What can I do with this PC?

S

Skell

n00b
Joined
Mar 24, 2005
Messages
18
Hi all, long time lurker, first time poster, yada yada whatever

Anyway, I recently bought a refurbished Dell GX150, for £80, specification as follows:

P3 1Ghz
Intel 815 Chipset
512Mb PC133 SDRAM
20Gb HDD

Etc etc

This deal was too good to pass up IMO, but im at a loss as to what I can do with it! Ive got a Windows 2000 Pro and Server licence (it actually came with a Windows 2000 Pro COA), and Im not adverse to installing a version of Linux on it. Only thing I can think of doing with it is turning it into a Print Server, but its a bit of a waste for a machine this powerful.

Any ideas guys?

Skell
 
WEb server, ftp server, team speak, firewall router, game server, the possibilities are endless
 
Do you have any plans to put any larger hard drives in it? I was thinking maybe a file server or maybe a htpc. Another thought is if you have extra bandwith you could use it as a ftp server for sending and receiving files.
 
server (file, ftp ect)
dedicated hardware firewall
dedicated Intrusion Detection System w\ built in firewall (SNORT)
attach a butt load of storage and make it a NAS
borg it for the [H]orde

any of those intrest you I can get you additional linkage, but not till Monday
 
Good chance to pull out some Win98SE and play some old games also... Diablo2 and maybe even some Wolf3D.EXE
 
Dont need a router or a firewall as I already have one :)
Dont really have enough upload bandwidth for an FTP server (256k)
Teamspeak server is plausable
HTPC sounds fun, Id need a low profile TV card tho, unless I bought a USB 2 PCI card and an external one. Plus Id have to find out how well they work in the UK.
A file server sounds like a good idea too, but Im not 100% sure on how to set something like that up

Thanks for the ideas, keep them coming :)

Skell
 
I have a similar computer except with a p3 850mhz. I tried running a TV card in Win98SE, and it wouldn't work right. It couldn't keep up, so maybe not a HTPC. I'm keeping it around for old games (along with a Celeron 366 for Win95 and DOS games).
 
Skell said:
Dont need a router or a firewall as I already have one :)
Click to expand...


of sorts
many of us have a basic NAT firewall built into a router
what you can do with something like that is employ it to learn enterprise class rule based firewalling and intrusion detection, a skill that if you had aspirations to being a sysadmin would look mighty fine on a resume. ;)

of course most any old box would do for that, if and when you think you might want to try ;)
 
Hehe Ice Czar, you've tempted me to have a go. Very keen on becoming a sysadmin, but alas, I havent found a way into the industry as yet :( I'll have to look it up at some point.

Skell
 
while sheepskins are generally required, actual experience helps, and like many business its a catch-22
however running a mixed OS LAN of your own especially with a security bent could land you in that first real job. ;)

Basic starting point > http://pigtail.net/LRP/index.html (simple and easy)
graduating to > http://www.netfilter.org/ (opensource freeware)
* stateless packet filtering (IPv4 and IPv6)
* stateful packet filtering (IPv4)
* all kinds of network address and port translation (NAT/NAPT)
* flexible and extensible infrastructure
* multiple layers of API's for 3rd party extensions
* large number of plugins/modules kept in 'patch-o-matic' repository


then to > http://www.snort.org/ > http://www.snort.org/docs/iss-placement.pdf
and if your really serious about security > http://www.sans.org/aboutsans.php
(GIAG certs)


NAT & PAT (NAPT)
IPTables (PDF part 1) & Part 2
Stateful vs. Stateless IP Filtering
 
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