Tue 11 May 2004
Project Ideas
Posted by Chip under Thoughts and Ideas
Just a list of stuff I would like to do computer-wise at the moment. Most of them will probably never get done due to lack of money or time, but I can still dream, right?
- Get a VoIP phone for home. Currently looking at VoicePulse, which has some pretty good rates, like unlimited local and 200 minutes long distance for $15/mo. I might actually do this in the near future. I’d like to build my own voice system thing with Asterisk, but then I’d need to buy more expensive parts to use analog phones again, or buy VoIP phones.
- Build a home router. Been thinking of this for a while. I’m currently using Interceptor, my sparcStation 10 for this, but it’s hard drive is noisy and it’s extremely slow, so I can’t really play around with Snort on it. Ideally, I’d like to build a small box using a VIA EPIA CL board, but they’re kindof expensive. I might build up one of my current systems to do it first, just taking out the hard drive and putting in a flash device. Probably going to be putting OpenBSD on this one.
- Reformat my HTPC and put Windows XP on it instead of Linux. I’ve had way too many issues trying to get Linux to get decent TV output, so I’m going to let Windows have a shot at it. Also, I’ve been eyeing a bundle from SnapStream that includes their TiVo-like software, their RF remote control, and a Hauppauge TV tuner with MPEG encoder. I’ll see how it goes. I don’t really watch enough TV to justify it at the moment, but I would like to be able to catch a few things.
- Reformat my WinXP box. It needs it anyway, it’s got a bunch of funky things going on, so it probably needs a good brainwashing. I think I’m going to try dual booting it with Linux again now that the 2.6.6 kernel is out, along with some patches to make it more stable (hopefully) on nForce2 boards (which I have.)
- Redoing the I-Opener. I never really got it to the point I wanted to before, so I’m thinking of taking a stab at it again. I found a neat CF board that’s the same size and shape as a 2.5” laptop hard drive, so I was thinking of replacing the drive in the I-Opener with a flash card, so as to cut down on noise. Maybe I’ll try to find a way to put the stock heatsink back on, then it would run fanless. I’d like to be able to use it as a basic terminal for checking email and doing IRC and AIM.
That’s all I can think of for now. I still want to do the car computer at some point, but my bank accounts are telling me to wait for a bit on it. There’s also the 1 terabyte storage server I’d like to build, just for the fun of it, but again, those drives get expensive. Maybe later on in the year.
June 3rd, 2005 at 12:00 am
I like that SnapStream thingie - exactly what I was contemplating for the home PC. When I finish playing with the MG, I might get one of their kits - looks like a decent price for the combo, and I guess it is more likely to work properly(!).
By the way, I figured out the web site mystery. It turns out that cablespeed has both a size (10M)and a file count (500) limitation. It was the count that was giving me trouble. I would still like to relocate it though, so that I can use the photo album stuff.
June 3rd, 2005 at 12:00 am
SnapStream is the bomb. I “found” a copy to play with and even with my primative tv-tuner card (and old ati I think) it still worked rather well. The multiple levels of compression really helped too… it was eating up way to much disk space in the begining. Then I decided not to have cable… so it became rather pointless for me, unless of course I wanted to record fuzzy-bunny-ear-type episodes of shows on the 4 stations I get. I didn’t figure there was much PBS that needed recording so I stopped using it. Still I nifty system though.
And as for that reformat, I feel your pain. I’ve just recently started clearing some space on mine. I somehow filled a 120G and a 80G. I’ve also taken to duel-booting BeOS 5 Pro, which is slicker than snot IMHO. Thankfully the BeOS community is still writting apps. Go figure.