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Geek Culture / Turning a PC into an old server, and I have no idea if this is worth it...

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DJ Almix
19
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Joined: 25th Feb 2006
Location: Freedom
Posted: 28th May 2011 22:30
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I have an old PC sitting in my garadge with no video card and these specs:

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo

RAM: 2GB 2Rx8 PC2

Hard Drives: 900GB HD Space (Split into 2 internal HD's (80GB and 320GB) and one 500GB external HD)

Keyboard: Razer Reclusa Gaming Keyboard (With back lit keys)

Disk Drive: DVD R/RW,CD R/RW Disk drive. (I have no clue the exact specs)

Internal Wireless adapter. (I use a wired connection with it)

Case: Dell XPS 710 Case w/ LED lit front and back (color customizable)

Monitors:

Aser 1280x1024 LCD Monitor

Current OS: Windows 7 Ultimate.

Would it be worth it to convert it to an old, say, minecraft server or something?

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charger bandit
15
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Joined: 10th Nov 2009
Location: Slovenia
Posted: 28th May 2011 22:32
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Lol you call that old? I am running my server on Sempron 3000+ 1,8ghz and 1.5gig ram. Your PC should have NO problem running any server.


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Stormwire
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Posted: 28th May 2011 22:38
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That would be a great server! Go for it I did it with a truly old PC once and the experience was well worth it.
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AutoBot
15
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Joined: 25th Sep 2009
Location: Everywhere
Posted: 28th May 2011 22:42 Edited at: 28th May 2011 22:42
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Yeah DJ, you should make a TGC survival server with no boundaries or anything, since you have so much disk space.

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MrValentine
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Joined: 5th Dec 2010
Playing: FFVII
Posted: 29th May 2011 10:13 Edited at: 29th May 2011 10:16
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if you got win7Ultimate on it, its already got server capabilities, just go to add remove programs and check turn windows features on or off and add Internet Informetion Services ans well as other aspects and allow whichever port the server application requires to your firewall, Win7U is exactly the same as WinServer2008R2 if fully updated.

But yeah I do this all the time, I install a virtual PC in my Win7U system usually my WinVistaUltimate licence and run it as a server, works wonders however I will be building a dedicated server for application testing purposes soon too.

Only thing I can say is, ensure you have a STATIC IP and a very good upload speed.



Heya Almix and guys

EDIT

oh but you will still need some simple display adapter if the board doesnt have one onboard, go buy some dirt cheap display card as long as it is 32bit compatible you should be fine. min 8MB memory too.

EDIT

Also strip all unimportant services and running applications and desktop themes and icons (turn icons off with right click) and remove desktop images, use performance mode for all aspects.

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bitJericho
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Location: United States
Posted: 29th May 2011 13:07
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You'll likely need 4gb of space to run a minecraft server. I ran one, it's slow on 2gb.

[center]Official TGC President elect.
Pwning newbs since 2002.
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MrValentine
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Playing: FFVII
Posted: 29th May 2011 13:12
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Jerico - you must be tired its late there, you meant 4GB of Ram/Memory

your welcome

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bitJericho
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Posted: 29th May 2011 13:25
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wtfwtf. Ram is definitely what I meant

[center]Official TGC President elect.
Pwning newbs since 2002.
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MrValentine
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Playing: FFVII
Posted: 29th May 2011 13:35
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crispex
17
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Joined: 22nd Jun 2007
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Posted: 29th May 2011 18:30
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Quote: "You'll likely need 4gb of space to run a minecraft server. I ran one, it's slow on 2gb."


I ran a decent server on 1gb, but yes, it gets VERY slow once you get 4 or more people building at once.

As said, make sure you get yourself a static IP, as your users will get annoyed if they keep having to connect to a different IP. I suggest using DNS to allow users to connect to a domain, instead of having to use an IP. This is, if in fact, you are running a Minecraft server.

Otherwise, your hardware is very good, and can run a server quite well. I've got a home server using a Pentium IV 2.4 GHz and 1.25gb of RAM, and it runs beautifully.

I just now realized I've had a typo in my signature for the past 3 years.
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DJ Almix
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Location: Freedom
Posted: 29th May 2011 21:54
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The video card is the biggest problem right now, I cant boot until I have one...

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crispex
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Posted: 29th May 2011 23:09
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Pick up a cheap Nvidia GeForce 6200. I paid $35 for one for my home server. It's cheap, works decently, and doesn't really require much. Your PC will definitely be able to run it.

I just now realized I've had a typo in my signature for the past 3 years.
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AutoBot
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Posted: 30th May 2011 17:18 Edited at: 30th May 2011 17:19
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Yeah, you just need a basic GPU to run the OS and the server application. The server actually doesn't have minecraft's requirements (or at least I don't think so), since I don't believe the server does graphics calculations, that's client side. If you want to play on it you can go to your normal PC and type your internal IP Address. Everyone else types in your external IP address if they're outside your network.

I actually tried to start up a server, but my network admin just didn't feel comfortable with it. Perhaps you could revive Jerico's server?

You can follow instructions for setting up a server here: http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Tutorials/Setting_up_a_server
Map download: http://minecraft.itmustbetrue.com/world.zip

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The Wilderbeast
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Location: UK
Posted: 30th May 2011 20:53
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You don't even need to buy a GPU. Most modern mobos support boot from LAN, so if you have the ISO on your network you can boot the machine from that and access everything remotely during the setup. But for ease, pick up any old card off eBay (make sure it's not legacy so it will actually be supported by the OS!).

I've never run a Minecraft server before but stick something like Ubuntu Server on it, or if you're feeling ambitious try Arch Linux, you'll be able to get it flying along with less than 90MB RAM usage! (excluding Minecraft of course)


Blitzwerks | Indie Development Team
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data 98junkiee
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Location: England
Posted: 1st Jun 2011 01:36 Edited at: 1st Jun 2011 12:47
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That's a good spec for a cheap server providing you avoid using a GUI. Ubuntu with apache and webmin is good and of course Java for running the Minecraft server (command line version), I ran a Minecraft and a pseudo web server on my Pentium 4 HT with 2gb ram and it seemed to run pretty well.

<edit> If you have Windows 7 ultimate on it, it might be a good idea to make a Linux partition unless you can move it to a different computer. even though windows 7 has server capabilities, I'm not sure if windows computers can run without the GUI (if it cant it might mean a lot of wasted resources).</edit>

Interested in Linux?
check out my new Linux blog
http://comamain.blogspot.com/
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PAGAN_old
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Location: Capital of the Evil Empire
Posted: 4th Jun 2011 21:41
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i heard fibrechannel drives are slowly being replased by SAS (serial attached scsi) so many companies are selling fibrechannel equipment for really cheap. if you can get your hand on some of that equipment it would be great for a small server.

Fibre channel drives can be as fast 15000rpm data transfer rate of up to 4 gb/s

You need a fibrechannel host bus adapter (best ones are at 8Gb/s transfer rate) and an enclosure or some drive array case (there are no internal ports for these drives only external) compatible with SCA-40 interface, if you dont have an enclosure, you can buy a bunch of SCA 40 to fibre adapters and just put them somewhere safe.

this is just for a basic fibre aray setup more complex data centers based on this tech need a bunch of expensive equipment like fibre channel switches and stuff. but for your own personal tiny data center you just nees what i said above

btw fibre drives look really cool in my opinion


and you can read more about this stuff here...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibre_Channel

dont hate people who rip you off,cheat and get away with it, learn from them
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