Question about expanding the SETI Farm?

[TSDible]

Hello All...

It is good to be involved with such an excited team. It has inspired me to do more for the team. I have some hardware lying around that I may be able to put to use. I didn't know if there is a simple linux distribution out there that may do the trick.... Here is what I have...

2 x Celeron 450 (100 MHz FSB)
1 x Celeron 333
2 x MB for above CPUs
1 x 64 MB PC100
1 x 128 MB PC100
1 x Case/PWS (Could get another cheap)
1 x 2 GB HDD
1 x 1.44 FDD
(Plenty of Networking stuff)

Is there a linux distro that will run Seti from a floppy? I'm sure that I could come up with at least one machine to crunch another WU a day or so...

Keep in mind... someone will need to hold my hand as I have really no experience with Linux... I also have access to my copies of Win98 which I no longer use. However, I expect that Linux will be more efficient in proccessing the work. Maybe someone can clarify that....

Thanks for any help/ideas.

 

[Shuxclams]

http://lrp.gibbsoft.com/






We're here to help...






SHUX

 

[TSDible]

I'll check it out thanks....

How much would a graphic linux on a small hard drive kill production? I'm thinking that with my limited knowledge, it may be easier to find a couple of small HDDs to build with...

Or am I better off just throwing 98 on them and having them up quicker? I have the latest Mandrake Install I believe, so that would be my other option.

What do you guys think?

 

[ICXRa]

Bump

anybody?

 

[Crazee]

From some of the stuff I have read on the forum, the client for linux is not quite as fast as the one for Windows (Someone correct me if I am wrong). The advantage would be to put together the machines without the hard drive. If you are thinking about putting HDs in I would recommend going the Windows route.

 

[Sukhoi]

It actually probably wouldn't be a whole lot slower running Linux of the HDDs, and it would be easier to configure I would think.

 

[JimMc]

I loaded XP on two old hard drives and run the Seti client on those. Made the SetiQ/networking pretty painless, but I am hardly conversant with Linux so there may be advantages to going that route I'm not aware of.

 

[Derango]

Ok, lets see here...there are plenty of distros that will let you boot them from a floppy. Try running a search over at either www.linuxnewbie.org or www.linuxjunor.org.

Take it from me, you don't want to run any type of GUI on 64MB of ram if you want to get any type of crunching done in the backgound. It's just too slow, as it will spend more time swapping things out to the hard drive. If you can get another hard drive, I would say throw win98 on there, the client is suposed to be faster anyway. If not, linux would be the way to go here. Sorry if I coulden't help you more...my expertiece is with more specific questions. If you ask the guys over at either linuxnewbie.org or linuxjunior.org, you'll probably get a really good answer.