Tiny PC: The Matchbox Web Server's Revenge

honkytonkyman writes "You may remember the matchbox Web server Slashdotted a while back. Since then, the matchbox Web server has been expanded with a micro disk drive, ethernet, standard vga, keyboard and mouse connectors -- all in a near-matchbox-sized package, a true PC in a matchbox. Stanford professor Vaughan Pratt has founded Tiqit to market these miniature PCs." This micro PC makes the (admittedly beefier) Xybernaut and friends look like an old Compaq luggable next to a Vaio. I'd like one with an input for use as external storage for my digital camera.

Comments

In the year 2000, I predict...

[Karmageddon]

This message is posted from the future, using microwaves and faster than light travel. BTW, we figured out why a microwave burst crosses a cesium filled cavity to emerge fully formed slightly earlier in time: to get to the other side!
Anyway, here is what http://implants.stanford.edu/ says 50 years from now in my inertial frame. If your browser does not support inertial frames, try this page:

Fifty years ago, a computer with less computational power than a modern spamfilter implant filled a whole matchbox -- no, it's true, it's hard to imagine: people used to "wear" computers in their clothing back when they wore clothing -- and ran programs consisting of something less than a few hundred million instructions.

In the intervening decades, computer hardware has continued to shrink, though physicists assure us that we will soon reach the limits of silicon chip physics and will need start using "quantum computers" and "optical computers". And, software functionality has continued to grow, or at least, code size has, so that today we can fit the whole <drool>Beowulf cluster</drool> used to drive this simple webpage into a World Wide Web server farm the size of one grit. Still no room for Propaganda, though.

Good grief.

[curtisg]

$1000 seems pretty steep when you can get a SIMM-sized computer for $50 from Dallas Semiconductor. It's called TINI (get it?). If you haven't seen it before, take a look; it runs Java and includes an ethernet connection and an interface to their iButton components.

Highlights of the machine for the interested:

[toast-]

Here's some highlights from the log:
1) It uses a restricted bash shell =)

Log highlights follows:
Linux version 2.2.15-2.5.0 (root@porky.devel.redhat.com) (gcc version egcs-2.91.
..
Calibrating delay loop... 33.18 BogoMIPS
Memory: 14248k/16384k available (1148k kernel code, 416k reserved, 488k data, 84
k init, 0k bigmem)
..
CPU: AMD 02/0a stepping 04
..
hda: SunDisk SDTB-128, ATA DISK drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
hda: SunDisk SDTB-128, 15MB w/1kB Cache, CHS=490/2/32
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
..

and further:

bailey% uptime
10:19am up 59 days, 10:10, 5 users, load average: 0.15, 0.08, 0.01

bailey%ifconfig eth0
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:E0:4B:00:2D:19
inet addr:209.185.108.212 Bcast:209.185.108.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:5726415 errors:0 dropped:379 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:103461 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:1121 txqueuelen:100
Interrupt:10 Base address:0x300

*drool*

Re: etching PCBs for your PC

[BigBlockMopar]

A Vic-20 to washing machine interface?
Why did you need your washing machine to talk to something as primitive as a Vic-20? ;)

I told you not to ask. :)

Actually, the washing machine is far more primitive than the Vic-20!

Seriously, it's a 1954 Maytag Automatic. It's been washing dirty underwear for almost 50 years. When I got it, it needed a hose, a belt and a timer. Not bad for reliability - I love Maytag stuff.

The hose and the belt were readily available from any Maytag dealer, since they're still used on today's coin-op washers. And take care, since Maytag belts are meant to slip, not like a comparable automotive fanbelt. Spend the extra for a genuine Maytag part.

The timer was another story. I didn't want to kill the look of the original timer, so I didn't try to hack another one in. I just disconnected all the leads off the timer and ran them to a relay board.

The relays are controlled by a Vic-20 with an EPROM that I programmed back when I still programmed in assembly language. (I haven't programmed anything more than HTML lately, and you start to forget all the op-code labels and important addresses when you haven't done assembly in a while.)

The washer sits in the laundry area of my kitchen, with the Vic-20 and a small black-and-white TV set right beside it. Turn it on, and the washer immediately asks you the usual sorts of washing-machine questions.

Tub water level is read through the joystick port. A little bit of custom I/O turns on and off the water solenoid and motor relays. And an analog to digital converter pulled from an early digital voltmeter reads the temperature of the tub with a thermistor, and the software opens and closes the water solenoids to set the temperature to whatever you desire.

I did have a crashing problem with the first EPROM I blew - there was a bug in the software that tried to divide by zero, causing the computer to lock up. Of course, it was in the routine that was reading the joystick port to determine the level. With the water solenoids open and the computer locked up, a crash caused a flood. I added a deadman switch to the circuit and the software as a safety device, corrected the bug, and it's been great since. 5 years later. :)

It's really cool, not very useful, but a lot of fun. I think I'll put it on the Internet someday.

PC/104

[spagthorpe]

You know, for a little bit larger footprint, you can go with a PC/104 solution, and get a fully functional PC for a fraction of the cost. None of the JAVA based, special purpose embedded web server crap, but a real-life functional PC that can run anything you want. The beauty of these things, is once you have the main CPU board, you can add on virtually anything you want...hundreds of different interface boards for them. Check out this link for some examples....

Power Supply

[mu_cow]

Power supply required

5 VDC regulated at 2.5-6 watts

Looks like the power supply may end up being bigger than the computer. Now I wonder whether you can get 5 VDC out of a dozen potatoes... :p

Another small webserver...

[Anonymous Coward]

Another small webserver...

PicoWeb Server

About the size of four US quarters.

Web-farm

[Ron Harwood]

You could make these things hot pluggable and manufacture web-farm "arrays" of the little buggers.

Take a couple more and make a DB cluster, and you got yourself the world's smallest slashdot site... ;)

Matchbox PCs

[BigBlockMopar]

Wow! What's pricing and availability going to be like? I can think of a dozen uses, both at home and at work.

Ya know, sneaking this thing into Canada without having to pay duty on it should be pretty easy. It's possible that it might even elude a body cavity search if you're determined. (And have it well packaged...)

This webpage served live from the colon...

so

[jbarnett]

the dam thing get slashdotted enough, thanks CmdrTaco. (joking).

suprised no one has committed on "a cluster of these". Have 200 cpus cranking away (even if they are 486) would be kinda need.

So is that a cluster in your pocket processing ray trace or are you just happy to see me?

They did install Windows and Linux on it, that is pretty cool. Since it looks like a "standard" pc, I bet you could pretty much throw anything on it, as long as it supports a 486. OpenBSD could be cool, just so you could say "I got 12 differant types of encryption in my pants, you want to guess which kinds and where?"

Or load up the thing with Metallica MP3's, stick it in your pocket, grab it from the out side of your pants and shout "HEY LARS I GOT YOUR MP3'S RIGHT HERE"

There is so many fun things you can do with this. Portable web cam, portable mp3 player (might have to tweak it out a bit, cpu wise) 300 Megs in the world of mp3 players is nothing to laugh at, hook up a zip or extrenal hard drive for extra storage.

Ever seen those LCD screens about the size of a tab of LSD? They are like 1(2??)CM square, small enough to put into a part of sunglasses. Hook up on those up to your shades, slip the match box computer into your pocket and you can watch down the street and have the "Terminator Bulls Eye" on everyone you meet. Or just want down the screen and have a slide show of Miss Portman pics, no one would ever know.

Man, this things has so many uses, anyone see the price his company will be offering these for? The site is slashdotted and could tell if they said or not.

Those are the good things, the bad things about this: You might accdentily drop it in the crapper if you aren't carefull. Plomp.

Sorry if this post seems long, I don't care, I just though of something else.

Being this small, you could (if you had the skill) implant one of these into your body somewhere (you pick the best spot).

Seriously I could imbed a matchbox size devices into the back of my neck, in my arm or maybe my legs with nothing more than the devices, a really sharp and CLEAN knife, a sharp and clean switching needle and a case of the cheapest beer you got.

If anyone wants to buy me one of these and a small LCD screen (2CMx2CM for example), I WILL embed this into some part of my body (which ever is the easiest and less painfull). Seriously I WILL give my body to science for this, if anyone wants to foot the bill for the matchbox computer and workable LCD screen. But the only thing I would require it to run either Linux or *BSD. Having a BSOD inside your body doesn't sound like fun.

I am not joking around here, ship me one of these and an LCD and I will self-insert this into my body for the "advancment" of science or the "curiously sick" side show expeirnce. In exchange for this, I will give you free banner ads on any web page/server I run out of this for the life of the unit.

people will probably think I am fucking around here, this is not a joke. Ship me one of these units and I will self-insert this somewhere into my body somewhat permentably (for the life of the unit or the life of me, or if there is a upgrade avaiable with more cpu, etc). On the creepy side, what would happen if I died with the unit still on, "Hey you got the check out slash dot, they have a web server running from inside some dead guy"

Seriously I am going to get one of these, one way or another and insert it into my body, that would rule. Doom2 24X7, nonstop, dool...

Price??

[Thomas Charron]

The price of 1,XXX$ (as they put it) is a *VERY* poor decision on their part. This targets their systems for higher end products, which could have hardware much better suited for them for a much lower cost.

Price breakdown

[Tekmage]

Just to shed a little light on how their costs might break down...

Pricing for individual components is available at http://www.emjembedded.com/

...for the JDM486, JDMCOM, MITEPC and MODBOX, plus a JDMCPS and JDMIOS, the price comes out to $680 before any taxes or shipping.

...from IBM's online shop, the MicroDrive (31L9335) is $379 before taxes and shipping.

So, that's $1,059 worth of individual parts. That leaves $436 for the remainder of the parts, low-volume production of the custom boards, labour for assembly, and some source of funds to pay everyone and offset future development costs.

Recommendation for future development: Transmeta Crusoe as processor. :-)

Re:Careful now...

[Bob McCown]

Don't say 'passing'...that thing has sharp edges...

but wait...

[geekpress]

I'm just waiting for someone to make small computers that look like Campbell's soup cans, like the kind you can hide valuables in. You could have a whole network in your pantry cleverly hidden from anyone with a warrant.

Okay, so it's a bit absurd, but what isn't these days.

-- Diana Hsieh

Server details

[CMU_Nort]

Personally, I much prefer the HotWheels server compared to this matchbox server. They always seemed to have a lot more detail.

Computer on a chip

[CAIMLAS]

From what I (think that I) have heard, some larger schools have processor dye etching facilities. CalTech, or something like that. Not entirely sure, but I recall hearing this at one point.

Wouldn't it be technically feasable to minimize the circuitry and produce a single chip on a small board, similar to some of the old 486sx chips that had small boards, since they were smaller than normal 486 chips?

All that would need to be done is then put connection sockets on the board, or wires away from the board, and you basically would have a space-free computer. it could (possibly) fit inside the large plastic cases on most cables. heck, with modern .18 microns and such, it's definately possible...

Now THAT would be a cool grad student project...

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CAIMLAS