[Beowulf] NSLU2 as part of a low end cluster

[Jim Lux]

At 01:54 PM 3/9/2007, Geoff Jacobs wrote:
>Gerald Davies wrote:
> > On 08/03/07, Jim Lux <James.P.Lux at jpl.nasa.gov> wrote:
> >> Has anyone tried using the LinkSys NSLU2 (aka, the "slug") as a
> >> server in a small demo cluster?
> >> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSLU2 for more info)
> >> Seems that people get 5 MB/sec sorts of speeds with NFS or FTP. While
> >> no ball of fire speed wise, it is an inexpensive widget that might be
> >> handy for a "toy" cluster to serve as a boot server.
> >>
> >
> > IIRC, this was mentioned in a previous thread somewhere :)  I've not
> > had a play with it, but i agree, it's possibly a useful tool.
>
>Looks like people are seeing speeds of roughly 5MB/s up and 3MB/s down
>with NFS. FTP is faster.
>
>Not great, but we're talking a power envelope of 15W.

and something that fits in your pocket.

Imagine this scenario..  A slug with a big flash memory dongle and a 
wireless AP.  People have a bunch of laptops, and they set them up to 
netboot across the wireless.  Instant (low performance) demonstration cluster.

Mind you, it's not clear that you can actually do PXE across wireless 
in a laptop.  I've done PXE boot and clustering with wireless 
interfaces, but it was with external 802.11a "modems", so the node 
actually doing the booting thought it was just seeing the wired ethernet.

But... imagine this.. you can walk into a consumer electronics store 
with your "head node" in a backpack, push the reset button on all 
those laptops on display..

All your base belong to us.. etc



James Lux, P.E.
Spacecraft Radio Frequency Subsystems Group
Flight Communications Systems Section
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Mail Stop 161-213
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena CA 91109
tel: (818)354-2075
fax: (818)393-6875