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dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

I have an old 33MHz monolith lying around that I want to get working again. Aside from the hardware upgrades/additions I plan on doing, my intention is to have a system running nothing but freeware. Fist question: thoughts on Corel Linux?

Space is rather limited. Is it possible to use my mac as the computer's monitor using VNC (which would also enable the computer to use the mac's keyboard and mouse)?

Once that is set up (if possible), would I be able to run the VNC on my mac from the VNC I may install on my visor (and be able to access all information on my virtual network)?

As I understand it, I would need to get an ethernet hub and plug Mac and Bessy into it with the cable modem as the uplink, correct?

I may have more questions as I go.

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Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-13-2001 04:38 PM

septimus
VisorCentral Staff

Registered: Feb 2001
Location: Them Twin Cities
Posts: 1758

quote:
Originally posted by dick-richardson
I have an old 33MHz monolith lying around

Are you talking about a Platinum?

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06-13-2001 04:44 PM

dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

quote:
Originally posted by dietrichbohn

Are you talking about a Platinum?

No, this is upgradeable.

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Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-13-2001 05:01 PM

Soul Raven
Member

Registered: Dec 1999
Location:
Posts: 239

By 33mhz monolith, I think he is referring to a PC.

I can't speak for Corel Linux, I have only used Slackware and RedHat. I have had pretty good luck running them on older machines (even have a 16 mhz 386 around somewhere). The problem I would see controlling it with your Mac would be that all the work is done on the server, so that old PC is going to be grinding away trying to push out to your Mac. This is one of the reasons I thought it was so cool to use a handheld device to control a PC; the handheld doesn't have to do much work.

Might as well give it a shot. When I get a minute, I'll try your daisy-chain idea (controlling one PC that controls another). I know I have used VNC to control a PC that was running PC Anywhere to control another machine. It was as slow as molasses flowing uphill in a snowstorm, but it worked......OK, it was also going over a 10Base-T card, 700 miles over a single DS1 that I have to share with the rest of the plant, and another high-usage 10Base-T network, so that might have been part of the problem.

Later:

OK, I tried it, and it works (PC#1 controlling PC#2, PC#2 controlling PC#3). There was a problem with the screen-refresh. Reading the VNC documentation, VNC only sends a new screen on the "screen update" event, and not all apps trigger that event all the time. That's why sometimes you have to swish the mouse around to "paint" the new image. Well, when I would do something on PC#3 it would send a new screen to PC#2, but PC#2 never gets an "update event", so it never sends a refresh to PC#1, and you end up moving the mouse around a lot on PC#1, just to see what's happening on PC#3. You can manually request a refresh, which works fine, but is a lot of effort.

Also, beware screen resolutions. PC#3 was running 800x600 and PC#2 was running 1024x768. Wasn't a problem, nice compact box in the middle of the screen. PC#1 was on 800x600, and I ended up doing a lot of scrolling just to see what's going on.

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06-13-2001 06:37 PM

homer
Member

Registered: Jan 2000
Location: Twin Cities, MN
Posts: 1683

33mhz? That isn't going to cut it if you want to run X Windows on linux.

I have a 133 at home running Linux and it is tolerable, but anything slower wouldn't be worth the effort.

Mandrake 8 is what I use and have been really happy with it...I guess they also just came out with Mandrake for PPC too (not sure if you want to run this on a Mac or PC).

As for networking, yes, you'll need a hub to connect everything up via ethernet. You may need a router too...some cable/DSL modems can act as routers.

As for getting the Linux box to talk to the mac, we've been running NetaTalk on the linux machine, which is Appletalk for linux. So far so good. We then added Samba to connect our PCs to the same box.

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06-13-2001 06:38 PM

dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

quote:
Originally posted by homer
33mhz? That isn't going to cut it if you want to run X Windows on linux.

I have a 133 at home running Linux and it is tolerable, but anything slower wouldn't be worth the effort.

A processor upgrade is in the works. How fast I can go with the current motherboard is the question.

quote:
Mandrake 8 is what I use and have been really happy with it...I guess they also just came out with Mandrake for PPC too (not sure if you want to run this on a Mac or PC).

Is it free?

quote:
As for networking, yes, you'll need a hub to connect everything up via ethernet. You may need a router too...some cable/DSL modems can act as routers.

How do I tell if my cable modem has this possiblity?

quote:
As for getting the Linux box to talk to the mac, we've been running NetaTalk on the linux machine, which is Appletalk for linux. So far so good. We then added Samba to connect our PCs to the same box.

I don't want Bessie to be just dead storage (I'm thinking along the lines of dedicated distributed computing for it). If I just network the PC to Mac, won't I need a separate screen for it (as well as a keyboard and mouse)? I'm thinking VNC has the ability to act as a screen, as well as allow input into Bessie with Mac's keyboard/mouse.

You should take after Soul Raven. I didn't have to ask her a single question.

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Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-13-2001 08:12 PM

miradu
TreoCentral Staff

Registered: May 2000
Location: St. Paul, MN
Posts: 1429

ALL linux is free in one way..

Corel has a nice isntaller, but it always carshed on my system. at 33 Mhz don't bet on using KDE or gnome, you'll be stuck to the command line. You learn a lot though with that

My frist computerthat was MINE was a 25 Mhz dx i486. wow.. such good times! Hek.. I'm even using the same monitor, floppy, and case that I used with that old system!

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06-13-2001 08:15 PM

homer
Member

Registered: Jan 2000
Location: Twin Cities, MN
Posts: 1683

As Miradu pointed out, all linux is free. It's really a convenience/support factor. If you just want it for free, you can download all of the major distributions from their respective web sites.

Otherwise, you can purchase a copy on CD with a support package.

I couldn't tell you how to tell if your Cable modem would act as a router. Anyone else know?

You will will need a monitor/keyboard to get things set up on the linux box, but after that, you can probably do without. You can log into the server from your Mac via a terminal window, or there are a couple of web-browser based admin tools that work quite nicely.

I'm not sure what the VNC is.

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06-13-2001 08:29 PM

Toby
Member

Registered: Jul 2000
Location:
Posts: 3034

quote:
Originally posted by homer
I couldn't tell you how to tell if your Cable modem would act as a router. Anyone else know?

Brand name and model number lookup would be the way to tell.

quote:
I'm not sure what the VNC is.

VNC

06-13-2001 08:38 PM

bblue
Member

Registered: Apr 2001
Location: Prison
Posts: 421

Does anybody know how BSD (net, open, free, etc.) runs by itself?

It sure does great as part of OSX!

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06-13-2001 10:19 PM

dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

quote:
Originally posted by bblue
Does anybody know how BSD (net, open, free, etc.) runs by itself?

It sure does great as part of OSX!

Hijack your own thread.

__________________
-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-13-2001 10:46 PM

Soul Raven
Member

Registered: Dec 1999
Location:
Posts: 239

quote:
Originally posted by homer
33mhz? That isn't going to cut it if you want to run X Windows on linux.

Bah! Who needs a GUI? TCSH, baby!

Linux command-line VNC:
http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/...ms.html#svgalib

Now, where did I put my.......?

grep car.keys /usr/dev/pockets/

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Wherever you go, there you are.

06-14-2001 02:58 PM

sowens
Member

Registered: Sep 2000
Location: Rochester, NY
Posts: 284

quote:

I don't want Bessie to be just dead storage (I'm thinking along the lines of dedicated distributed computing for it). If I just network the PC to Mac, won't I need a separate screen for it (as well as a keyboard and mouse)?

2.2 and later kernels have the capability to run the console over a serial port. You'd be limited to text only, but that should be sufficient to get the machine running. You'll still probably need a monitor to get the initial install done, but then you can reconfigure the kernel.

As far as CPU upgrades, I'm guessing it's a 486 or equivalent, so the best you'll be able to do is 66Mhz. Better, but still a little slow if you want to run X. Most people I know that have ancient machines like this use them as firewalls. I'm not sure of your network setup or intentions for this machine, but you might want to consider doing this.

You also might want to consider Debian as a distro. I haven't used it in a while, but I know they have a net-based automatic upgrade capability, and I believe you can also install over the net. So, you can install the distro by just downloading a couple of floppy images, and continually have the machine upgraded ("Look ma, no CDs!")

Just tryin to help.

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06-14-2001 05:55 PM

dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

She's a 486DX, so you're right: the fastest I'd be able to go would be 66MHz. I didn't think about using it for a firewall. Is there a good, free solution along those lines? What exactly does a firewall do, how does it do it, is it hardware/software/both, etc.?

Setup for the machine is going to take place at work, but I'm only bringing the box home when I'm done.

I've decided to go with a command line version of linux (for the experience). Suggestions? BSD?

__________________
-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-14-2001 08:27 PM

dick-richardson
Member

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Aberdeen, SD
Posts: 2531

My processor is on a daughter board. It's a 486SX 33MHz. The daughter board also has a "pga socket" available. As I understand it, I can upgrade the processor to a 486SX 66MHz, which would leave the option to add a pga processor. How fast of a pga processor would I be able to add, and would the two processors add their computing ability, or would the faster one just run the show?

__________________
-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

06-14-2001 11:47 PM

sowens
Member

Registered: Sep 2000
Location: Rochester, NY
Posts: 284

quote:

She's a 486DX, so you're right: the fastest I'd be able to go would be 66MHz. I didn't think about using it for a firewall. Is there a good, free solution along those lines? What exactly does a firewall do, how does it do it, is it hardware/software/both, etc.?

A firewall isolates your internal network from the rest of the world, and can be used to translate internal addresses to a single outside address and back if the software supports it (Linux does). The only things you need are a cheap computer, a couple of NICs, and your favorite Linux distro. The actual firewall is in software, and is mostly a matter of configuring the kernel correctly and modifying a couple of other files. Check out Firewall-HOWTO. This is a pretty complete (though possibly cryptic and slightly out of date) howto of setting up linux as a firewall. There are also a couple of GPL'd projects out there to create firewalls, routers, gateways, etc, with Linux. Check http://www.linux.org.

Keep in mind that, if you want to use a 2.4 kernel, the packet filtering has been completely rewritten, so these docs may be out of date. You should be able to find something on linuxdocs that explains the new packet filtering stuff.

quote:

My processor is on a daughter board. It's a 486SX 33MHz. The daughter board also has a "pga socket" available. As I understand it, I can upgrade the processor to a 486SX 66MHz, which would leave the option to add a pga processor. How fast of a pga processor would I be able to add, and would the two processors add their computing ability, or would the faster one just run the show?

Hmm. I'm not familiar with this design. You may be able to simply replace the daughter card with a Pentium, but don't quote me on that. There are a number of companies that produced (and may still) conversion chips and cards for 486's. Evergreen comes to mind. You might want to check around and see if these places still make 486 replacements, but the 33 should be sufficient if all you want to do is firewalling and such.

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06-15-2001 06:13 PM