Upgrades

by JS

So what was I working on? I put the desktop computer shown in the previous post together during college. I’ve since repurposed the machine as a generic file and print server (it was also the web server for this blog at one point). The machine is built around a mid-generation P4, which was kind of the peak of processor clock speeds (though not processor performance). It was a good time to buy a computer, since computers from that era are still “speedy” on most apps in a way that defies Moore’s Law and general technological progression that has made so many previous computers obsolete in mere months (remeber the PIII?).

One problem with the P4 is that it is an energy hog. Servers, sort of by definition, are always on, and keeping this server always on is more an exercise in heating the apartment than computational need. I was trying to get the computer to suspend to RAM during periods of non-use (say 3am and 10am) so that the processor would not be idly sucking up enough juice to power a Prius.

Well, this kind of power management nitty gritty is very much a black art in Ubuntu. The easy stuff is easy, and available in a nice gui, but waking up on a schedule is hard. I migrated through a host of possibly depreciated power management toolsets – acpi, apm, and finally pm-utils. It’s a graveyard of efforts to match the baroque specification that is (BIOS) power management. But all my efforts failed. Then I thought, well, power management is ultimately something the BIOS supports, so why don’t I try updating the BIOS?

This, my friends, is how trying to suspend a computer can result in swimming with sharks. My BIOS version: 12. The latest version: 25. So I figure the fix to my problem is in there somewhere. I dutifully looked up vendor software (Intel), only to discover that the options are Windows Executable, or Window’s Bootdisk.

I run Linux. Hmm.

This of course led to a meandering set of steps that ultimately resulted in a failed Window’s Vista install corrupting the MBR. No problem – pop in an Ubuntu CD and run grub-install. Except when I put in the boot CD for Ubuntu – the 5+ year old CD drive decided it had finally had enough. Its death was shuddering, a sickening sound that haunts. Matters were further complicated by the inexplicable lack of any flash drive anywhere in our apartment. When I don’t need a flash drive, they seem as plentiful as manna, but when I do….

No CD drive, no USB flash, corrupt MBR… you see where this is heading. Turns out the power supply fan was busted too. I electrocuted myself tinkering with that before sense took over and I decided to by a new one. So I made a trip to Fry’s for a power supply, CD drive, a new HD, and a flash drive to boot. After installing all those I was able to repair the MBR and double my disk capacity (a good thing for a file server). I still haven’t figured out how to flash the BIOS though…