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Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

tamas.dev

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Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#21

Post by Abishek_Muthian »

One reason to do this is because, fan-less intel Celeron Chromebooks are the most accessible x86 Single Board Computer(SBC) currently available.

If you have a x86 specific workflow, then there are not much choices out there at such low power/price scale e.g. I used one for running a Chromium puppeteer task, as Chromium was nearly unusable in similar or better specced ARM SBCs running Linux.

But that's a one-off example, for almost every headless application an ARM SBC like Raspberry Pi makes more sense.

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#22

Post by dheera »

m-p-3 wrote: post #17
roland35 wrote: post #15

My raspberry pi 4 has been running as a home server and gitlab runner under my tv stand for a few months now and works great! I just need to set up a backup scheme at some point since the whole thing runs on an sd card. It seems easier than ever to repurpose old hardware for home servers with docker and all the great projects out there!

My main gripe about the Raspberry Pi is the SD card unreliability. I know you can boot from USB now but I wish there was a way to integrate an SSD directly on the board (something in the m.2 2242 form.factor) to make it more resilient and also faster. I'll probably go with a small NUC or something like that instead, especially if there's some AMD Ryzen systems coming out in that form factor.

That, and also I really want a protected power input jack that isn't a USB jack. Like a good locking 2-pin Molex Micro-Fit connector, or 2-pin JST-EH, XT30, or some other low profile locking or tight-fitting connector would be great.

I'm tired of having to power the Pi over the expansion header while people keep saying "don't do that because you bypass the power protection" well no shit but there isn't any other option if I don't want to use USB.

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#23

Post by Animats »

I use Asus EeePC subnotebooks for that. They're about US$30-$50 on eBay, and there are models with 64-bit CPUs. I run the CPU and disk test, wipe the disk, and install XUbuntu. A few script mods make the device stay on when the lid is closed, but the screen turns off.

It's more convenient than packaging up a Raspberry PI. You get keyboard, screen, disk, power supply, and battery, plus some USB ports, in one compact unit.

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#24

Post by nickt »

m-p-3 wrote: post #17
roland35 wrote: post #15

My raspberry pi 4 has been running as a home server and gitlab runner under my tv stand for a few months now and works great! I just need to set up a backup scheme at some point since the whole thing runs on an sd card. It seems easier than ever to repurpose old hardware for home servers with docker and all the great projects out there!

My main gripe about the Raspberry Pi is the SD card unreliability. I know you can boot from USB now but I wish there was a way to integrate an SSD directly on the board (something in the m.2 2242 form.factor) to make it more resilient and also faster. I'll probably go with a small NUC or something like that instead, especially if there's some AMD Ryzen systems coming out in that form factor.

M.2 case for Raspberry Pi 4

https://www.argon40.com/argon-one-m-2-case-for-raspberry-pi-...

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#25

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

Animats wrote: post #23

I use Asus EeePC subnotebooks for that. They're about US$30-$50 on eBay, and there are models with 64-bit CPUs. I run the CPU and disk test, wipe the disk, and install XUbuntu. A few script mods make the device stay on when the lid is closed, but the screen turns off. It's more convenient than packaging up a Raspberry PI. You get keyboard, screen, disk, power supply, and battery, plus some USB ports, in one compact u…

But doesn't that use way more power than a pi? And weren't they also slow AF?

I remember I had a celeron notebook from 2011 and it was slow back then even with an SSD. I gave up on the idea that it would be an efficient always-on server.

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#26

Post by mongol »

roland35 wrote: post #15

My raspberry pi 4 has been running as a home server and gitlab runner under my tv stand for a few months now and works great! I just need to set up a backup scheme at some point since the whole thing runs on an sd card. It seems easier than ever to repurpose old hardware for home servers with docker and all the great projects out there!

Raspberry Pi is great but for some applications it is too small. It becomes more cables than computer so to say, does not stay put. A larger and heavier computer is my preference then .

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#27

Post by freeqaz »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #25
Animats wrote: post #23

I use Asus EeePC subnotebooks for that. They're about US$30-$50 on eBay, and there are models with 64-bit CPUs. I run the CPU and disk test, wipe the disk, and install XUbuntu. A few script mods make the device stay on when the lid is closed, but the screen turns off. It's more convenient than packaging up a Raspberry PI. You get keyboard, screen, disk, power supply, and battery, plus some USB ports, in one compact u…

But doesn't that use way more power than a pi? And weren't they also slow AF? I remember I had a celeron notebook from 2011 and it was slow back then even with an SSD. I gave up on the idea that it would be an efficient always-on server.

Probably slower too. Depending on the model of CPU. Those early 32-bit Atoms were soooooo slow!

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#28

Post by freeqaz »

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #21

One reason to do this is because, fan-less intel Celeron Chromebooks are the most accessible x86 Single Board Computer(SBC) currently available. If you have a x86 specific workflow, then there are not much choices out there at such low power/price scale e.g. I used one for running a Chromium puppeteer task, as Chromium was nearly unusable in similar or better specced ARM SBCs running Linux. But that's a one-off examp…

Is that because Chromium isn't as optimized for ARM as it is for x86? Or is it just because the ARM SBCs are lower speed cores? Curious to know more specifically

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#29

Post by freeqaz »

lsiebert wrote: post #8
teejmya wrote: post #3

"[...]especially knowing it can run on batteries for 10 hours (allegedly), without having a UPS." In my experience of trying the same, this is a swollen Li-Ion battery waiting to happen.

Given that the monitor is a big part of power draw, it will probably last longer than that with the lid closed. Of course if you lose power, you probably lose the wifi router it's connected to anyway.

I bought a few cheapo UPS units one time. They're only 2-prong (no ground) and the capacity is low. But they were like $20 each with "refurbished" batteries from the vendor.

All of my routers are 2-prong so I have one unit for every router/switch/AP in my house. Actually really helpful and if I was running a Chromebook for a server like this, I could keep my services accessible remotely even if a short power outage happened!

Re: Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

#30

Post by Uberphallus »

teejmya wrote: post #3

"[...]especially knowing it can run on batteries for 10 hours (allegedly), without having a UPS." In my experience of trying the same, this is a swollen Li-Ion battery waiting to happen.

There are kernel modules to float charge at 80% (or any %) and not stress the battery.
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