A new contest from Plat'Home wants to establish just how cruel you can be to your hardware. The most creative method of abuse will earn the winning evil geek five free OpenMicroServers and a chance to test their evil genius.
A new contest wants to hear creative and cruel suggestions on how to abuse OpenMicroServers. (IMG:Plat\'Home)
Geeks are creative; yet, while most of their creativity is used to solve problems and create cool things, often some will choose to focus their energy on how to break things. Plat'Home says that its OpenMicroServers are known for being tough.
However, just saying that is not enough, so Tokyo-based server manufacturer Plat'Home wants to prove it.
“We want to put our servers up to the test though. For five weeks - from August 1, 2008, through September 5, 2008 - Plat'Home will conduct an online contest to solicit ideas for the most interesting and challenging conditions to successfully run Plat’Home’s OpenMicroServers,” the company told TTH in a recent e-mail.
The contest has some interesting spin. Yes, it is marketing, but the little server boxes are certainly cool looking, and Plat'Home claims them to be both heat resistant and focused on taking abuse found in most environments that would kill normal servers. Using Power-over-Ethernet, and SSD/Linux, the small boxes will withstand maximum ambient operating temperatures of 50°C/122°F.
The idea is to send them suggestions, creative and cruel, on how you would use the OpenMicroServer and neglect it.
“Does your small business in Arizona have a server room with no air conditioning? Do you live in Alaska and need server(s) that might be subjected to cold conditions? Are you an archaeologist that needs a computer that can be taken on a dig with you and survive dust and bugs? Tell us about it,” the company said in its official contest announcement.
While the idea of using it on a dig for dinosaur fossils is creative, there has to be better ways of proving how tough these little servers are. So get cracking, and send Plat'Home your evil thoughts.
One idea that came to mind after hearing the suggestion of a server room with no air conditioning, I suggested using the access point functionality of the OpenMicroServer on top of a freshly tarred roof in Phoenix.
The little server is designed for several uses, fifteen of them are listed on the company site. If anyone has one of the boxes and wants to talk about them, e-mail me, Steve Ragan, at the Tech Herald security address.
Check out the official contest rules by clicking here.
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