Thin terminals for FreeBSD

[Chris Shenton]

cpghost <cpghost at cordula.ws> writes:

> I'm using EPIA 5000 mini-ATX boards with 512 MB RAM, diskless booting
> from an NFS server. They load X.org and everything else on demand.
> Compared to local HDDs, there's a small performance hit when loading
> programs [and those boards are not the fastest, though 100% silent ;-)],
> but users here are happy enough with them.

Ditto: I have one of these in my kitchen and like it -- no sysadm,
silent, etc. Not the fastest but mine is 3 years old.  

Only problem I've noticed is if Mozilla (or whatever) uses all the RAM
then X11 restarts, losing your sessions.  Doesn't happen all the
time.  One day I'll set up swap to run over the net.

I really like the fact that I install stuff like Mozilla and other
software on one box (the server) and its immediately available around
the house on the rest of the boxes. The less sysadm I do the better. 


>> - Do I need to use gigabit ethernet? Or is it enough to use a normal 100 
>> Mbps wired network? I heard that there can be bandwidth problems when 
>> using many terminals, but I do not have experience.
>
> For a diskless setup, 100 MB switched on the client side is enough; but
> you'd definitely prefer gigabit ethernet on the NFS server.

I'm using switched 100Mbps ether but I only have the one diskless
client. I have a couple other clients mounting just some of the
filesystems over the net and would prefer GigE but it's not bad as it
is.

I'd definitely do this diskless thing if I had 10-20 client terminals
to set up, like in an internet cafe or something.  If they get wedged,
who cares: just power-cycle them.  :-)