Rick Gouin

Make Your Own METAR Weather Map

· Rick Gouin

This is kind of like COVID sourdough bread for pilots.  Seems like many of us undertook this fun project to keep us busy during COVID.  As usual, I was a little behind the trend and just finished mine.  I’m going to write up how I did mine, hopefully it will help make yours come out better!  If you are stopping by because you made a METAR map and it recently stopped working, scroll to the bottom for instructions to fix it. ** UPDATED 10/06/2025 *** What is a METAR Map?  METAR is a format for reporting weather information, and its […]

Move an Existing VM into AWS EC2

· Rick Gouin
AWS Logo

You want to move a VM into AWS EC2 with as little knowledge as possible, right?  You don’t care to become an expert in AWS, you just want enough to get the job done.  Here is what you have to do, how to do it, and how long it will take. Time it: For a 15GB VM, this entire guide can take up to 4hrs to complete, depending on connection speed and VM size.  Most of that time is waiting on uploads and conversions. I’m going to assume: You already have an AWS root account.  If not, follow this guide […]

New PowerStore in the Lab!

· Rick Gouin

As I mentioned here, we were beta testers for the Dell PowerStore all-flash storage array.  We tested everything from initial imaging of the array as either a Model T or Model X all the way to importing external storage arrays.  We really enjoyed having the opportunity to get our hands on the gear early, and appreciated getting ahead of the release so we were ready to answer customer questions on day 1.  Eventually, they made us give that beta array back to them (the nerve!)  and we were all sad to see it go. The empty rack space was taunting […]

Dell PowerStore Part 2!

· Rick Gouin

In the last segment, we went over PowerStore hardware. This time, we are going to dig into some more of the features, functionality, and capabilities of this newest midrange all flash storage array from Dell. The Basics: RAIDPowerStore supports RAID 5, and you can choose from one of two different stripe widths. 4+1 or 8+1. Thats it! Hope you weren’t thinking about using double parity on those 15TB flash drives. This old school RAID underpinning will have an impact on how you scale the system going forward, so its an important point. These RAID groups are managed as a pool […]

Dell PowerStore Released!

· Rick Gouin

Dell officially announces, releases, and launches their new midrange storage product today. You may have heard rumors about this platform under its code name midrange.next. Today, the product is released as PowerStore, so lets take a minute and talk details! I was happy to participate in the beta program several months ago, so I’ve already gotten up close and personal with the array. Lets start at the top, because there is a lot to unpack here. First, there are 2 distinct versions, the PowerStore X and the PowerStore T. Within each of these are separate models. I’ll get into what […]