[Cialug] [OT] Re-using monitors, end of an era

[Daniel A. Ramaley]

I have a pair of 17" LCD monitors with no specific use as they've been 
replaced by a single widescreen monitor. The monitors support VGA and 
DVI inputs (no HDCP though). I was thinking that they are a good size 
for a bedroom TV. The most obvious (to me anyway) way to use them as a 
TV would be to hook up a small computer with a TV tuner card. I could 
even put a DVD drive in the machine and have a DVD player too. But, i'd 
rather not have so much hardware hanging off of them. Any ideas for a 
better way to go about this?



And speaking of old hardware, it is my sad duty to report that the 
computer-in-a-box that i once brought to a CIALUG meeting many moons 
ago has been taken out of service. The machine still works, is still 
silent[*], and is still in the cardboard box. The box originally held 
analog audio tapes from Drake's Educational Media Department, a 
department that hasn't even existed for several years. The computer was 
built with cast-off parts from the University of Minnesota Law School, 
from when i worked there in the summer of 1998. The computer is an AMD 
486-133MHz (yes, a 133 MHz 486!) with 24 MB RAM, a pair of 3com 3c509b 
ethernet cards, no hard disk, and runs entirely from a floppy. Since 
the floppy drive sits directly atop the motherboard, it is loosely 
encased in an anti-static bag.

If anyone is interested in the machine, let me know. It does just fine 
at routing a 10 Mbit connection, the only problem with it being that 
the CMOS battery has long since departed this Earth and so on power 
failure the machine needs to be retold what millennium it is and that 
it has a floppy drive. Also, i discarded the outer case for the power 
supply (to make sure heat could still rise out of it after the cooling 
fan was disabled to make it silent), so don't touch the high voltage 
circuits when it is plugged in.

It runs Coyote Linux. Since it doesn't run any services, it has seemed 
reasonably secure despite running very old and outdated software. I 
don't remember what kernel it has, whether it is a 2.0 or a 2.2 series, 
but it is something old enough to be small enough to fit on a floppy 
and still have space for some admin utilities.

The 486 has now been replaced with a machine that is smaller, faster, 
and cheaper (as in it uses less electricity) running OpenBSD from an 
industrial flash-based storage device.

[*] Silent except for a *very* faint and very high-pitched whine that
    i suspect comes from some component in the power supply. It is so
    high-pitched that i could hear it when i got the machine, but now
    enough years have passed that i cannot.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dan Ramaley                            Dial Center 118, Drake University
Network Programmer/Analyst             2407 Carpenter Ave
+1 515 271-4540                        Des Moines IA 50311 USA