chessnerd
April 14th, 2010, 06:22 AM
I have a 14 year old computer that I've been trying to think of something to do with. The specs are pretty sad: 200 MHz Pentium I, 32 MB RAM, 4 GB HDD, so even DSL or another really small GUI distro didn't seem too promising. After all, even a normal web page would suck up all the RAM. So far, my best idea had been a CLI-only workstation, but that seemed, well, boring.
Then, I thought about, maybe, using the computer as a jury rigged thin-client-esque machine.
I would install a minimal, CLI distro and give it the smallest window manager I could find. I would then give it only one GUI program: a VNC client. Then, I would SSH into another desktop running Linux and use the VNC client to run all of the programs off of that machine. Then, two people could use the same computer at the same time, doubling the abilities of said computer.
My question is, would this type of a setup even be possible?
If so, would it be possible on that hardware? (The other computer would have a 2.8GHz Pentium 4, 1 GB RAM, and a 120 GB HDD)
Also, can you think of any better/easier/more efficient way to do this?
Then, I thought about, maybe, using the computer as a jury rigged thin-client-esque machine.
I would install a minimal, CLI distro and give it the smallest window manager I could find. I would then give it only one GUI program: a VNC client. Then, I would SSH into another desktop running Linux and use the VNC client to run all of the programs off of that machine. Then, two people could use the same computer at the same time, doubling the abilities of said computer.
My question is, would this type of a setup even be possible?
If so, would it be possible on that hardware? (The other computer would have a 2.8GHz Pentium 4, 1 GB RAM, and a 120 GB HDD)
Also, can you think of any better/easier/more efficient way to do this?