Converting An Old Pentium II Machine Into A File Server With Debian

While working on the Point of Sales system for the restaurant, I found the need to have a file server to host the restaurant database files so the different POS system can access it from different location and also have some kind of user access control . Since using Microsoft Server is pretty much out of the questions because of price and system requirements, I decided to clean out my old Pentium II with 300mhz, 128MB RAM, 6GB HD and tried installing Debian Linux with Samba. Samba allows people using Windows system to access files on Linux and vice versa, allowing you to save a TON of money on software and hardware. While it sounded really intimidating when I started, I was very pleased on how relatively simple it actually was.

Here're the steps I took in resurrecting this old antique of a computer into a critical part of our restaurant POS system.

Step 1. Get Debian Linux
If you have high speed internet connection, I recommend downloading just the minimal bootable CD image and just download the rest of the files during installation. The minimal bootable cd is only about 180MB's and can fit on one of those little CD-R(W) discs.

Step 2. Boot the CD and Install
Here're the screenshots I took during installation.

Startup.

Booting from CD.

Installing setup files.

Disk partitioning.

Network and user setup.

Base system installation.

Choosing system configuration. I chose the most basic setup I needed, which was just a file and maybe a print server. Recommend not installing anything else to conserve system resources.

Installing software. The installation time depends on your configuration.

Finished installation and log in.

Now you can access the new file server with any Windows machine. Go to "My NetWork Places" and look for your new computer. A log in screen will pop up. Now you just need to add users for access.

Step 3. Configuring and Adding Users To Samba
Now Debian and Samba are installed (By choosing "file server" during installation, Samba is automatically installed for you). Your new server computer should show up from in the "My Network Places" from any Windows computer. Now just follow the following tutorial to add users for accessing your new file server. You can skip the Samba installation and go straight to creating a shared space and adding users.

http://howtoforge.com/debian_etch_samba_standalone_server_with_tdbsam_backend

That's it! You are done! Now you have a nice file server for you to share files across your network and you have full control over who gets to access your files. Use the "Map Network Drive" feature in Windows for easy access to your new share folders.

Hope this helps, good luck!