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Linux Powers Lilliputian PCs
An anonymous reader writes "Gumstix is launching a whole line of dinky little PCs little larger than a Big Red Plenty Pack. The first Netstix model targets server, sniffing, and network simulation. The next model will be USB-powered, followed by models with SD/MMC slots and built-in WiFi. They come with Linux 2.6.17, and lots of room for user applications."
Nice: 200MHz XScale, 64 MB RAM, 16 MB Flash (3MB occupied by OS), 100MBit Ethernet, CF-II slot, 1-3/8 * 4-1/8 inches (35 x 103mm). Even nicer: the next version with integrated WiFi. All done by a company of 26, with no intention to grow, but to automate more if more work has to be done, so prices will fall.
Not so nice: $186.5 for one, $165 in volumes of 1000. I know, this is still very cheap for something in "industrial size", but too much to build one into my door bell, one into each phone, one into each light switch (the joy of being unable to turn of the light due to an 500 error), one into the fish tank, one into the fridge to finally order milk like we have been promised for years.
But give it some years, and I will have a log of how many minutes I brushed my teeth based on the report my eToothBrush send wirelessy to my server.
memomo: free web based language trainer DE-EN-ES-FR-IT
This will be just the right amount of computing power to, say, monitor the tire pressure in my Bronco or use an infrared LED trip sensor to turn on my desktop computer when I walk through the front door.
I figure you'd need Linux for that, right? Java too, probably?
wget
Damn... and I thought lynx was hard core!
--Phillip
Can you say BIRTH TAX
ok, imagine a cluster of next years model, plugged into many usb hubs.
This thing looks small and cool enough that you could just make it a portable router and skip the WiFi/ndiswrapper tangle for a Linux laptop?
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
These aren't PCs. They're hardware platforms for embedded projects -- a hobbyists toy or something a student could use. Don't expect to be chatting on IRC with your gumstick PC quite yet.
It's been a long time.
Yeah, that's pretty cool, but there are no headphone jacks!
Oh, wait, I get it....
Register the editry.
Gumstix is launching a whole line of dinky little PCs little larger than a Big Red Plenty Pack. The first Netstix model targets server, sniffing, and network simulation.
These guys seriously need to take a page out of the book of Apple. Listen guys, it's not "dinky" and "little". You gotta jazz it up a little bit. Throw in some "nano" and a bit of "micro" and "mini" for good measure.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
to be implantable. GIT/SAC here we come.
:wq
I don't understand that unit of measurement.
How many will fit in an altoids tin? How many volkswagon beatles is that?
1-3/8 x 4-1/8 inches isn't 35 x 103cm, it's ~ 3.5 x 10.3cm. Otherwise that's a rather enormous teeny Linux server.
I just got myself a KuroBox. This is a fantastic little thing. It's a full computer (headless). It's excellent for a home file server or web server. Its decently cheap. You add you own hard drive. If you've done a chroot before, you should have no problem setting it up with you own custom linux. I used debian. But you can use Gentoo or others too.
These systems are very much comparable to typical desktop systems we had at the end of the 1990s. As I'm sure you are aware, we did have fairly capable systems then (it wasn't that long ago!). We had ICQ, web browsers, office suites, and even desktop Java applications! I am without doubt that enterprising individuals and groups within the open source community will port applications like Seamonkey and GAIM to this device, so we can surf the web, check our email, and chat online.
Also keep in mind that a 200 MHz ARM CPU is somewhat more powerful than a 200 MHz Pentium CPU. So in effect, these systems may turn out to be quite a bit better than the desktops we had in the late 1990s.
Plug one of those into a midi/usb keyboard, a DSP unit (or a math processor tailored to sound), a card with samples or patches, and speakers, and you'd have yourself a synthesiser probably better and cheaper than anything on the market.
Then again, you could just buy a used desktop from the local computer shop like I did, which is much cheaper, faster, and powerful, but has the disadvantage of size.
I have freaks! I did something right...
standard replies:
Can you make a beowulf cluster out of them? I guess so
Is that a pack of gum in your pocket with a porn server or are you just glad to see me?
First, this looks like a really cool product, so I feel like kind of a jerk for picking this nit, but I will anyway because social skills are not my forte:
"For example, users who need secure remote access from insecure PCs could plug in the ThumbStix, ssh into it, and connect to remote VPNs from there, Hughes suggests."
I guess it could provide a layer of obfuscation. If you know what specific attack is being used, and you're sure that the insecure PC is not running a keylogger or sniffer, it could help. But if the first link in the chain is broken, don't trust the chain.
Just did a check on programming the Gumstix and there's no Ruby support. Damn.
And no VB either? How they going to sell these things?!?!?!?
$30 Off All Plans: Use code TRIPLESAWBUCK
You might as well use the Linksys WRT54GS for your project, you will save a lot of money for basically the same thing.
...it could help. But if the first link in the chain is broken, don't trust the chain.
<VOICE TYPE="PYTHON" MOVIE="HOLY GRAIL" CHARACTER="Sir Bevedere">Who are you who are so wise in the ways of science?</VOICE>
$30 Off All Plans: Use code TRIPLESAWBUCK
compared to devkits for equivalently powered devices it's extremely cheap. About one tenth the price of a typical devkit. And the gumstix has a much better development environment. If you need Linux in a small place with just a little bit of storage and a few I/Os then gumstix is relatively affordable choice.
I am going to chalk up the price as a "very nice" instead of a "not so nice". Not so nice would be it's limited amount of I/O and that you can't combine multiple expansions on one system (except in only a couple of special cases).
I already have a connex 200 and netCF. so I just bought the case for $7.50, and I'm going to use it to replace the big ugly alumnium case I made with a hacksaw.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Definitely interesting stuff... pretty soon the reality of taking your computer around with you and plugging it in to a console for access to it (whether at work, etc) will be pretty common place. So it is "neat" to be able to what kind of progress is being made and what is being mass produced these days.
Netstix goodies.
My question is, is anybody here familiar with general costs for the parts that they utilized for their units? I was just wondering what an estimate would be simply for the parts involved. Of course there is alot more cost to look at, from their employees to having custom boards fabricated... but it seems quite pricey for what is involved.
Justin - Don't be afraid of my blog, it won't bite.
That's not to say that Gumstix aren't cool. But this is not news.
Uhhh.... I can go out and buy any number of devices around $50 that will all of this and much more with OpenWRT. Granted they aren't as small, but they almost all include 802.11g and several have USB2.0. For the increased capability, and reduced price, it's a far better deal unless you absolutely need something that tiny...
Wow, I could really see this being useful for building your own robotics. It seems like it could provide a really nice off the shelf solution at a much smaller size than using a full laptop.
Cool little PC but a bit expensive at about $185 don't you think?
What is the benefit of this device? For nearly the same amount you can get a pda capable of running linux that includes a faster processor, an input method and a screen. Am I missing something?
Yes it is subject to keylogging. But on the upside if you have ssh and such setup right on the little guy all an attacker gets is your keystrokes in the apps you run, the only password would be the one you login to the thing with, which requires physical possession of the unit anyway. All of the remote systems would be accessed with crypto keys stored safely on the unit and never shared with the potentially tainted windows PC. Run all of the sessions via X or VNC sessions so the output is graphical and that will cut down on how much can be snooped.
Is it safe? No. Better than carrying around a USB key with Putty installed? Hell yes.
Even safer would be one of those little Nokia tablets and a WiFi or Bluetooth+phone connection and if you just had to have a full keyboard go with a foldup bluetooth model.
Democrat delenda est
Considering you can get a Pocket PC for $100 more, which additionally gives you SD, WiFi, Bluetooth, color touchscreen, microphone, speaker, hardware controls, more RAM, more flash capacity, a faster CPU and an integrated "UPS" that runs for several hours, I don't see these selling too well. There are few applications for the hardware that could not benefit immensely from an integrated display alone. Granted most Pocket PCs do not come with integrated ethernet, but it can be easily added via CF.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
I'd like to see them make a simple, stupid framebuffer module for these things - just NTSC or PAL resolution output at 256 colors would be plenty - look at what the old Atari/Apple/Commodore computers could do.
I want to use these as a very simple display for home automation - hang one on the back of the TV, use a PIN switch video port (or the video input on the TV), run about a 40 by 24 character display - not fancy, but enough for display.
A frame buffer like that could easily be implemented in a small FPGA now-a-days.
Of course, a tiny X server or VNC client would be even better.
www.eFax.com are spammers
http://www.projectblackdog.com/
This is similiar. I bought one but haven't had much time to play with it.
How much harder to make something like this but non-headless? I am thinking po' man's base for making custom PDAs, etc, but you need a screen, and sound would be nice, too. I don't see any provision to be using these except for headless applications. Closest I have is a mini itx box, that's small, but not nearly small enough.
While this still has to drop a bit in price it points to the next big thing. Bubblepack computing. I.E. PC grade computers (this and the OLPC) with preinstalled distros in bubblepacks on the racks by the checkout counters at Target and WalMart. Buy one plug it in, use it. Store your work on removable flash or USB key. When the unit breaks, fails, or is stolen, toss it in the recycle bin and get another. Zero maintenance, zero support. Within a few years the'll make the standard PC look like mainframes.
While the next model apparently will be a USB-powered plugin, the product documentation isn't clear about where THIS model gets its power.
Does it need a wall-wart, is it powered via power-over-ethernet, or what?
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So, are they big endian or little endian?
It'll Never Work, We're all doomed!
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Right... I think we pretty much agree, you just went into more detail. Though another threat would be that in a standard configuration somebody could log in from the tainted PC to your stick, then grab or use your keys, or take root through sudo or a local exploit-- anyway, I'm sure you know this and my original message was not really intended for people who know this stuff already. The worst risks in this case require either foreknowledge of your setup, live monitoring, or that the passwords and other information you type during this session are sensitive elsewhere.
Meh. I still want one.
Next it will power PC's from Laputa, Balnibarbi, Luggnagg, Glubbdubdrib, and let's not forget Japan. ...sorry.
16MB of flash RAM, with 3MB used by the OS, leaves a whopping 13MB.
Maybe they should say "enough room for a web browser... maybe."
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
With apologies to:
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Print server appliance. Pre configured out of the box with ethernet and USB.
One box + some small linux printer drivers + USB hub = Network Printing Centre.
Windows has detected an undetectable error.
I don't think this is really any better than Putty.
.reg file maybe, along with a .bat file to clean up the registry when you're done, that means someone has to be specifically targeting Putty in order to 0wn you -- basically, wait for putty.exe to run, and find the key file. Or, keep some uber log of the contents of every file ever read from USB.
Think about it: If you carry around a USB key with Putty, an RSA key, and a
Now, if you're carrying around your Gumstick Linux, all they have to do is MITM you -- not exactly hard, since they're already on your box. Basically, as you ssh in, they grab your credentials and scp over all your files. Then you have the same scenario as grabbing every file from a USB key when you plug it in -- they can figure out what you were trying to do at their leisure.
No matter what you do, it's just an arms race, and the only thing that really makes you more secure than Putty is the price difference between an ordinary USB key and a gumstick Linux -- not many people will have this, compared to the people running putty off of USB.
You want a secure Linux computer to log into home from anywhere? Get a laptop. In fact, if all you need is SSH, you could probably borrow or steal an old Thinkpad from someone and buy a wireless card, and not be spending too much more money than the guy who had this USB stick.
How could they make this (more) secure? Give you a couple of cables to carry around in your pocket, to enable you to borrow someone's mouse and monitor. Or imagine -- I know you can buy a device that projects a "keyboard" onto a surface. You type on the desk, it uses motion tracking to watch you. So, couple that with a simple video projector (about as sophisticated as the keyboard projector was) and this gumstick, and you have a Linux terminal that you can use on any flat surface, that's about the size of a gumstick and a couple of pens.
At which point, I'll be happily using a laptop (OSX, Ubuntu, or Gentoo), and my coworkers will be using their Pocket PCs, and we'll be looking at your gumstick thinking "Cool, but what's the point?"
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Maybe they should say "enough room for a web browser... maybe." But... 16 Megs oughta be enough for anybody!
It looks kinda neat, but where do I plug in my keyboard, mouse, and monitor.
SSH? You mean I need another computer in order to be able to use this computer?
- James
Maybe they should say "enough room for a web browser... maybe."
What business does a browser have on an embedded system? Yet again, a thread proved that low UIDers have the lowest IQs. What the fuck is wrong with you people? Have you all forgotten about "NewsForNerds"? Stupid gits.
but since it's a liliputian pc, will it be big endian?
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Dude, capitalizing HTML tags is sooo 1996.
See subject. it's the most droll thing I have read on slashdot all day.
Netstix seem good for taps, on demand server functionality, and testing scenarios. But would you really want to run heavy things on it?
Not trying to be a downer on this, since Gumstix are cool, but if you want a portable device with more functionality, you need to look elsewhere.
Now a BlackDog, there's something with potential.
http://www.projectblackdog.com/
Now if they could just get their next hardware revision out the door...
For these types of items to really take off, they have to be Walmart marketable. The best way to do that is to create a device everyone would want to use. An in-line firewall would be such a good application. One Lan-in, and either USB or Lan out cable, and a small server sitting in the middle acting as firewall, spam filter, pop-up/phishing blocker, and if they could squeeze it in, a virus blocker. Or, better, yet, one device that does each really well and really fast, and then chain several together to do each feature.
Connect, connect, safe and secure PC. The mass market for these products remains in constructing single, highly specialized but widely sought after features, that require no setup or a completely automated setup. LAMP on a micro-server isn't really that sort of product, even if it would be fun to play with. The market is in daemons on USB, preferably in-line or on its own dedicated node (though that's a bit wasteful, imho) - firewalls, independent shared drives, dns (plug and play opendns via in-line from modem to router), and even time servers (maybe with a little back lit LCD display, and adjustment controls on the outside). These tasks are currently being pushed into virtualization. But moving occasional services into a cheap occasionally used device would be even better.
I8-D
I administer a few websites configured for dynamic content to be held on a free POP3 eMail account. A cgi to a NNTP and SMTP service is also integrated. All this runs on a modified Fujitsu aDSL SpeedPort modem. These modems today are usually tossed into the trash, although can be purchased on Yahoo Auctions or eBay for less than USD 5. Locally, the Fujitsu aDSL modem runs netBSD (as original from the designers for manufacturer), thereby slightly modified to host custom application that I wrote to receive requests and return content based on a rough Draft script that determines how to interpret content received to the Inbox. All interaction with the webserver simply categorizes and hashes the subjective form data from the client, and induces a post by SMTP to the free POP3 eMail account (cough *Google* cough).
The end-result is somthing that is less-remeniscent of Slashdot, but more useful than Myspace and YouTube and GeoCities rolled together. One of these days, I hope to do an integration with Freenet to cause the content to be more redundant in its purpose; such as in a discussion forum that people may subscribe onto, whereby the content is accessed through whomever is interested/contributed to the discussion, and cached by whomever wants to continue the discussion. This leads to a much more life-long Courtship, such are many living documents held localy in RAID can now be retained as though a distributed Network-Accessed-Storage.
Slashdot may not need so many duplicate stories to post, and Slashdot's overall importance may be found if it implements a similar idea. Who would save a Slashdot Article in compressed form to assist in the Slashdot Search function? I think Slashdot would then be returned to the 7-day attention span that its average user appears to have, maybe even less (given how there are even duplicate front-page news articles on-average within 2 days).
without prejudice
The real problem for those who want to dig deeper into embeded linux is lack of schematics for constructing this kind of boards. As an old electronics and Linux enthusiast I'd love to use this kind of boards 4 my hobby projects and play with different IO devices. Unfortunately I can't find one suitable site to realy start doing that. The only project that was close was uClinux. But you can't find schematic for their boards there either. IS THAT REALY OPEN SOURCE THINKING ? I have no intetion to buy boars since I want to extend it with my IO ports (I2C).... Or I better stick to my old compiling tool (SDCC) and their range of microcontrolers. Anyway try doing this by yourself and you'll see that starting such thing is realy hard. Hope someone will give something back to comunity. Right now it seems only big coorporations can build such devices and they don't give a shit about comunity.
A bit bigger than that, but I've got me a http://pcengines.ch/ WRAP, 3x100MBit, 1xSerial, 233Mhz Pentium-I-compatible processor, 128MB Ram, MiniPCI-slot and a Compact-Flash slot. Make a perfect firewall.
"The more prohibitions there are, The poorer the people will be" -- Lao Tse
I just squished beer through my nose reading this. Excellent reposte. Please mod parent up, as out of mod points.
no just imagine two ethernet ports on each end ... :))
...
plus something m0n0wall, red, yellow, blue
case dangling of all the insecure WIN XP boxenz
but it into some plastic casing like they
sell them SD, Memory Stick, etc. cards in, and hang
'em right beside the checkout counter
gumstix indeed.
I, the great Kahei, command it -- BRING ME this strange foreign trinket that it may AMUSE ME! Go, my warriors, slaves and concubines, GO, scour the world! A jar of gold coins for the first to bring me this device! Search, my subjects, search until MY DESIRE IS APPEASED.
Except you, Svetlana. You should, uh, stay behind. In case, you know, extra appeasing opportunities arise. Also your sister should stay too.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
No, HTML tags in capitals make perfect sense when you're making changes to pages on a web server in co-lo using vi (the old-skool BSD one as used in Debian, not vim as in every other distro except the busybox ones) over ssh from an xterm. Think of it as a sort of user-defined, cross-platform syntax highlighting.
Of course, why you'd do it that way, and not use Kate with the fish:// KIOslave (or even run a GUI editor on the server but have it talking to your own desktop's display server), is another matter entirely.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Wrap boards are a much cheaper and performing platform (Geode runs circles around ARM at same clock speed) while having a higher current demand. However they usually draw around 5 watt or less, which is perfectly acceptable in most situations. I run some of those as small firewalls or OLSR wireless nodes and they literally rock.
The only complaint I could raise about the WRAP boards is the lack of models with peripherals such as USB2.0 (for compatibility, not speed), wide gpio, IDE interface, audio and low speed video. That would be an excellent platform for kiosks and other appliances where a mini-itx board would be a pricey waste of resources.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Apparantly it's a big pack of chewing gum containing 17 sticks.
Sugar, Gum Base, Corn Syrup, Natural and Artificial Flavors, Glycerol, Acesulfame K, Softeners, Mannitol, Red 40 Lake, Blue 1 Lake, BHT (to Preserve Freshness). Would this even be legal in Europe?
Reduce, reuse, cycle
I've been using these things for several months now. I think one of the major things that makes this device is that the documentation and support is really solid. Right now they're moving the wiki, so there are some growing pains, but in general it is both large, and correct. The mailing list is also extremely helpful. None of these vague, semi-correct HOWTOs or people on forums telling you to RTFM because they don't understand your question.
Plus you get all the benefits of the software people and the hardware people being the same people. Stuff works.
No, I don't work for them.
But now you can build your Beowulf Cluster of these and fit it all into one rack!
Pacifist paratroopers yell, "Ghandi!" when they jump.
I like this one better:
http://www.norhtec.com/products/mcjr/index.html
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
I wish someone would make a gumstick or kurobox that has sound, which is often neglected on these. I need:
USB (for an external drive)
Ethernet (to hook it up to the house network)
Sound output (soundblaster-era quality is fine enough)
Cost under $100
All I want is a gumstick-sized ultra-low power consumption quiet jukebox. Right now I use an old Pentium II that sucks up way too much power. Sound, internet, USB, low power consumption, low price... it's not a tough combination. But I haven't found any out there. Anyone know of one?
A.
It's not the size, it's how you use it. FYI: We all should think of how this device will advance the porn industry.
Hmm, only 1 ethernet port? Guess I'll have to keep using my old P90 as my firewall/router box. The only fan is on the PS, so it is really quiet. But it does take up a bit of space. I would love a linux-on-a-chip tiny firewall/router box. Yeah yeah, I know. I can probably buy something off the shelf for $40 that will do the same thing. Any recommendations?
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Oh, uh... nevermind.
Spork.
P.S. Spork.
Seriously, when you read a spec sheet, do you not notice the "physical dimensions" line?
Anybody who uses one of these is cramped for space, that's the whole point of the product.
This is a lot of power.
There is every reason to think that this machine could do a lot more than power a bronco, or work inside of a toothbrush, or some other retarded and small task.
In 1997 I learned how to program on a computer that ran on less than 10 mghz and had far less ram and memory than this device. It also didn't have network connectivity or anything like that.
So, what's my point?
Basically, I could use this device to do wordprocessing, browse the internet, perform distributed supercomputing tasks (read beowolf cluster of these), play civilization, or where in the world is carmen san diego. I could make CAD drawings of shopping malls, or whatever. The point is that this affords more computing power than most people realize, because they've never been crunched for processing power. Remember all those PDA's and cellphones probably have lower or nearly equivilant specs to this little device and some of them cost quite a bit more.
Thanks... (Get's down off of soap box)
I did my final project with Gumstices, developing a complete user manual and they are incredible. You can have many kind of software running inside them and the connectivity is also awesome, USB-net, ethernet, bluetooth, wifi, and now gps (and probably more to come). We set up a JamVM to test Java and also C and C++ small programs. Was nice to work with those small pieces of hardware.
a variant on the following
http://www.holio.net/dildocam.html
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random