Does anybody know if they also accept mac minis? Or is the keyboard/display a fundamental requirement to their offering?
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Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
41–50 of 258 posts
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#42This 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 Website copyright is out of date by two years...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…
What if it’s a compute Ponzi scheme?
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#43> We're based in Amsterdam and aim to work with Hetzner
I wonder if Hetzner knows their aim.
> We might modify your laptop to remove or power down the battery, wireless radios, etc. to ensure it can be used safely in the data center.
Yeah, just use the DC's UPS.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#44Collocating a bunch of lithium-ion heat pillows all in one place, what could go wrong!
Most laptops work perfectly fine with the battery removed and for those who cannot replacing it with a large capacitor is usually a solution.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#45Old 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, look to a standard cloud provider or, at the very least, a colo facility where you can put production-grade equipment.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#46Old 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,…
They aren't targeting big companies for sure, but maybe a small or medium-sized office could make use of this.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#47This 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…
1) You don't have to keep copyrights up to date (and in fact you don't have to put them at all), 2) Every single startup i've seen on HN is sketchy af. Racking laptops in a cage at a Hetzner DC is probably the least sketchy product i've seen here.
And honestly, not a terrible idea, I have old laptops that would work as a VPS. $7/month for somebody to host a public server for me, and not on my crappy residential isp? All I have to lose is an old laptop I haven't touched in 5 years? Sign me up
(they do need a real domain before i'll give them money tho, lol)
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#48Hmm, there's might something to this: + The usual limiting factor in data centers is power, so laptops could be more optimized for greater cycle efficiency per power than comparable old servers. + Laptops are generally compact and so achieve greater rack densities than individual co-lo servers. I'm thinking about 34 or 51 laptops could be stored in 9 or 10U either 2 or 3 rows deep by 17 wide. + Shipping a laptop to a…
I think it's one of those ideas that only works with nostalgia or hoarding impulses to support it.
I think normal virtualization approaches are far more power efficient, at a fleet level, than any kind of cluster of laptop scenarios. You can pile in the cores and amortize the costs of memory controllers etc. over a large set of guests.
It is a funny way to get features of both worlds. One reason to want colo (rather than VMs) is for predictability, but laptops still give you the funny throughput problems, because of thermal throttling instead of competing guests.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#49Does anybody know if they also accept mac minis? Or is the keyboard/display a fundamental requirement to their offering?
tons of places do mac mini colo, https://www.macminivault.com/mac-mini-colocation/
Marco tells us that if you have 48 Mac minis, buy them yourself and rent a rack.
Re: Old laptops in a colo as low cost servers
#50This is CLEARLY a scam.
There is no way they are partnering with Hetzner, or charging just 7€/month flat rate... they specifically want to know the model of the laptop, and offer to send send a courrier to your door...