ideas for a spare computer?

[Mirrorboy]

i just built a computer with parts my computer teacher was giving away and i have no idea what to do with it. i was more interested in the act of building than actually having a computer around (i love working with that kind of stuff). so right now i have an extra computer sitting in my room with no real idea what to do with it. really the only thing i thought of doing was selling it craigslist because i owe my parents a LOT of money (my last computer endevour got really out of hand and i owe about $460), but i'm not sure how much i can get for it. anyway, here's the specs if that helps anyone's suggestion:

3GHz Pentium 4 (possibly a dual core, i'm not sure)
2GB DDR-800
GeForce 8600 256MB
120GB IDE hard drive

the one thing is that it doesn't have an optical drive. originally, my teacher was only giving out cases and didn't want us to take any other hardware like drives. he eventually decided to give out more stuff, but i was out sick that day and kind of had to bug him a bit to let me take a board and cpu and i had the other parts except a DVD drive. so if i want to put Windows on it, i gotta find some way to install from USB. otherwise, i might put Ubuntu on it since that's easy to install from USB. not sure why i went ahead and typed most of that since it turned into a rant, but whatever lol. thanks in advance for your suggestions.

 

[bassfisher6522]

You could turn it into a small server and load windows server 2003 or 2008 on it. Then hook it up to your network to store and share files across your network.

 

[Mirrorboy]

i thought about that, but then i realized that nobody in my house needs access to anyone else's files. and if we do, the 2 main computers in the house are running windows 7, so we just use homegroup.

 

[Qdos]

Sell it on eBay, only remember to claim it's a quad core...

 

[Mirrorboy]

lol that's an idea. i'm not sure how much i can get for it without a DVD drive though. that's kind of important. also, i'm not even sure if i want to sell it. not because i don't think i can get anything for it, but because i don't want to give it away. i'm attached to my computers, what can i say? xD

 

[pparks1]

DVD drives are only about $25...so that's no big deal.

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Based on the specs...you might be able to get about $100-$150 out of it.

Rather than install Windows Server 2003 or 2008 (which unless you have Technet will be expensive), load Linux to it instead and use that as a server. It will be far better suited to the hardware and far less expensive.

 

[Uber Philf]

I don't see any problem with installing a Linux Distro and having a play around with it.

Are you highly experienced with Linux?

If not it's worth using it as a learning computer, just play around with Linux, the experience is priceless.

Never know, might come up handy for a job or a promotion sometime in the future.

 

[Qdos]

Seriously... whack in a large pair of RAID mirrored drives, and a gigabit
NIC card, or two, and make yourself an NAS file server

 

[Mirrorboy]

i've used ubuntu before, but it was mainly just to play with what was once called Beryl (i think it's called Compiz now). it confused the hell out of me lol. i'm not good with terminal commands :/ as far as the DVD drive goes, i have no money and no money coming in. like i said, i owe my parents a lot of money and they're holding my allowance to help pay it back. plus i don't have a job and in addition to the computer payback, my cell phone bill is also getting tacked onto that for each month. so i probably won't have any money for quite a long time. and i really don't need a server. my hard drive is big enough for anything i really need. and for the spillover, i have an external hard drive.

 

[Uber Philf]

Hmmm, try a different OS, i think there are other OS's out there, that aren't mainstream, but there out on the internet somewhere, have a play around?

 

[Mirrorboy]

i thought of that too, but i really don't have anything i really want to try. on the off chance that i do find something like that, i usually just load it into a VM to get a general idea of the workings of it. also, i forgot to mention that i don't have a spare monitor i can use. the only other monitor i have is a really tiny one that my dad picked up on the street that we really only use for random testing or emergencies (like one time some water leaked into my dad main monitor and he had to use the small one while it dried).

 

[pparks1]

I just mentioned that the DVD won't be a big deal which would prevent a sale as somebody could buy one or use an external one for a cool $25 or so.

I'd sell the computer or give it away to somebody who wants to learn something about computers since you don't really have a need or the monitor, etc..to really use it.

 

[Mirrorboy]

oh, i thought you meant for me to buy one for it. i wouldn't sell it or give it away just yet considering that something strange is always happening with the computers in my house and a spare one is always handy to have. right now the only spare ones i have are from the windows ME and older era (specwise). so something like this is a welcome change from what we're used to using.

 

[Uber Philf]

Looks like you've got yourself a new spare PC.

No Monitor and CD/DVD drive is a bit restrictive to actually use for anything.

 

[Mirrorboy]

looks that way. once i get some money, i might look on craigslist or something if i can pick up a cheap monitor. hopefully an LCD one. can't stand carrying those old CRT ones up and down my stairs. those suckers are heavy...

 

[Qdos]

No Monitor and CD/DVD drive is a bit restrictive to actually use for anything.

One KVM switch and a network share for an optical drive sorts that.......

 

[Mirrorboy]

KVM switch?

 

[pparks1]

KVM=keyboard, video, mouse switch. You can use 1 of each, but on multiple computers.

 

[Mirrorboy]

0_o i had no idea that was possible. how would i set that up?

 

[pparks1]

You take 2 computers. Plug them into the KVM switch with a KVM cable. Then you plug the keyboard, mouse and monitor into the KVM switch. Then you either push a button or punch some buttons on the keyboard and can switch back and forth between the 2 computers.

You can get 2 port KVM switches (for 2 computers), or 4 or 8 or 16, etc. Some start cheap and others can be extremely expensive...it all depends upon what you want.