$100 Linux wall-wart launches

Ecological issues around computing. This is an experimental forum.

Moderators: Ralf Hutter, Lawrence Lee

Post Reply
sea2stars
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 167
Joined: Fri Sep 01, 2006 4:04 pm

$100 Linux wall-wart launches

Post by sea2stars » Sat Feb 28, 2009 9:45 pm

SheevaPlug

- 1.2GHz ARM CPU
- draws 5 Watts
- come with Linux
- 512MB each of RAM and Flash
- gigabit Ethernet
- USB 2.0
- size of a wall-wart

A SheevaPlug DevKit is available for $99 and it looks like some products based on it are coming out. I'm tempted to get one to play with; might make a decent NAS server.

edh
Posts: 1621
Joined: Mon Mar 17, 2008 1:49 pm
Location: UK

Post by edh » Sun Mar 01, 2009 1:26 am

I don't like the idea of a brick that big plugging directly into a mains power socket. Makes adjacent sockets inaccessible. It also means that they're specific to the electrical socket type. Putting all of that weight on a pathetic set of NEMA pins doesn't sound very secure either. At least here we have a plug type which I would be happy to put that kind of weight on.

sea2stars
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 167
Joined: Fri Sep 01, 2006 4:04 pm

Post by sea2stars » Sun Mar 01, 2009 6:58 am

*grin* All solved with a power strip or a small battery backup.

Hrm. I might just get one of these to screw with IT at work. I never did top the black felt stickers on the bottom of a black mouse; you'd be amazed how long one person could spend trying to fix a mouse without actually looking at it. No IT was harmed.

LodeHacker
Posts: 628
Joined: Sat Dec 13, 2008 1:25 pm
Location: Finland

Post by LodeHacker » Sun Mar 15, 2009 1:21 pm

This might be old news, but is certainly the winner regarding coolness factor: http://www.chippc.com/thin-clients/jack-pc/

sea2stars
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 167
Joined: Fri Sep 01, 2006 4:04 pm

Post by sea2stars » Mon Mar 16, 2009 2:06 pm

Yeah. Those had made the rounds a while ago. Heh. And so has the one I posted; after catching up on the forums. Doing a search for Sheevaplug before posting didn't help much.

padmewan
Posts: 106
Joined: Fri Mar 12, 2004 7:56 am
Location: Cambridge, MA
Contact:

What results?

Post by padmewan » Thu Mar 26, 2009 4:07 pm

What's the verdict on this? I'm looking for an NAS solution... but don't know jack about Linux and would to buy one of these configured.

codyBane
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon Mar 30, 2009 1:08 pm
Location: seattle

Post by codyBane » Mon Mar 30, 2009 1:24 pm

If you're doing a lot of 'writes' flash is NOT the way to go for an Network attached storage system. That and it's only 512MB. For the same price you can get a 500GB-1TB NAS if you shop around.

If this really only draws the power of a nightlight though I can think of some wonderful applications for it. Personally the 1st thing I would use it for is for a hardware firewall. If the specs are open I'd be looking into building my own firewall/router with it. (need more network ports though and wireless) That's a lot more hardware power than most home routers come with for the same price.

These would be great for car computers as well.

Post Reply