[stoneman4172]

Hi, I need some feedback as to how I should go about this.

I would like a dedicated box to browse and torrent and nothing else. Naturally, linux seems like a good choice. However, the hardware I got is very old (I do like the shape of those box). The system I'm thinking of using is a P3-800, 512mb ram & 10gb harddisc. There is no CD rom. I'm thinking of running linux off a USB drive and use the hd for storage.

However, I do need to be able to remote login to the box like the Remote Desktop Connection funtion with Windows as I tend to use my laptop to login to other computers I have and operate in that manner. Preferably, I can do a virus scan of files downloaded before being move to another storage system. Anything else like word processor of the likes should be able to be removed from the operating system so that I only have what is being used.

Anybody got suggestion?

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to run linux off the USB key would slow things down though it is easy to do, but either way since network install is not easy here,it would mean installing the linux os to a USB key first but then I would go on and install linux on the computer too from the key for the simply reason that linux takes up little space on the harddrive, but either way remote desktop is easy, 512ram is what I have on most of my laptops, Mint linux is a great starter linux since there is no after install, either way whichever linux you choose I would join that distro's forum as things differ from distro to distro but all you ask for it met with linux

[fleamailman]

to run linux off the USB key would slow things down though it is easy to do, but either way since network install is not easy here,it would mean installing the linux os to a USB key first but then I would go on and install linux on the computer too from the key for the simply reason that linux takes up little space on the harddrive, but either way remote desktop is easy, 512ram is what I have on most of my laptops, Mint linux is a great starter linux since there is no after install, either way whichever linux you choose I would join that distro's forum as things differ from distro to distro but all you ask for it met with linux

[stoneman4172]

Thank you for pointing out the speed issue. I will need to test it out. I'm thinking if I strip everything out and just have the broswer, k-torrent, RDC, file sharing and maybe AV then it might all fit onto ram? Or is that too much?

My logic is if I use RDC the linux box to browse the net and scan every file that I might want after it is downloaded but before moving away to another computer to use them then this can minimise the chance of getting a virus. Does this sound fair? Am I missing any logic here?

[fleamailman]

well yes and no, if you download something with linux, which is not linux, it will store it as an executable albeit one that doesn't execute on linux, meaning that once one transfers it to a windows system it is executable again, whereas if your main system is linux, one is free from that problem for various reasons that you probably know of already, btw I can't see the reason to strip down the system because by the time you have figured out how to do it and done it, any time gained in doing so would have been lost against the process needed to do it, unless you like tweeking stuff that is as the mini distros like puppy and dsl are already pretty minimal

[dsenette]

*dsenette has nothing to contribute here....

HEY FLEA!!! long time no see (that rhymes!)

[fleamailman]

the goblin thanked dsenette for the comment, saying "...well, that's the trouble with linux, 90% of times it's either advising which distro, or redirecting the poster to the forum of that distro which has, or hasn't as may be, the answer...", in fact the goblin had never stopped reading the notifications here, only that there were just too many linux distros to really help out with clarity someone where their distro wasn't the one that he had used for himself now, Window, being uniform, didn't have that problem

Edited by fleamailman, 10 September 2009 - 03:23 AM.