On October 29, 2025 9:56:30 AM GMT+02:00, Robert Kisteleki <robert@ripe.net> wrote:
On Tue, Oct 28, 2025 at 7:03 PM Cornelius Keck <atlas@keck.us> wrote:
My first-generation probe (1198) has been down for 2 or so years. Managed to get it going again inasmuch it pings the outside world. Current status at https://atlas.ripe.net/probes/1198/overview shows it to be abandoned, though it does SOS-ping. What could be done to change its state to active?
Thx!
-Cornelius
Hello,
Every time an old v1 or v2 dies, we shed a virtual tear... these cuties have been up and running for up to 15 years now - to wit: https://atlas.ripe.net/probes/1/overview where you can see "FIRST CONNECTED 2010-10-29 15:53:03 (UTC)" so it is literally 15 years old *precisely today*. TBH we expected them to live for a couple of years, maybe. We also expected them to run out of memory and reboot every couple of hours - yet in the end managed to keep them connected for weeks, if not months sometimes...
Unfortunately, they wear out after a while, and there's not much one can do to repair. I suspect yours is in some limbo - TCP/IP stack is up but it lost its key material or the knowledge of what to do as a probe. Still it has a total uptime of "11y 141d 3h 34m 10s", so it had a good run :-)
As for the future, I'd recommend spinning up a software probe, if you can.
Regards, Robert
i have one like this here: https://atlas.ripe.net/probes/4415/overview FIRST CONNECTED 2013-01-23 22:08:42 (UTC) LAST CONNECTED 2024-08-01 11:39:56 (UTC) TOTAL UPTIME 11y 70d 16h 27m 52s i still keep it connected as it gives useful sos and is local pingable, set to forever dhcp/ra long time after a fault, i found that the atx psu it was connected to also has developed a hidden fault. the kind of where it apparently couldn't keep the +5vsb up in proper levels. i yet have to debug it fully. last time it wasn't even able to get that up and just whined that psu has been running 24/7 since 2006 and had stuck fan you needed to poke etc and once fan stopped and it overheated kind of it refused to keep machine up but i kept probe on it still since it had 5v apparently. didn't debug the machine and wondered if mobo so after i realized psu had actually failed and previous faulta might be it's pg turning off since it's apparently a proper psu. i started wondering if i had broke my probe on that then i did put mine on load tested external 5v 1a psu and that didn't bring it back. i somehow don't still have a scope even for lifelong ee, so i don't know it's ripple. but it's a charger supplied with nokia n9 phone so unless caps have have failed, it would have none of that whether it broke by itself of on undervoltage, seems like i can't get it up so has anyone reversed those probes to see what actually happened? or what server says? on mine i see it makes a ssh connection but then server seems to reset it. first i assumed maybe server is configured to reject old clients but then how do all others keep up, must be same old config kept for all others too at some times, probe seems to reboot, at least according to switch unsure what happens there flash failure is my first idea. then maybe flash corruption. considering i traced it back to having been on psu that later showed signs of malfunction. or flash cell data loss from age, even with power on in any way i'm curious if it could reloaded or have new flash or something actually i think it has internal flash. funnily it's even x86. good advertisement to lantronix too or it had flash added? it already has like 5v to 3.3v ldo or something added. i don't know what's inside from ripe vague docs i don't really get what it runs fully so maybe ripe hw dept has ideas how to check or maybe reflash it even if just for like challenge accepted make this probe the longest running v2 in the world last time i heard like weird replies as if i'm having military equipment or something. only thing i heard was like looked like developed hw fault but which one nobody told. felt like you saw more than said if i like have wanted to pwn it locally i would have done it before or so i bet you don't want your property back either. so i would need to discard it? i likely won't ever. but funnily it even still works as a network device maybe it even has some way to be flashed from your side even, no? it surely has a way to be flashed locally because i doubt you used harry potter magic wand to make fw appear inside of it in your lab btw i have this feeling that this thing has latest fw for it's v2 https://atlas.ripe.net/docs/releases/firmware_index/4790 so it still has like public key to verify upgrades? if it has, i don't see any reasons why special version can't be given to my probe only that checks or replaces the connection private key. which i assume is broken here. could even send back dns req with like "sorry can't do, flash area bust" message i see v3 probe fw open, sw is open too so it can't be like what if there's rogue probe on network. i bet you have removed more than one of them already i thought you would be curious to get it back up even if it's old. you also have seemingly decided to run all versions of probes until the heat death of the universe so that means you have kept all the tools too. so i'm surprised the lack of interest even if someone is offering to even reflash probe locally if needed can't be that much of a work or lack of motivation there eh