Plug Computers: Green, Small, Cheap and Maybe the Future
What is it exactly that makes a good PC? Is it an ever shrinking size? Is it affordability? Is it ease of use? Historically it has been a mix of all the above and those three may only become more important indicators with this week's announcement of Silicon Valley based Marvell Technical Group's SheevaPlug computer and their Plug Computing Initiative.
With a plug-in design that resembles powerline network adapters, which utilize existing electrical wiring to extend a home network, Plug Computers are ultra small Linux based computers that plug into wall sockets and can run network-based services that normally require a dedicated personal computer. The SheevaPlug connects to a router via its Ethernet port, and to external storage sources or networked devices via USB 2.0 or mini USB, sharing those out over your network. It features a 1.2GHz Marvell Sheeva CPU with 512MB of flash memory and 512MB of DDR2 memory. Marvell is hoping that the SheevaPlug will be a natural fit in households and small businesses comfortable with and competent at sharing digital media across networks and at the same time looking to go green. The SheevaPlug address the green sentiment of the latter by using only a tenth of the power a typical, always on computer used as an inexpensive media server does. It also comes at the nice price of $99 each, with eventual price drops predicted. Of course this being an open source based product it is a little dubious how successful it will be in the mainstream market as is. That's why the kit, which includes a SheevaPlug, USB cable, Ethernet cable, CD containing software and documentation, is in fact a developer's kit. I'm sure that there are lots of people capable of writing fantastic code for this and I hope they do. If it was made easy for me and the price was kept down, I'd buy a few from a middleman. If not I might just have to learn to write a little code myself and take a shot at it.
If you want to learn more about the SheevaPlug and plug computing check out the Marvell site.
--Tom Milnes
Greg Treadway on February 26, 2009 at 10:33 AM
It took me a little while to figure out how this would be useful and then I thought of a few. I could host databases from this device or share software. How about just storing files or movies. Seems like a good idea. Might be good for some backup needs also. I like it too, but it needs to be easy easy easy to use.
Erik R. on February 26, 2009 at 10:36 AM
Very cool! The beauty of open platforms like that is that the only limit for usefulness is the users' creativity.
Waye Mason on February 26, 2009 at 10:41 AM
It is good to see (hopefully) less expensive non-apple alternatives to Apple Airport Extreme and Apple Time Capsule, two products that do all of this but also add in wireless networking.
butch howard on February 26, 2009 at 10:58 AM
ok. cool. lot's things can be done from home automation to home security to other cool stuff. But why isn't it smaller and cheaper by now?
From Sept2000:
http://www.linuxdevices.com/articles/AT7186701822.html
Doug Curry on February 26, 2009 at 11:08 AM
At first glance I thought this was a hoax, but as I read more it seems this is a great little device! I've been looking for something small that doesn't consume much power to act as a digital media server rather than leaving my PC on all the time just to watch a movie or listen to some music. Add a 1TB external USB hard drive and voila! Obviously this requires some additional development before it's ready for prime-time, but I love the idea.
Dewang Mistry on February 26, 2009 at 11:12 AM
This looks like a great little device you can use as a NAS (Network-attached storage), just plug-in your USB drive and it's available on the network, or better yet it's available as an FTP drive.
Keith on February 26, 2009 at 12:18 PM
Is there any reason why this couldn't be used as a full-fledged desktop? Add a USB hub, USB monitor (does that exist yet?) and keyboard/mouse and hard disk. OK, so the hard disk would be on the slow side, but it should be functional.
ajacksonian on February 27, 2009 at 04:43 AM
Add this to a nice, tiny, Pico-ITX system for hosting media files, use ethernet over power lines and plug this in next to your TV and stream your media files throughout your home. Plug in anywhere and you get full connectivity for any device you have. Save once, use everywhere in your home. Throw in one of those digital picture frames that does video and you now have the perfect system for media just about anywhere in your house and with a usb hub you can up that to full internet connectivity... all that on top of microcontrollers for your home... soon you will have a cloud of computing available to you within your home and begin to miss it elsewhere.
Dr. Kenneth Noisewater on February 27, 2009 at 05:19 AM
I'd just like to take a second to marvel at this. Back in 1994-1995, I was working with IBM and Sun servers, and to have a server with 512MB RAM and 133mhz CPU was a highly-expensive luxury. I'm thinking specifically of SuperSPARC 20s or RS/6000 model 390/590/990.
Those are the type of 'big iron' servers that the interweb got its start on, and this little wall wart puts them to shame.
mishu on February 27, 2009 at 07:37 AM
They already have these for printers but I guess this would be more flexible for other devices.
Timothy on February 27, 2009 at 06:48 PM
X10 on steroids...
TJ Leeland on August 11, 2009 at 02:53 PM
I'm having the opposite reaction to this than many others. At first I thought, "how cool!" But the more I think about this the more I wonder what this can do that can't be better done by other existing stuff.
Unless it has a lot of storage built-in, it seems that a network storage hard drive is better suited for storing data, whether it be files, movies, or music. It's just smaller, which isn't automatically better. What can you fit on this, half a movie? 30 songs? If you add a USB drive then you're just reinventing the wheel.
If you attach it to your TV, what does that do? Your TV needs to be pretty sophisticated to do anything with it already. If your TV has ethernet or USB it should already be able to do anything this puppy can add. Right?
The real use is in creating new things to work with it, but why not just build the capability into the device instead?
You can't read email on it since it doesn't have a screen.
Maybe I'm just not a visionary, but I just don't see a real use that can't be just as easily done without the plug computer. At best, it might be a form factor for networking other products, but as a stand-alone product?
Aric A. on August 11, 2009 at 04:14 PM
@TJ: I don't think anyone sees it as a standalone product, but rather as a modular option that takes very little space. Via USB or Ethernet, you could attach a plug computer or a full-fledged HTPC to your HDTV, but the former takes up much less space and power and is easier to work with because it's right where your HDTV already plugs in. A practical example would be to use a plug computer to serve as a web TV portal--you don't need a NAS to run a simple Eliza server that can stream Hulu, CBS.com, YouTube, etc.
Some plug computers have SD slots, and seeing as we're already up to 32GB SD cards, it's perfectly reasonable to think you'll eventually be able to run it as both a headless server and a full-on NAS, all from something the size of an AC adapter. Small and simple, sure, but some people just need small and simple. As cheap as these are, it's almost worth picking one up just to use as a GNUMP3d or Vibe Streamer jukebox:
http://maketecheasier.com/4-easy-ways-to-stream-your-music-online/2009/04/13
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