OMG, it has been over a year since I posted last... I am so sorry! The COVID-19 situation gave me some sort of reluctance, in which I indulged, watching other folks' work. My Raspberry Pi projects were quiet too. I simply tried to focus on growing a business... Has that worked? Maybe!
Anyway, for my business, I figured that my (t)rusty old dual core Celeron NUC was not cutting it any longer. I like the NUC, but, it might do better service to me as an Owncloud server or something alike. So, in replacing my authoring workstation, I was looking for silent (!) alternatives. When I was employed, many years ago, I was given a "thin client" to connect with the company's servers. This thing was fully passively cooled and silent but butt ugly. Not sure what brand it was, and this is not important either.
So, in recall of what the silence during my thin client usage was, I started researching on a suitable thin client for my own business. The distinction here is that there is no intention to use the thin client as intended by the manufacturer. The original plan was to replace my (t)rusty old NUC, with something more silent and more powerful.
The research of tech and availability got me to the Dell Wyse range, in particular the 5060 model. And here is why:
- accessible BIOS (password "Fireport") with USB boot option
- quad core AMD 64bit CPU up to 2.4 GHz
- 2 SODIMM sockets (one populated with a 4 GB card)
- 8 GB SATA SSD module (internal connector)
- 4 USB2 ports
- 2 USB3 ports
On top, there is an internal connector for a wlan card.
Hence, this thing should be pretty decent as a Linux workplace PC. In fact, I am writing this article on this particular piece of kit.
However, there is of course no free lunch, so, there was some work to be done before arriving at this workstation.
First of all, 8 GB of storage night be enough to run Puppy Linux, or distributions alike, however, more serious work will ask for a heavier distro. I am a long time user of Linux Mint, as this is what I was intending to use on this machine. Linux Mint does not install on 8 GB storage however.
This might look like a big problem, but it isn't, promised!
First, I want to give you an overview what the thin client looks in it's original state...
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| DELL WYSE 5060 |
Now that we has established how the thin client looks with the covers removed, lets have a look at the guts.
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| SATA SSD module |
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| installed SODIMM module |
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| SODIMM module removed, showing 2nd slot below |
I had a 2GB SODIMM module in my junk box, so, I dropped it in. The original 4 GB module is now in slot 0, while the spare 2 GB module is in slot 1. While this may not be a big deal, every little bit of (gratis) RAM helps.
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| 2 SODIMM slots used |
The more interesting mod is of course to purpose the the SATA slot. 8 GB might be something, but more might be something better.
It just so happened that I had a 240 GB Sandisk SATA SSD in one of my junk boxes. It previously served a Raspberry Pi 4 but was not presently in use. There are other SSDs in my junk box, however, it is important to point out that the PCB of the Sandisk SSDs are particularly small. Have a look:
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| SanDisk SSD plus 240 GB |
Now, lets compare that to the SSD module of the Wyse 5060...
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| On the left: 8 GB SSD module, on the right: 240 GB SSD |
It is obvious that the Sandisk PCB is a little bit larger than the one of the original 8 GB SSD, However, it is not large enough to pose a real problem.
First of all, there is a screw and a respective terminal right in the middle of the original SSD. For electrical reasons, this has to be covered (by some electrical tape).
When installing the Sandisk SSD, some additional measures are needed to prevent electrical problem. In particular the EM-shield of the of RAM section might interfere with the larger SSD pcb. In order to overcome this problem, pliers might be required to bend the EM-shield such to no longer interfere/touch the SSD pcb.
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| Sandisk 240 GB SSD pcb installed |
I will spare you a picture how I secured the SSD with just a strip of electrical tape.
This was a weekend project, i.e. just a few hours old. Still, I think this is a very worthy project to do. Inexpensive (if you are patient enough) and pretty rewarding in the results in my view.
I am running this with Linux Mint 20.3 and I am very pleased. I wish to point out that tweaking of the CPU frequencies might improve your experience.
