How many B3's out there ?

[Clive]

I often wonder how many B3's there are out there up and running ?

My own B3 has been up and running on it's original HD continuosly since 2011. I often use it to test or play with new ideas and it still occasionally streams to my TV. But I have never had a problem with it and it must be my oldest bit of computer tech still in use.Mounted to all my current computers, I naturally have other backups which I make sure are there when (if) the B3 eventually fails.

Thanks to all those Excito developers from way back, you created a great product which in 2011 was somehow ahead of it's time..

[MouettE]

Hello,

I have one at home, still running, plus 1 b2 and one b3 for dev. Also in the easyfind system, we have 200 entries updated in the last year. Not all B3 have easyfind active though, and some run on fixed IP.

[Clive]

....as does mine

It's great that some of these are still up and working !

[fredrikj]

I have a B3 running 24/7, and a spare that has seen little use except some experiments. I'm not using easyfind, so there was at least 201 active installations last year.

[Gordon]

My dynamic IP has not changed in eight years. You'd probably find a lot more entries if you count the number of IPs checking their IP address. And even then you would not see the ones that are directly connected to the internet and use the DHCP exit method to trigger an easyfind update.

I have two units running production, one for internet access and internet exposed services, the other serves as home automation server, Squeezebox server, time machine and central storage. A third B3 is being used for bubbagen development and I have a fourth one spare. The development machine is actually the oldest machine and it still has the original 1GiB green disk that according to its health statistics should have broken a long time ago.

[goodgirl]

Running B3 I bought from @stryker with 4TiB drive. No web interface, just Debian Buster (I think I owe a big "Thanks" to @MouettE) and installing the packets need. Media server (minidlna), smb, backup (dirvish), no clutter. Much better than any of the NAS devices you can buy nowadays. Freshly set up some time ago.

Code: Select all

root@b3:~# uname -a
Linux b3.i.groovy.home 4.19.59-1 #1 Wed Jul 17 14:58:51 EDT 2019 armv5tel GNU/Linux
root@b3:~# uptime
 02:01:50 up 106 days,  9:48,  0 users,  load average: 0.00, 0.02, 0.00
root@b3:~# lsblk
NAME      MAJ:MIN RM  SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda         8:0    0  3.7T  0 disk 
|-sda1      8:1    0   10G  0 part /
|-sda2      8:2    0    2G  0 part [SWAP]
`-sda3      8:3    0  3.6T  0 part /data
mtdblock0  31:0    0  768K  0 disk 
mtdblock1  31:1    0  128K  0 disk 
mtdblock2  31:2    0  1.1M  0 disk
root@b3:~# lspci
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88F6281 [Kirkwood] ARM SoC (rev 03)

@Gordon: 1GiB green disk seems quite small for dev, uhh?

[Gordon]

TB

[stasheck]

I have:
- B3 at my parents, used as an AP/gateway/remote backup target
- B3 at friend's company, used as backup target
- B3 at another friend, running Transmission
- B3 at home, being remote backup target

I retired my own B3 because it could not keep up with my new uplink (250/250), replaced with Celeron J1900 running OPNSense on top of Proxmox.

[ahoff]

I have:

• One B3 as Nextcloud server (no easyfind)
• Two B3's for experiment
• Six or seven B3's spare units. Never used
• Two Bubba Storage
• One B2 (retired)
• One Bubba (aka B1 retired)

[Puma]

I have:
at home: 1x B3 + S1 as main server 1x B3 + S1 as backup server
my father: 1x B3 + S1 as main server
Work location: 1x B3 as server
my father in law: 1x B3
my brother in law: 1x B3
1 b3 spare at home
all running perfect
Puma

[Torsten]

Mine died recently, I suspect it is a hard drive failure. Currently working on replacing the hard drive, got a new one mounted, but are struggling to find a boot image.

[Gordon]

Mine died recently, I suspect it is a hard drive failure. Currently working on replacing the hard drive, got a new one mounted, but are struggling to find a boot image.

Latest official image here: http://install.excito.org/latest/b3/ (2012)

A selection of more modern operating systems here: https://forum.excito.com/viewforum.php?f=7

[kennywest]

1 b3 currently serving as active directory (for my windows and Linux clients), dns, file server, nfs server, firewall (running squeeze)

1 spare b3 currently being installed with Debian Buster, will replace the aforementioned b3 once completely configured and tested.

Amazing this forum is still alive and recent Debian install archives are still readily available.

[dorus43]

My B3 is running from February 2014 and is still reliable working.
Today I had a problem, the /dev/sda1 was full , but thanks to this forum I quickly could solve that problem.
(The root mailbox filled the nearly a quart of the free space.)

So a big thank for all those who has supporting this forum.

[oticxe]

One still in use here.

Took me 'a while' to find the password for my username for this forum. I was part-way through registering a new username.

Actually looking to upgrade to a more recent kernel, so very happy to see so many options. A surfeit of choice.

And my view is that the Excito Bubba /B3 was so far ahead of its time, it isn't funny.

I have some reading to do, but I am looking to answer the following questions...

1) Is there a capacity limit to the disks that can be attached (I seem to remember there is/was one)
2) Is there a new/improved U-boot around? (I think not)
3) Are there possibilities of getting hold of one or two more? (Possibly old stock from USA, or pre-owned?)
4) Can one run something like OpenMediaVault? I like the web interface because I am fundamentally lazy, but I also like all the possibilities of having a full Linux machine available. I'm not wedded to the Excito web solution. I am happy with Debian, but Gordon's Bubbagen looks interesting, but I'm not sure I'm ready for Gentoo, yet.

If the answers are here on the forum, I'm sure I'll find them.

Thank-you to all keeping the software going, and giving hardware tips (such as replacing the RTC battery).