The <$100 Linux Box

The decTOP avaialble for $88 each (including shipping, in lots of four) makes a great little Linux box.

The decTOP from Data Evolution Corporation

The decTOP comes with (almost) everything shown here.

The decTOP

Universal(100-240Vac) input 12Vdc adapter.

USB Mouse

USB Keyboard

USB to Ethernet adapter

All necessary cables, power cord, Ethernet, phone, and USB extension

*LCD monitor not included*

Right side has power switch/LED, two USB ports, and audio jacks

Left side has modem jack, two USB ports, VGA, and power jacks

Close up of the included USB to Ethernet adapter

Whats inside?

Being more of a hardware guy I opened mine before I even powered it up once! The decTOP was a pain in the ass to open. There are six plastic clips, three per side, under the blue rubber edging. These have to be lifted and the top pried up a bit to get it to open.

You can see the interior metal frame and stock 10GB hard drive mounted on top.Interesting to note the stock hard drive has a Windows CE 5.0 serial number sticker on it. Now this leads me to believe that if I could find the installation disks for Windows CE 5.0. I would be able to legally install it using this serial number...

Under the hard drive is the one and only system board. You can see the Geode CPU under the SODIMM.

Better view of what's inside.

I installed an old 40GB Western Digital hard drive and replaced the 128MB SODIMM with a 512MB one while I was in there.

Installing Ubuntu Linux

Installing Ubuntu Linux was pretty straight forward using Jonathan Scott's instructions.
Installing Ubuntu on the decTOP (AMD PIC)

decTOP boot screen.

Ubuntu installer

Literally HOURS later I got to boot Ubuntu for the first time.

SUCCESS!

Overall this is a nice little unit, maybe a little slow for a full-blown Linux desktop, but certainly usable. I have an old laptop that is a Celeron 433/128MB RAM that runs Xbuntu and the decTOP running full Ubuntu is only slightly slower, except program load times are notably slow compared to the Celeron laptop. The decTOP is certainly fast enough (and silent except for HDD) to be a printer, FTP, DNS, mail, file, torrent, or whatever server for the average household, or even an Internet kiosk or point of sale terminal for a small business. Since it does run from 12VDC (and only draws about 8 Watts) with a low power monitor it could be a nice car, boat, or camper computer, the possibilities are endless