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NodeCIB
Node CIB - status 21/08/04
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ClaeStatus
Gathering hardware, building home networkLocation
Near Batman Station, Coburg North - cr Gaffney and SydneyLine of Sight
Please feel free to email me if you are in the following areas, and would like to try some experimental linkage. Anyone who wants to come play roof monkeys is welcome too - especially if you have access to a two storey ladder
- Probable: Coburg North, Coburg, Fawkner, Pascoe Vale
- Possible: Brunswick, Preston etc
Coming soon!
- Panorama photos from the roof.
- Mast-mounted strobe light and silver party balloon/ mirror ball.
Description
I'm pretty inexperienced at networking. I've been a Mac user since for ever, and have always used Appletalk networks (serial port adapter, bus topology, proprietary protocol). They are fairly plug and play as you'd expect, but it doesn't teach you anything about IP for example. I have never set up a *nix box, although I have used them occasionally. The same goes for Windows boxes and IP/Ethernet networks. I'd certainly appreciate a whack with the cluestick.edit: about to build a *nix based router from Toshiba laptop, and install YDL on a PPC machine.
There are two nodes under development here. Cheaply as possible is going to be the key to getting them up, as my total income is fixed at about $220 a week, apart from excess hardware sales. And I still have an analogue synth habit to support
Nodes
NodeCIB
Adventure Playtime Industries. This is my new residence, a large warehouse conversion in Coburg. The internal home network will serve DSL, printing and files to 3-6 client machines, mixed Win/*nix/OS X/MacOS environment.Mobile Node
Low-power (see below) system for Toyota Dyna mobile home. This will be a leaf/ad hoc node initially - probably just a laptop and roof mounted omni.Eventually adding directional(s) and mast, and a low-power flashable AP/router or embedded/SBC board. Then GPS, antenna rotators.
General idea being to provide local AP service at temporary sites (like Melbourne Wireless meetings, parties, festivals, conferences, protests) and bridge to the rest of the network.
Hardware
Wireless Gear
- 1 x 8dB omnidirectional antenna, N-type male connector
- 1 x 18dB Galaxy parabolic grid antenna (not hacked yet)
- 1 x 24db ditto
- 1 x Enterasys PCMCIA cards (Orinoco Silver clones)
- Flashed to Gold 128 bit WEP
- Modified with a permanent pigtail to N-female (thanks VAK)
- 1 x N male to male adapter
- 1 x D-Link double rate 802.11b+ card For Sale2
Unix-capable Macs
PCI
- G3, 7220, 7500, 95/9600, Powercenter, Powerbase 180 (Mac clone, donated by Barry) etc Most For Sale2
- OS: YellowDog, BSD, OS X, MacOS 8, 9
- CPUs from 100 mHz 601 to dual 200/604e (think P/166 to 2x P2/366)
- 3-6 PCI slots, 10/100 baseT or base2 Ethernet, serial, SCSI, floppies, CDs
- PCI slots appear to be v2.2, cards with Unix drivers work OK
- some upgradeable to G3 or G4 CPU
- adequate RAM and HD space available
- USB requires a PCI card (builtin on some G3s)
- Some clones take PC keyboards, mice
- Some with IDE/ATA onboard
Nubus
- 1 x 6100 set-top box/media server hack
- 60 mHz 601 CPU (P100 speed)
- low power consumption - 24/7 operation?
- Distros: MKLinux, LinuxPPC
- Ethernet, serial, SCSI, CD, floppy
- No PCI slots - router/firewall/server behind AP
- No USB - never ever
PC hardware
- 1 x Toshiba 400CDX laptop and dock
- Not booting - needs CMOS battery
- Pentium 1 133 MHz
- 4 x PCMCIA slots
- unknown RAM
- USB, Ethernet(?), serial port
- 1 x Mitac 586/166 laptop
- 1 x PCMCIA slot
- No Ethernet
- 16 MB of RAM
- serial port
- 1 x generic AMD PC
- Not booting - needs CMOS battery
- 366(?) MHz K6-II
- 2 x ISA, 4 x PCI
- 1 x Cyrix 200 CPU on ISA motherboard
- 3 x ISA 10bt/10b2 Ethernet cards
- 1 x generic VGA card
- no RAM (72 pin) - donations gratefully accepted
- power supply, case, CD and small HD available.
- Some kind of AMD single board computer with a 33 MHz CPU, SCSI, Ethernet and serial -NB not likely to ever run a mainstream OS, but there are rumours of an Inferno port. It's out of an old laser printer.
Client Machines
- Powerbook 1400/166MHz, MacOS 8.6, Orinoco
- Beige G3/G4 upgraded, OS X.2, unknown NIC
- Wintel PIII 966, XP
- various neolithic Powermacs
Needed:
- Hard discs - ATA 6GB+, 2.5" ATA 2GB+, SCSI 50 pin 1GB+
- ISO CDs - I'm on dialup
- Such as... ? Debian, BSD, DSL etc - Have YellowDog Linux
- Complete Idiot's Guide to Networking or similar
- Practical assistance - roof climbing, configuration, etc
- Someone to connect to
More Information
Sale and trade page: ClaeTradeFor further information click here to email.
More information on Mac gear can be found here
Low Power
A note about low-power use. The mobile system will spend at least part of its life running from a battery bank charged by solar panels and/or a small wind turbine. All of these are expensive, so spending a little extra on hardware to get the power useage down is well worth it. The laptop would use somewhere between 10 and 45 watts depending on screen, HD and wireless activity. To give you an idea, a 40 watt solar panel is about $450 - and that's peak power, at noon on a sunny day. Ideally, I want to get down to under 5 watts, which might be possible with a flashed AP.Version 4 (current) modified Mon, 26 Jul 2021 12:49:29 +0000 by clae
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