Arch Linux

selket

Member

Registered: 2008-04-23

Posts: 2

What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

Hey guys

My eeePC display broke severel weeks ago. Since i dont really want to spent much money for repair on it i thought how can i turn this sucker into something usefull.

Then i got the idea. The eeePC still worked inside very fine. So i got the idea to turn it into a NAS/Homeserver. I have to admit i dont know what i did without the nas now. Its like the internet if u never had it u dont need it...but if you had it once u cant be without it.

It makes life so easy for me and my GF. When we both wanted to watch a movie together on PC we always had to copy it to USB and carry it 5 meters into the other room and then look on the laptop;. That was timeconsuming and annoying. Now, I dont even have to let my PC on at night to download. The little eee-server does this for me. And after the download is finished i can directly watch it from the share no copy needed. The eee-server can even stream 2 HD movie at the same time. This i call nice.
Other very nice thing is i have linux and WinXP as dualboot since my GF is strongly against Linux she always reboots the PC when she want to do stuff like ...surfing what always fucks up my downloads...this problem is away  since the ee-server handles the downloads. a nice thing is also that rtorrent can scan folders for torrentfiles and start them automaticly so just make a folder named "new" (or whatever) and put this folder on a samba share then when u put from your remote PC the torrentfile inside the folder it will start automaticly

If u have a netbook thats too old or the display is broken u can do the same. just deactivate all useless things in bios. install arch rtorrent ssh and samba and you are set.

Im relativly happy about it but i think it can do more then that im no server network wiz. so maybe u have some suggestions what else will be usefull in a small homenetwork.
]

PS eee-server runs now 3 weeks nonstop except for today when i -Syu`ed. processor never goes higher then 20% in ondemand 25(?)mhz mode even with 6 torrents downloading at the same time.

crouse

Arch Linux f@h Team Member

From: Iowa - USA

Registered: 2006-08-19

Posts: 907

Website

Re: What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

Hey guys

My eeePC display broke .......

yeah mine too..... 
Costs about $110 for a new display..... not sure I'm going to bother...  I really don't know WHAT I want to do with mine either....

deadrabbit

Member

Registered: 2008-04-26

Posts: 118

Re: What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

Speaking of nice home servers / NAS, I recently purchased a MSI Wind desktop to use as a server: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6856167032

It only costs $140, and it has gigabit ethernet, a Atom CPU, and a compactflash slot on the mobo. So, I installed the OS to the CF card (Debian - I didn't want to use a rolling release distro for my server), and I stored my media files on a 750GB hard drive, which is set to spin down when it's not in use. It's pretty close to silent when the HD if isn't running, and it barely uses any power.

Atom powered computers are the perfect platform for Linux home servers - I'm surprised there aren't more of them out there.

Girlfriends and Linux don't seem to mix - my girlfriend hates Linux, since it takes up so much of my time

azemute

Member

From: Kingston, Ontario

Registered: 2008-04-21

Posts: 3

Website

Re: What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

What exactly is wrong with the display, if I might ask.

I would gather you've already looked into repairs and fixes, but curiousity got the better of me. Is there any ghosting on the screen if you hold it up to a bright light? Many LCDs have bad power regulators for their backlights... sometimes this is confused with the LCD display it's self dying, while the regulator is a 10$ part.

[Just curious, I may have to keep an eye out for 'dead' Eees if it's a common problem ]

elliott

Member

Registered: 2006-03-07

Posts: 296

Re: What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

What exactly is wrong with the display, if I might ask.

I would gather you've already looked into repairs and fixes, but curiousity got the better of me. Is there any ghosting on the screen if you hold it up to a bright light? Many LCDs have bad power regulators for their backlights... sometimes this is confused with the LCD display it's self dying, while the regulator is a 10$ part.

[Just curious, I may have to keep an eye out for 'dead' Eees if it's a common problem ]

They are all LED backlit, failures are not common.

crouse

Arch Linux f@h Team Member

From: Iowa - USA

Registered: 2006-08-19

Posts: 907

Website

Re: What to do with a old/broken eee-PC

What exactly is wrong with the display, if I might ask.

I would gather you've already looked into repairs and fixes, but curiousity got the better of me. Is there any ghosting on the screen if you hold it up to a bright light? Many LCDs have bad power regulators for their backlights... sometimes this is confused with the LCD display it's self dying, while the regulator is a 10$ part.

[Just curious, I may have to keep an eye out for 'dead' Eees if it's a common problem ]

he he he, on mine, well......... it got stepped on.....   The screen has black smudges all over it now, and displays nothing else.....
I've found the replacement screens for about $100, but may just create a headless Arch web server out of it, it definitely won't draw much power