Low-Power Home Linux Server?

mpol writes "For years I've been using a home server with Linux, but recently I've been having doubts about the electric bill. I'm not touched by the recession yet, but I would like to cut costs, and going from a 100-Watt system to a 30-Watt system would save me 70 bucks a year. The system doesn't need to do much, just apache, imap, ssh and some nfs, but I do prefer to have a full-fledged system, where I can choose what to install on it. I also don't really care if it's a low-power Via or an ARM processor as long as it's cheap. I'm aiming for $300 or less for a full system, which I could then earn back in about four years through power savings. I've been reading about the Western Digital Mybook World Edition, which has an ARM processor but isn't that easy to install Debian on. A Mac Mini draws about 85 Watts, so that isn't an option either. Something a bit more than turn-key would be fine, but preferably not a complete hack-job. Adding a temporary CR-ROM or DVD-ROM, or a USB disk with an iso to install from would be nice. Any Slashdotters run nice and cheap low-power Linux systems? What can you recommend?"

Comments

Underclocking

[XPeter]

You don't look like you need extensive processing power, so why not just underclock your current server? That alone will save you a pretty penny on your bill.

Also, the mac mini draws 110 watts http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_mac/family/mac_mini?aid=AIC-NAUS-K2-BUYNOW-MACMINI-DESIGN&cp=BUYNOW-MACMINI-DESIGN

Re:Underclocking

[Sorny]

I get a whopping 35 Watts used running SETI@home on my Mini... That is with a bus powered FW external HDD for Time Machine hooked up and not spinning down the disks when idle.

A Mac Mini uses nowhere near the power you claim, unless you've got a case where both cores, the GPU, the HDD, and the DVD Burner all all running full tilt at once; a pretty tough thing to do with the use described by the submitter, I'd say.

Re:Underclocking

[DurendalMac]

No, the Mini power adapter puts out a max of 110w. Under load, the Mini actually draws a lot less:

http://www.applesource.com.au/mac/soa/Apple-Mac-Mini-2009-/0,2000070803,339295252,00.htm

Just under 30w under load. Might be a bit higher if you have a DVD in there. It draws a lot less juice than the adapter provides.

Re:Underclocking

[kitserve]

I second this - a few years back I switched my home server to a Mac Mini from an old x86 box, for power draw and space/noise reasons, much like the original poster. At the time I checked out alternatives, but there wasn't much to recommend other machines, all the ones I could find had much more limited storage space. No doubt that has improved recently, but being able to fit any standard 2.5" drive is a big advantage if you want to use it as a file server.

My Mini draws 20W when idling (I tested it with a kill-a-watt). Power use will be higher under heavy load, of course, but your average home server spends most of the time idling. I'm pretty sure the 85W/110W ratings are the maximum the PSU can handle, not the power draw you'd expect in normal use. My box runs a web server, ssh, mail server, file server and various other bits and pieces. X is not installed. It is one of the old PowerPC Minis, which I think draw a bit less than the more recent Intel Minis, but I can't imagine the power draw has increased that much.

My advice to the OP would be to pick up a second hand Mini and use that - there might be machines out there designed specifically as low power home servers, but Minis are fairly easy to come by and easy to install Linux on as people have been doing it for a few years now, even if Apple don't encourage it. If you're thinking about environmental impact as well as your electricity bill, buying a second hand machine is going to be better than buying a new piece of kit. This was another part of my decision to go with a Mini, there are various computers designed to do the sort of thing the OP has asked for, but they're much more niche and consequently hard to find second hand.

By the way, if you choose to use a PowerPC Mini, choose a distro that fully supports PowerPC! When I set up the box Ubuntu still officially supported PowerPC, but it has since been switched to unofficial ports only support, which is pretty flaky. Debian is a much better bet, I am now using that as it is much more reliable (note to anyone who wants to call me on this, I am very happy using Ubuntu on x86 desktop, but my recent experiences of the PowerPC releases have not been favourable).

Some people are suggesting laptops, but I wouldn't recommend one myself. For one thing, they aren't designed or expected to be on all the time, and I suspect you're more likely to run into heating and dust related issues. For another, one of the main advantages of a laptop is that it has a battery and therefore won't require a UPS. However, leaving the machine constantly on and charging is going to kill the battery life fairly quickly, at which point it's not really very useful. On top of that, most laptops use 80W+ when running on mains power. They're usually only designed to save power when running from battery. Obviously you can change the power saving settings, but it's going to be a pain to do so.

Sheeva Plug

[Anonymous Coward]

Get a Sheeva plug its 5W and it looks like an adapter.
http://www.marvell.com/products/embedded_processors/developer/kirkwood/sheevaplug.jsp

Re:Sheeva Plug

[DamonHD]

The SheevaPlug is great: I've come down from over 600W for a rack of Solaris servers via 18W for a Linux laptop to now under 4W for a SheevaPlug (all quiet/typical consumption) to provide the same services, see:

http://www.earth.org.uk/note-on-SheevaPlug-setup.html

(Served off the plug indeed...)

I've reduced the consumption so much that the plug now runs entirely off-grid from a small array of solar PV panels (under 200Wp) with a small (12V, 40Ah) battery to cover nights and very dull days...

Rgds

Damon

Laptop

[talcite]

An old laptop will probably give you the lowest power for the cheapest cost. It doesn't sound like reliability or performance is your main concern. You can disassemble it and take out the LCD to save a couple more watts if you want, but a typical laptop draws between 10-20 watts.

Re:Linkstation Pro Duo

[evilviper]

What's your experience with the speed of files in and out of the Buffalo device?

Absolutely TERRIBLE, no question about it. You'll get much better performance out of the oldest system you can snag off ebay for $20.

Even if you get one for free, I would recomend NOT using it. They made some of the most horrendous design decision ever. First is vastly underpowering the system. Second is giving it anything more than 10BaseT networking, and advertising it as if there's a snowball's chance in hell it'll be able to utilize it... Third, is not providing ANY WAY for the end user to access the underlying system, so when the array gets completely hosed for no reason (and it will! No question.) you can't get in, anywhere, to fix anything, and only a hacked firmware image will save you... Fourth and perhaps most significantly, is cheaping-out on $1 worth of flash, and instead storing the OS image on the HDDs, leaving it vulnerable to data corruption, and a huge pain in the ass to bootstrap with fresh drives (requiring Windows, or at least WINE to run the firmware updater app).

I posted on a forum somewhere about all the typos I found in the firmware of my unit... "ehco" is a good extensive one in the software-raid scripts, ensuring nobody can actually get the reports of a few specific errors, should they occur. And this is in a commercial product.

Re:So it's $70 a year....

[sdpinpdx]

It looks like you included the energy for producing the 17" CRT Williams assumes each desktop computer has. I think we could leave that out for a server.