Linux Mint and Steam. Reviving the dead.

As many of the regular readers may know, I am one of those people who doesn’t really like spending money. I approach almost all of my projects with the aim of “the most acceptable outcome for the lowest possible outlay.” That way I can spend more on other projects and goodies. So for example, if I could buy a PC for X price, but actually hand build an equivalent or maybe slightly lower spec machine for half the price, I’d much rather do that. It’s all about value for money. Next to this, I’m also a fan of recycling and re purposing old hardware and bits. Recently I was brought an oldish laptop and an even older PC to have a play with in order to see if I could get them up to a reasonable running spec for nearly nothing. I wasn’t sure I could pull if off but I figured with nothing to lose I may as well give it a try, which leads us onto the main of the article.

Rust removal, the results.

Rust removal with science.

Right, listen up folks. This here is probably going to be the most advanced and scientific post that ZD has ever seen which is pretty cool. Its also going to be quite long and I know some of you won’t stick with it as far as the science section but oh well.

Project Alfa: The Birth

So here it is, I finally get to unveil the new project. Currently it is only dubbed rather unimaginably as “Project Alpha” for the reasons of tags and post sorting, soon I will come up with some form of catchy and possibly witty permanent project name.

Raspberry Media Pi

So as many of you may know, I have been talking about getting a Raspberry Pi for a little while. This was mainly to play with and possibly use as a media centre. Well, I have finally managed to get my hands on one and have done exactly that. Got one to version to “play” with and the other for a media centre. No, I don’t have two PIs, just two SD cards is all you need as the base OS is run from there. This means a simple swap of card can create a completely different machine. If you have one though, you’ll already know this and if you don’t you may not even need this sort of flexibility but I find it incredibly useful. Over the new couple of posts I will detail the project from start to finish. This will document the case build, caddy area for HDD and external USB hub build and then the actual software install, configuration and tweaking as well as the details for the android powered remote control.