Linux-based BitTorrent box/file server

[lifeisbetterwithketchup]

I plan on making an old computer (HP 8240 w/Pentium 233Mhz, 160MB RAM) into a headless torrent box/file server. I've looked over this guide, and it seems to be able to do everything I want ("remotely administer your server from the Web using SSH, VNC, and an intuitive HTML UI, while being able to retrieve files while you’re away from home."). However, it wants Ubuntu, which will not boot on that computer. Damn Small Linux boots on that computer, but I'm not sure where to go from there. (I'm still in the process of learning Linux.)

Should I use a different disto? Can I achieve everything I want with this computer? Thanks.

[bicostp]

You could try an Ubuntu fork like Fluxbuntu. (it uses Fluxbox instead of GNOME.) or even Debian, which Ubuntu is based off of. Really, any distro will work (even DSL, the 50 meg OS that can run on a 486 with a GUI), but you'll want a distro based off Debian to follow the tutorial.

[Kenny_McCormic]

DSL is based off Debian

[Sparkfist]

You can use just about any distribution of Linux. I would however suggest getting a distribution that has runlevel 3, which unless you know how to make your own Ubuntu can't offer you. I say that as you have limited ram and so you'd want to avoid having a GUI as it will only eat up resources. As for the Bittorrent client, I've read that bittornado has a plugin that you can get that makes it easy to manage from a remote terminal.

Don't know if you know this, but when you ssh into the server you can have it setup to give you a GUI so you can manage things easier. Look through the ssh man page, it's either -x or -X. A google search should give you the information on how to set that up if the man pages are too cryptic.

[lifeisbetterwithketchup]

I downloaded and burned a liveCD of fluxbuntu, and it booted, but I'm having graphical problems (shouldn't be an issue in the long run, as I plan this thing to be headless); could this mean there may be other (more-meaningful) problems ahead?

Also, is there any reason I won't be able to throw a 500GB (IDE of course) hard drive in there? I assume there isn't, but I want to be sure before I buy one.

[bicostp]

Since it's so old, the VESA driver might not like the card.

Try DSL. I've gotten it to work on a Pentium machine before, and it will take up a lot less space on the hard drive.

As for the 500GB HD, it may or may not work. I thought older BIOSes have trouble with hard drives over 120GB? Remember that amount of storage was unheard of back when that machine was new. You could throw something like a 100 GB drive in it and put the 500 GB in your good computer, then FTP the files to the good computer. (Make sure you give the torrent box a static IP so you know where to get to it, and install an FTP server because that's the fastest way to transfer files.)

[lifeisbetterwithketchup]

Hmm, if the 500GB drive won't work, I will probably not use that computer and try to hunt down another (newer) computer to use. I was initially planning on just making a file server, but thought I'd throw in a torrent box as an extra. So the main point of this computer would be a file server, not the torrent stuff. Does anyone else know anything about the 120GB BIOS limitation? Google got me nowhere.

[bicostp]

Looks like updating the BIOS and installing a new controller card are the two easier solutions.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=ha ... limitation
http://www.storagereview.com/guide2000/ ... /over.html

[lifeisbetterwithketchup]

Well, it would appear that this would be perfect. It's also the best SATA PCI card to use to flash a 360 DVD drive, if I ever felt compelled to do so.

So, with that resolved, back to Linux. This is a bit stupid of me, but I can't find the terminal/console in DSL. Could someone point it out?

[bicostp]

Click "ATerm" on the desktop, or select any of the items under the XShells category of the menu.