessed using the local IP; once signed in to the Synology account, you can access it via Synology’s cloud-based web app (QuickConnect).

Although Quickconnect can allow inbound connections to your server natively using UPnP, I strongly recommend keeping that disabled on your router and using manual port forwarding rules, instead. It can also check if you configured your router correctly or not.

The Control Panel lets you configure almost any aspect of the NAS, I didn’t have to login using the Linux Terminal even once.

There was a short learning curve over a few days to understand what “storage space”, “volume”, “shared folders” meant and I was able to settle down on the configuration in a few days.It even lets you adjust the brightness of the LEDs on the front of the unit and auto-change them during different times of the day. (The Blue Power LED is especially irritating early mornings).

Next, its time to install apps.

Media Server-1 : Plex

Media sharing was the primary reason for getting the NAS. I created a separate encrypted Shared Folder to store my media on.

I spent sme time researching and comparing Plex, Jellyfin and Emby. I installed Plex because the Pros outweighed the cons

Plex Pros
  1. Functional, powerful settings
  2. Fast Library scanning
  3. Cloud/Plex Account based connectivity <—Some self-hosting purists would consider this a con
  4. Accurate metadata retrieval
  5. Natively installable from Synology Package Manager
Plex Cons
  1. Hardware transcoding does not support ARMv8 processors.
  2. Hardware transcoding is a paid feature.
  3. Interface is cluttered, Plex tries to shove its streaming services down your throat (Can get around this by using A 3rd party client like Infuse)
  4. Plex Relay is massively bandwidth limited, even with a paid subscription. Without this, need to pay for a public IP and also setup port forwarding.
  5. Plex can see what you have and what you’re watching.

Once installed, the web interface is enabled. You only need to use the local web interface once to sign in to your Plex account. Further access can be via Plex’s cloud-based web app.

Although Plex can allow inbound connections to your server natively using UPnP, I strongly recommend keeping that disabled on your router and using manual port forwarding rules, instead.

It can also check if you configured your router correctly or not.

Streaming performance is great even without transcoding. I never saw the CPU go above 30% when streaming, nor did I experience skipping and buffering.

Media Server-2. : Jellyfin

I also installed Jellyfin to test it against Plex.

Jellyfin Pros
  1. Completely open source
  2. Completely free
  3. No requirement to have a JellyFin account (The connection is directly between the client and the NAS)
Jellyfin Cons
  1. Indexing is slow and painful.
  2. Movie/V Show matching is not as accurate as Plex
  3. Requires more technical involvement to get it working
  4. Since there’s no cloud component, you have to manually choose between a local connection and an internet-based connection (Some may consider this a Pro)

On Synology, the easiest way to get Jellyfin up and running is as below:

  1. Install Jellyfin from Synocommuity using this guide
  2. Enable https access for Jellyin
    • Set up Dynamic DNS and SSL certificate using this guide
    • Set up reverse proxy on DSM and point it to Jellyfin using this guide

On clients, you can install the Swiftfin client. However, there’s a catch:

  1. For devices like TVs, you will obviously connect to Jellyfin server using your local IP
  2. For mobile devices like iPhone/iPad, the switching is not automatic (Like Plex). When on the same network, you need to connect (over http) using the local IP, when outside, need to connect (over https) using the dynamic DNS name set up previously. I didn’t bother and set up the WAN connection permanently. This means even when I am at home, I am streaming over the internet.

The interface is cleaner than Plex, as in it is not trying to shove its own services down your throat.

Eventually I found Plex to be a better match for me and got rid of Jellyfin.

Private Cloud : Synology Drive

Having a second backup of all my photos (First backup is on iClown) was the other reason for buying the NAS.

The NAS comes pre-installed with Synology Cloud Sync, which can automatically sync with a public cloud. I would have preferred this way, but unfortunately, iCloud is not among the list of supported clouds (The fault is likely on Apple’s side for locking down their ecosystem). So I decided to use my iPad to backup photos from my iCloud to the NAS.

Now, there’re two apps which you can use to backup your photos From your iDevice to your NAS – Synology Drive and Synology Photos. Synology Drive works quite like the Google Drive and OneDrive apps; it can be used for file management and backup. Synology Photos, on the other hand focuses on photos and can also act like a media gallery. Both can backup photos equally well and do, to the same location on the NAS. Both apps are quite well built and designed.

I wanted to treat my photos as files and didn’t want the photo management features, so I went with Synology Drive.

The options to backup files and photos are quite extensive.

The app automatically backs up new photos in the background, but this process is quite throttled because of Apple’s restrictions. For the first upload, there’s a special focussed backup mode which can keep the app in the foreground, but lower the screen brightness. Using this, I was able to upload all 18000 photos and videos overnight.

Backing up files and documents is a more manual process. You need to frequently copy your files to a dedicated sync folder and the app syncs them from there on.

Synology Drive sync task settings
Synology Drive sync task settings

Apart from requiring manual sync every few days, your device also needs to store 2 copies of each file, which is not ideal. Luckily, it takes less than 10 minutes to upload <20GB of documents (~1800 files).

It’s also a waste of bandwidth, because it synced and overwrites everything, every time, not just changes.

Local Storage : SMB

For local storage and backup, I debated between SMB and AFP. Although AFP did provide faster transfer speeds, I went with SMB because of dwindling support for the former.

DSM provides granular control for multiple users, allowing you to choose which user can access which part of the file system. Eg, I created a separate account for my daughter and assigned a file storage quota on a dedicated shared folder for her MacBook to make nightly automatic backups using Time Machine.

IoT Management : Homebridge

Homebridge allows your NAS to emulate itself as an Apple HomeKit bridge, which further allows you to see non-HomeKit accessories in your Home app. The app is completely open source, and so are the plugins. Ideally you need 1 plugin for each non-HomeKit device you have. I used the below plugins

PluginDeviceData Supported
Homebridge LG ThinQLG ThinQ Washing machine1. Operational Status
2. Door Lock status
Homebridge MiotMI 3C Air Purifier1. Operational Status
2. Mode Toggle (Auto/Sleep/Full)
3. PM2.5 level
4. Temperature
5. Relative Humidity
6. Fan speed control

There are thousands of plugins available, covering almost every vendor of smart home devices.

Unlike Plex, Homebridge is not natively available in the Synology Package Manager, you need to add a new repository and install from there.

Your IoT devices need to have a consistent IP address on the local network, I suggest setting up DHCP binding on your router. Some of the plugins have quite an involved process of adding devices, but thankfully it is a one time thing. Once done, the data from your accessories will appear in the Homebridge UI.

Homebridge showing data from IOT
Homebridge showing data from IOT

Once you add your Homebridge as a HomeKit bridge in your Apple Home, the data is further relayed to the Home app on all your devices.

The experience is not as seamless as native HomeKit devices and this is not what I bought the NAS for, but it was a pleasant bonus, nonetheless.

Antivirus : Antivirus Essential

Antivirus Essential is Synology’s antivirus solution. I am not sure how effective it is, but it is a pain to run the first time. The first “full scan” took 4 days with the NAS too busy to do almost anything else during that time. Even the first time update of virus definitions takes hours.

Thankfully, if you enable “smart scan”, subsequent scans are much faster (Around an hour).

Probably the performance is much better on more powerful units.

Download Manager : Download Station

Download Station is Synology’s web based download manager. For a first party app, it is quite powerful. It can download files from a wide variety of URLs & P2P file types.

You can even download using RSS feeds. It is not as powerful as some dedicated clients, but it is good enough that I don’t use a 3rd party utility.

It even supports eMule!

Third Molar Extraction

During my adolescent years, the third molars in my lower jaw came out crooked. Because of food getting stuck in the space between the second molar and the third, I used to suffer regular bouts of Pericoronitis which was annoying. After years of annoyance and advice from dentists to take them out, I finally decided to do so, late last year.

I had actually considered doing it a few times before, but always chickened out. This time, I decided to go ahead with it. I did this at my regular Dental clinic, Smile Seasons.

Impacted Third Molar of the Lower Jaw
Impacted Third Molar of the Lower Jaw

The Process

The first step is to X-Ray the mouth. After that, they were able to tell me that the upper molar can come out via regular extraction, but the lower one would require surgical extraction. I decided to get the left side done first.

After copious amounts of anaesthetic, they wiggled out the upper molar in five minutes. It was a bit scary but painless; I thought my jaw would snap from the pressure. The feeling of the tooth cracking away from the jaw was horrible.

The lower third molar didn’t go so easy. They had to break it apart and it came out in pieces. The root was quite sensitive and they had to keep giving me anaesthesia. It took a long time for it to come all out, while my lips were being stretched like a rubber band. I was relieved when she said it’s done and started applying the stitches. I was already stressed about repeating this for the right side in a few months.

The Aftermath

Recovery Phase 1- First 24 hours

I left the dental clinic with a bunch of painkillers and antibiotics and the left half of my mouth drooling. I was foolish enough to think I won’t need the painkillers, and I was in for a rude shock soon. Once the anaesthesia wore off, there were so many pains, I had to count

  1. Stabbing pain in the empty sockets – 8/10
  2. Burning pain in the gums of adjacent teeth – 8/10
  3. On and off cramps in the jaw muscles (Couldn’t open the mouth properly) – 6/10
  4. Pain in the neck – 6/10
  5. Dull pain and swelling in the lips – 5/10
  6. Dull pain in the front teeth – 4/10

Ibuprofen : 3
Paracetamol : 1
Diet : None

Thankfully, after taking the painkillers, most of the pain turned dull. Remembering the doctor’s instructions, I was careful not to spit the continuous bleeding out, but rather swallow it (And also because I am not from Uttar Pradesh). Tried having an ice cream, but couldn’t finish it.

By evening, I was tired of the ever-present taste of blood in my mouth and could not wait to go to sleep. I didn’t brush my teeth.

Sleep was not very peaceful. Kept waking up and had bad dreams.

Woke up next morning with my mouth feeling like a morgue, full of congealed blood. I also realised that my lymph nodes were swollen (Looked like a ping pong ball protruding from my neck) and I couldn’t swallow without pain. Also, the trauma activated a painful cold sore on my lip.

Recovery Phase 2- Days 2 to 7

ItemDay 2Day 3Day 4Day 5Day 6Day 7
Neck/Throat Pain5/102/101/101/10
Tooth pain5/104/103/102/102/101/10
Lip Pain5/103/101/101/10
Jaw Movement10%10%15%20%25%40%
Ibuprofen22211
Paracetamol11
DietLiquidSemi SolidSemi SolidSolidSolidSolid

Overall, there was quit a lot of improvement in the first couple of days, after which it kind of plateaued out.

On Day 2, in the afternoon, I developed a low grade fever which went away with Paracetamol. Swallowing was painful but the tooth was more or less OK. I started brushing my teeth on the other side.

On Day 3, woke up feeling a bit better. Lymph nodes were less painful, although still had swelling. Had more or less a normal day, except for the diet.

On Day 4, Tried eating normally, but the jaw just won’t open. The food kept falling off the spoon. Went out for lunch, but got discouraged and ate in for dinner.

On Days 5-6, I started exercising my jaw, pushing it gently to open more. By evening of Day 6, I was quite demotivated by the lack of improvement

Day 7, was the first day in a week when I woke up feeling anything close to normal. My spirits immediately lifted.

Recovery Phase 3- Week 2 onwards

On Day 8, I started running again and went to the dentist to get the stitches taken out. I was relieved to hear that I don’t have a dry socket. After the stitches went, I felt a release of pressure from my gums and over the next few hours, the remaining pain went away.

Over the next few days, the jaw became more and more loose, and I went back to regular food.

By the end of week 2, everything was 95% back to normal.

By the end of week 3, everything was 99% back to normal and I considered my recovery more or less complete.

Repeat, Right side

Last month, I repeated the procedure on the teeth on the right side. Luckily, it went much better than the left

  1. There was very little neck/throat/jaw pain
  2. The pain in the teeth/gums was much less

Unfortunately, I had to get the twitches taken out in India and the dentist was brutal; tugged on the stitches and gums till I had tears in my eyes.

Tip : During recovery, stay away from things that can make you sneeze. Restarts bleeding and increases the pain a lot.

For anyone considering this procedure, don’t watch the video below, or you may end up changing your mind (Like I did last year).

My TV Shows of 2024

I thought I would do a yearly version of this article. Below are the TV shows I started watching in 2024, TV shows I stopped watching in 2024 and TV shows I tried to watch but couldn’t. Also, TV shows I continued to watch this year.

Shows I tried but couldn’t get into

  1. Futurama (Hulu) <– Lame
  2. Frasier (Paramount+) <– Lame
  3. Modern Family (Disney+Hotstar) <–Liked initially, but got bored and abandoned after a few seasons

TV Shows I started watching

  1. Severance (Apple TV+) <–The best show I saw in recent years
  2. Avatar the Last Airbender (Netflix) <–Above average
  3. 3 Body Problem (Netflix) <–Excellent
  4. Fallout (Amazon Prime) <–Excellent
  5. Constellation (Apple TV+) <–Average
  6. Dark Matter (Apple TV+) <–Above average
  7. Shrinking (Apple TV+) <–Excellent

Shows I continued to watch

  1. True Detective (HBO) <–Excellent
  2. For all Mankind (Apple TV+) <–Average
  3. Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (Apple TV+) <–Average
  4. Fargo (FX) <–Above average
  5. Young Sheldon (CBS) <–Excellent
  6. Curb your enthusiasm (HBO) <–Average
  7. Aspirants (Amazon Prime) <–Above average
  8. Silo (Apple TV+) <–Excellent
  9. The Boys (Amazon Prime) <–Excellent
  10. Mirzapur (Amazon Prime) <–Above average

TV Shows I re-watched

  1. Michael Palin’s New Europe (BBC)
  2. Brazil with Michael Palin (BBC)

TV Shows I stopped watching

  1. Tulsa King (Paramount+)

Overall, I feel I discovered many great TV shows this year. 2 shows (Severance & Shrinking) that I tried, but couldn’t get into last year, turned out to be some of the best ever.

Overall, I feel Apple TV+ is coming out with a lot of great content suitable to my tastes.

PS: I use trakt to track my TV show viewings.

Earth bound misfit, I