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Repurposing my old Chromebook to a low power home server

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

#71

Post by AlotOfReading »

roland35 wrote: post #32
m-p-3 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Yeah I agree about sd card reliability concerns. The funny thing is that I've used as cards as data storage inside gun launched munitions (Howitzers!) And they survived 10,000 G of acceleration, but too many writes is a problem! I use a mounted usb drive for logging and storage so hopefully that helps the sd card stay fresh.

I'm assuming those were industrial cards? A previous employer would stick them in enclosures next to high power motors for decades at a time without issue. Expensive as hell, but damn were they reliable.

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

#72

Post by FunnyLookinHat »

dervjd wrote: post #44
m-p-3 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Have a look at the Dell Optiplex Micro line - I just picked up one of these. Sips power, ultra quiet. Runs ESXI with no issues. https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Optiplex-i5-8600T-802-11ac-Bluet...

Yeah those are great. I think they're over-priced for most home hacking applications, but you can find older models for much cheaper at Woot.com: https://computers.woot.com/offers/dell-optiplex-3040-micro-i...

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

#73

Post by Johnny555 »

superkuh wrote: post #36

This list isn't so much repurposing a chromebook for a home server as setting up a complex work environment on a chromebook. I hope it doesn't discourage people from just running a simple webserver on their extra computers. It's pretty much just 'apt-get install nginx' and a port forward on your router for ubuntu-flavors, isn't it? All that extra software setup for managing container and databases for monitoring and…

It's pretty much just 'apt-get install nginx' and a port forward on your router

Isn't this what leads to home networks being cracked and added to botnets (or your webcams broadcast to the public)?

If you aren't willing to commit to good sysadmin practices like doing regular patches and segmenting off the public webserver from the rest of your network, you're pretty much guaranteeing that you're going to get hacked some day. Auto updates can help, but if you're not actively monitoring, some day an update is going to fail to apply due to a package conflict and you're going to remain unpatched.

If all you need is a simple webserver, you're better off letting someone else host it.

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

#74

Post by totalZero »

sergeykish wrote: post #70
rootsudo wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, a 10yr old laptop, that was designed to be bargain bin parts, for a now dead niche of netbooks, that has 10yr old parts can't compete with a pi4 for $30 ($50 nicely equipped w/ case and SD card) or a pi nano. It's not even close. The LCD, battery and I/O keyboard/mouse/usb are nice but, no hdmi, just VGA... It makes sense if it's Free but even then, the pi simplifies this so much and then you have no movi…

Netbook has SATA and nice enclosure for hard drive. But the main reason is reuse.

RP4 has UASP, you can buy a SATA hat, and you can put it in a box with your drive if you don't want to look at it.

I have some netbooks lying around and I'd still prefer to buy an RP4 for little projects here and there. Reuse be damned I guess. For me, the main reasons to go with RP4 are gigabit ethernet, less power draw, less need for noisy fans, and a large community.

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

#75

Post by superkuh »

Johnny555 wrote: post #73
superkuh wrote: post #36

This list isn't so much repurposing a chromebook for a home server as setting up a complex work environment on a chromebook. I hope it doesn't discourage people from just running a simple webserver on their extra computers. It's pretty much just 'apt-get install nginx' and a port forward on your router for ubuntu-flavors, isn't it? All that extra software setup for managing container and databases for monitoring and…

It's pretty much just 'apt-get install nginx' and a port forward on your router Isn't this what leads to home networks being cracked and added to botnets (or your webcams broadcast to the public)? If you aren't willing to commit to good sysadmin practices like doing regular patches and segmenting off the public webserver from the rest of your network, you're pretty much guaranteeing that you're going to get hacked so…

No. nginx remote exploits are extremely few and far between. Hosting a static site made out of html pages and actual files in directories is incredibly low risk and requires no maintainance or particular security knowledge.

If all you need is a simple webserver it's best to host it yourself. If you need anything more you're better off letting someone else host it.

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

#76

Post by sdenton4 »

ianhowson wrote: post #45
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where the hell is a X200 is similarly priced to a RPi?! In my neck o the woods(Austria) a X200 series is around 150-200 Euros. Add 16GB of Ram and an SSD an you're looking at at least 250 Euros instead of just 40 for a PI.

My beef with the Pi is that it's not just EUR40 for the device; you also need to add on: - power supply - quality SD card - heatsinks - a case and then deal with - non-x86 - thermal issues - SD cards - the CPU is too tiny to do anything useful anyway Sorry to hear that X2x0 is expensive where you live. I find that the small additional investment over the RPi is worthwhile.

Ha. My home server for a very long time was a RPi 3B+. Totally fine for all kinds of background home server-y tasks, including running a local jupyter server for one-off calculations. (When I need a lot of cpu for something, I probably need a beefy gpu, which is a whole other beast.)

Power supply: It's USB powered. For a home server, I find it convenient to plug it into a USB port on the router, to which it is also connected for ethernet.

SDCard: It was set up to only use the sdcard to boot and use a USB stick as root, which gets around all of the sdcard issues. This is not a totally plug-and-play experience, though. My understanding is that the newer firmwares finally allow direct boot from USB, though.

Case: You can DIY it easily. The case for my home server was basically a folded piece of cardstock on which I drew a picture of a once-bitten pear. Other times I've used legos or dremel tooled altoid tins.

Heat sink: Unnecessary prior to the Pi4. (which also ramped up the cpu and power usage quite a bit...) They keep producing the older models, so it's mainly a matter of picking where you want to live on the compute vs heat management scale.

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

#77

Post by sergeykish »

totalZero wrote: post #74
sergeykish wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Netbook has SATA and nice enclosure for hard drive. But the main reason is reuse.

RP4 has UASP, you can buy a SATA hat, and you can put it in a box with your drive if you don't want to look at it. I have some netbooks lying around and I'd still prefer to buy an RP4 for little projects here and there. Reuse be damned I guess. For me, the main reasons to go with RP4 are gigabit ethernet, less power draw, less need for noisy fans, and a large community.

That would add $43.00 and $56 for the aluminium case though you'd have 4 SATA. Or start with external USB drive use 3d printing or duct tape to make DIY case.

I can't imagine Raspberry Pi community is bigger than Linux users on laptop and desktop. And how can one separate?

On a plus side of Raspberry Pi I would add GPIO with PWM, SPI, I2C and Serial.

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

#78

Post by totalZero »

dheera wrote: post #22
m-p-3 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 opti…

Just out of curiosity, why not use the USB?

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

#79

Post by diffeomorphism »

ianhowson wrote: post #45
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where the hell is a X200 is similarly priced to a RPi?! In my neck o the woods(Austria) a X200 series is around 150-200 Euros. Add 16GB of Ram and an SSD an you're looking at at least 250 Euros instead of just 40 for a PI.

My beef with the Pi is that it's not just EUR40 for the device; you also need to add on: - power supply - quality SD card - heatsinks - a case and then deal with - non-x86 - thermal issues - SD cards - the CPU is too tiny to do anything useful anyway Sorry to hear that X2x0 is expensive where you live. I find that the small additional investment over the RPi is worthwhile.

You do?

Heatsink and case were totally optional in my experience (or a case would make thermals worse). Power supply maybe, if your phone charger did not already work. SD Card or flashdrive; I have many of these lying around.

There is something to be said for having keyboard, pointing device and screen included with a used laptop, but the stuff you list it seems you just don't actually need.

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

#80

Post by roland35 »

AlotOfReading wrote: post #71
roland35 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I agree about sd card reliability concerns. The funny thing is that I've used as cards as data storage inside gun launched munitions (Howitzers!) And they survived 10,000 G of acceleration, but too many writes is a problem! I use a mounted usb drive for logging and storage so hopefully that helps the sd card stay fresh.

I'm assuming those were industrial cards? A previous employer would stick them in enclosures next to high power motors for decades at a time without issue. Expensive as hell, but damn were they reliable.

No they were normal off the shelf cards, but they were soldered directly on to the PCB and everything was vacuum potted.
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