<div dir="ltr"><div>thanks for the update ed. are the computers already at sudo room?<br><br></div>i'm happy to help do installs/test memory/test that you're preparing once it's ready to go. just let me know when.<br>
</div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Jul 18, 2014 at 2:06 AM, Ed Biow <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:biow@riseup.net" target="_blank">biow@riseup.net</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
<div>So I had a chance to muck with one of
the new OptiPlex 755 machines that I brought home to tinker with,
it has a Intel Core2 Duo E6850 @ 3.00GHz processor, which is quite
nice, 3rd quarter 2007, and quite powerful.<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core2+Duo+E6850+%40+3.00GHz" target="_blank">http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core2+Duo+E6850+%40+3.00GHz</a><br>
<a href="http://ark.intel.com/products/30785/Intel-Core2-Duo-Processor-E6850-4M-Cache-3_00-GHz-1333-MHz-FSB" target="_blank">http://ark.intel.com/products/30785/Intel-Core2-Duo-Processor-E6850-4M-Cache-3_00-GHz-1333-MHz-FSB</a><br>
<br>
Energy usage is reasonable, about Max TDP: 65 W, maybe 11 W more
then a current generation Haswell i3-4130 desktop CPU. <br>
<br>
The machine is quiet and has one low riser PCI slot. a metric
buttload of USB ports (6 back, 2 front), a DVD-RW, serial ports
& most unusually, it looks like 2 RCA sound-out jacks. No
PS/2, though. <br>
<br>
It seems to sport a 270 GB SATA drive. Plenty, plenty. I ran it
through a short smartctl hard drive test and it passed and has
about 40k hours on it, a fair amount. <br>
<br>
The box I grabbed only has 2x1 GB DDR2 sticks, but has 2 free
slots. I gathered from Brian that some of the boxes have 4 GB.
Because of the marginal amount of RAM I decided to install an i386
version of Kubuntu 14.04 Trusty Tahr, and the thing performs
well. I may throw on XFCE4 for those who want a lighter
environment, but I'll try to rein in my OCD and not install too
many additional desktop environments. If folks feel like they
prefer Cinnamon, Mate, LXDE, Gnome3, openbox, Unity, etc. they can
all be installed on individual boxes later, but I feel like KDE is
a good choice for these robust boxes, being very configurable and
familiar to people coming from a Windows background. BTW, the
14.04 version of LXDE is much improved, particularly the file
manager, pcmanfm. <br>
<br>
RAM & 32 bit vs. 64 bit:<br>
<a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/7034/what-are-the-differences-between-32-bit-and-64-bit-and-which-should-i-choose/70551#70551" target="_blank">http://askubuntu.com/questions/7034/what-are-the-differences-between-32-bit-and-64-bit-and-which-should-i-choose/70551#70551</a><br>
<br>
Unfortunately an old friend and his spawn and mate are visiting
from Guanajuato, MX, so I won't be able to do much else on the
project until mid-week. <br><div class="">
<br>
<br>
On 07/17/2014 04:50 AM, Matthew Senate wrote:<br>
</div></div><div class="">
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">Awesome!
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Perhaps La Commune would be interested in hosting a few for
general usage in the entrance cafe/bookstore?</div>
</div>
</blockquote></div>
That would be great.<div class=""><br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">On 07/17/2014 05:24 PM, Marina Kukso wrote:<br>
> this is amazing! thank you ed!<br>
><br>
> i'd love to help get as many of these set up as i can. feel
free to email me offlist with some more info about what's needed
to get these set up.<br>
> question for anyone: forgive my ignorance, but are the small
library/classroom spaces downstairs slated for a particular
collective right now or are they available? (also, is there a map
that shows what collective is in what space?)<br>
><br>
</blockquote>
<br>
<br>
</div><div class=""><blockquote type="cite">On 07/17/2014 05:24 PM, Vicky Knox wrote:<br>
> This is perhaps the greatest news I've read on Sudo Discuss
EVER. It has always been my dream that Sudo Room provide public
computer terminals for folks without access to the hardware, for
classes such as basic computer literacy, and for events that
require computers such as Oakland Wiki editathons.<br>
> Ed, how can I help?<br>
</blockquote>
<br></div>
You guys are far too nice, cut it out, really. Once I get a nice
image ready I'll bring it to the room and if folks are interested I
can show them how to install the pre-configured image and test the
hard drives and memory. I wrote a little script that is helpful, it
renames the host in 4 places, etc. <br>
<br>
If folks want to install Linux on their own I put a binder with a
bunch of recent Debian & Ubuntu (and PCLinuxOS) DVDs on the top
shelf where all the computer parts lurk. It says Micro$oft
Developers Tools or something. Just please, please, please don't
disassemble the boxes and take or lose the panels and hardware like
some helpful individual did at the old sudoroom. I'm hoping if this
bloke re-emerges that folks will chase him off, he made working on
those donated machines a pile more frustrating.<br>
<br>
But another thing that people could do if they feel the call is run
the machines' little self-diagnostic routine. Hook a box up to a VGA
monitor and USB keyboard & Hit F12 as the system is booting up
and use the down arrow key to choose DIAGNOSTICS. After you run the
routine it will ask you if you want to test the memory more
thoroughly, which is probably a good idea. Then label the machine
as checked with a piece of paper or tape and note any problems.
Extra points if you write down whether the box has 2 GB or 4 GB of
RAM. <br><div class="">
<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">On 07/17/2014 06:38 PM, Max B wrote:<br>
> I think another really interesting model is the way that a
lot of community bike shops have people volunteer for a number of
hours and then build a bike which they're able to keep. Public
terminals would be really great and I think it would also be
amazing to be able to send folks home with their own machines (and
maybe some basic computer knowledge)</blockquote>
<br></div>
Max, OTX West already does that. It takes 20 hours of "Service
Bucks" to buy a computer. Seems like they charge extra SBs to add
peripherals and to "upgrade" to a faster machine with Windows 7.<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.otxwest.org/volunteers.html" target="_blank">http://www.otxwest.org/volunteers.html</a><br>
<br>
I've been meaning to go over there and volunteer a bit. I can
"earn" a mouse an hour, since I'm a little more experienced then
their typical volunteer maybe I can con them into throwing in an
extra power cable as well. Also, I'd like to talk to them about the
benefits of open sores, particularly for older machines that can't
handle Windohs 7, especially now that XP is no longer supported by
MS.<br>
<br>
Anyway, I think that a labor-for-hardware program would be a great
idea for us, too, though I would hate to have to administer it.<br>
<br>
All PowerBooks to the People,<br>
<br>
Big Red Ed<div><div class="h5"><br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Jul 17, 2014 at 10:09 AM, Ed
Biow <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:biow@riseup.net" target="_blank">biow@riseup.net</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF"> My crony Gerald &
I picked up about 15 'puters from <a href="https://youthradio.org/" target="_blank">Youth Radio</a> today, and brought them
to the sudoroom. We also grabbed about 7 monitors and a
bag full of cables. These boxen look pretty sweet, dual
core, Windows 8, 4 GB of RAM. I was planning on
installing some version of Trusty Tahr (*buntu 14.04) or
maybe Debian testing and then using a live disc (<a href="http://redobackup.org/" target="_blank">redobackup</a>) to blow the image on the
rest of the machines after testing the memory and hard
drives. Brian, the IT bloke at YR is replacing the
machines with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Unit_of_Computing" target="_blank">NUC</a>s. It looks like there are
another 30 or so of these Dells available to us when they
get readied. If we can spare the table space maybe we can
set up a few machines for visitor browsing in a quiet
corner somewhere. And we should have some nice boxes for
the Oakland kids' computer center. The four boxes I have
ready to go are mostly pretty funky, missing panels, or
very loud, etc. I'm sure we can find them a home, though.
I also have a few more expendable desktop Linux machines
at home. Finding rodents, power cords, monitors &
keyboards may prove a bit of a challenge, though I have a
few extra keyboards and power cables.<br>
<br>
I'm planning on going camping in August, but in September
I'd like to start hosting a weekly Linux install
fest/trouble shooting session on Friday afternoons at 4
PM. Folks can bring their Linux problems in for
troubleshooting, and I can bring pizza back from a pickup
I make at 8PM from a local collective. Maybe if nothing
else is going on we can cap the evening with a
tech/polit-related flick to go with the pizza, perhaps
even a round of frosty malted beverages. As I mentioned
before, maybe we could use some always-on machine to act
as a proxy for deb files, so we could update machines at
11MB a second instead of pounding our limited internet
bandwidth. I'm familiar with approx and apt-cacher,
though there are others. I'll bring up the idea during
one of our weekly Wednesday meetings soon.<br>
<br>
Einstein & campaign staff<br>
</div>
<br>
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</blockquote>
</div>
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</blockquote>
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