(no subject)

[torkell]

To pleaseremove and pewterfish:

I'll be taking Metis will be offline in a couple of days while I sort out a new connection for it. Based on the last time I had to get BT to do something, it'll probably take me a few weeks to get it reconnected.

Thinking about it, that's probably as good a time as any to retire Metis and replace it with something beefier and quieter. Currently Metis is a roughly 10-year-old Windows-based 1.3GHz Athlon and runs IIS for a web server and occassional FTP server, RouterStats to monitor my router, VNC and Telnet for remote access, and has a fair amount of disk space for backups and suchlike. Long-term plans for it include running a media server (ideally one that can real-time transcode MPEG-2 video to FLV), fitting a TV card, and maybe adding some home automation hardware (/me waves geek badge).

Any suggestions for a very quiet box intended to sit in the corner without a monitor, run 24/7, and generally do Useful Stuff? Linux is an option as well as Windows, although I've had better experiences with Windows software.

Comments

[tau-iota-mu-c.livejournal.com]

linux: backuppc server (can back up the windows machines through samba, and if it becomes a central fileserver to the windows machines also through samba, there's barely a need for backing up the windows machines at all anyway, and silly issues like not being able to backup open files like your mail folder, because Windows Is Lame[TM], is neatly worked around).

squid proxy (will lots of tweaking, can even cache youtube videos if you frequently go back to the same videos. youtube is a pain).

Apache is of course a much better webserver than IIS and will have no problem on the current server.

mythtv can probably do all your video needs, but I've never fiddled with it (looked good in a demo I saw the other day though).

The machine is probably too old to host virtual machines efficiently, I think lacking the relevant instruction set.

[pleaseremove.livejournal.com]

Im going to suggest Mini ITX for low power and cheap. There are some dirt cheap boards with fairly nice Atoms on them and a couple of sweet cases too. Take it you want a couple of disks? maybe 1.5TB each? (come on, you must need that kind of storage these days by now!)

As for software, I would be suggesting Unix for it, but are you adverse to moving away from IIS and asp?

If you are feeling a little more money friendly, I would suggest anything by these guys: http://www.synology.com/enu/index.php I am certainly planning on getting one of their boxes. (I find Scan has decent prices for them).