Newbie to Thinclient

[netkid]

Hi, I have never used a thinclient or WinXPe. I am following the guide by VaHam @ "http://gnbi.com/T5710/" and am a bit confused primarily because of my lack of knowledge on the hardware.

1. What is the difference between a Compact Flash Adaptor and a Compact Flash Card and Microdrive and Dom?

2. Is there a Hard Drive that comes built-in to these machines?

I see that VaHam used the Microdrive in his guide and secure the microdrive with tape. However isn't there any storage method that attaches directly to the 44-pin onboard instead of using a cable etc.

3. If I need this machine only for magic jack use initially which machine should I get and would a machine with 512MB Flash and 512MB RAM be sufficient.

4. What is EWF? Is that something that comes standard with WinXPe. I read that it basically write protects the Flash.

5. What is a Ramdisk and why do I need one?

Thx

[VaHam]

Hi, I have never used a thinclient or WinXPe. I am following the guide by VaHam @ "http://gnbi.com/T5710/" and am a bit confused primarily because of my lack of knowledge on the hardware.

1. What is the difference between a Compact Flash Adaptor and a Compact Flash Card and Microdrive and Dom?

The Compact Flash Card is the media storage device itself; akin to a SD card but a different size and pin configuration.
The Compact Flash Adapter interfaces to the IDE port in the T5710 and allows you to insert a Compact Flash Card into it; so it adapts the IDE to Compact Flash physically.

2. Is there a Hard Drive that comes built-in to these machines?

Yes and no There is a device called a transflash which is the card shown in the pictures that you remove. It is really a flash media device itself and you can simply buy a larger one of these devices to increase the storage size to 512MB or even 1GB; and that would be the simplest approach to just allow MJ to be run on the TC. The cost of these devices has dropped dramatically since 2008 when that article was written. Read through the STICKY and you find links to transflash units and lot of other good info.

I see that VaHam used the Microdrive in his guide and secure the microdrive with tape. However isn't there any storage method that attaches directly to the 44-pin onboard instead of using a cable etc.

See above - BTW those T5710's of mine have not been opened since 2008 and run 24/7 here without failure.

3. If I need this machine only for magic jack use initially which machine should I get and would a machine with 512MB Flash and 512MB RAM be sufficient.

For now, yes and if you were willing to do some of software tuning even 256 can be made to work.

4. What is EWF? Is that something that comes standard with WinXPe. I read that it basically write protects the Flash.

Yes EWF comes in XPe. Using EWF the flash memory is mirrored into RAM and thus is not saved to the flash unless you command it to do so by issuing a "Commit" which copies the RAM to flash so that it can be remembered after the next bootup. All of the reading going on while the TC is running programs is saved in RAM. Although modern flash memory devices attempt to increase their life by using various techniques internally it still remains that unlike a hard drive they are worn out each time they are written to.

5. What is a Ramdisk and why do I need one?

See above

[netkid]

Hi VaHam,

Thx for answer.

The Compact Flash Card is the media storage device itself; akin to a SD card but a different size and pin configuration.
The Compact Flash Adapter interfaces to the IDE port in the T5710 and allows you to insert a Compact Flash Card into it; so it adapts the IDE to Compact Flash physically.

So the compact flash card is different from the Microdrive and the transflash?

Yes and no There is a device called a transflash which is the card shown in the pictures that you remove. It is really a flash media device itself and you can simply buy a larger one of these devices to increase the storage size to 512MB or even 1GB; and that would be the simplest approach to just allow MJ to be run on the TC. The cost of these devices has dropped dramatically since 2008 when that article was written. Read through the STICKY and you find links to transflash units and lot of other good info.

Is the transflash the same as the DOM chip. I read through your post however cannot find any reference to a transflash anywhere in that doc. Is there another name for this device?

5. What is a Ramdisk and why do I need one?

See above

What is the relationship between a Ramdisk and EWF? I understand that EWF does not let you write to your hard disk unless you commit but what does that have to do with Ramdisk? From what I have read the ramdisk seems to be allocating more RAM from your Harddisk space or some sort of virtual memory but I think that would be to speed up applications so do not see the relation with EWF.


Thx

[VaHam]

So the compact flash card is different from the Microdrive and the transflash?

Yes they are all different. And I had a brain lapse when I said transflash I ment to say transend module. The microdrive is designed to have the same interface as the compact flash card however; so they will both fit into a compact flash adapter. The Transend IDE Flash Module or (DOM) Transcend's IDE Flash Modules is a Disk on Module (DOM) and is designed to interface using eide standard pinout and are direct replacements for the stock DOM in the T5710. The 1GB is as large as you can easily use in the T5710 with the HP XPe since the the primary partition is limited to 1GB. But for ease of expansion simply replacing the stock DOM with one of the Transend 1GB modules is about as easy as it gets and now is very cost effective.

You asked earlier about other hard drives in a T5710 and yes others can work if you read through the stickies you'll see strohs used a laptop drop (20GB if I remember correctly) taped to the lid of one of his. You just need to be careful since the power for the drive is fed thru the ide cable and the T5710 doesn't have robust power supplies, as a regular computer would; but I have seen lots of other folks use a laptop drive. Not sure if there have been any long term reports on their life however. Mircodrives are low power devices which were commonly used to replace compact flash cards in cameras etc. and so they fair well in the TC use.

Is the transflash the same as the DOM chip. I read through your post however cannot find any reference to a transflash anywhere in that doc. Is there another name for this device?

Yes my mistake see above.

What is the relationship between a Ramdisk and EWF? I understand that EWF does not let you write to your hard disk unless you commit but what does that have to do with Ramdisk? From what I have read the ramdisk seems to be allocating more RAM from your Harddisk space or some sort of virtual memory but I think that would be to speed up applications so do not see the relation with EWF.

EWF protects the operating system and it's persistent storage i.e. the registry etc.; but temporary files need to be created and used as the operating system is in use as well. These temporary files need disk space and again since flash memory has a finite number of times each cell can be written to (reading doesn't count in lifetime) a simulated d: drive is created in RAM memory space for use with these temporary files to avoid writing them to flash memory. The use of a mirrored or shadowed os space and a ram drive also means increased access time during operation since ram access is faster than flash or disk access and hence overall performance is increased as well.

The beauty of EWF and ram drive is that if you do a reboot all the temporary content is flushed and a pristine copy of the os and it's persistent files is reloaded at the next bootup. This means if there were a virus or other harmful piece of code or temporary file they would be wiped out each time the system is rebooted. A very nice way to keep the machine clean. A commit cause the persistent values in to be written to flash and thus should only be done when your sure your system is in a clean state; like shortly after a bootup and say a new update from MJ has just occured.

I have not tracked it lately but I believe there was a time in the past when MJ softphone had a small memory leak and over time this would occupy too much memory space and cause problems. This is why I have mine set to reboot each night while I am asleep; that way they memory is reloaded daily.

I chose to go the microdisk way because I had in mind using the TC for more than just MJ. I wanted to keep bookmarks in the browser etc. since I wanted to use it as a guest computer as well. I also use another one connected to some medical equipment I use at night (CPAP and Oximeter) and use that TC's serial port virtually from my desktop to dump data from those devices so that I don't have to string serial cable from one end of the house to the other. Another of my T5710 with a microdrive has for some time now been a full blown version of PBX in a Flash (Asterisk). So it is running linux(CentOs 5).

If you setup your microdrive the way I showed in that article you still have the benefits of EWF for cleans reboots and added disk space for use in other ways; but you don't need that if your just looking to run MJ.

If your just looking to run MJ on the T5710 then I would recommend the 1GB Transend DOM. Plug it in, run the HP software to load XPe on the DOM add the USB audio driver, plug in MJ and your in business.

[netkid]

Hi VaHam,

Thx for the detail response. I have few more questions

1. How do you connect to the machine initially and than after its setup. Do you need to RDP to it or have a monitor, keyboard etc dedicated to it.

2. If I use DOM than I cannot use EWF?

tx

[VaHam]

1. How do you connect to the machine initially and than after its setup. Do you need to RDP to it or have a monitor, keyboard etc dedicated to it.

Initally I use a monitor, keyboard and mouse. First thing I do after getting it setup up initially is to load Teamviewer;which is free for personal use. Then the monitor, keyboard and mouse can be disconnected. You can remotely control the TC via Teamviewer. Others use VNC instead of teamviewer but I have found Teamviewer is very easy to use and works well.

2. If I use DOM than I cannot use EWF?

If you use the DOM then you will certainly want to use EWF and since it is a standard component of HP's XPe, once you flash the DOM with XPe it will already be loaded and active to protect the DOM.

[netkid]

Can I use a T5730 instead of a T5710? Is there any difference between the 2. It seems the T5730 has a DC-input? Is it the same for T5710 and if so will than it won't work will it unless the adapter that comes with it converts the DC to AC? Thx

[netkid]

I see a lot of TC online that say T5000 T5700 1G with 512/256. Are they the same as the 5710 or is there a way to tell the model number.

Some Others also have a AMD processor some say NX1500/512/512 and others say AMD Sempron. Is there any difference?

[VaHam]

Can I use a T5730 instead of a T5710? Is there any difference between the 2. It seems the T5730 has a DC-input? Is it the same for T5710 and if so will than it won't work will it unless the adapter that comes with it converts the DC to AC? Thx

The only TC's I have experience with are the T5710 which are often shown as part of the T5000 series. The T5720 and T5730 are more powerful machines and I am sure they would serve your purpose. But if your going to pay over $150 or so you may want to look into and Acer Aspire Revo. Same kind of form factor and low power consumption but they have much more horse power.

As far as I know however all the 5000 series actually run off 12VDC which is supplied with a power module to the TC.

Read through the stickies! There is much information there regarding the other modules and power supplies etc.