After much deliberation and mulling over specifications, I finally went out and bought the components for a new computer. My flatmate Mike helped me assemble it, and it’s now handling DNS requests for my local network at home in Bury, plus it hosts and provides the DNS for two of my domains. It’s also running secondary DNS for CircleSoft Entertainment, who are returning the favour by doing the same for my domains.
The eventual plan is to build up services on the machine until it’s ready to replace my D-Link router, which is showing signs of age. I’m currently looking for a decent ethernet ADSL modem and a network card so that I can route the packets through the box, hopefully I’ll get this setup early in the new year, if not before. I also want to move most of my domains to the box, because then I’ll be able to ensure some form of reliability above that of my current hosts. Once I figure out how to use Postfix, I’ll be moving my email there as well, and hopefully providing a secondary MX record for CSE.
In case you’re curious, here are the specifications of the machine:
- AMD Athlon XP 2600+ (CPU)
- 512Mb Corsair DDR 400 RAM
- 128Mb nVidia graphics card (cheapest I could buy, couldn’t even get a 64Mb one)
- Shuttle SN41G2 case with nVidia motherboard (and ICE cooling system)
- 52x Sony CD-RW
- 160Gb Maxtor hard drive with 8Mb cache
Due to the ICE cooling system, the box runs fairly quietly and produces hardly any heat (especially when idle), so I can put it in my bedroom without being kept awake at night or being suffocated by the temperature.