Discover how a simple experiment with virtual machines on a gaming PC can spiral into a full-blown homelab hobby. A personal story of accidental tech passion.

It’s funny how hobbies happen.

You don’t usually wake up one day and decide, “I’m going to dedicate a significant portion of my free time and closet space to this new, complex activity.” It rarely works like that.

For me, it started with a simple thought while sitting at my gaming PC: “I wonder if I can run a different operating system without actually installing it.”

The First Step is Always a Virtual One

That’s where it began. Not with a grand plan, but with a piece of software called a Virtual Machine, or VM. It’s basically a computer inside your computer. I spun up a simple Linux VM on my gaming rig just to poke around and learn something new. It felt safe. If I broke it, I could just delete the VM and my main PC would be fine.

Then I got an idea. I could use a VM to run a private server for a game my friends and I were playing. It worked! For a while. Then I wanted to set up a media server, something like Plex, so I could watch my movies from any device. So, I spun up another VM.

Soon, my powerful gaming PC was spending most of its time running background tasks. And I started to notice. My games would stutter. The fans were always running. The machine that was supposed to be for fun felt more like it was doing chores.

The Tipping Point

The moment of truth came during a gaming session with friends. My PC froze, the game crashed, and it was because the media server was working too hard in the background. That was it. I needed my gaming PC back.

But I didn’t want to give up my new server projects. They were actually useful. And more than that, they were fun to manage.

So, I started looking for a solution. I figured I’d get a small, cheap, used computer to run my services separately. I went online, and that’s when I fell down the rabbit hole. I discovered a whole community of people who do this. They call it “homelabbing.”

These people weren’t just running a couple of VMs on an old Dell. They were building dedicated home servers, sometimes even full server racks, to run all sorts of interesting and powerful software.

My Accidental Hobby

Fast forward a year. That single, used computer has… multiplied.

What started as a way to get my gaming PC back has turned into my favorite hobby. I now have a dedicated machine (okay, a few machines) that handle everything:

• Our media server: The whole family uses it now.
• A network-wide ad blocker: No more ads on any device connected to our Wi-Fi. It’s amazing.
• A personal cloud: I host my own files, so I don’t have to pay for Dropbox or Google Drive.
• Automation tools: Little programs I’m learning to write that do things like organize files for me.

It sounds complicated, and sometimes it is. But it’s the most satisfying puzzle I’ve ever worked on. Every little success, every new service I get running, feels like a huge win. It’s a practical way to learn about networking, cybersecurity, and how the internet actually works.

So be careful. Your next great hobby might be hiding inside a simple, innocent thought. It might start with just one virtual machine, but it rarely ends there. And honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Discover a clever way to use a portable power station with a UPS for a flexible, long-lasting backup power solution for your home network.

It All Started with a Simple Rule

I have a cardinal rule for my basement: keep things off the floor.

It’s a simple rule, born from the universal fear of water heaters letting go or a freak storm overwhelming a sump pump. So, when I was rearranging my home server rack recently, my main goal was just that—get my gear up and organized.

In the middle of the shuffle, I tried something on a whim. I grabbed my portable power station, a Bluetti AC70, and slid it onto an empty rack-mount shelf. It fit perfectly. Like, perfectly. It was one of those small, satisfying moments of accidental organization.

But what started as a simple tidying-up exercise quickly turned into a much smarter power backup strategy for my whole house.

More Than Just a Big Battery

For years, I’ve relied on uninterruptible power supplies (UPSs) to keep my home network and servers safe from blackouts. A UPS is basically a big, heavy battery that kicks in the instant the power goes out. It gives your sensitive electronics a few minutes of juice so they can shut down gracefully instead of crashing.

My main servers are connected to a beefy, traditional UPS. When the power fails, it keeps them running for about a minute and then tells them to shut down. That’s all I need. I don’t need my file server running for hours during a blackout.

But my internet connection? That’s a different story.

Losing power is one thing, but losing internet feels like being stranded on a digital island. I want to be able to check outage maps, get updates, and let family know we’re okay. So, keeping my modem and router online is the real priority.

This is where the portable power station changed everything.

A Smarter, Tiered Power Plan

Here’s the setup I stumbled into, and it works beautifully:

• Layer 1: The Servers. The big, old-school UPS handles the power-hungry servers. Its only job is to provide a safe, orderly shutdown.
• Layer 2: The Internet. The portable power station, sitting neatly on its new shelf, now powers the critical stuff: the modem and router. Because these devices use very little power, the Bluetti can keep them running for about three hours.

This two-layer system is great, but there was one problem to solve. My Bluetti is a fantastic portable power pack, but it isn’t a “smart” UPS. It can’t talk to my other systems or tell them to shut down.

So, I kept a small, basic APC UPS in the loop. This little guy is now the designated “canary in the coal mine.” It’s plugged in with the Bluetti, and its only job is to signal my network when the main power has actually failed. The Bluetti handles the long-haul power, and the small UPS handles the communication.

It’s the best of both worlds.

The Real Win: Flexibility

Here’s the best part of this whole setup.

A traditional UPS is a one-trick pony. It’s heavy, it’s bolted into the rack (or sits awkwardly on the floor), and it does one job. You’re not going to haul your server UPS out to the garage to run a power tool.

But a portable power station? Its main job is to be, well, portable.

If I need power for a weekend camping trip, I can just unplug it from the rack and toss it in the car. If I’m working on a project in the backyard, it comes with me. It’s my go-to power source for everything, but its day job is keeping my internet alive during a blackout.

It’s a simple idea, but it solved multiple problems at once. My gear is off the floor, my internet stays on for hours during an outage, and I have a powerful battery I can take anywhere. All because I decided to see if it would fit on a shelf. Sometimes the best solutions are the ones you just stumble upon.

A personal look at my two-year journey building a home server with Unraid, Plex, and Homebridge. Here’s what I used, why, and what I’ve learned along the way.

It’s funny how some projects start. You think it’ll be a weekend thing. A quick fix. Then you blink, and it’s two years later, and that “quick fix” has become the quiet, humming heart of your home. That’s the story of my home server.

It didn’t begin with a grand plan. It started with a frustration I think a lot of us know: digital mess. I had movies and TV shows scattered across a handful of external hard drives. My smart home was a patchwork of different apps that refused to talk to each other. Nothing was centralized. Nothing was simple.

So, I decided to build a central place for everything to live. A digital command center. Two years later, it’s one of the most useful things I own.

The Brains of the Operation: Unraid

The whole setup is built on something called Unraid. If you’re not familiar with it, the simplest way to think about it is as a flexible operating system for a server. Its best feature is how it handles hard drives.

You can mix and match drives of different sizes, which is great when you’re building a system over time. You buy a new drive, you slot it in, and you add it to the pool of storage. It’s perfect for a project that grows as your needs (and your media library) do.

Unraid is the foundation. It runs 24/7, quietly managing the hardware so the fun stuff can work.

What’s It Actually Doing?

So what does this server do all day? It mostly handles two main jobs: being my personal media library and running my smart home.

• Plex: My Own Personal Netflix
  This is probably the most-used part of the whole system. Plex is software that takes all those movie and TV show files, organizes them into a beautiful, easy-to-use library, and lets me stream them to any device, anywhere. It automatically downloads movie posters, cast information, and descriptions. It feels just like Netflix or Disney+, but it’s all my own media. No more hunting for the right external hard drive. I just open the Plex app on my TV, phone, or laptop, and everything is right there.

• Homebridge: Getting My Smart Home to Cooperate
  Have you ever bought a smart plug or light bulb, only to realize it doesn’t work with Apple HomeKit? That’s where Homebridge comes in. It’s a clever little piece of software that acts as a bridge. It takes devices that aren’t natively supported by HomeKit and makes them show up in the Apple Home app. Suddenly, that oddball smart plug or old garage door opener can be controlled with Siri or included in my automated routines. It’s the glue that holds my smart home together.

Backups, Because Peace of Mind is a Feature

The most important job of any server is keeping your data safe. A server without a backup plan is just a disaster waiting to happen.

My approach is pretty straightforward. The main Unraid server holds all the primary data—the media, the software, everything. But I also have separate Network Attached Storage (NAS) drives that serve one purpose: backups.

Periodically, the main server copies everything over to these backup drives. It’s the old 3-2-1 rule in action: three copies of your data, on two different types of media, with one copy off-site (or at least on a separate device). If the main server ever fails, I won’t lose two years of work and collecting.

A Two-Year Journey

This setup didn’t happen overnight. It was a slow burn. It started with one hard drive and a Plex server. Then I added Homebridge to solve a smart home annoyance. As my media library grew, I added more drives. I learned about networking, data integrity, and the quiet satisfaction of building something yourself.

It’s a hobby. There’s always something to tweak, a new app to try, or a better way to organize things. It’s never really “done,” and that’s part of the fun.

If you’re thinking about starting something similar, my only advice is to start small. Solve one problem first. Maybe it’s organizing your photos. Maybe it’s setting up a simple media server. You can build from there. It might just become your favorite project.

Is your always-on home server or NAS using old, power-hungry PC parts? Learn how a simple hardware upgrade can save you money on your electricity bill.

I have a computer that’s on 24/7. It’s my home server—a simple Network Attached Storage (NAS) box that holds all my files, photos, and media. For years, it was built from leftover parts from an old gaming PC. I figured, why not? The parts were free, and they worked.

It wasn’t until recently that I realized this “free” server was quietly costing me money every single month.

The Silent Power Hog in the Corner

My setup wasn’t anything wild. The heart of it was an old Intel i5-3570K processor and a GeForce GTX 970 graphics card. Back in their day, these were solid gaming components. But for an always-on server? They’re dinosaurs.

Here’s the thing about old gaming hardware: it was built for performance, not efficiency. These components draw a surprising amount of power even when they’re just sitting there, doing nothing. This is called idle power consumption.

A server is mostly idle. It’s waiting for you to ask for a file or stream a movie. For maybe 23 hours a day, my NAS was just sitting there, humming away and sipping electricity. But it wasn’t a small sip. It was more of a steady chug.

The GTX 970 graphics card was the main culprit. A NAS doesn’t even need a powerful graphics card. In fact, it barely needs graphics at all. But it was in there because the old i5 processor didn’t have integrated graphics. So, this powerful card, designed to render complex 3D worlds, was spending its retirement doing absolutely nothing… and drawing a lot of power to do it.

Doing the Math

Curiosity finally got the best of me. I started looking up the typical idle power draw for these parts. While it’s different for every system, the numbers were higher than I expected.

Let’s say the old system idled at around 90-100 watts. That doesn’t sound like much, right?

But then you do the math:
* 100 watts x 24 hours = 2,400 watt-hours per day
* 2.4 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per day x 365 days = 876 kWh per year

Depending on where you live, that could be over $100-200 a year. Just for one computer to sit there. I was paying a premium for a service I wasn’t using. That “free” hardware suddenly had a very real running cost.

The Simple, Efficient Fix

So, I decided to upgrade. The goal wasn’t more power; it was less.

I swapped out the old motherboard, CPU, and GPU for something much more modern and modest. I chose a newer, low-power CPU that had integrated graphics. This let me ditch the power-hungry GTX 970 completely. The new processor could handle all the server’s tasks effortlessly while using a fraction of the energy.

The difference was immediate.

• Quieter Operation: Without the big GPU fans, the machine is nearly silent.
• Lower Power Bill: The new setup idles at a much lower wattage, maybe 20-30 watts. That cuts the yearly running cost significantly.
• Better Use of Space: Modern parts are often more compact. After moving everything into a new case, I suddenly had a ton of extra room. It made organizing the storage drives and managing the cables so much easier. Everything runs cooler with the improved airflow.

It all just works. The server does the exact same job it did before, but now it does it quietly and cheaply.

Is Your Old Hardware Costing You?

I think a lot of us have old tech running somewhere in the house. An old laptop acting as a media player, or a dusty desktop repurposed for backups. We set it up and forget about it.

But power efficiency has come a long way in the last decade. If you have a computer that’s on all the time, it might be worth taking a second look at what’s inside. You don’t need to spend a fortune on brand-new, top-tier server equipment. Sometimes, a simple, modern desktop CPU is more than enough.

My old gaming rig served me well, but its parts were from a different era. Upgrading my NAS wasn’t about chasing performance. It was about building something smarter, quieter, and cheaper to run. And honestly, the peace of mind is worth it.

Curious about why you’re seeing ‘solana’ in your server logs? Learn what these failed login attempts are and what they mean for your security.

I have a small server running at my house for a few personal projects. It’s nothing fancy, just a little box humming away in the corner. For fun, I set up a simple alert system. If someone tries to log into it and fails, it sends me a quick message on Discord.

Most of the time, it’s quiet. But a while back, I noticed a strange pattern. I was getting a flurry of failed login attempts, and they all had one thing in common: the username was “solana.”

At first, I brushed it off. Just another bot, right? The internet is buzzing with automated scripts constantly probing for weaknesses. They knock on every digital door, hoping to find one unlocked. These bots try common usernames like “admin,” “root,” or “test.” It’s the digital equivalent of checking if you left a key under the doormat.

But “solana” was different. It wasn’t a default system name. It was oddly specific. And it was persistent.

So, What’s the Deal with “Solana”?

My curiosity got the best of me. Why that name? A quick search confirmed my initial hunch: I wasn’t the only one seeing this. It turns out, this is a widespread phenomenon. System administrators all over the internet have been noticing the same thing. Their logs are filled with failed login attempts from a user named “solana.”

So, what’s going on? It all seems to trace back to the world of cryptocurrency.

Solana is a popular blockchain platform known for its fast transaction speeds and low fees. Because of its popularity, it’s a big target for hackers and scammers. The ecosystem around Solana involves validators, which are computers responsible for verifying transactions and maintaining the integrity of the network.

The leading theory is that these login attempts are from a botnet—a large, interconnected network of compromised computers—that has been specifically designed to target servers running Solana validator nodes.

How the Botnet Likely Works

Here’s the probable game plan for these bots:

1. Scanning the Internet: The botnet constantly scans the entire internet for servers with open SSH ports (Port 22), which is the standard por for remote management.
2. Brute-Force Attacks: Once it finds an open port, it starts a “brute-force” attack. This means it tries to guess the username and password over and over again. Instead of generic usernames, this botnet uses “solana.”
3. The Goal: If it manages to guess the correct credentials for a server, it then checks to see if that server is running a Solana validator. If it is, the attacker has hit the jackpot. They can then try to steal the crypto assets associated with that validator, disrupt its operations, or use it for other malicious activities.

The reason so many of us are seeing these attempts on our personal, non-crypto servers is that the botnet doesn’t know what kind of server it’s attacking beforehand. It’s just casting a very wide, but oddly specific, net. It’s playing a numbers game. By trying “solana” on millions of servers, it only needs to find a few that are actual, poorly secured validator nodes to make a profit.

Should You Be Worried?

If you’re like me and just running a personal server for hobbies, seeing these “solana” attempts isn’t a reason to panic. It’s just noise. As long as you’re practicing good security hygiene, you’re fine.

Here are a few basic things everyone should do:

• Use Strong, Unique Passwords: This is the most important step. Don’t use “password123.” Use a password manager to generate and store something long and complex.
• Change Default Usernames: If your server came with a default username like “admin” or “pi,” change it immediately.
• Consider Using SSH Keys: For a more secure setup, you can disable password logins altogether and use SSH keys instead. This is far more secure than relying on a password.

In the end, this whole “solana” mystery is a great reminder of the constant, weird background radiation of the internet. It’s a glimpse into the automated battles being fought every second of every day. For most of us, it’s just a bit of strange log spam. But for a Solana validator who cut a few security corners? It could be a very bad day.

So, if you see “solana” knocking on your server’s door, don’t be alarmed. Just make sure your locks are strong. It’s not personal; it’s just a bot playing the odds.

Ever get a bizarre YouTube recommendation? Here’s a look at why algorithms get it so wrong sometimes, and why those weird suggestions are part of the fun.

I opened YouTube the other day, and the first thing it recommended stopped me in my tracks.

It wasn’t my usual mix of cooking tutorials, old movie clips, or that one channel that just restores rusty old things. This was… different. It was so specific, so out of left field, that I couldn’t help but laugh. It felt like the algorithm had a weird dream and decided I needed to see the results.

For a second, I wondered if I’d been hacked. Did my nephew use my account to search for something bizarre? But no, it was just the algorithm, doing its best and failing in the most spectacular way.

And honestly, I kind of love it when that happens.

The Ghost in the Machine

We all know there’s an “algorithm” watching us. It’s not a secret. This little ghost in the machine takes notes on everything we do. It sees the videos you watch, the ones you skip, the channels you subscribe to, and even how long you pause on a thumbnail before scrolling past.

Its goal is simple: keep you on the platform. Show you something you’ll click.

Most of the time, it does a decent job. It learns that I like videos about making sourdough bread and shows me more. It figures out I have a soft spot for 90s alternative rock and lines up a playlist. It’s a useful, if slightly creepy, digital butler.

But sometimes, it gets things hilariously wrong. It’s like it makes a wild guess based on a tiny shred of evidence. It might see that you watched one video about fixing a bike and decide you’re now a candidate for a documentary on the Tour de France. Or you watch a clip from a movie, and it assumes you want to see every interview the lead actor has ever done, including that one from a local news channel in 1998.

The logic is there, but it’s stretched so thin it becomes absurd.

More Than Just a Funny Glitch

These strange recommendations are more than just a programming error. They’re a peek behind the curtain. They remind us that this incredibly complex system, designed to understand human desire, is still just a machine making its best guess.

It can’t understand context, irony, or idle curiosity. It just sees data points.

• You watched a history video? You must be a historian. Here’s a three-hour lecture on Byzantine tax law.
• You listened to one sea shanty? Your new identity is “sailor.” Prepare for a feed full of knot-tying tutorials and clips of stormy seas.
• You looked up how to fix a dripping faucet? Welcome to the world of professional plumbing.

These moments are a shared, unspoken part of being online. It’s a funny reminder that for all its power, the algorithm doesn’t really know us. It has a distorted, funhouse-mirror version of our interests. And in a world of hyper-personalized content that can feel a little too accurate, these weird misfires feel refreshingly human.

They give us a chance to stumble upon things we’d never look for. A Japanese woodworking channel, a competitive marble racing league, a guy who just really loves reviewing canned fish. It’s a little window into a corner of the world you never knew existed.

So next time YouTube or Netflix serves you something truly strange, don’t just dismiss it. Take a moment to appreciate the weirdness. The algorithm is trying its best, and sometimes, its failures are more interesting than its successes.

Moving in together is about more than just sharing space. For two tech lovers, it meant merging home labs—and creating a surprisingly romantic network diagram.

My girlfriend and I recently moved in together. It’s a big step, full of exciting firsts: deciding on a couch, figuring out who gets which side of the closet, and, of course, merging our home labs.

Wait, what?

Yeah, you read that right. We’re both tech nerds. So for us, combining our lives also meant combining our servers, routers, and switches. It’s not your typical relationship milestone, but it was ours. And it was kind of awesome.

More Than Just WiFi

For most people, a home network is just the WiFi password you give to guests. It’s invisible. It just works (most of the time). But for us, it’s a hobby. A “home lab” is just a playground for tech enthusiasts. It’s where we host our own media servers, run smart home automations, or just tinker with new software.

So when we moved in together, we had two of everything. Two networks, two sets of gear, two digital worlds. We had to figure out how to make them one.

I was ready to just plug everything in and hope for the best. My approach is usually a bit of organized chaos. But my girlfriend? She’s a planner. She’s the kind of person who reads the instructions.

One evening, she sat down with her tablet and started sketching. I thought she was doodling, but then she turned the screen to me. It was a complete network diagram.

A Love Story, in Diagram Form

There it was. A beautifully organized chart showing how every single device would connect. Her servers, my servers, the modem, the router, the smart lights, even our gaming PCs. Everything had a place.

It had clear labels:
– His: My collection of servers and gadgets.
– Hers: Her equally impressive setup.
– Ours: The new, unified network that would power our home.

It wasn’t just a technical drawing. It felt like a map of our new life together. It showed how we were taking our individual passions and finding a way for them to coexist and work together. It was logical, collaborative, and honestly, a little romantic.

Seeing our digital lives laid out like that made the whole process feel real. It wasn’t just my stuff and her stuff anymore. It was becoming our stuff.

Why This Actually Matters

Okay, I get it. A network diagram might seem like the nerdiest thing in the world. But it taught me something.

Every relationship is about merging two lives. It’s about communication and finding a shared language. For some couples, that might be figuring out a cooking schedule or a system for laundry. For us, it was drawing a map of our home network.

It’s about respecting each other’s worlds, even if they’re filled with blinking lights and weird acronyms. It’s about building something new together. The diagram wasn’t about control or being rigid; it was about creating a system where both of our interests could thrive. It was a practical solution born from a shared passion.

So, yeah. My girlfriend moved in, and we made a network diagram. It’s not the kind of romantic story you see in movies. But it’s ours. It’s a little bit nerdy, a little bit weird, and a whole lot of us. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

It’s a reminder that the best parts of a relationship often happen in the small, unexpected moments—even if those moments involve routers and IP addresses. It ain’t much, but it’s honest work.

Thinking of building a homelab to train a custom cybersecurity AI? Here’s a practical guide on the hardware you’ll need to build around your GPUs.

So, you’ve got your hands on some serious hardware—maybe a couple of powerful GPUs—and an idea is sparking. You’re thinking about building your own homelab to train a custom AI, maybe one that’s an expert in cybersecurity.

That’s a fantastic project. It’s the kind of thing that’s not just for fun, but could actually help you in your work. I’ve been seeing more people get curious about this, so I thought I’d walk through what it actually takes.

Let’s imagine you’ve got two NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000s. That’s a pretty amazing starting point. The big question is: is that enough, and what else do you need to bring your idea to life?

First, Let’s Talk About Those GPUs

The heart of any AI training rig is the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). It’s all about the VRAM—the GPU’s own super-fast memory. When you’re training an AI model, the model itself and the data you’re feeding it have to live in that VRAM.

Each RTX 6000 has a generous 24 GB of VRAM. With two of them linked together (using something called NVLink), you can get them to act like a single GPU with 48 GB of VRAM.

So, are they enough? Yes, absolutely. For a homelab, 48 GB of VRAM is a massive amount of room to work with. You won’t be building the next GPT from scratch, but you can definitely fine-tune some very powerful open-source models on a huge amount of cybersecurity text. This is more than a good start; it’s a great one.

But a Homelab is More Than Just GPUs

Your GPUs are the star players, but they can’t win the game on their own. They need a solid supporting cast of hardware. If the rest of your system can’t keep up, your powerful GPUs will just be sitting around waiting. This is called a bottleneck.

Here’s what you should think about for the rest of the build:

CPU (The Traffic Cop)

Your CPU’s job is to get data ready for the GPUs. It handles tasks like loading data from your storage, pre-processing it, and feeding it into the training pipeline. You don’t need the most expensive CPU on the market, but you don’t want to skimp here either. A modern processor with a good number of cores (like an AMD Ryzen 7/9 or an Intel i7/i9) will prevent a lot of headaches.

Motherboard (The Foundation)

This is what connects everything. Your main priority is finding a motherboard with at least two PCIe x16 slots. These are the slots your GPUs plug into. Pay close attention to the spacing—you need enough physical room between the cards for air to flow. You’ll also want to make sure the motherboard supports the NVLink bridge needed to connect your two RTX 6000s.

RAM (The Workspace)

While your GPUs have their VRAM, your system needs its own RAM for the CPU to work with. Data gets staged here before it goes to the GPU. For an AI project, more is better. I’d suggest starting with at least 64 GB, but 128 GB is a safer bet if you can swing it. It feels like overkill, but you’ll be glad you have it when you’re working with massive datasets.

Storage (The Library)

Training AI means reading a lot of data, and doing it quickly. Your storage needs to be fast.
* For your OS and active datasets: Get a fast NVMe SSD. At least 1 TB, but 2 TB is better. This is where you’ll store the data you’re actively using to train your model.
* For everything else: You can use a larger, slower hard drive (HDD) for archiving old models, storing raw data, and general file storage.

Power Supply (The Power Plant)

Don’t underestimate this. Two power-hungry GPUs, a capable CPU, and all your other components need a lot of clean, stable power. An underpowered PSU can cause random crashes that are a nightmare to debug. For a build like this, look for a high-quality PSU with at least a 1200W to 1500W rating. Look for an 80+ Gold or Platinum efficiency rating—it’s a sign of quality.

It’s Not Just About the Hardware

Building the machine is the first step. The next, and arguably harder, step is the project itself. You want to train an AI on “most major cybersecurity literature, tooling, policy work, etc.”

That means your real challenge will be collecting and cleaning a high-quality dataset. Where will you get this data? Think about sources like:

• Academic papers from sites like arXiv
• Security advisories and vulnerability databases
• Documentation from open-source security tools
• High-quality security blogs and articles

Curating this data is a massive task, but it’s what will make your AI unique and useful. You’ll likely be taking a powerful open-source model (like Llama 3 or Mistral) and fine-tuning it with your custom cybersecurity library.

So, is it possible? One hundred percent. It’s a challenging road, but you’d learn an incredible amount along the way. And starting with two strong GPUs gives you a serious head start. Just remember to give them the team of components they deserve.