What does your old equipment do for you?

scheidel21 · 10-30-2006, 12:24 AM

I was wondering how you've put old computers to work for you?

IBall · 10-30-2006, 12:41 AM

I use my old machine as a webserver, remote access for files using SFTP, and as a backup server.

--Ian

slantoflight · 10-30-2006, 02:06 AM

router, i like smoothwall. All the little mods.

I think thats the best use for 233 mhz pentium these days. Enough power for IDS, web proxying, reactive firewall, blocklists. Fairly awesome. Don;t really need it, but then thats arguable. Be leaving your computer vulnerable you could be adding fuel to the fire. And noone wants that. Firewalls can make you paranoid on the other hand. On average my router blocks 20-40 people a day. And those are just the people I know about. People that make glaringly obvious attempts at your computer. Port scans, net bios, dns attacks.

It can get worse. Always get worse.

eeep!

sleepyEDB · 10-30-2006, 08:24 AM

Currently using 3 different old hardware boxes. One each for:

1. Test machine - meant to be built, played with, broken and rebuilt ad nauseum.

Currently running Debian Etch

2. File server - serves up files to my local network. Currently running Debian Sarge

3. Firewall - Don't have this one up and running yet. I have tried unsuccessfully in the past to get IPCop running on this box, but won't give up just yet. Will give it another shot soon.

sleepy

alienux · 10-30-2006, 08:42 AM

I have 3 older machines that I use for different things, although one of them I wouldn't consider *really* old.

1. Web and Sendmail server - 866Mhz with 256MB RAM

2. Firewall: IPtables using Fwbuilder interface and 3 old network cards - 650Mhz with 256MB RAM

3. Slackware test system (I used to test config changes and new apps on this machine before changing/using them on my production Slackware desktop machine) - 266Mhz - 128MB RAM.