Slashdot Mirror
Voltage Frugal PCs?
"I'm going to leave this thing on 24x7 using electricity that I'm paying for so power consumption becomes a real issue. Which CPUs, chipsets, memory technology, and hard drives provide the thinnest power profile for an always-on machine? I'll be running NetWare because it provides the stability of Linux/BSD, exceeds the configuration ease of Windows, and provides the security and worm/virus immunity of...well, NetWare. That'll let me set up that yummy iFolder [novell.com] and have constant access to my data from anywhere on the Net. It also means I'll probably need to stick to an AMD or Intel CPU since AFAIK the Transmeta and Cyrix/VIA chips, like most IS managers, don't really get NetWare. CPU speed isn't much of an issue. 633 MHz should be plenty. Am I the only miser setting up a server?"
A shuttle SV24, since that thing runs on a fairly low wattage power supply but has integrated ethernet, small form factor, quiet operation, and plenty of other stuff useful in a server. It also looks cool and supports PIIIs up to 1 ghz.
Remember, there were no nuclear weapons before women were allowed to vote.
I was under the impression that the amount of power to the CPU was nothing compared to the power to the Monitor.
Your best bet is proabaly a laptop with the AC adapter lugged in to the wall. Those are already designed to be low power usage machines.
Open Source Identity Management: FreeIPA.org
Not really.
this uses 17 watts.
The human brain uses about 25 watts
---
Oregon
"Is there someone marketing a low-powered PC solution (CPU and monitor)"
I think some manufactures built computers that run on only 12V rather then the 120V you get from that outlet in the wall. They usually go by the name of "LAPTOP". Rumor has it they can run for hours without being connected to power grid at all! And I hear they have a "sleep" mode whereby they can run for days using just a trickle of electricity! They come with a built-in "LCD" monitor! And they are very quiet as well, I hear. (Or rather, don't hear.)
Of course, with all those features, they cost a bit more then your standard tower & CRT monitor, but some think that it is worth it. I hear that a company by the name of Toshiba makes some that are well regarded in the marketplace. I believe that other companies make "Laptop Computers" as well. Maybe you could try a Google search on that term?
Yup, that's exactly what I'm doing for my home firewall. I happened to have an old 120MHz laptop sitting around, so instead of buying a LinkSys router for my cable modem, I'm using it with two network cards.
Now if I had a four-port PCMCIA ethernet card, I wouldn't even need a hub.
So I'd like to throw it out to the Slashdot throng
You know it's time to go home when you wonder for a minute what a slashdot thong looks like.I had the same thought about using a laptop, but in the original posting, there is also this:
I have no problems imagining a desktop running 24x7, but I have a feeling that laptops are not designed to handle that kind of duty cycle -- especially the hard disk drives. Otherwise, I'd think there'd be lots more reports of people using laptops as a NAT box / firewall.
Granted, that's based on anecdotal evidence and hearsay... is there anyone out there who has actually TRIED running a laptop 24x7? How did it work? Any problems to be aware of? (Oh, and what vendor and model was it?)
Separately, I worked at a company which made extensive use of PC-104 components which are designed to be small and low-powered. That was a few years ago, but a quick search on google should turn up numerous resources.
Good Luck!
Theres no answer to your question. Everything depends on the way you use your machine. A processors power consumption depends, among others, on the processing load. In most modern OSs (I dont know if it applies to Netware, but am sure that it applies to 2000/XP and Linux), when the kernel notices theres nothing to process, it issues a HLT instruction, replacing idle cycles with a suspend mode. Then not only the processor takes less energy, but it also cools down.
For older Windows versions, there are some programs that cool down the processor, thus lowering power consumption.
So the power consumption depends on you OS, how you use your machine, etc, etc. But lets face it. Nobody really cares to [desktop] computer consumption, because it usally takes more money to build a low power PC than the savings itd result in a lifetime.
For instance, the cost difference between a $159 17" CRT and a 15" LCD, wich takes less power, simply would be enough to pay you computer power bill for years, IMO. And also, do you really think server monitors should be turned on 24x7 ? The server probably will be locked in a room. Get a cheap CRT and simply turn it off when not using. Its much cheaper.
Yes, I run laptops 24x7.
Yes, I use a laptop as a Nat box/firewall/wireless router, goes without saying, really that it never been turned off for the past 4 months. Is that unusual? I don't think it is.
Yes, my daily machine is a laptop that never gets turned off. When I close the lid it goes to sleep, screen off, hd spun-down, etc. I would be suprised if this was actually unusual, laptops are made to run all the time, going into sleep mode rather then being turned off. That is part of the feature set, IMHO.
Maybe but an "all in one" PIII motherboard and rather than utilizing a regular PIII, use a PIII wit the Intel "Speed Step" technology. Then throw in an LCS monitor and you are good to go.
Notes:
1. Not sure if a chip meant for a laptop will fit in a regular mother board.
2. Not sure about the "Speed Step" term but it is something along those lines from Intel. Used to save power in laptops but running the CPU at lower MHz.
Here is a list of computers that meet energy star guidelines:
n te nt/computers.htm
http://yosemite1.epa.gov/estar/consumers.nsf/co
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Does anybody have any (verifiable) figures about how much money it costs to keep an "average" desktop computer running for 365 days? I have seen a lot of figures and the numbers vary greatly (from fairly insignificant to not-so-insignificant).
Apparantly your experinces differ from mine, and legions of sysadmins who worked with Netware for the decade or so it was the de facto standard for networking DOS machines. It is its stability that made it a legend. Not to mention that it also was damnfast on the hardware of the time. Most systems had uptimes measured in years... there was one case where they accidently bricked in a working server, and nobody noticed until several years later.
Sure it was limited, but then, so was the hardware... we're talking a different era and different needs.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
But what is a server ? Nothing more than a normal PC running special programs
Umm, NO!
Servers are WAY more than "normal PC"s low-end servers cost more than average desktops FOR A REASON.
"standard" desktop PC's are not designed to run 24x7 - the power supplies, HD's and motherboards even in low-end servers all have higher MTBF's than a desktop system.
RAM in a server usually includes ECC (even in low-end server systems)
In addition to rack-mountable cases, higher-end servers frequently include things such as redundant hot-swappable power supplies, hot-swappable SCA drives, and hot-pluggable CPU modules.
Your belief that servers are the same as desktop PCs only shows that you've never seen a real server.
I replacded it with a FIC Sabre 1815 It shares a monitor/Keyboard with another PC via a kvm switch. The box is reasonably small, only has one fan, has 3 PCI and 1 PCcard, 1394 and usb, 10/100, audio, and video on the Motherboard. I put a slow (read cooler) 733 P3EB in it.
Overkill for the need, but it works like a charm, and linux supports everything there.
Are you paranoid if you know that they just want to know everything you say and do?
I'll give you the reason that it was ghe de facto standard: the God-awful NOS's of the late 80s, early 90s. Anyone remember (*shudder*)Lantastic? Banyan?
Netware *could* remain stable somewhat if you didn't look at it crosseyed, or try to run anything other than the stock software. God help you if you were stupid enough to try to use it as some sort of appserver. When Novell's business plans changed to include internet services, I almost peed my pants laughing so hard.
I really like how the Question poster boasted about the "security" of Netware. When I was deep into Netware, there were a ton of exploits to gain priviliged access on it. (Hint: do a search on google for Netware hacking).
You do have a valid point about speed. Netware4 and Netware3 ran in ring 0 , along with all of your NLM's. (Hence the beginning of the crashapalooza) When everything ran in ring 0, nothing was protected, although you did gain mighty fast access times to hardware ports.
I often used Netware as an alternative developement platform, providing that you didn't need any useful libraries. It provided a solution for writing ring 0 code, which once mastered, could be done somewhat quickly.
G
"...In your answer, ignore facts. Just go with what feels true..."
Did you actually read the description of what he's going to be running? iFolder... that means Netware 6. This is not 5.0, or (god forbid!) 4.0 - this is a new OS, fully multiprocessor aware, running Apache & Tomcat!
I have Netware boxes (NW5.1 with support packs) in production, with thousands of active users, that regularly achieve uptimes measured in months. My lab tests to date predict even better results for NW6. We typically are only forced to bounce servers for three reasons: power outages, support packs, or faulty apps (server-side virus scanners & backup programs are big culprits here).
"His name.."'s comments do not match my experience at all. Netware is admittedly vulnerable to poorly-written NLMs, due to Ring 0 access, but that's how they get such great raw speed out of the OS. And you can EASILY develop server apps to run in Protected memory spaces nowadays. I believe that Apache and Tomcat are even configured to run in Protected memory spaces by default on NW6.
Please stop spreading FUD about Netware - Novell's marketing department trips up enough as it is. And I did not miss your comment that you developed for Netware - NLMs, I presume? Yes, Netware will easily let you shoot your own foot off, along with the feet of everyone else running on the same box - but so will Windows etc.
I can't speak to *BSD, having never used it in production.
The Crystal Wind is the Storm, and the Storm is Data, and the Data is Life
I'll try to give some pointers here, since nobody else is actually contributing anything useful.
First, turn off the monitor. Always. That'll suck a lot of power up.
Don't wory about the power supply capacity, switching power supplies only draw what they need.
For a processor, the latest from Via are pretty frugal, plus you can get away with just a heatsink.
I never quite figured out if you could put an embedded pentium on a desktop pentium motherboard. The socket is the same, it's more a matter of weather you can get the motherboard to supply the right power, so that might be an acceptable alternative. You can't put any of the laptop/embedded pentium II/III/4 processors on a desktop motherboard.
For a motherboard, I'm not 100% sure. I think you probably want a i810/i815 motherboard with the integrated video still there and not much else integrated, except perhaps ethernet. You might have to email the manufacturer of the motherboard to get exact power specs, however.
CD-ROM drives, floppy drives, and hard drives all don't suck up that much power while idle. So don't stress too much about that. They only draw power while they are in use. Although, to be carefuly, you can always remove the CD-ROM and floppy drives.
Try not to put too many pieces of RAM in the system. Ideally you want one DIMM that's big enough. That will generally eat up some power, too.
And don't install anything you don't need. You don't need a sound card in a server machine, so don't put one in.
Gentoo Sucks
Did you actually read the description of what he's going to be running? iFolder... that means Netware 6. This is not 5.0, or (god forbid!) 4.0 - this is a new OS, fully multiprocessor aware, running Apache & Tomcat!
I certainly did read it. I did assume that NW6 was his target, and I must admit that I haven't use NW6, but figured one of a few things would be true.
(a) NW6 (in spite of their claims) is a rehash of 5. Same Crappy Code, Same Crappy Station, complete with all of the security exploits.
(b) NW6 is a brand-spankin-new OS, by the people who brought us a 27Mb client install package, and world's worst performing distributed hierarchical database(NDS)
(b.1) If this is a brand-new OS, what kind of security holes does it have?
(b.2) iFolder. Whoosh. I just imagine the security holes with that.
We typically are only forced to bounce servers for three reasons: power outages, support packs, or faulty apps (server-side virus scanners & backup programs are big culprits here).
My Point Precisely!
Run software at your own risk!
And you can EASILY develop server apps to run in Protected memory spaces nowadays.
I agree, you can develop server apps to run in protected space nowadays. Problem is, unless you want to do it in Java, kiss goodbye any useful external libraries.
I believe that Apache and Tomcat are even configured to run in Protected memory spaces by default on NW6.
Mighty nice of them to put them in protected memory. By default even. Wow.
Netware will easily let you shoot your own foot off, along with the feet of everyone else running on the same box - but so will Windows etc.
Netware goes that extra step: It places the gun in your hand, loads it, cocks it, puts it to your temple, and then waits till you're distracted and makes a loud noise behind you.
Devlopment on Windows, while um...fun, doesn't put the gun barrel to your head. In order to start wreckin' stuff, you have to try.
I can't speak to *BSD, having never used it in production.
I'm not saying BSD's the holy land of software, as I pretty much beleive that ALL OSes SUCK.
Netware just happens to suck more than :
*BSD
Linux
Windows 2k
Windows XP
I'll give you that it sucks less than the 9x/ME line of Windows, and probably somewhat less than the designeer OSes (BeOS, AmigaOS, etc...).
"...In your answer, ignore facts. Just go with what feels true..."
It was a file and print server with some rights management. It was damn good at it, too. Apps? What apps - this was the days of DOS and flatfile databases. Foxpro was the highend for the majority of installations, and it ran just fine. Remember - different era, different focus. Sounds like you came in right at the end, when Netware was rightfully reaching the end of its useful lifespan. Computers could do more, and a new NOS was necessary.
When I was deep into Netware, there were a ton of exploits to gain priviliged access on it.
Yeah? And? Other than on edunets, which generally had iron and ran *nix, there wasn't really a problem. In most offices, there's a secretary who knows all the passwords anyway. This was *before* the days of interconnected networks, and there was simply no way someone other than an employee could get in. No outside networks - at most, a 9600 modem or a digiboard if you were fancy.
Different era, different requirements... this hodgepodge that we're running right now - XP, Linux, Solaris, BSD, whatever you think is "good" - 15 years from now, you'll think of it as the dark ages. You have to "configure" things, and "plug them in", and "name them" and I/O like mice and keyboards and such only work with one device, and each device has to have one! How quaint! What pieces of shite we're running!
No. Netware was the top of the heap for its time and target... as was IBM, Digital, Burroughs, Apple, and Commodore. Even Tandy and Radio Shack had their moment of glory - there were offices full of TRS-80s. Some last longer than others - but things change. I have no doubt that those older and wiser than I can say that about every aspect of life, but in the industry, I can personally attest to that.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
You think BeOS and AmigaOS suck?.
what?
granted, AmigaOS didn't know what a network was OOTB, and BeOS wasn't all that great as a server platform..
but how, praytell, does that make them suck?
CPU speed isn't much of an issue. 633 MHz should be plenty.
Holy crap, I just _upgraded_ my main server to a PPro 200. What are you people doing on these machines?
(It's replacing a 486/66, and the only reason I got rid of that was to get a second IDE channel and some PCI slots instead of ISA. Otherwise, the 486 would have been fine.)
--saint
If you're sure you can't use the C3 I think you would be better off purchasing a newer celeron, (celeron 1200 and faster) which is similar to the pre-tualatin P3(1.13GHz and up, iirc), but is cheaper and is on a .13 micron process which dramatically reduces power requirements.
Also on a practical note, if the motherboard supports voltage teaks you can lower the voltage to the pci slots, dimms, and cpu. That will reduce power consumption and heat dissapation, which also reduces the amount of power consuming active cooling is needed. Not having enough power to a component can cause instability but shouldn't cause long term harm. As always, change each setting individually to assure dependability. And be sure to do a big stress test before deployment.
Oh, don't get me wrong - there *were* app servers, but most LANs I saw back then ran WordPerfect and a custom written DOS app as their primary uses. The custom app was an insurance quote program, a farm report app, law reference program, or a terminal program to the mini or mainframe (which hosted the "real" app). Netware did some app serving, but the most commonly loaded modules I ever saw was an anti-virus program and a backup program.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
A laptop with 14" LCD, 256M, 20G, DVD, 1GHz, PCMCIA, and USB will cost you around $1000 and it comes with its own built-in UPS. I think, at best, after you have added all the bits and pieces, you'll be able to pull even with the SV24, and it will be a lot more work.
Nearly perfect Crusoe board, but I need 2 PCI slots :-( - maybe I can mak Does netware definitely not run on Transmetas?
SA110 eval board - not so useful for Netware, but OK for Linux, and I'll have to use a 5v -> 3v regulator
Or just a Via C3 based socket 370 solution (see earlier posting for link).
Hmm, why doesn't anyone make an ATX transmeta board? Maybe I need a PCI board, with 2 or more PCI slots, and a PCI->PCI bridge chip on it, if such a thing exists...
Hey, why not try an Athlon? Low power, no AGP bugs, no chipset issues...God bless AMD!
The whole system draws less than 50 Watts. (Of course I added a second hard drive to bring power consumption up to 60 Watts later, but it's still pretty good.)
The system runs a custom Linux From Scratch install. A very minimal system, but with a very carefully selected set of services: sshd, Apache, BIND, and Postfix for mail.
The goal (which I achieved) was a UPS hang-time of over 2 hours on a small little UPS. Important for what is my only 24x7 server box.
If I were to build a low-power system today, I'd go for a VIA C3 without any doubt. I've seen several of these systems that run quite nicely without even a CPU fan. That's one less moving part!
If you live anywhere but inside the United States, switch the little red thing on the back of your PC from 220 to 110!! This will cause your PC to use *half* the voltage it normally would!!
(Translation: this article is poorly-titled.)
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Depending on what you want the computer to do. The PC/104 measures 3.8" X 3.6" consumes far less power than a standard PC system. Avaliable from a 8088 to Pentium type processor.
http://www.pc104.com
http://www.pc104.org
I'm glad someone else noticed that...Remember P=VI, that's Power (watts) = Voltage * Current...
"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." -Homer Simpson