Wanted: a Satellite office access box

[jan]

How about a single board computer? Advantech
(http://www.advantech.net.au/) sell a number of boards with low-powered
chips that don't need a fan e.g. PCM-9550: Pentium 266Mhz MMX with
ethernet, etc. Don't know the cost, though. They have offices in Canberra
and Melbourne.  (I have nothing to do with Advantech, just looking at
their products.) See www.embeddedlinuxjournal.com for other single board 
Linux's

Jan
--

On Fri, 30 Aug 2002, Stephen Hodgman wrote:

> G'day all,
> Well I have searched around and so far cannot find what I want.  So, I 
> thought I should throw it open here as what I really want is a linux box in 
> an appliance.... let me explain.
> 
> The requirement  is for a box to dial (phone network) a central office and 
> supply network access to/from the satellite office.  I want no firewall on 
> this appliance i.e. I want full access from central office to the satellite 
> office computers.  I would like it to provide printing services accessable 
> from satellite office and the central office for printer(s) in the satellite 
> office.  It should incorporate a hub/switch as well.
> 
> Now that is easy you all say.  An old junk PC with linux would do that with 
> cpu to spare.  However, the environment is dusty, not secure and I am 
> looking for something that is robust, no fan, low cost, easy to configure 
> and replace if necessary...
> 
> The latest rage seems to be these "Cable Internet Access Routers with 
> dial backup".  Well, so far every one of those I have looked at has a 
> firewall that does NAT whether you like it or not!  Hence no access from 
> central office to satellite office computers/services.
> 
> So I am returning to the idea of a junk PC with integrated hub and no hard 
> disk and Linux.  Just a boot floppy/cdrom.  Problem is there is still a fan 
> and they will break and overheat etc. Or is there another solution that 
> anyone can come up with e.g. an "appliance" with no fan that will do it.  I 
> need to install four of these pretty soon.
> 
> Thanks for your time and help.
> ---
> Stephen Hodgman               steve at namsys.com.au
> Namadgi Systems                Ph. +61 2 6285 3460
> Canberra                       Fax +61 2 6285 3459
> Australia
> 
> 

-- 
  Jan Newmarch, School of Network Computing
  Monash University 
  Email: jan.newmarch at infotech.monash.edu.au
  WWW: http://jan.netcomp.monash.edu.au

No-one calls a spade a spade if there's a chance of calling it instead an
HDK ("hole development kit")