System Designation?

[VaKo]

I've managed to acquire a bunch of computers, and now I need to work out what to do with them. I have 3 machines which I cannot work out what to do with. You got any ideas? Bare in mind that I have a P4 Intel Desktop running XP pro and will soon be getting a second for linux, and a windows 2k3 file server.

1:

Dual P3 500Mhz,

1GB ECC PC133 SDRAM,

1x36GB & 1x18GB SCSI disks

Not sure what to do with this one, it was running as a webserver but I think it can do more. Maybe this:

http://www.howtoforge.com/openvz_centos4.4

But ideally in the long term I'd like it to do more than just be a webserver, although its quite old its still a good system in a classic car type of way. Anybody got any ideas?

2:

Celeron 733mhz,

192MB SDRAM

10GB IDE

Low powered, ubuntu 6.10 runs like a dog although xubuntu works fine. Kubuntu had xorg running at 43% idle. lol. Despite its lack of power, its extremely quite and runs very cool, so I'm using it as a web server at the moment. Running FreeBSD 6.1. Anyone know of a free apache control panel like ISPconfig that works on freeBSD?

3:

2 Working AMD Athlon XP's (one 2200+ and one 1600+), 1 working motherboard, 1 stick of DDR, a battery powered 10mbit Ethernet hub, 2x16mb flash cards, 3 ethernet NIC's, 8 PCI modems, 3 floppy drives, a baggie full of misc screws and jumpers, a parallel port zip drive, 2 ATX cases, 1 PSU, a pci S3 graphics card, a geforce 2 with a heatsink superglued to the gpu (good or bad?) and a soundblaster pci card.

No idea...

[Sparda]

Stick minimal FreeBSD install on them (with Linux binary support) and get them folding!

[moonlit]

Where'd you get that lot, dude? I could do with some new kit :p

[cooper]

The Dual machine might be fun to play on with Xen.

For the Celeron:

Mail server / spam filter.

Proxy server

Caching DNS server

Asterix box, using one of the PCI modem cards.

Keep the PCI graphics adapter on hand as an emergency known-good card. They're EXCELLENT for diagnosing problems.

Keep the network cards on hand as spares aswell. It's one of those things I really hate to find myself without.

The Zip drive and flash cards I'd say are useless doing what the manufacturer wanted them to be used for. Scavenge the Zip drive for screws and ICs and what not, and scrap the rest.

The hub is another nice thing to keep about for emergencies.

The GeForce 2 is allright to have around as a starting point for when you want to make a machine you're actually going to use, but aren't going to game on. Never mind the heatsink. As long as it works everything's cool.

[OtterFox]

Since the celeron run quietly maybe turn it into a Pandora playing box, just set it up in the corner and use it instead of a sterio. You could even use it as a alarm clock?

I was going to do this with a 500MHz laptop but they all cost too much...old laptops are expensive for what they are </rant>

[Heinzanova]

I would put a TV card in the Celeron and kinda do an audio box... but better.

http://www.mythtv.org/

check it out, nice simple, rig up the network let it dump the saved media onto a Samba share on your lan. and you will be in heaven.

(maybe turn that first machine into a samba file server)

[Arsenic]

A few things that I want to do when I have the money to spend is:

1: Media Center PC

2: Security System Box.

-Always wanted to build and manage my own security system.

3: Home/Apartment automation

-Air conditioning, Security, power management, light/appliance control, sprinkler control, garage door, etc.