April 2008 - main

MSI Titan 700 via based system
by Chris G 22 Apr '08

22 Apr '08

Well the MSI Titan system I was talking about arrived yesterday, it's certainly very compact, but with all the 'bits' you could want. I have installed Ubuntu Server 7.10 on it, it installed without a hitch, not a single problem except that I somehow mis-typed my password during installation and couldn't log in when the system booted. Oops! However running 'rescue system' from the CD allowed me to run as root and modify the password file. It runs from a little 60 watt external power supply which is just luke warm after being on overnight so around 20 watts or so consumption seems about right. It's not incredibly quiet, the fan is quite noticeable with it sat on my desk, that's not an issue for me as it's going to be in the garage but it might be for some people. I've got an external disk drive sat on top of it at the moment so it may be a bit warmer than it should, the fan is CPU controlled. I've already got the external USB drive working with it, I haven't dared try and re-format it yet though (any answers on that front?). All in all I'm very pleased with it, exactly what I want at not too bad a price. -- Chris Green

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Lenovo Thinkcentre A61e USFF
by Tim Green 22 Apr '08

22 Apr '08

After Wayne's recommendation I bought one of those Lenovo Thinkcentre A61e USFF thingies. He's not kidding about expansion options - no PCI slots! I think there is a mico-PCI slot free next to the (laptop) memory slot, so WiFi is possible. On the back there are 3 audio ports, 4 USB, 1 Ethernet, one VGA and the DC power socket. That low price of £195.73 + VAT (=£229.98) also includes a sturdy keyboard, a very lightweight optical mouse, and an XP licence, but no CDs and no monitor. The concept is not far off a MacMini, but about three times larger, and black. I'll be installing Hardly Heroin when it's released at the end of the week, and I'll let you know how it goes. Regards, Tim Green.

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Tools to clean "empty space" on disks
by Mark Rogers 22 Apr '08

22 Apr '08

Are there any tools around that can clean empty space on disks? I'm not too worried about doing this for secure deletion purposes, I just want to get a good result from a compressed image of the disk. NB: I tend to use: dd if=/dev/hdb | gzip > hdb.dd.gz .. but there's probably a much better way to do this. Usually it's an NTFS disk but in this particular case it is ext3. -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0845 45 89 555 Registered in England (0456 0902) at 13 Clarke Rd, Milton Keynes, MK1 1LG

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Firefox toolbars - help!
by Chris G 21 Apr '08

21 Apr '08

I've been playing with Firefox themes and have been customising the toolbars. A while ago I added a new toolbar, basically as a separator for the theme I was using but now I need it no more. So, how do you *remove* a toolbar you've added? You can turn view off for the toolbar but I couldn't make that 'stick', every time I restarted Firefox the toolbar was visible again and I had to turn view off again. So I clicked on "Restore Default Set" in the toolbar customisation window. That got rid of my added toolbar permanently which is something, but now I have loads of icons in the Navigation Toolbar that I don't want. It says "You can add or remove items by dragging to or from the toolbars", no I can't! I can add items by dragging them too the toolbar but I can't remove them by dragging them from the toolbar. How on earth does one remove items? -- Chris Green

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[Fwd: Re: [ALUG Announce] 3rd Monday Monthly Ipswich Social Meeting : The Milestone, Woodbridge Road]
by Dave Crisp 20 Apr '08

20 Apr '08

It looks like I'm actually going to be at this one. I'm scared..... On Wed, 2008-04-16 at 11:49 +0100, Tracy Dickerson wrote: > Hello, Guys and Gals, > > Rick and I will try and be there this month. Sorry for our absence, I > hope all is well. > > Tracy x > > On 15/04/2008, samwise <samwise(a)bagshot-row.org> wrote: > > ALUG Announce > > > > Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk > > Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce > > ----- > > The monthly "Third Monday" ALUG Ipswich Social Meeting is back next > > week (Monday 21 April 2008) at 20:00: > > > > > > The Milestone Beer House > > 5 Woodbridge Road > > IPSWICH > > IP4 2EA > > > > Tel: 01473 252425 > > Map/Directions URI: http://maps.google.co.uk/?q=IP4+2EA > > > > The Milestone pub is in the centre of Ipswich, near the now-defunct > > Odeon cinema and not far from The Regent Theatre. > > > > There is more information on the venue, including car parking info, on > > the ALUG wiki: > > > > http://www.alug.org.uk/wiki/moin.cgi/Meetings > > > > All are welcome, novices and experienced users. Hopefully, it > > shouldn't be too hard to find the pack, look for those huddled around > > a laptop! > > > > Feel free to ask for further information on the Main ALUG mailing list. > > > > > > Hope to see you there, > > > > Peter. > > > > > > ----- > > Send discussion replies to main(a)lists.alug.org.uk (Reply-To set) > > Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > main(a)lists.alug.org.uk > > http://www.alug.org.uk/ > > http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/main > > Unsubscribe? See message headers or the web site above! > > > > _______________________________________________ > main(a)lists.alug.org.uk > http://www.alug.org.uk/ > http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/main > Unsubscribe? See message headers or the web site above! >

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Free to a Good home
by Wayne Stallwood 19 Apr '08

19 Apr '08

Alphaserver 800 5/333, in a rack case, 512MB of RAM, 3 4.2GB hotplug disks with a carrier for a 4th, DAT drive (untested), CD ROM. I have OpenVMS installation media (it's up to the buyer to obtain a free hobbyist licence) it had BSD on it I think but one of the disks has failed. The remaining two disks go through block test diags fine however. As a system it probably still has ebay value, I just can't be bothered to deal with listing it, packing it for postage etc Also Last call for my original media server, headless 833Mhz PIII with 128MB RAM, no disks installed, small form factor case. You need to be able to do a serial console installation or attach a pci gfx card and usb ports to do a local console one. Also HP PA-RISC machine, series 9000 model C110. I took this from Noodles before he moved on behalf of another ALUG member who then didn't want it after all. I know nothing about it other that it boots and it is now officially in my way. All of the above need to be collected either as a whole or in part, however you might be able to convince me to attend a meet with some/all in my car boot :)

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What I've decided to buy as a low power system
by Chris G 19 Apr '08

19 Apr '08

I've found this MSI Titan 700 system:- http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?id=21448 I've not actually bought it from CCL because they're out of stock at the moment, I bought it from Lambdatek (slightly cheaper too). Low power VIA processor, all ready put together for me, Gigabit LAN, what more could I want? Hardly any more expensive than a NAS and much more capable. -- Chris Green

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How to talk to something configured for a different subnet?
by Chris G 18 Apr '08

18 Apr '08

What's the easiest way to 'talk' (i.e. connect) to a device that's set up for a different subnet from the one that your local subnet is using? This is a common recurring problem in two situations:- You have a subnet that's *not* 192.168.1.x and you want to use a router (or whatever) that comes with its default address set to 192.168.1.1. You have set a router (or something) to a different subnet for some reason and want to 'get it back'. I have done it a few times by editing /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 to the new subnet and then rebooting, doing what I need to do and then changing ifcfg-eth0 and rebooting again but this seems a little laborious. Is there an easier way? Could I just run ifconfig from the command line to do what I did above, but rather more quickly and easily? Are there any other ways to do this? -- Chris Green

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PHP+MySql bod required
by Steve 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

Arternoon list, My boss' other company is looking for a PHP and MySql guru to take over and maintain a number of systems. The website is at http://www.thefeedbackcompany.com/ If anyone's interested, let me know and I'll pass details on. Cheers, Steve

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Low[ish] power PC building
by Chris G 16 Apr '08

16 Apr '08

I'm coming to the conclusion that the most sensible approach for my 'garage server' will be to build it myself. A Mini-ITX system would be ideal but the prices are still silly compared with boring old ATX and ATX related systems. In addition I have an ATX case that I can use. Size isn't an issue, I have two huge garages. Noise isn't an issue, I don't sleep in the garage or watch TV there. :-) So it would seem that a motherboard with an AMD BE series processor would give me a start for a low power system. Is there any way to decide how power hungry motherboards are? I'm open to alternative recommendations for the processor but Googling about suggests that an AMD BE-2400 or something like it is probably the best low-power/price compromise, so I'm looking for an AM2 motherboard with video and ethernet on board with low power consumption. -- Chris Green

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