Ideas for second PC

I bought a router so I could finally go ahead and turn off my main PC
that served as a router using ICS and XP, until now.

I have a Pentium 90 that I use on my network. Since the router will
allow this PC to be connected to the net all the time, I am thinking
of transfering all my chat programs (ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, MSN
Messenger and mIRC) to this PC. This way, even if I reboot my main
computer, I will still be connected to the chats. I would basically
have a "chatting machine" that would be on all the time, I felt this
was a cool idea, I would just remote control the P-90 with Remote
Administrator.

I would like feedback from people that have thought of this or tried
this. Is running a remote control program as much overhead as running
four different chat programs?

I'm open to suggestions. Thanks!


Dave

Perfect idea..Internet appliances can be just about any Pentium class
machine(with 32megs+), but will the OS/browser your using load onto
it(minimum requirements)?
"Bebert" wrote in message
...
I bought a router so I could finally go ahead and turn off my main PC
that served as a router using ICS and XP, until now.

I have a Pentium 90 that I use on my network. Since the router will
allow this PC to be connected to the net all the time, I am thinking
of transfering all my chat programs (ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, MSN
Messenger and mIRC) to this PC. This way, even if I reboot my main
computer, I will still be connected to the chats. I would basically
have a "chatting machine" that would be on all the time, I felt this
was a cool idea, I would just remote control the P-90 with Remote
Administrator.

I would like feedback from people that have thought of this or tried
this. Is running a remote control program as much overhead as running
four different chat programs?

I'm open to suggestions. Thanks!


Dave

On Sat, 05 Jul 2003 00:34:26 -0400, Bebert wrote:

I would like feedback from people that have thought of this or tried
this. Is running a remote control program as much overhead as running
four different chat programs?


I don't use Remote Administration but NetOps (a PCAnywhere clone) and
its cpu usage is negligible.

I have a W2K server as my machine#2 and stays on 24x7, but it's
configured to go sleep when idled. This is my webserver box (hey, if
you have 24x7 Internet connection, why not have you own website?)

Website aside, I've found box#2 real useful as a file server. A CD
burner (fire it up while I go about my business on box#1), a
Peer-to-Peer file server (i.e. Kazaa - you mean you don't know what
Kazaa is?!!!). Video decoder/encoder (which can take a while). and any
other usage you can dream off, AND it doesn't make you stop surfing
the web from box#1, while box#2 is hard at work.





-bobb

I don't use Remote Administration but NetOps (a PCAnywhere clone) and
its cpu usage is negligible.

Hi bobb, I just tried NetOps to remote control two machines
simultaneously on my LAN... and it slowed my PC a lot! CPU usage was
between 20 % and 45 % for the NetOps process, on a Pentium 3 @ 800
Mhz!

I will do the same test with Remote Administrator for comparison...
NetOps is a full-fledged app that seems faster than RAdmin, but the
CPU usage is awful...

I have a W2K server as my machine#2 and stays on 24x7, but it's
configured to go sleep when idled. This is my webserver box (hey, if
you have 24x7 Internet connection, why not have you own website?)

Good idea, guess I could have my own website, or in my case, it would
be more like an FTP site so I can get all sorts of files remotely.

Website aside, I've found box#2 real useful as a file server. A CD
burner (fire it up while I go about my business on box#1), a
Peer-to-Peer file server (i.e. Kazaa - you mean you don't know what
Kazaa is?!!!). Video decoder/encoder (which can take a while). and any
other usage you can dream off, AND it doesn't make you stop surfing
the web from box#1, while box#2 is hard at work.

Thanks for the suggestions bobb... Too bad NetOps is so CPU hungry
though... any other suggestions for an app that would allow remote
control of PCs over a 100 Mbit LAN, that doesn't hog the CPU as much?

Thanks!


Dave