9. Retired Servers

9.1. knuth: HomeBrew AMD 64

This machine was rebuilt in October 2004, replacing Chvatal.

Note that there was a predecessor "knuth" running an AMD K6 CPU, as well as a further predecessor that was a Cyrix 150+-based system purchased from Atipa.

The Atipa unit unfortunately suffered from a "motherboard fire." A capacitor on the motherboard approximately an inch away from the CPU caught fire and exploded. The "can" wound up elsewhere in the case, and a significant chunk of the motherboard had melted traces. This left the assortment of peripherals (that did survive the "blaze") without a system to connect to.

I replaced the motherboard with a FIC 2001, CPU with an AMD K6-266, replaced the case, and it provided service until late 2000 as my main machine.

Unfortunately, the power supply fan died, and there was a bit of a heat problem, which resulted in an IDE hard drive sitting at the top of the stack of drives of various sorts overheating severely and burning out.

This led me to removing most of the case, to ensure adequate cooling, and to start to build Chvatal, which has not one, not two, but three case fans. Overheating shouldn't be a problem...

This machine's host name was inspired by Donald E. Knuth, Professor Emiterius of The Art of Computer Programming. His series The Art of Computer Programming is an incredible resource in theoretical computing. (And is of practical importance in designing efficient algorithms.) He created the TeX typesetting system, and has developed the whole concept of Literate Programming, where documentation and software is fundamentally linked together so that you can describe why the program is correct, and compile the program out of that documentation package.

• ASUS K8V Motherboard with AMD64 3000+

• Antec Sonata case

  Which, having rubber components here and there, and quiet fans, was designed, successfully, to be particularly quiet.

• ATI Radeon 9200

9.2. WITS A81

This is one of the Chinese-made Section 1 tablets. Possibly somewhat hackable. I have one of the resistive-touch ones, branded as a "Nationite MIDnite". Sadly, dysfunctional. One of the firmware updates "bricked" it.

• Slatedroid: Witstech A81E

  Has some specifications, alas relatively little else.

• a81linux

• A81 Linux

• On Installing Angstrom Linux on A81E

  Angstrom is one of the interesting embedded Linux distributions.

Here are some links less specific to the A81 unit:

• The Sad State of Open Source in Android tablets

• Run Android on Your Netbook or Desktop - How-To Geek

• How To Root Android Devices

  Using Android ADB.

  Documents process set up for Augen tablets, but this evidently works fine on A81.

  Obtain ChainsDD/xinx's Superuser.apk/su , and get the appropriate version (Eclair=Android 2.1, Froyo=Android 2.2).

  Unzip update.zip on your computer (or on the tablet)

  Run the following from your computer (or from a terminal on the tablet, in which case one may omit the adb bits):

  adb push ./system/app/Superuser.apk /system/app/ adb push ./system/xbin/su /system/xbin adb shell rm /system/bin/su adb shell ln -s /system/xbin/su /system/bin/su adb shell chmod 6755 /system/xbin/su adb shell reboot

9.3. Viewsonic gTablet

This is quite a nice Section 1 tablet. It runs CyanogenMod nicely, and it was very easy to install that as a substantial enhancement. Sadly, it got burgled.

• Specs @ Viewsonic

• CyanogenMod Viewsonic gTablet Instructions

9.4. chvatal: Homebuilt AMD K7 Duron Server

This server is long dead, replaced by Knuth.

It consisted of:

• ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.- A7V133-C Motherboard

• AMD Duron K7 processor

• Some disks, cannibalized from predecessor systems, notably Knuth ;

• NetGear Ethernet NIC, also cannibalized from an earlier iteration of Knuth

• Various and sundry DIMM sticks scavenged from other systems

• Due to overheating problems with a previous Knuth iteration, this machine had a whole lot of fans.

• ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.--V6600 GeForce Video

This machine ran Debian GNU/Linux,

Linear Programming by Vasek Chvatal was my main reference to linear programming whilst in both my undergraduate and graduate studies.

9.5. GrabBag of Hardware...

There is a bunch of hardware that may or may not be connected to anything...

9.6. godel: IBM Intellistation Pro Z

This used to be my the main server, consisting of:

The IBM IntelliStation Z Pro Replacement Parts List noted that it uses "EDO ECC DIMMs." The model number seems to be 6899... See also

PR440FX motherboard Supported Processors, System Board Memory - PC 300/700 and IntelliStation Series, 6899 - PentiumŪ Pro 200MHz System Board, 6588 and IntelliStation - 6888, 6898, 6899 Models 6899 - PentiumŪ Pro 200MHz Parts Listing, and 5V to 3.52V VRM-Connector

Kurt Godel set up a representation of a "general theorem construction system," the propositional calculus and provable manipulations of expressions using multiples and powers of prime numbers. From this, he established that not all statements that can be represented in the Propositional Calculus can be proven to be correct by "provably correct manipulations."

This proved that Bertrand Russell's attempt to build a comprehensive guide to the theory of mathematics, Principia Mathematica, was to be a project doomed to failure. You can't prove everything in mathematics.

This box has been running Debian since about 2001, and has been my firewall throughout that time.

9.7. dantzig: Digital Alpha

Compatible RAM variations:

• SN-MSP01-HC - 64MB ECC SDRAM DIMMs

• SN-MSP01-HD - 128MB ECC SDRAM DIMMs

• SN-MSP01-HE - 256MB ECC SDRAM DIMMs

• SN-MSP01-HF - 512MB ECC SDRAM DIMMs

Found on the web variously as:

• AlphaMemory has quite favorable pricing for RAM for Personal Workstations.

• 128MB Upgrade Kit Memory Upgrade Module for Digital Equipment Corporation Personal Workstation 600a (Au)

  $270 for 128MB

• Crucial - RAM for PW 433a

3DFX Voodoo 3000 graphics card, cannibalized from Knuth

Compaq/Digital has various updates to BIOS and other system components:

• AlphaBIOS V5.70, SRM, POST

AHA-2490UW Dual SCSI Controller User's Guide

It's got a PCI bus, 53C810 SCSI, Alpha CPU running at 166 MHz, 96MB RAM, 340MB SCSI disk, and a 15" SVGA monitor. The specs are described in much more detail in my Alpha UDB/Multia web page; I've added only external components: a satellite Sony 2x SCSI CD-ROM, and a Zip drive. Note that 10Base2 and 10BaseT Ethernet is built-in on the motherboard.

It was upgraded to "Red Hat 4.1 Official Version" on April 6 1997 after a several-month hiatus wherein I had (unsuccessfully) tried to move several times to version 4.0; as of April 1999, it more recently runs the stable version of Debian GNU/Linux.

It has been upgraded, adding a Diamond Stealth Video 3200, using the S3 968 chip chipset with 2MB of apparently fast RAM. This is compatible with the S3 XFree86 X server, and provides decent high resolution graphics.

• 128MB Upgrade Kit Memory Upgrade Module for Digital Equipment Corporation Personal Workstation 600a (Au)

  $270 for 128MB

AHA-2490UW Dual SCSI Controller User's Guide

It's got a PCI bus, 53C810 SCSI, Alpha CPU running at 166 MHz, 96MB RAM, 340MB SCSI disk, and a 15" SVGA monitor. The specs are described in much more detail in my Alpha UDB/Multia web page; I've added only external components: a satellite Sony 2x SCSI CD-ROM, and a Zip drive. Note that 10Base2 and 10BaseT Ethernet is built-in on the motherboard.

It was upgraded to "Red Hat 4.1 Official Version" on April 6 1997 after a several-month hiatus wherein I had (unsuccessfully) tried to move several times to version 4.0; as of April 1999, it more recently runs the stable version of Debian GNU/Linux.

It has been upgraded, adding a Diamond Stealth Video 3200, using the S3 968 chip chipset with 2MB of apparently fast RAM. This is compatible with the S3 XFree86 X server, and provides decent high resolution graphics.

Should Dantzig fall down, and have difficulty coming back up, here are some notable bits of configuration: /dev/sda1 is the MILO partition /dev/sda2 is the root partition Unfortunately, there are several dysfunctional kernels kicking around; the one known to work OK is invoked via the MILO command: boot sda2:boot/vmlinuz-2.2.1 root=/dev/sda2

Dantzig "the Multia" is now defunct, due to a severe power surge. It has been replaced by a rather faster Alpha box by the same name...

George Dantzig was the inventor of Linear Programming, a "mathematical programming" approach to solving optimization problems. This was one of the early techniques that popularized Operations Research in industry.

9.8. salesman: AMD-based Toshiba Satellite 2105CDS Laptop

For on-the-road operations... It fairly regularly got "scraped off" to try things out, and has been known to run BeOS, FreeBSD and Debian Linux.

• Linux Laptop Page

• TuxMobil: UniX On Laptops

• Linux Laptop HOWTO

• lanoche

  A tool that builds a hardware report about laptop features.

• www.davidwatson.org: Redhat Severn Beta On Emachines M5310

  If quality is there, I might pick up one of these; they seem nice...

9.9. wolfe: AMD5x86-133 VLB System

This machine used to be my main server, but is presently disused.

It has gotten fairly seriously "hacked on" and has been used to supply spare parts for other systems, so that any correlation between the configuration mentioned below and reality may be purely coincidental. It's liable to either disappear or to spontaneously turn into a PCI bus machine. But there are some useful notes here nonetheless.

This machine is very much a hodge-podge of components acquired from various places Old IDE disk drives, CD-ROM, and video card were raided from an old system, case and monitor came from an Addison-based surplus store called CompuSurplus, newer IDE drive bought at some "outlet" computer store. It's all been in pieces and all been dysfunctional at various points in time.

Once legacy files get dumped off, this machine ought to become a "test bed" for OS experimentation; I'd like to try out some combination of:

• Linux on L4

• Hurd

• One of the *BSDs, perhaps OpenBSD

• VSTa

Wolfe and Dantzig created a scheme known as Dantzig-Wolfe Decomposition that splits large linear programs into a set of subproblems (that are themselves LPs) that are connected together using a "master problem." These pieces are all smaller and more easily solved than the original LP.

9.10. On the Road

When on the road, I used a PalmOS PDA.

• Motorola 68328 "DragonBall" CPU

• 1MB ROM (containing Palm OS and built-in applications)

• 2MB RAM expansion

• 4.7 x 3.2 x.7 inches

• 5.7 ounces, including installed batteries

• 160 x 160 pixel reflective, pressure sensitive LCD screen

• Proprietary RS-232 serial connector (readily connected to a more normal DB25/DB9 RS-232 serial connector)

I've got a web page of Pilot Links, but my brother, David runs the vastly more voluminous PDA-Archives web site.

9.11. escher: UMAX PPC/603e

SuperMac C500LT/200 w/ PowerPC 603e, 16MB RAM, 2.0GB HD, 8X CD, 1MB video RAM

To be deployed real soon now, this might run MacOS, BeOS, or LinuxPPC . Uncertain at this point.

Afterthoughts: It's currently in mothballs, as 16MB RAM isn't enough for Linux/PPC, and is a bit flakey running MacOS.

9.12. NSLUG

• Linux on the NSLU2

• NSLU2-Linux - Main / HomePage