General computer and tech thread

[somitomi]

I've been thinking of repurposing an old laptop with a less than reliable screen into some form of home server-like thing. Basically, I'd like to store files and backups on it and run some .NET-based Discord bots I wrote. Naturally I'd like to access the files remotely and it'd be nice if I could do that from outside the house as well, but that second part is not essential. I'd also like it to automatically turn on and off so it's not running at night when I'm asleep. What's the best way to set this up?

[ratammer]

Couple of days ago my computer stopped working. Seems to be a hard drive issue. I've already ordered a new computer (I've always had issues with this one) but I don't yet know how much data it will be possible to recover from the hard drive of this one, so I've been desperately checking what backups I have where.

All in all, if it can't be recovered, the most important things I've lost are various photos from holidays and other events.

[Jplus]

I've been thinking of repurposing an old laptop with a less than reliable screen into some form of home server-like thing. Basically, I'd like to store files and backups on it and run some .NET-based Discord bots I wrote. Naturally I'd like to access the files remotely and it'd be nice if I could do that from outside the house as well, but that second part is not essential. I'd also like it to automatically turn on and off so it's not running at night when I'm asleep. What's the best way to set this up?

I probably missed this question at the time. Did you figure out a solution?

I don't have much experience with this myself and I would not be able to tell you what's the "best" approach, but I do know that you can install off-the-shelf Linux on pretty much any old computer and that there is off-the-shelf, free of charge, open source, Linux-compatible software for all the things you mentioned (most .NET-based programming languages work fine under Mono). As for being able to reach the server from outside your house, that is a matter of (1) paying for dynamic DNS (included with many domain name registration services), (2) configuring your home router correctly and (3) configuring the server correctly.

Couple of days ago my computer stopped working. Seems to be a hard drive issue. I've already ordered a new computer (I've always had issues with this one) but I don't yet know how much data it will be possible to recover from the hard drive of this one, so I've been desperately checking what backups I have where.

All in all, if it can't be recovered, the most important things I've lost are various photos from holidays and other events.

Good luck recovering your data! Hugs (if you want) if anything important is lost.

[ratammer]

Thanks! My new computer just arrived and I'm setting everything up - and making sure to back up everything I can this time!

[somitomi]

I probably missed this question at the time. Did you figure out a solution?

Sort of I guess, I ended up running the computer non-stop and sharing one of the drives using the default Windows tools that exist for that purpose. It does the job