[vox] Sheevaplug

[Bill Broadley]

On 11/16/2010 12:59 AM, Michael Wenk wrote:
> Thanks for all the responses.
> 
> However, I don't really want a full system.  I'm replacing an NSLU2, a
> device which is actually somewhat overpowered for what I use it for.  What I
> want:

Did you hook up spinning drives to your nslu2?  I couldn't find anything
except the big warning that it didn't work.  Anyone using a sheevaplug
and usb based spinning disks?

> 1) low power, I like the fact that the sheevaplug/guruplug are ~5 watts.

Ya, that's very nice, and unmatchable with an atom.

> 2) low heat, I'm not sure how to measure this, but I assume that a low power
> device should generate less heat.

100% of the power used is 100% efficiently converted into heat, well
quite a few 9s worth anyways.  For once thermodynamics is on your side.
 Sure you might not have to pay for the cooling for a random photon that
sneaks out a window but that's a vanishingly small fraction of power
used and should be considered zero for all practical purposes.

The new atoms include most of the hottest parts of a motherboard, the
memory controller, cpu, and gpu peak at 13 watts and idle significantly
lower.  Of course the motherboard, dimms, and disks (if you have them)
take power as well.  So if you can live with a flash storage the
sheevaplug is going to be a big win.

> Bonuses: Two lan interfaces and a wireless(N/G) device that works decently
> under linux. 

Sounds good.

> The bonuses would let me replace my home router, which would be nice.  But I
> don't want to go with a full system.  I replaced that with the NSLU2 and a
> home router back 3-4 years ago.  It really saved me a ton of money on power
> and cooling.

I had a hard time finding total system power for an atom, I found a
review that included a nvidia ION chipset which I'm sure adds some
heat/power usage where the system idled under 30 watts but did include a
hard disk.  There are atom based mini systems with GigE and Wifi
but they are going to be more expensive, hotter, and larger than a
sheeva plug.