Comments on: Things to do with an old computer http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/ K.Mandla's blog of Linux experiences Sat, 06 Sep 2008 03:19:11 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=MU hourly 1 By: Case in point: An rtorrent slave setup « Motho ke motho ka botho http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36806 Case in point: An rtorrent slave setup « Motho ke motho ka botho Mon, 04 Aug 2008 13:39:34 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36806 [...] Thinkpad as a torrent slave for my Inspiron. I suggested this setup about a year ago (as well as some other ideas), when I described a cool way to set up rtorrent, and since I have the system working and in place [...] [...] Thinkpad as a torrent slave for my Inspiron. I suggested this setup about a year ago (as well as some other ideas), when I described a cool way to set up rtorrent, and since I have the system working and in place [...]

]]> By: Drew http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36558 Drew Wed, 25 Jun 2008 01:31:24 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36558 Thanks for the list of ideas, I'll be using these to try out all kinds of stuff on my old computer. I am thinking on trying out Ubuntu. Thanks again! Regards, Drew Thanks for the list of ideas, I’ll be using these to try out all kinds of stuff on my old computer. I am thinking on trying out Ubuntu. Thanks again!

Regards,

Drew

]]> By: James http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36381 James Mon, 26 May 2008 01:57:30 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-36381 "And by the way, if you can get the new, free releases of Command & Conquer running in Linux, let me know how you did it. It’s not happening for me. :(" Really? C&C worked out of the "box" for me the day they made it freeware. I just used a fully updated Arch Linux and Wine. It has for a lot of other people, too. Not perfectly mind you (the sound was a bit glitchy), but quite playable. http://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=246 Oh, you can also grab the data files from the freeware release and drop them into FreeCNC. I haven't tried this (Also, FreeCNC looks somewhat lifeless), but it's probably worth a shot. http://sourceforge.net/projects/freecnc “And by the way, if you can get the new, free releases of Command & Conquer running in Linux, let me know how you did it. It’s not happening for me. :(”

Really? C&C worked out of the “box” for me the day they made it freeware. I just used a fully updated Arch Linux and Wine. It has for a lot of other people, too. Not perfectly mind you (the sound was a bit glitchy), but quite playable.
http://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=246

Oh, you can also grab the data files from the freeware release and drop them into FreeCNC. I haven’t tried this (Also, FreeCNC looks somewhat lifeless), but it’s probably worth a shot.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/freecnc

]]> By: K.Mandla http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-35277 K.Mandla Sat, 09 Feb 2008 11:33:59 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-35277 Excellent idea! Three gold smilies for that one! :D :) :D Excellent idea! Three gold smilies for that one! :D :) :D

]]> By: Jonty http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-35276 Jonty Sat, 09 Feb 2008 11:17:17 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-35276 I use an old PC as an automated backup machine. 1) Hardware is a 1GHz, P3, 256MB, Compaq desktop. 2) Install a hard drive big enough to hold all the backups. RAID might be a good idea if you are doing this commercially. Partition it with a small area for the operating system and a large area for holding all the data. Logical Volume Manager (LVM) can help if you want to join several partitions into one big area for data. 3) Install some flavour of Linux. I use CentOS for mine but Ubuntu, Slackware, or Debian are all good choices. 4) Install BackupPC software. http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/. This is the magic. 5) Read the manual for BackupPC. Learn how to wield the magic. 6) Configure BackupPC to take backups of other machines over the network. It can reach into Windows machines and Linux machines. Connections can be through the LAN or over broadband if you use something like a VPN. Full backups every 30 days and incrementals every day is a simple strategy to start with. 7) My backups usually take about 4 or 5 hours overnight, and I don't want the machine burning electricity while it idles for the other 20 hours of the day. I have a small gateway machine on the network that is always on (another small, old computer). The backup machine is usually switched off. I use cron and Wake-On-Lan from the gateway to power up the backup machine at 23:00 every night. The backup machine contains a cron job to shutdown at 07:00 every morning. 8) So what do I do if I need to talk to BackupPC when the machine is off and I'm not in the house to switch it on? On the gateway machine I run Pound web proxy and Apache web server. One site in Pound and Apache is configured for the backup machine. Pound and Apache run other sites for me, but they're not important here. If a web browser sends a request for this site Pound will first try the backup machine. If it is switched off Pound will wait a few seconds and then pass the request to Apache. The backup site in Apache is configured to send Wake-On-Lan signal to the backup machine and return a message to the web browser saying 'Try again in 5 minutes'. A few minutes later the web browser sends its next request, Pound forwards the request to the backup machine which is now running, and the browser gets to talk to BackupPC. Sweet. I use an old PC as an automated backup machine.

1) Hardware is a 1GHz, P3, 256MB, Compaq desktop.

2) Install a hard drive big enough to hold all the backups. RAID might be a good idea if you are doing this commercially. Partition it with a small area for the operating system and a large area for holding all the data. Logical Volume Manager (LVM) can help if you want to join several partitions into one big area for data.

3) Install some flavour of Linux. I use CentOS for mine but Ubuntu, Slackware, or Debian are all good choices.

4) Install BackupPC software. http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/. This is the magic.

5) Read the manual for BackupPC. Learn how to wield the magic.

6) Configure BackupPC to take backups of other machines over the network. It can reach into Windows machines and Linux machines. Connections can be through the LAN or over broadband if you use something like a VPN. Full backups every 30 days and incrementals every day is a simple strategy to start with.

7) My backups usually take about 4 or 5 hours overnight, and I don’t want the machine burning electricity while it idles for the other 20 hours of the day. I have a small gateway machine on the network that is always on (another small, old computer). The backup machine is usually switched off. I use cron and Wake-On-Lan from the gateway to power up the backup machine at 23:00 every night. The backup machine contains a cron job to shutdown at 07:00 every morning.

8) So what do I do if I need to talk to BackupPC when the machine is off and I’m not in the house to switch it on? On the gateway machine I run Pound web proxy and Apache web server. One site in Pound and Apache is configured for the backup machine. Pound and Apache run other sites for me, but they’re not important here. If a web browser sends a request for this site Pound will first try the backup machine. If it is switched off Pound will wait a few seconds and then pass the request to Apache. The backup site in Apache is configured to send Wake-On-Lan signal to the backup machine and return a message to the web browser saying ‘Try again in 5 minutes’. A few minutes later the web browser sends its next request, Pound forwards the request to the backup machine which is now running, and the browser gets to talk to BackupPC. Sweet.

]]> By: K.Mandla http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-28058 K.Mandla Fri, 16 Nov 2007 14:57:06 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-28058 By the way Daniel, you might want to look at <a href="http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/anton/computer-power-consumption.html" / rel="nofollow">this</a>. ;) By the way Daniel, you might want to look at this. ;)

]]> By: Luke http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-20152 Luke Sat, 15 Sep 2007 18:48:19 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-20152 Btw, the torrent slave can work nicely combined with mounted network share as the old machines often come with small hard drives. Alternatively you can just equip it with an external USB device. Oh and Star Wars Galaxies? Most kids that I know of play World of WarCrack these days. Conversation at work: Lady #1: My son Kenny is whining about heading out to the beach house for the weekend. Lady #2: How come? Lady #1: He doesn't want to miss his "raid" in his Warcraft World game. Lady #2: Oh, your son plays that game too? Lady #3: My sod too! I like can't get him out of the house sometimes. Lady #1: Sigh... The kids these days... Btw, the torrent slave can work nicely combined with mounted network share as the old machines often come with small hard drives. Alternatively you can just equip it with an external USB device.

Oh and Star Wars Galaxies? Most kids that I know of play World of WarCrack these days.

Conversation at work:

Lady #1: My son Kenny is whining about heading out to the beach house for the weekend.
Lady #2: How come?
Lady #1: He doesn’t want to miss his “raid” in his Warcraft World game.
Lady #2: Oh, your son plays that game too?
Lady #3: My sod too! I like can’t get him out of the house sometimes.
Lady #1: Sigh… The kids these days…

]]> By: Daniel Aleksandersen http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-20003 Daniel Aleksandersen Fri, 14 Sep 2007 10:11:34 +0000 http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/09/14/things-to-do-with-an-old-computer/#comment-20003 What you really should do is to send old computers to recycling. Most of them are very <em>power inefficient</em>; and an unnecessary drain on the environment. Use it till it is not useful to you anymore. Then try selling it if it is worth anything to anyone else. Or else send it to recycling. What you really should do is to send old computers to recycling. Most of them are very power inefficient; and an unnecessary drain on the environment.

Use it till it is not useful to you anymore. Then try selling it if it is worth anything to anyone else. Or else send it to recycling.

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