The Rant of a Thinker

I have 23 Dell Desktops, and about 8 laptops.  I needed a solution to wipe and reload the systems as quick as possible.  I did some testing and the best free cloning software I found was PING.  PING is modeled after Norton Ghost and will allow you to put the images onto a network file server or a local partition.

Once I had PING down, I moved onto the network system . Since PING is capable of booting the computers through PXE, I wouldn’t need to burn any CDs or DVDs.  It even allows you to script the image creation or restoration.  Since the image creation was a one shot deal for me I just did it manually.

So in the end,  I ended up having a linux server with TFTP and DHCP for the PXE and NFS for image storage.  It took the Dell D800 image 4 minutes to restore from boot to shutdown.  A heck of a lot better then the 1.5 hours it took me to put on XP and all the drivers.

I haven’t posted recently, but I now have a reason so read through and let me know what you think.
If you didn’t know, I  have recently started working with a liquidator in my work life.  They usually call me in to backup the data of the company they are liquidating.  This time however they asked that I take care of wiping the hard drives of the desktops and laptops.

Therefore, I recently came into posession of around 20 23 Dell desktops.  Two different models, pretty similar configs.  So now that I have these sitting around awaiting their sale on eBay I am stuck with the question of what to do with them.

I thought about setting up a beowolf cluster.  However, I have nothing to run on it so what fun would it be?  So I am now open for suggestions.

Also, I have some other IT equiptment so if you are looking to buy some stuff check what I have for sale on ebay