A while back, I read up on installing YDL on the B50. I was prompted that I would have to upgrade the firmware. I didn't upgrade it, out of fear that I would not be able to reinstall AIX should I choose to...but I now have 4 of these things, and I'm ready to try installing Linux again.

I also have several scsi drive arrays, I would imagine support for this would only require recompiling the kernel if it's not already included?

Besides Yellow Dog, are there any distributions you recommend using?

And now...besides a web server, what are some good uses for these boxes? scsi is still a bit too pricey to justify using for a network fileserver. Encrypting and archiving personal files would be a good option for one of them...but what to do with the others?

Thanks for your input.

I'd stick with YDL, if you've got decent install notes for it on that hardware.

As far as the SCSI array, if it's configured in the controllers firmware, it should just show up as one drive (or however many array's you've built), as long as the controller is recognized. I've had to manually load drivers before at installation time, and do the mkinitrd thing later, to make sure reboots were clean, but it wasn't a big deal.

Uses? Hmm...you could throw an HBA into it, and get it on a SAN for a storage server. Load Samba and CUPS, use it as a file and print sharing server. Load Postfix or sendmail, and use it as a mail relay host, or Nagios and use it as a monitoring server for other boxes.

Or hell, it's Linux...do ALL of it.