When we started setting up Blackbox, our self-hosted AI workstation, one of the biggest questions was: Which local language models (LLMs) should we run? With so many models available — from tiny 1B parameter experiments to heavyweight 70B giants — the challenge was finding a perfect fit: * Fast enough for everyday use

A streamlined setup for local LLM interaction via a web interface. Why We Did It 🖥️ After experimenting with local model serving, we needed a lightweight, fast web interface to interact with LLMs running directly on CPU — no GPU acceleration. The goals were: * Keep it simple * Use existing hardware (Blackbox 🖤) * Make

Welcome to my blog — a blend of thoughts, experiments, and digital tinkering. I thought I’d kick things off by introducing Blackbox, the machine that made all of this possible. 🛠️ The Origin Story Blackbox is a Lenovo ThinkCentre M710q that I picked up secondhand. I was looking for something compact,