Small Form Factor PCs by Duane Wessels; Matthew J Weaver Publisher: O'Reilly Pub Date: April 22, 2008 Print ISBN-13: 978-0-596-52076-2 Pages: 304 Table of Contents | Index Overview Shoebox sized and smaller, small form factor PCs can pack as much computing muscle as anything from a PDA to a full-sized desktop computer They consume less power, have few or no moving parts, and are very quiet Whether you plan to use one as a standalone PC or want to embed it in your next hacking project, a small form factor PC may be the next thing you build Small Form Factor PCs is the only book available that shows you how to build small form factor PCs from kits and from scratch that are more interesting and more personalized than what a full-sized PC can give you Included in the book are projects for building personal video recorders, versatile wireless access points, digital audio jukeboxes, portable firewalls, and much more This book shows you how to build eight different systems, from the shoebox-sized Shuttle system down to the stick-of-gum sized gumstix With thorough illustrations and step-by-step instructions, Small Form Factor PCs makes it easy for anyone who wants to get started building these tiny systems Small form factor computing is taking off, and this guide is an absolute must for anyone who wants to get in on the launch Small Form Factor PCs by Duane Wessels; Matthew J Weaver Publisher: O'Reilly Pub Date: April 22, 2008 Print ISBN-13: 978-0-596-52076-2 Pages: 304 Table of Contents | Index Preface Introduction What Is Small Form Factor? Why Small Form Factor? Small Form Factor Systems More Cool Hardware Digital Audio Jukebox Introducing the VIA EPIA-M Additional Hardware Step 1: Install and Configure Gentoo Linux Step 2: X Windows and XMMS Step 3: Infrared Remote Control Case Modding Extra Credit Digital Video Recorder with MythTV Introducing the Shuttle ST62K XPC Operating System: Gentoo Linux X Windows MythTV Adding a Remote Control Starting MythTV Automatically Using Your TV as the Display Extra Credit Home Network Gateway Introducing the Soekris net4501 Additional Hardware Installing OpenBSD From Installation to Gateway Packet Filter (pf) Extra Credit Network Monitor Introducing the Soekris net4801 Additional Hardware Installing FreeBSD Arpwatch Nagios Snort RRDTool Extra Credit Wi-Fi Extender Introducing the Access Cube Assembling the System Exploring the Access Cube Wi-Fi Configuration Antenna Options Using the Wi-Fi Extender Building a Console Cable Extra Credit A Portable, USB-Powered, Bridging Firewall Introducing the OpenBlockS SSD Linux Turning the OpenBlockS into an Ethernet Bridge Using the Firewall Powering OpenBlockS via USB Extra Credit Cheap Wi-Fi SSH Client Introducing the ZipIt Wireless Messenger Updating the ZipIt Firmware Playing with the BURN3 Firmware Loading OpenZipIt Playing with OpenZipIt Extra Credit Bluetooth LED Sign Introducing the gumstix Assembling the System Exploring the gumstix Building Software for the gumstix Learning About Bluetooth The Pro-Lite LED Sign Putting It All Together Sending Messages to the Sign Extra Credit Running an NFS Server About NFS The Exports File Starting NFS Services Mounting Index Small Form Factor PCs by Matthew Weaver & Duane Wessels Copyright © 2008 O'Reilly Media, Inc All rights reserved Printed in U.S.A Published by Make:Books, an imprint of Maker Media, a division of O'Reilly Media, Inc., 1005 Gravenstein Highway North, Sebastopol, CA 95472 O'Reilly books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales promotional use For more information, contact our corporate/institutional sales department: 800-998-9938 or corporate@oreilly.com Print History: April 2008: First Edition Publisher: Dale Dougherty Associate Publisher: Dan Woods Executive Editor: Brian Jepson Creative Director: Daniel Carter Designer: Gerry Arrington Production Manager: Terry Bronson Cover Photography: Duane Wessels The O'Reilly logo is a registered trademark of O'Reilly Media, Inc The MAKE: Projects series designations, Small Form Factor PCs, and related trade dress are trademarks of O'Reilly Media, Inc The trademarks of third parties used in this work are the property of their respective owners Important Message to Our Readers: Your safety is your own responsibility, including proper use of equipment and safety gear, and determining whether you have adequate skill and experience Chemicals, electricity, and other resources used for these projects are dangerous unless used properly and with adequate precautions, including safety gear Some illustrative photos do not depict safety precautions or equipment, in order to show the project steps more clearly These projects are not intended for use by children Use of the instructions and suggestions in Small Form Factor PCs is at your own risk O'Reilly Media, Inc and the authors disclaim all responsibility for any resulting damage, injury, or expense It is your responsibility to make sure that your activities comply with applicable laws, including copyright ISBN-10: 0-596-52076-X ISBN-13: 978-0-596-52076-2 Preface Miniaturization has been one of the great success stories of computer engineering Most of us know that the world's first computers, such as ENIAC and the various Mark Is, were huge machines that occupied whole rooms By the early 1980s we had more powerful computers that sat on our desks But personal computers stopped shrinking for the next 20 years or so Why is my Pentium 4 system from 2005 about the same size as my Apple II from 1981? One reason, of course, is that while the size of the computer remained the same, engineers were able to pack more into that space Both processors and memory have increased in density over the years, generally following Moore's Law Another reason is that equipment manufacturers now build more features into the hardware My Pentium 4 motherboard includes built-in Ethernet, video, sound, USB, and FireWire, in addition to the old-fashioned serial and parallel ports In the good ol' days, each of those would have required an expansion card of some sort Finally, certain physical characteristics of our computer systems have remained the same over the years in the interest of compatibility PCI cards are the same height as ISA expansion cards so that both fit in past and future computer cases The 200 MB hard drive from my IBM PS/2 fits in the same bay as my P4's new 250 GB hard drive In recent years we have seen a renewed interest in miniaturization of computer systems Companies such as VIA Technologies and Soekris Engineering were among the first to market small, low-power, general-p-urpose computer systems to individual consumers People began to realize that certain tasks and applications, such as routing and firewalling, don't require super-fast systems Who wants a big, hot, noisy computer in their home or office when a small, silent, minicomputer works just as well? The phrase small form factor (or SFF) usually refers to personal computers with a small footprint That is, a SFF PC has most of the same features as its standard-sized ancestor: fast processor, plenty of memory, hard drive, video, sound, etc SFF PCs usually have fewer expansion options due to their smaller size, however In this book we consider even smaller, and less powerful, systems as small-form-factor computers It would be a stretch to call them PCs, since many don't have hard drives, video, or sound For some, it may be more appropriate to think of them as embedded devices, although that is another vague term Whatever you or we call them, we think you'll enjoy learning about these small computers How to Use This Book Our primary goal with this book is to expose you to a variety of small-form-factor computers and devices We want to show you how they work, how they look (inside and outside), and how you can use them We've come up with a number of projects that demonstrate their features and capabilities We hope that you find the projects both interesting and useful Even if you're not interested in putting SFF computers to the uses that we've documented, you'll still find useful information in this book For example, we'll show you how to load an operating system onto a Compact Flash card using TFTP and NFS, and how to bootstrap the OS onto a laptop hard drive from another PC If you have other projects or applications in mind, the information in this book will help you select an appropriate platform Our project descriptions aim to help you understand the advantages, and disadvantages, of the computers that we've used Another reason to read the book (and do the projects) is to see how easily you can get Linux and BSD operating systems running on non-x86-based processors The four largest systems in the book have Intel x86 or x86-compatible processors The smallest computers, on the other hand, use MIPS, PowerPC, ARM, and XScale processors For some of them we'll even show you how to cross-compile your own programs Who Should Read This Book We've written this book for people who like to tinker with both computer hardware and software Along the same lines, we expect that you have a "do it yourself" attitude, either because you simply want to understand how something works, you want some extra features, or you don't trust product manufacturers to get it right We also assume that you already have a minor fascination with miniature computers If you still need some convincing, check out Chapter 1 for the list of things that we especially like about SFF computers Most of our projects involve some hardware assembly For the most part, however, you won't need any fancy tools Screwdrivers and pliers will come in handy The only time you'd need a soldering iron is to build a custom cable or two We devote the most space in each chapter to providing detailed instructions on how to install and configure the software components Every project is based on an open source operating system, including Linux, OpenBSD, and FreeBSD Previous exposure to at least one of these operating systems will be helpful However, we try to not make too many assumptions about your experience With a little patience and perseverance, even first-time Unix users will be able to get up and running with our instructions Organization of This Book This book includes eight individual small-form-factor projects, each in its own chapter We've chosen to place chapters roughly in order of decreasing computer size We'll start with a couple of Mini-ITX based systems and finish with a computer the size of a stick of gum Here is a brief description of each computer: Chapter 1, Introduction The introduction to the book includes a brief discussion of what "small form factor" means and why you might be interested in using SFF systems We also introduce you to the hardware components used for each project, including where to get them and about how much they cost Chapter 2, Digital Audio Jukebox Here we turn a Mini-ITX motherboard, a little memory, a laptop hard drive, and an infrared receiver into a digital jukebox The IR receiver allows you to control the jukebox with a standard universal remote We'll show you how to install and configure Gentoo Linux, the XMMS audio player, and a few ancillary programs If you're so inclined, we also have a few hints for mounting the components into an antique radio cabinet Chapter 3, Digital Video Recorder In this project we show you how to build your own digital video recorder We used the toaster-sized ST62K "XPC" from Shuttle and a TV tuner card from Hauppauge Of all the projects in the book, this one requires the most CPU processing power and storage capacity We use Gentoo Linux as the operating system and MythTV for the actual DVR application Chapter 4, Home Network Gateway We'll show you how to build your own home (or small office) network gateway from OpenBSD and a Soekris net4501 This gateway protects the systems on your network with NAT and a state-of-the-art firewall It also provides a local DNS server and DHCP if you so desire The Soekris box uses Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Infrared iPod iptables utility 2nd 3rd 4th 5th iwconfig utility 2nd 3rd 4th iwlist utility Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Jaeggli, Joel Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Keelan, Ken Kismet 2nd Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] LCD character display LED character display Linksys Linux, kernel 2nd SSD Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Maymi, Fernando memory Mikrotik Mini-box.com 2nd Mini-PCI MySQL MythTV 2nd Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Nagios 2nd Nano-ITX NAT NetBSD network, gateway 2nd monitor Nokia NorhTec Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] OBEX OpenBlockS OpenBrick OpenBSD OpenZipIt OQO Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] packet filter (pf) PalmOS PC Engines Plat'Home 2nd power, conservation converter over Ethernet (POE) supply 2nd Pro-Lite 2nd Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] remote control RRDTool Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] serial port 2nd 3rd 4th Sharp Shuttle 2nd 3rd Silver, Amy Snort 2nd Soekris 2nd 3rd Spiegel, Jared SSH Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] tcpdump 2nd TV as display tuner card 2nd Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] VIA 2nd via USB Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] Wi-Fi 2nd 3rd 4th 5th WildLab Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] X Windows 2nd Index [SYMBOL] [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] [K] [L] [M] [N] [O] [P] [R] [S] [T] [V] [W] [X] [Z] ZipIt 2nd updating ... Print ISBN- 13: 978-0-596-52076-2 Pages: 304 Table of Contents | Index Preface Introduction What Is Small Form Factor? Why Small Form Factor? Small Form Factor Systems More Cool Hardware Digital Audio Jukebox Introducing the VIA EPIA-M... usually includes the title, author, publisher, and ISBN For example: "MAKE Projects Small Form Factor PCs, by Duane Wessels and Matthew Weaver Copyright 2008 O'Reilly Media, Inc., 059652076X. " If you feel your use of code examples falls outside fair use or... Mounting Index Small Form Factor PCs by Matthew Weaver & Duane Wessels Copyright © 2008 O'Reilly Media, Inc All rights reserved Printed in U.S.A Published by Make: Books, an imprint of Maker Media, a division