Alternative Imgur version for the main image
Previously I was using Samsung N150P (netbook) as my home server and it served me around 6 years. >> https://programming.dev/post/708584
Though after upgrading to Debian 13, additional 90 packages were installed just with the upgrade. I also had a little adventure with it :) >> https://programming.dev/post/708488
Anyway, this new mini PC I got is from 2016 and surprisingly it has 8GB DDR3 RAM (I’m rich now). It’s generally in good condition. Even though it’s Celeron N3000, this one doesn’t have hyperthreading so only 2 cores. Still it’s a real upgrade over Atom N450 CPU.
Since last year, I was planning to get a Raspberry Pi and moving from there. However thanks to AI overlords it got so expensive I had to bail from that fantasy. I got this for 40$ and with 8GB RAM I think it was a good deal.
I was already planning to change my home server to Alpine for a while but I just couldn’t touch a perfectly fine system because lazy. So this time I went with Alpine and I already love how small it is. I just installed a couple monitoring tools and packages like sudo along with Pi-hole so currently it has quite few packages.
Don’t worry though, I’m planning to use that RAM, with time. :)
I bought them a long time ago, and always refused to pay scalper prices. My Zero 2Ws were all $15, most of the others are Pi4 and Pi5 from before the RAM inflation.
Power is nice and stable in this arrangement, a bunch of the RasPi foundation supply bricks on a power strip mounted to the breeze-tunnel.
I’ve been a NUC fan since forever, but last year I had two NUCs that I bought in 2020 die within a month of each other, one had a power supply issue and I think the other one had a worn out SSD - it was working fine when I unplugged it, but when I plugged it back in 6 weeks later it wouldn’t boot.
Like I said, one old / low power NUC could do this, but when it dies far too much of our smart home goes dumb all at once.