About Me
Rebuilding My Life With Tech — Chaos, Curiosity, and Growth
Hi, I’m Stephen 👋
Most of my experience comes from learning on the job and tinkering. In recent years, I’ve become keener to learn more. Each day, I push myself to limits I never thought I could reach. When COVID-19 hit back in 2020, I was among the first in my company’s First Line Support Team to be furloughed. Suddenly, I had time—time I put to work on my knowledge, though it started out a bit rocky.
What Sparked My Journey?
The real reboot happened at Comic Con 2016, where I saw an EVGA gaming PC running Doom 2016. The buttery-smooth performance made me think: “I want that in all my games.” That was the hook.
After that, I dove into YouTube and found channels that changed my life and learning style:
- Linus Tech Tips: The gateway tech channel—especially the PiHole setup video, which I’ll never forget.
- NetworkChuck: The reason I gave Linux (and Kali Linux!) a real try.
- John Hammond: His hacking walkthroughs fueled my curiosity about penetration testing and CTFs.
- David Bombal: Deep-dives and alternate solutions for networking and tech problems.
- Jim Browning: For the pure joy of watching scammers get reverse-hacked!
From PiHole to Professional
My Linux journey began with a single purpose: block ads. My first real project was setting up a PiHole ad blocker for the house (if you know me, you know how much I hate ads). It worked for all the “unblockable” devices—brilliant!
Fast forward a year: Back to work after 6 months, only to be furloughed again until March 2021. Eventually, I landed full-time again, all the while learning.
That single ad-blocker snowballed into a career. Nearly eight years on, I work as an Infrastructure & Support Engineer — the person who picks up the escalated, gnarly problems across Microsoft 365, Entra ID, networking, telephony and backups when the first fix didn’t stick. Some days are stressful (and yeah, I’ve definitely banged my head on a wall or two), but I wouldn’t trade the ride.
The Journey So Far 🚀
Nearly 8 years across MSP and enterprise environments, growing from front-line support into infrastructure, escalations, networking and Microsoft 365 administration. Here’s the path:
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Infrastructure & Support Engineer Now
Owning escalated tickets through to infrastructure-level resolution in a busy MSP. Managing Microsoft 365, Entra ID and Active Directory; administering hosted telephony (HVS, 8x8, CallSwitch One); configuring Meraki, Aruba, UniFi and WatchGuard networks; and running Acronis Cyber Protect backups.
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Infrastructure Engineer
Promoted from Junior to a senior escalation point for complex infrastructure across MSP clients. Led the transition to a new RMM platform, monitored server performance and backups, and mentored help-desk engineers through tricky VM and troubleshooting work.
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Infrastructure Engineer
Managed user accounts and backups (RedStor and Nakivo), configured IP phones and M365 licensing, and oversaw group policies and shared drives.
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Support Analyst
Technical support for a broad client base, blocking brute-force attacks, building custom Windows installs with SCCM, and becoming a go-to for technical training.
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First Line IT Support
Where it started: global first-line support over remote access, improving first-time-fix rates and training new agents in a fast-paced environment.
What I Work With 🛠️
The tools and platforms I reach for day to day — at work and in the home lab:
Cloud & Identity
Systems & Virtualisation
Networking
Backup, Monitoring & Security
Scripting & Automation
Why I Build
My journey is about trying, failing, and trying again. Even when it’s tough, don’t give up. Take a break, grab your favourite drink, or play a game. Fresh perspective is everything.
By the way, if you made it this far—thanks for reading! If you’re into hacking and defending systems, check out TryHackMe and Hack The Box. I’m still a beginner, but learning is the fun part.
AIVidz: My AI Experiment
AIVidz is my pet project, created to showcase AI capabilities with minimal input from me. I consider ChatGPT my business partner and friend in this journey!