Labs & Projects

From Laptop to Cloud: Migrated My Discount Monitor to a VPS

May 28, 2026April 21, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Migration diagram showing the transition of an automated discount monitoring workflow from a local laptop setup to an always-on virtual private server in the cloud.

A few days ago I built a simple but useful automation: an n8n workflow that checks the Google Cloud certifications blog every morning . It uses a local AI model to detect any exam discounts or promo codes, and sends me a Telegram message with the result. No more manually checking. No more missed deals. … Read more

Securing a Self-Hosted AI Lab with Cloudflare Zero Trust

May 28, 2026April 20, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Shield diagram illustrating Cloudflare Zero Trust security architecture surrounding a self-hosted AI lab, with multiple verified network connection nodes and a never-trust, always-verify policy.

Within hours of going live, my home AI lab was being probed from Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Singapore, and the US. Here is what I did about it and what I learned about securing self-hosted infrastructure the right way.

Self-Hosted AI Lab Accessible From Anywhere

May 28, 2026April 20, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Globe visualization showing a self-hosted AI lab server at the center with connection points spanning multiple global locations, illustrating worldwide remote access to a personal AI infrastructure.

A complete beginner-friendly guide to building a self-hosted AI lab on Windows Ollama, Open WebUI, and Cloudflare Tunnel configured as permanent Windows services that survive every reboot.

I Chose the Wrong Tool

May 28, 2026April 20, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Decision diagram showing crossed-out wrong tool choices on the left contrasted with the correct SDK selection on the right, illustrating lessons learned from poor tool selection in AI development.

I ran the benchmarks. LM Studio was faster. So I built my home AI lab on it and discovered that speed is the wrong metric when your server needs to run without you.

LM Studio vs Ollama on a 12GB Laptop GPU

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Side-by-side comparison diagram of LM Studio and Ollama local AI runtime tools, showing feature differences including interface style, API access, setup complexity, and platform support.

I have an Acer Predator Helios Neo 16S with an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX, an NVIDIA RTX 5070 Ti with 12GB GDDR7 VRAM, and 32GB of DDR5 RAM running at 6400MHz. Ollama is already installed with Open WebUI running locally. The model I used for every single test is Qwen3.6 35B-A3B at Q4_K_M quantization … Read more

I Ran a Good Model With Decent Hardware

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Bar chart comparing performance scores of local AI models including Llama 3, Mistral, Phi-3, and Gemma running on a mid-range consumer GPU.

I saw a benchmark showing Qwen3.6 outperforming Claude Sonnet on my laptop. I didn’t believe it. So I ran it myself — mistakes, PowerShell errors, and all.

I Pushed My Local AI’s Memory to the Limit

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Memory utilization dashboard showing VRAM, system RAM, swap space, and context window usage bars approaching capacity during a local AI inference stress test.

Testing context window limits on local AI — what worked, what slowed down, and what crashed.

Running Local AI on a Gaming Laptop: Set Up

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Screen of a gaming laptop showing terminal output of a local AI model loading via Ollama, with progress bars for model allocation and VRAM usage.

I set all of this up and do not fully understand everything I did. But it works, it is fast enough to be useful. That is the point of documenting it. The Hardware My machine is an Acer Predator PHN16S-71. CPU: Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX. GPU: NVIDIA RTX 5070 Ti with 12GB VRAM. RAM: … Read more

I Built My Own AI Server on a VPS

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Illustration of a glowing server rack hosted on a virtual private server, representing a self-hosted AI inference server with multiple GPU and storage layers.

I set up my own AI server on a Hostinger VPS running Ollama, proxying Claude through LiteLLM, and eventually adding Gemini. Here’s what that actually looked like.

I Made My Local AI Accessible From Anywhere

May 28, 2026April 18, 2026 by Carlos Paredes

Network diagram showing a laptop connected through an SSH or Cloudflare tunnel to provide remote access to a locally hosted AI model from any location.

I didn’t want to pay for a VPS just to access my local AI setup remotely. Cloudflare Tunnel solved it for free — and it took about ten minutes to set up.