sounds like a battery fire waiting to happen
Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
71–80 of 258 posts
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#72Just gonna point this out since I noticed it a few weeks ago and notice is still there, Hetzner has paused selling new colocation service: https://www.hetzner.com/colocation/
So this is probably a joke site or a scam.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#73I don't want to crap on peoples ideas. Really, I don't.
But getting some closet case computer with unknown hardware and turning it into a server, at scale, is an impossible scheme.
The only way to make it work would be to buy hundreds of laptops at once and refurb, new storage, and standardize with custom power delivery. Because who wants hundreds of laptop PSU's plugged into power strips. And those do in fact die.
And then there's the horror of manually removing wifi hardware and batteries. Battery disposal is an issue. And having worked on hundreds of laptops, some of them are major pains in the neck to get to the battery. Consumer HP's come to mind. The bottom cover can be difficult to remove without breaking any of the clips.
Point of Reference: 27 years in web hosting
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#74that's how my university did a linux cluster for exercises
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#75Is this how we bring "works on my machine" in production? /s
"But it works on my machine!"
"Great. Put your laptop in this box, and we'll send it to the DC."
"Done!"
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
More likely a prank.
I think it's most likely testing the waters for a real offering. It's not that weird. Many colo data centers already have policies about hosting laptops because it's already something that happens. It just isn't common and usually isn't for hosting servers.
If the battery in the laptop is still good, it comes with it's own UPS. My MBPs haven't had an ethernet port in a minute, so do you have to supply your own adapters as well??? You could fit ~15 MBPs on their edge in 9RUs. That'd be an interesting looking rack. Not quite a blade chassis. It'd be rather boring looking as there's no blinky-blinkies
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s not about your battery, it’s the battery in all the other laptops that would have me concerned. Plenty of fire risk.
Not just the batteries. User supplied power bricks sounds like an incredibly bad idea at pretty much any scale.
Wait, power bricks are a fire hazard?
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#78This seems very sketchy. Give us your laptop and we promise we won't keep it... > © 2024 CoLaptop. All rights reserved. Website copyright is out of date by two years... And the website has been online since then. https://crt.sh/?q=colaptop.pages.dev > Thank you for your interest. Please submit the form below and we'll get back to you within 2 working days. > - Team @ CoLaptop.com Also colaptop.com is not even registe…
> Give us your laptop
There's no way to read this without hearing Scottish accent. It's like a sleeper agent activation phrase.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#79Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#80Old laptops as low cost servers? Absolutely, build a homelab in your own basement, rent a cheap VPS, set up wireguard and viola - instant data center for tens of dollars per month. It's not production grade but you'll learn a ton. But colocation? Strip away the learning component and add production uptime requirements - why would you even consider using crusty old laptops for this? If you have production grade needs,…
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