Hey, I went searching through newegg and found a cheap combo Mobo/CPU. At first I was thinking of upgrading my old P3 500, and for 85 bucks for the combo looks interesting. Then I started thinking "hey, I could buy 4 or 5 at that price", mount them, install PSU's, Hard drives, Lan already included, on a rack. Then hook up my network to each and run them via RealVNC.

Then I thought, "Hmm, which OS?" I'm not accustomed to Unix, linux, etc. I've run Dos and then windows. They want 269 bucks for a FPP (full package) of XP pro, I can get Win98 from ebay for 40 bucks, XP home for 200 bucks. These OS costs are bugging me, S##T they want twice the puter cost just for an OS.

Can anyone tell me if Win98SE can be installed on several systems without having the MS police pull up to my door? What's up with these Key code changers I see on Ebay? Would they do the trick? Should I learn Linux? If so they sell a Novell copy of Suse 9.2.something for 75 bucks, is that limited to one use? If I use Linux would I have to have a hard drive?

Is there anywhere I can go to learn any of this?

thanks

tony

I'd stay away from key changed Windows's if I were you, and instead run Linux. I'm no Linux guru, but it's not so much you have to learn just to run SETI on a Linux machine. The commandline interface is not so different from good 'ol DOS, and the graphics resembles Windows.

Yes, you can copy Suse 9.2 on so many PC's as you like, without doing anything illegal. If you have a fast Internet connection, you can even download what you need directly from Internet instead of buying a CD. (In Suse's case, you won't get the installer YAST2 if you download yourself).

I read (I think it was in here somewhere...) about people running SETI without harddisk on Linux machines, with just a diskette and RAM disk. It was in a thread with pictures of SETI farms... Maybe I'll find the thread later. In that same thread there were links to those people with farms, and their home pages were loaded with tips on how to do it (both builds and running).

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It was in a
> thread with pictures of SETI farms... Maybe I'll find the thread later. In
> that same thread there were links to those people with farms, and their home
> pages was loaded with tips on how to do it (both builds and running).
>
I remember the thread, just hafta remember the name. lol. has anyone had MS show up at there house? Any Ideas how much an "Open License Value" would run for 8 puters?

thanks

tony

Try, http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/...skless_Farm.pdf

fedora core can also be down loaded for free.

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> Try, http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/...skless_Farm.pdf

I get a 404 error and a picture of Bagdad Bob, when I tried this. I looked around the "home" page and didn't see a way to get there, i also did some shopping.

thanks

if you realy want to use MS software, they do have several good for one year only downloads from their home page. http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/evaluation/trial/default.mspx

linux would not be a bad bet either, knowing it could serve you well later.

as for hardware, it doesn't realy have to be the newest, when looking at a price vs work unit output, sometimes you can do much better with an older server with dual or even quad cpus. If you live in a larger city (or even a smaller one) you can often find a computer shop that picks up corperate "depriciated" equipment, and if you're lucky a nice quad p3 xeon system without OS can be only a few bucks. or if you're willing to pick them up (shipping on those things sucks) e-bay had some great deals if you're willing to wait till you get the price you want. I've picked up 4 nice rackmount servers in the last few weeks for only about $70 each... (that's shipping included)

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<img src="http://teamstarfire.org/boinc/summary.php?name=Dwarlock&amp;team=Kansans%20Searching%20for%20a%20Planet%20With%20People%20More%20Interesting%20Than%20This%20One&amp;seti=7832952&amp;cbg=grey">

> I remember the thread, just hafta remember the name. lol. has anyone had MS
> show up at there house? Any Ideas how much an "Open License Value" would run
> for 8 puters?

They probably won't, but they could ...

The problem is that almost all of the "newer" MS O/S phone home and tell them where and what they are running on ... so, a person I know refuses to install above win 2K (from MSDN subscription) on his computers.

I know that *MY* perpetual licence for MSDN, which should have let me use the subscription forever, would not let me have the codes to unlock them after the subscription expired. Which means that for MS, perpetuity means "next week" ...

Anyway, most of the more modern Linux have an install that works very much like MS's with a GUI and lots of smarts. You get dumped into a GUI when done too ... actually you usually get serveral you can use.

The only part for me that is a little bit of a hang up is the install of BOINC ... which for Linux is a little messier than I like ... that is why I am waiting for the GUI version for Linux before I stick my toes into that water ...

---

I was in Dells site and switched back to Seti and saw this post so just for giggles I when back to the Dell site and ran thru the buying process and this is what I came up with..

Get a Dell P4, 3.0ht, 512 mem, 80 gig Hd, xp home ,cd ROM, keybd, mouse, no monitor 391 plus tax and shipping. Buy 2 for about $900 you got 4 in your farm......

You also can get a free printer but you pay 25 bucks for the cable or so they say it is proprietary.

---

Semper Eadem
So long Paul, it has been a hell of a ride.

Park your ego's, fire up the computers, Science YES, Credits No.

Tony,

I had bookmarked one link (from the thread we talked about that we can't locate...) about setting up a farm, which you might find interesting. Especially, look at the two links on that page concerning diskless nodes.

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> Tony,
>
> I had bookmarked one
> link (from the thread we talked about that we can't locate...) about
> setting up a farm, which you might find interesting. Especially, look at the
> two links on that page concerning diskless nodes.
>
This site is for a hard drive less Classic Linux cruncher:
http://www.members.shaw.ca/dan.mckay/fscoseti.htm
It works fine, I used it for awhile but went back to Windows because it is easier for me.

---

> Can anyone tell me if Win98SE can be installed on several systems without
> having the MS police pull up to my door? What's up with these Key code
> changers I see on Ebay? Would they do the trick?

Realize of course that this is a copyright violation -- whether or not folks would go after you is a different issue -- though you've made it more likely by asking 'in public'.

> Should I learn Linux?

Good idea for the long haul.

> If so they sell a Novell copy of Suse 9.2.something for 75 bucks, is that > >limited to one use? If I use Linux would I have to have a hard drive?

Check the licensing -- note, you can download linux from a number of sites (the payoff with the Suse 9.2 package is that you get some pretty solid documentation along with it).


Oh, one other thing, before getting a farm together -- wait until the Seti BOINC folks get their data access act back together -- since Thursday this week life has NOT been good.

---

> > Try, http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/...skless_Farm.pdf
>
>
> I get a 404 error and a picture of Bagdad Bob, when I tried this. I looked
> around the "home" page and didn't see a way to get there, i also did some
> shopping.
>
> thanks
>


http://www.extremeoverclocking.com/articles/howto/FAH_Diskless_Farm.pdf

please to excuse me

---

For a cost-effective Farm, there is IMHO no way around Linux.

Depending on how large you plan to grow it, MS Operating Systems will eat your pocket out and impose several limiations, at the fraction of the functionality you'd have with a Zero-Cost Linux.
The time you'll have to initially invest into learning will quickly pay-off BIG time, trust me :)

PS.
I started with all Windows (still got about 25 licences lying around), now I'm almost exclusively on Linux and Unix and am darn glad I did it.

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> Get a Dell P4, 3.0ht, 512 mem, 80 gig Hd, xp home ,cd ROM, keybd, mouse, no
> monitor 391 plus tax and shipping. Buy 2 for about $900 you got 4 in your
> farm......

Don't know what things are like elsewhere, but here in Australia for the price of 1 G5 you can buy 5 Athlon64 systems, monitor, keyboard, mouse & KVM switch along with network cables & a network switch.

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Grant
Darwin NT

If you must stick with an MS operating system, do you know any Uni students, especially Computer science etc., MS ocassionally offers them free copies of operating systems and programs. My son got XP Pro and win2003 ent this way.

Unfortunately they can only get one copy and we are using ours.

[url=http://bhs.broo.k12.wv.us/homepage/staff/seti/farms.htm]SETI farms<a>


Would this be the one in question?

> [url=http://bhs.broo.k12.wv.us/homepage/staff/seti/farms.htm]SETI farms<a>

And some people think i need help...

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Grant
Darwin NT

> Would this be the one in question?

Yes, thanks! :)
That's one of the missing links! LOL

OK maybe I should change the questions. I've searched each of the last 51 pages of threads, done a keyword search for "farm" on this forum. Searched Newegg and other commercial sales sites including Ebay.

I just don't understand windows licensing. There must be 25 different OS packages available. I see Novell/Linux 9.30 (vision only, whatever that is), WinXP Upgrade, WinXP OEM, Winxp full for both home and XP. I see what appear to be versions for 3,5,10,20,25 and 30 licenses. I see Server 2003 in multiple configs. I just don't know which is my best option.

If I upgrade my P3 500 which has an OEM (HP) supplied version of Win98 (not SE). I've already upgraded the HD and was able to reinstall the original OS, would I be able to change the MOBO and CPU and still use the OEM win98? Since, it already had Win98, but am changing mobo and cpu, could I just get the Upgrade version of WinXP?

There are some deals available on 64 bit AMD combos, I notice Windows won't upgrade Home users to XP64 only Pro users, so Should I get XP pro? Is there a 64 bit linux client available?

Win98 has some issues with memory leaks, so that might not be a good choice.

Server 2003, what is it? Is it made to install on multiple puters? If so,how many? is it compatible with 64 bit systems?

Do you see my confusion?

Oh yeah, the Novell site offers up "Desktop", "Server", and "pro" is there a way to find out which would be best for a small farm?

Also, I'm on Dial up, does Linux work with my ISP Juno?

Many questions. Sorry I can only answer a few of them...

> [...] it already had Win98, but am changing mobo and cpu, could I just get the Upgrade version of WinXP?

Yes, you can buy the upgrade version of XP. You'll have to reinstall everything, but XP will ask for the Win98 CD when it needs it, and then you just insert it in the CD Drive and XP sniffs the licence.

> I notice Windows won't upgrade Home users to XP64 only Pro users, so Should I get XP pro?

Absolutely. If you go for Windows, XP Pro is the right choice, I beleive. (But I guess you should then look for multi-licencing options.) Windows XP Home is a toy (lacks some network capabilities, for instance) and server editions would perhaps be overkill.

> Is there a 64 bit linux client available?

Yes, there are Linux distro's which runs on 64-bit processors: Suse 9.x and Red Hat (current version, at least). Maybe others, but I don't know them.

About different versions of Linux; for instance Suse 9.3, it's not necessarry to go for the "Enterprise" version. That would be overkill. Perhaps the Pro version... Or just the Desktop. It's personal preference, really. Also look here.

> Server 2003, what is it?

Basically Windows XP Pro with additional server software, plus the ability to run on machines with more than 2 processors. There are several versions of Windows Server 2003, but all of them would be overkill for your needs, I think. They are also more expensive than XP Pro.