Cheap Download Rig Advice

WantoN · 8 May 2011 at 21:17

So I want a supercheap download rig I can access remotely. I've got a 500gb harddrive, optical drive and cable gubbins. What do you think of this?

Shuttle SG41J1 Plus (Socket 775) DDR3 Barebones - Black £94.80
Kingston HyperX Blu 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Dual Channel Kit - £35.99
Intel Celeron Dual Core E3400 "LGA775" 2.60GHz (800FSB) - Retail - £34.99
Edimax EW-7612 PLN 300Mbps Wireles PCI-E Network Card - £17.99

Total : £195.77

I was then thinking:
Ubuntu - Simple, well supported linux client with GUI. FREE

TightVNC - VNC client with automatic SSH tunnelling for Unix based systems. How does this work, and would it work with linux-based ubuntu?

Can you tell me if this is a good setup, and what I could do better re: software?

Cheers
Ant

stulid · 8 May 2011 at 21:21

I dont know about the software, I do know this is cheaper,

Your basketProduct Name Qty Price Line Total
"Primo Elevation" AMD DDR3 Ready Barebones (Socket AM2+/AM3) £59.99
(£49.99) £59.99
(£49.99)
AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 250 3.00GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £41.99
(£34.99) £41.99
(£34.99)
OCZ Special OPS 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3SOE1600LV4GK) £34.99
(£29.16) £34.99
(£29.16)
Edimax EW-7612 PLN 300Mbps Wireles PCI-E Network Card £17.99
(£14.99) £17.99
(£14.99)
Sub Total : £129.13
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £15.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £28.93
Total : £173.56

£154.56 with free delivery

d_brennen · 8 May 2011 at 21:24

For just a download box I'd get CPU and RAM second had tbh, new motherboard and PSU though

Cycrow · 8 May 2011 at 21:25

ubuntu comes with vnc built in, so u wont need to use another one

however, tightvnc is available in synapic, so its easy to install and get running

what kind of downloads do u plan to do ?
if u do torrents, u could look into torrentflux.
it'll run on any linux/bsd system and allows you to remotly controll torrents via a webserver

there are other software for specific types of downloads as well, like for newsgroups

good thing about torrentflux, is that u dont need to run the gui on the server at all, and just access it through your web browser on the local machine.

i take it u cant write the server up to the network, would be better than wireless if possible, and would save u money on a wireless card as well

WantoN · 8 May 2011 at 21:40

Crow you're a legend. Stulid awesome speccage thank you!

Sorry, I picked tight VNC for accessing the machine from my Win7 one.

It's for torrents, I've tried to get into newsgroups, I've even got a newsdemon account, I tried newsrover but could not work it out for the life of me. How do I do it?

Torrentflux looks absolutely perfect for my needs, but what is synapic, how would I install the torrents and access it all? Just run it on ubuntu and acess through my web browser? is this secure?

Wiring is unfortunately not viable.

Cycrow · 8 May 2011 at 21:59

synaptic is ubuntu's package manager
its the gui front end for it at least, its what lets u installed all ubuntu supported software

it should install all the dependancies and set it up all automatically.

then all u need to do, is use ur webbrowser from another machine.
this allows you to view all current downloads, access downloaded files, and add new torrents to the queue

either by specifying the address the torrent files can be downloaded from, or uploading them from your local machine.

u can also setup samba to access your downloads via the windows network, again with ubuntu its pretty much setup for you, you just have to define the share point of your downloads.

u can make it as secure as you like depending on where u need access
there is a login for the website, so its password protected

also, unless u forwards the ports to the download web server, u'll only be a ble to access it locally, so no one else would be able to access it anyways

WantoN · 8 May 2011 at 22:18

Absolutely perfect!

I'll be accessing the dl rig from another house. So I guess I'll have to setup the ports on the router?

panyan · 8 May 2011 at 22:59

WantoN said:
It's for torrents, I've tried to get into newsgroups, I've even got a newsdemon account, I tried newsrover but could not work it out for the life of me. How do I do it?

newsgroups is something that eludes many people, but once you work out its many mysteries - it is one of the most powerful tools

try and have a look at sabnzbd+

andy_mk3 · 8 May 2011 at 23:02

Get second hand parts. The PC in my sig cost less than £100 with a new case and PSU.

Cycrow · 8 May 2011 at 23:29

WantoN said:
Absolutely perfect!

I'll be accessing the dl rig from another house. So I guess I'll have to setup the ports on the router?

yeah if there on seperate connections, then u'll need to setup the ports to be able to access the server online

its easy enough to do that thou

JonJ678 · 8 May 2011 at 23:58

Several NAS drives will do this, the associated graphics / sound etc aren't really needed. The one I'm using came with Debian installed, but isn't especially friendly to someone new to linux. Out of the box it's not capable of much.

With a little effort you could get a GUI running on it, and accessible over the network. I've stuck with ssh though, 256mb of ram is loads for a text only system but might be pushing it for running gnome.