Round 1 goes to the server

Posted by geek on Dec 15, 2008 in Ranting | 3 comments

For the past 5 years (maybe more), I’ve had an eMachines (yes, an eMachines) computer sitting under my desk running Linux and acting as my local development server. It’s doesn’t serve any pages out to the interweb, only to me sitting at my desk. So the performance level has never been an issue. Actually, even to this day the performance has been fantastic. Unfortunately, none of the software on the machine has been updated since it was first installed, so that means I’m running an ancient version of PHP and MySQL. Thanks to a recent upgrade to WordPress, this became an issue.

I invited my Linux Guru friend Todd over for the evening. The initial plan was to upgrade PHP and MySQL on the box. Once Todd had a look at how the machine was set up (Todd did the original setup all those years ago), he concluded that it would be easier to ditch the Mandrake installation that currently existed and upgrade the operating system to Ubuntu. [If it sounds like I'm making some of these words up, I apologize.] Before we could do an upgrade like this, I needed to move all the files and database off the server for safe keeping. Since the PC is so ancient, the speed (or lack there of) of the hard drive really shows. Moving the files ended up taking way longer than we expected. While we were waiting for the files to copy we cooked and ate dinner and with the help of some instructions, I solved the Rubik’s Cube for the first time in my life. While this was a very cool accomplishment, it didn’t change the fact that we had been waiting for more than 2 hours while the data moved from the server to the PC, and it still wasn’t finished.

We finally had to give up and call it a night. We’ve made alternate plans on how we are going to handle the server upgrade, but for now, the server is winning 1-0. I’m not even going to act surprised.

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3 Responses to “Round 1 goes to the server”

  1. Carl Sziebert says:
    December 16, 2008 at 10:08 am

    You'd probably benefit from upgrading the hardware as well. You can get a decent server from Dell for less than $500 these days. Certainly would be worth it if you'd like to see your server last another 5 years. Oh, and I'd suggest that you let Ubuntu run it's updates every once in a while.

  2. John Hawkins says:
    December 16, 2008 at 7:44 pm

    Ha ha, I had to check with Todd to see if he put you up to that comment. While he was here last night he said “Ya know, I'm building a full computer for less than $450 for my brother, right? All new parts. Nothing recycled.” – What's the fun in that. Then, nobody can be impressed that I have the last remaining eMachine circa 1999.

  3. Doug Daulton says:
    December 17, 2008 at 2:18 am

    Dude – I have all the spare parts you need to build a real dev server. Nothing more than a year or so old. It was my production box at the NOC until I ran into heat issues because of the enclosure I was using. It is yours free, just come and get it. eMachines need to die. All of them.