Asus EEEPC 901 as seedbox?

**Pozarynicoeta** · 09-16-2010, 08:22 AM

Has anyone tried using one of these as a seedbox? I'm thinking about getting one for that. Low power, run linux with rtorrent or deluge daemon.

http://www.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=1sRO7tW9B0OdR9yz

What are your thoughts?

**Cabalo** · 09-16-2010, 11:59 AM

I have one of those, and though I don't use it as a seedbox, it may suite your needs.
I'm assuming you will plug external USB HDDs, as its standard SSD is 20 GB on the linux version.
I've ran ubuntu UNR 10.04 on that machine, and it's all very fast and smooth. Running it only as a seedbox, will always suffer from the USB 2.0 I/O bottleneck, but I'm supposing that won't be a problem as you will be using your home connection.

**Pozarynicoeta** · 09-16-2010, 10:52 PM

Yeah I will be seeding to the NAS on the network anyway so won't even have USB problems. I used to have one of these but broke it, it was Windows XP version but it ran Ubuntu Netbook literally 10 times faster, XP was a joke on it 10 minute boot time, 5 minutes to open Firefox, etc etc.

I'm just not so sure about the always on situation it will be put through, it does have a small fan, it will always be plugged in charging, keeping lid shut and packed away in a cupboard.
I'm thinking either this or a Mini ITX. I want low power consumption!

**Cabalo** · 09-17-2010, 04:42 AM

It does have a very low power consumption, and heating won't be a problem, as the atom N270 CPUs have a very low TDP (2.5w). The chipset (a i945G) does have a higher one, around 12w, which means chipset intensive operations (especially the memory controller) will raise the thermal operating conditions. You should focus on keeping the backside of the netbook as free as possible, as all I/O operations are done via the integrated I/O controller (separated from the chipset, but located on the mobo), which has a TDP of around 3.3w.
I used intel's powertop to stop some I/O operations and thus reduce chipset usage, which is the main "heater" inside the case.

Going for the mini-itx solution, you will have a hard time finding a CPU with less than 65w TDP, plus the more demanding integrated chipsets, very power hungry as they have to control the integrated GPU's too. It would spend 30 times more energy than the EEEPC.