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Running Old Desktops Headless?

Posted by Soulskill on from the must-be-the-new-chicken-os dept.

CajunArson writes "I recently dug up an old P4 that is in fine working order and did what any self-respecting Slashdotter would do: I slapped Linux on it to experiment with making an NFSv4 server. One other thing I did was to remove the old AGP video card to save on power, since this is a headless machine. Now, I removed the video card after the installation, and I'm doing just fine as long as the machine will boot to a state where networking works and I can SSH to it. My question: Is there a good solution to allow me to log into this box if it cannot get on the network? I'm looking for solutions other than slapping a video card back in. In my case, I will have physical access to the machine. A few caveats to make it interesting: This question is for plain old desktop/laptop systems, not network servers designed to run headless. Also, I am aware of the serial console, but even 'old' machines may only have USB, and I have not seen any good documentation on how and whether USB works as a substitute. Finally, if there is any way to access the BIOS settings without needing a video card, that would be an extra bonus, but I'm satisfied with just local OS access starting from the GRUB prompt."

1 of 347 comments (clear)

  1. Butterfly. by refactored · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Hmm...

    > Butterflies. What the OP needs are butterflies.
    > http://xkcd.com/378/

    XKCD doesn't seem to know emacs key chords very well. C-x M-c doesn't do anything useful....

    Curiously enough
      M-x butterfly
    does amazing physics.

    ;;;###autoload
    (defun butterfly ()
      "Use butterflies to flip the desired bit on the drive platter.
    Open hands and let the delicate wings flap once.  The disturbance
    ripples outward, changing the flow of the eddy currents in the
    upper atmosphere.  These cause momentary pockets of higher-pressure
    air to form, which act as lenses that deflect incoming cosmic rays,
    focusing them to strike the drive platter and flip the desired bit.
    You can type `M-x butterfly C-M-c' to run it.  This is a permuted
    variation of `C-x M-c M-butterfly' from url `http://xkcd.com/378/'."
      (interactive)
      (if (yes-or-no-p "Do you really want to unleash the powers of the butterfly? ")
          (progn
        (switch-to-buffer (get-buffer-create "*butterfly*"))
        (erase-buffer)
        (sit-for 0)
        (setq indent-tabs-mode nil)
        (animate-string "Amazing physics going on..."
                (/ (window-height) 2) (- (/ (window-width) 2) 12))
        (sit-for (* 5 (/ (abs (random)) (float most-positive-fixnum))))
        (message "Successfully flipped one bit!"))
        (message "Well, then go to xkcd.com!")
        (browse-url "http://xkcd.com/378/")))

    Almost more, ahh, umm, curious is the existence of...

    M-x animate-birthday-present

    I'm using a fairly recent "bleeding edge" version of emacs, so your mileage may vary substantially.