Difference between revisions of "DockStar"
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| − | == Dockstar? == |
+ | == What's a Dockstar? == |
[http://www.seagate.com/ Seagate's] [http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/products/network_storage/freeagent_dockstar/ Free Agent DockStar] is a very cheap, nifty little Linux machine with the following features: |
[http://www.seagate.com/ Seagate's] [http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/products/network_storage/freeagent_dockstar/ Free Agent DockStar] is a very cheap, nifty little Linux machine with the following features: |
||
* 1.2 GHz ARM processor |
* 1.2 GHz ARM processor |
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Revision as of 16:49, 30 December 2010
What's a Dockstar?
Seagate's Free Agent DockStar is a very cheap, nifty little Linux machine with the following features:
- 1.2 GHz ARM processor
- 3 USB 2.0 ports
- 1 USB 2.0 port with a little mini connector allowing the user to just plug in a Seagate FreeAgent Go hard drive
- 1 Gigabit Ethernet NIC
- $20 price tag
- User replacable firmware (it comes with PogoPlug from the factory -- the device is intended as a NAS)
It does have a few small annoyances:
- Only 128 Mbytes of RAM (256 or 512 would be SO much nicer)
- No battery backed clock
- Serial console is hard to get to (but the bootloader and Linux can use the normal Linux network console setup)
Debianizing a DockStar
There are a number of options for replacing the PogoPlug OS on a DockStar: OpenWRT supports them. Plugbox Linux does, too. But I'm a Debian fan, so that's what I'm running on mine.
Jeff Doozan has done much of the legwork making Debian an easy option on a Dockstar. He has a procedure for installing a new bootloader, kernel, and root filesystem into the Dockstar's flash and bootstrapping a Debian installation onto a USB mass storage device attached to the Dockstar (thumb drive, jump drive, FreeAgent Go, portable USB hard drive or whatever)