Date: 2008-11-02 11:52:02 Created: null
So, two rather nice (unless you start to get really demanding on the games side of things) PCs and one not completely ungeeky owner, what to do? A network of course! I've known since before I got my apartment that once I did move away from home I would want more than one computer around, and having them networked was more of an implicity than a goal in itself. Sure, being human I don't really do enough on my own to keep even one computer busy all the time, but there are still things for which it's damn nice to have more than one box running.
For one thing, my dislike for Microsoft is increasing with age and wisdom and I'm getting more and more interested in Linux and other "alternative" operating systems. However, I still rely on the whims of Windows to do many everyday things out of pure habit. With only one computer it easily became too much of a hassle to reboot back and forth every time I wanted to play in Linux or elsewhere, especially since much of the playing was aimed at getting the same things I could already do in Windows done.
So, Linux experiments was the number one thing I had in mind when I got my second PC, this would be my Linux testbed that I could play around with without the troubles of reboots. Of course, once I got Mandrake in it turns out that it's the Windows computer that's doing all the rebooting even though it's not changing OS :-) ...
Terminus is my first PC, the one I sit in front the most for one reason or the other (having the 17 inch screen connected is as good a reason as any :-). While it's got both BeOS and Red Hat Linux installed, it's Windows 98 it spends its time in. Too many habits and too much software ... Schoolwork, music, chatting, downloads and games.
What I really should do is of course install my one and completely legal copy of XP Pro on Terminus and start using that to gain some nice stability. But that seems like a lot of work too, especially since I'd much rather be an all-Linux person ...
Addition July 29th 2002
Terminus is now spending almost all its time in Windows XP rather than 98 (check out the Windows XP page for more information). The crashes of the old Windows are a fading memory.
It took a while before I got this one in order, but once I did things took off wonderfully. It came to me with the usual Windows 98 onboard, and the motherboard promptly failed before I could do much at all with it. After some agonizing it turned out that it was covered by the warranty and all I payed was error search (could have avoided that with some guesswork, but I tell myself it was nice to know for sure) and a new graphics card.
After that entertainment I could finally get started on acually installing anything. Debian was first stop, picked it on some kind of whim, but it turned out not to be my cup of tea. I'm still not so experienced I want total control and responsibility of my Linux installation, at least not to the point of doing everything with text based menus with millions of options :-) ... I stuck with it for a while, then I downloaded and installed Mandrake and haven't looked back ever since. Everything went just like I wanted it to, everything worked right, and many things were even easier to do than I'd even hoped for. When mounting volumes on Terminus over the network turned out to be a point-and-click-affair I knew I'd found something that suited me :-) ...
With great support from Niclas I had MySQL and Apache properly configured and serving this website in no time at all, which is about where we are now. I turn Pigbox on in the morning when I get up and off in the evening (since I can't sleep with the computer fans running), and I don't even need to turn on the screen if I type corretly when I log in to halt it. I do my php coding on it as well, but I'd really like to move more functions over to it. The less things that are affected by Windows crashes the better :-) ...
My trusty old Amiga 500+ isn't seeing much action these days, and the chances of excitement has decreased even more after I got rid of my TV :-) ... It does however serve faithfully as an external Amiga floppy drive, allowing me to transfer disk images to Terminus and use in UAE (hey Niclas, just say the word if you need the null modem cable back! :-). And everytime I think about it, I realize it boots a fully graphical OS from a 880K floppy that works great on a TV in 320*240 resolution :-) ...
One thing I'd really like to do as soon as possible is put a computer somewhere where I could leave it running around the clock. The thing is, my computers make enough noise to keep me awake at night, so there's no way I can go to sleep and let a huge download finish, which kind of sucks when it's midnight and that Mandrake ISO file is halfway down :-) ... This little space problem also prevents this site from being available, on average, from about 23:00 to 08:00 Swedish time, and that's not nearly as cool as having a server running 24/7 :-) ...
Addition on July 29th 2002
Done, done, done! Yesterday Pigbox made the move over to the kitchen. With a longer network cable everything would look much nicer (the router's on the floor and Pigbox' front is facing the wall to make the cable reach all the way), but now it works and I can't hear a thing from bed!
Another thing that would be really cool (you're free to have another opinion :-) is to somehow set up the old Mac, and perhaps the C64 too, to perform some nice functions ...
Oh, and I've got another 14 inch screen just sitting around. It's small and mistreated in previous duties (icons burned into the phosphor, learn to turn off screens for someone's sake!), but if I just got my hands on a PCI graphics card it would fit nicely next to my 17 inch screen. Extra desktop space is never wrong.