arthur

Buy a router. You can connect that router to the cable modem then to the 2 computers. A basic router here is about US$60. You don't need to buy another NIC, but NICs are cheaper than routers. But with a router at least both computers can connect to the internet independently. If it's just for file sharing, go for the extra NIC and crossed cable. You can still share the internet using the first machine as a gateway. Switch vs. hub: switch is faster, their operation is quite different, you can look it up at Google. Routers are altogether different. I don't blame you, routers, switches and hubs look the same to me too. Just look at the box's fine print to distinguish them.

Yes! I built a Beowulf using OpenMosix and *surprise* Mandrake 9.2. It's as simple as installing 2 RPMs (but make sure you have slocate and sshd) and adding it to LILO. It would be the same with RH Fedora. You can stop there but I'm doing more complicated stuff with my cluster, like installing MPI and highly 'techie' programs (think Computational Fluid Dynamics). In Mandrake supermount is under "file systems" in the kernel so it won't work. But it's rather buggy anyway, and in my experience the OpenMosix kernel can run all other apps. It depends on how much you *need* a customized kernel. To find out, you can also start with a vanilla kernel with OpenMosix and patch it until it stops working. Hardware requirements are just a 100Mbit LAN or faster (Gigabit LAN recommended) the more the merrier. :D I 'borrowed' several old computers at school Impress your friends by typing 'migrate [PID] [node]' and see that program pop up in another computer. Blow them away by typing 'ls', and show them how much memory your 'supercomputer' got! B) B) seeing the CPU loads on the nodes is also fun... I'm still writing my experience but if you have more questions don't hesitate to ask. There is also a more detailed HOW-TO at www.linux.org under documentation >> how-to's >> openmosix how-to Pretty soon the most powerful computers won't be just with the feds...

I did that...but I think my Windows installation was corrupted due to a power failure...'no ntkernel.sys' or something at boot. I don't need it anymore anyway. B) B) :D

Has anyone here gotten XP running on a slave HD? Dual-boot with Linux I mean?

EMI can screw up adsl. If the construction crew across the street starts using arc torches, I lose the adsl signal, and before it goes, internet becomes very, very slow. But maybe because I'm quite near the edge of the telco's adsl service area. I tried to put some metal between the street and my line but the construction stopped so I don't know if it would solve things.

I deleted the windows partition on my second hard drive in my Linux test box. Windows doesn't want to run on a slave drive, while a 2nd Linux distro doesn't even make a peep. B) Why can't we all just get along? :(

interested in making a Beowulf class supercomputer? i'm making a how-to. However Beowulfs are not really for home use...more like for research institutions/universities/etc. Unless you use POV-Ray-mpi (or other apps with parallel versions), you won't get performance improvements for everyday use.

Sorry to resurrect a dead post, Good news! My first Beowulf-class supercomputer is in operation! ...uh, if you can call it a supercomputer :unsure: ...it's slower than my laptop, but applying an identical procedure to many powerful computers will make the thing fly B) I documented the whole thing and I'll post it on the Tips n Tricks forum once I write it in a newbie-friendly style.

uh, of course... 2 500 MHz PCs are not going to break any speed records B) its only for experience, and to prevent those PCs joining the scrap heap. all that lead in the solder, you know. :D

It can't, the kernel is heavily patched by Mandrake. You have to use a vanilla kernel, and use LILO or GRUB to boot into it. You also have to add some libraries like MPI or PVM. I'll try to post a progress report soon.

This post might get this thread moved, but... Arabs preserved important Greek books while europeans were bashing the brains out of each other in the dark ages. The crusades unfortunately turned them overprotective of religion, and mr. bush is only following 800-year old foreign policy. Anyway, back to the topic, a USB HD would have FAT32 rather than FAT12, so I guess sda1 would be applicable. My brandless, made-in-china USB key uses the floppy format, *surprise* it has "Linux kernel 2.4 compatible" on the box. Not bad for a cheap key.

well those people who say Arabs have contributed nothing to civilization couldn't be more wrong. :)

Yeah, win2k is quite stable...and very, very expensive for a poor student like me. now "clustering" could be a killer app...it could be the future of the internet, and win can't do that. It has some way to go in terms of simplicity, but, it could be the one we're waiting for.

I'm making a 2-computer cluster for experiment using OpenMosix, I've successfully installed it and I am now learning to script using POV-Ray as my benchmark tester. Then to set up samba... If anyone has similar experience building this stuff, using Mandrake 9.2, feel free to give me some tips. After this experience I could possibly write a HOW-TO.

as an engineering student most of what I see is recognizably american... the only country still using imperial units for engineering, talk about shooting yourself in the metre... :D

mine is /dev/sda, not sda1. I don't know why, but works for me. It's the peculiar american way of counting starting from zero.

ahhh! bad advice! it's not iocharset=8859-1, it's iocharset=iso8859-1. sorry i'm still a newbie i think...here's the correct code, put all in one line. /dev/sda /mnt/usbdrive vfat user,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850,noauto,suid,umask=0 0 0 and you should login as root, make a folder in /mnt/ named usbdrive or something, it's up to you to name it. Right-click the folder and under the permissions tab check all the write permissions and the group to 'users'. Then login as normal user and see if it mounts, you should see an icon on the desktop.

just get the kernel. about individually picking udev, module-init tools and hotplug do that ONLY if it fails to get them. if it does you'll be back here anyway... initscripts - initialization scripts...I didn't use them, still ok.

Win2000 is better than WinXP, much better. Trust MS to screw things up when they merged the NT and 95/98/Me product lines. XP has more holes than swiss cheese. They make perfect zombies. Yeah, overloading the system won't crash linux. If it appears unresponsive, just get a cup of coffee, come back and it'll be finished. Then go buy more ram. Your ram type should be quite cheap anyway. And Windows runs installed programs in the BG often without asking your permission, but Linux is modular and only root can do everything, and give permission to everything. :lol:

I don't think it's necessary to disable supermount... just add to /etc/fstab: (login as root, just doubleclick the file) /dev/sda /mnt/removable vfat user,iocharset=8859-1,codepage=850,noauto,suid,umask=0 0 0 If your drive shows up as sda1 or whatever, modify appropriately. I'm not sure about the codepage=850 part could anyone offer some info about it? Then if you want to mount the drive(as a normal user) just go to the terminal and type mount /dev/sda To unmount: umount /dev/sda Note it's umount, not unmount. To automate it just make a script, but it's so easy to type I don't bother.

yup, that's a good thing to do. I "claimed" a computer in school and am now tinkering with it. I manage to crash Mandrake twice a day and I'm really having a hard time to fix it each time, but I learn a lot that way. Actually that was also how I learned windows except that I didn't WANT to crash it. And no, it was not a "test" computer.

I don't know ANYBODY who knew how to install windows. The very few that do, it was me who taught them. So, I think next time I'll install Linux - they won't be able to take it out anyway! They'll be forced to use Linux! Mwahahahaha! Just make sure they can still use OpenOffice and the internet, they'll be stuck with Linux forever. Maybe their children will become Linux gurus... Now am I evil or what?

CDs are more for archiving than frequent transferring. Flash memory has no moving parts, and is shock-resistant. Buy a USB thumb drive or a memory card with usb reader. Almost all computers now have USB. Con: it's more expensive per megabyte. Windows 98 needs drivers installed. My laptop doesn't have a floppy, so for me usb is the way to go. It can be *almost* as useful as a CD-writer, only that it is for different situations. You can also buy a usb hard drive, for bigger size but at least you can read and write, not read-only.

my memory is famously unreliable... I forgot that root created the folder. Thanks, I'll try it. Btw, anyone who's tried Cooker 10.0? How's supermount there? I'll compile 2.6 anyway, I got a lot of USB devices that might benefit from its reportedly better usb performance.

I got a flash memory usb key that I use instead of floppies, and my box seems to have problems with it. I can mount and unmount it manually, but I have to do that as root (it's /dev/sda) and I can access its contents, but only as root. I've tried editing my /etc/fstab file to make normal users access it, but I always "hotplug" this drive and I don't want to boot my computer with it connected. Supermount seems to have problems. I'm thinking whether I should compile a 2.6 kernel maybe it'll work better with USB. I could continue working as before, but, it's not a good idea to work as root very frequently. Any advice appreciated. In the meantime I'll get to work compiling the 2.6 kernel.