Re: [mh] running mh on router with ddwrt, openwrt, tomato, etc?

[carl m. <cmc...@co...>]

Hi Jim.

I run MH on an NSLU2 running Debian Lenny.
I tried OpenWRT/Kamakazie, had some problems and decided to look around. 
Debian has a fully developed suite of SW for the ARM in the NSLU2. 
Performance is OK, but I don't do anthing with Audio - just Insteon 
control for lighting and the web interface for GUI control. I use a USB 
PLM unit - works fine but does need some attention occasionally when (we 
think) the PLM takes a power hit  but the NSLU stays up (on UPS). 
causing /dev/ttyUSBx to move around. Marc Merlin posted some good USB 
udev tricks a while back.
Search this forum for some of my adventures.
I have run this from a USB thumb drive - works as expected but I was not 
comfortable with the flash wear issues. SSDs are an obvious option, but 
pricey and not really much, if any, power saving over 2.5" hdds'.
MH typically consumes 3-5% of CPU, seems to peak around 25-30% when it 
gets busy doing tasks.
NSLU2 has only 32Meg of RAM, and it is all used all the time (with some 
swap going on as well)
One thing I have noticed - CPAN is verrrrrryyyyyyyy sllllloooooowwwww on 
this - I use prepackaged Perl packages and apt-get whenever I can.

I run DD-WRT on all my routers, including an ASUS RT-N16. I have DD-WRT 
Mega and Optware "Done the Right Way" on an USB drive.
The RT-16N has a lot of RAM(128Meg) and plenty of performance to spare.
NFS runs well on Debian and on Optware, making managing the headless 
widgets much easier.
I have not tried Perl on the DD-WRT systems yet, I would suspect a lot 
of RAM swapping on a typical router which might affect the routing 
thru-put. I am also not sure if additional user accounts can be created 
either, and prefer to not run MH as root.
But I'll be happy to watch you and may give it a try.
I figure my NSLU2 plus it's HDD is about 20-25W, so not a whole lot of 
power saving to be had by combining but it would be an interesting exercise.

On 4/13/2011 12:49 PM, JimMH wrote:
> I am thinking of trying to put mh on a lower power machine since most of the
> tasks I want to do are not computationally intensive.  Seems like this
> should be possible since perl is available on that platform.  But the only
> posts I found about this are from someone who gave up:
>
> http://old.nabble.com/MH-on-NSLU2---OpenWRT-Kamakazie-8.09-td27380335.html
>
> This would obviously be headless.  Thinking I can add a serial port with a
> USB to serial converter (for CM11 and /or open2300).  Might even be able to
> add USB sound card.  I would probably need a USB hard drive or some other
> form of storage.
>
> I am looking to put this on a ASUS WL-500GPV2.
>
> I have seen several pages other places on running Asterisk on a router.
>
> Not sure about the feasability of running something like Asterisk AND mh on
> same router.
>
>