5 ms·

The biggest issue I've found while trying to do this is a very high rate of battery failure while plugged in 24/7 under load. 4/5 phones I've done this with hav

The biggest issue I've found while trying to do this is a very high rate of battery failure while plugged in 24/7 under load. 4/5 phones I've done this with have become spicy pillows in the 1-2 year timeframe. They were all Samsung or LG devices, so not complete bottom of the barrel garbage batteries either. IME if you need a cheap server, a used enterprise micro pc has a much lower chance of potentially burning your house down, can be found on ebay for literally $30, and can be easily stuffed full of ssds.

saurik 2y ago
FWIW, Samsung batteries explode even if you don't use them as servers, and in fact it was an issue with their batteries being trash (I think I remember it being that they had been contaminated with metal filings, but I might be entirely misremembering the verdict). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfM0GqsIB6c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfM0GqsIB6c
- pino82 2y ago
  I wanted to learn some details about that story (I heard about it back then, but never digged deeper). Your link seems to lead to some kind of shady video clip portal. Was that intended? If so, is there a textual version as well? Video clips seem to be a poor medium for most kind of actual information transfer.
metadat 2y ago
Did you try direct wiring to bypass the battery? E.g. https://www.instructables.com/Power-an-Android-Phone-Without-Battery/ https://www.instructables.com/Power-an-Android-Phone-Without...
- livueta 2y ago
  Nope, and that definitely would have helped, but I bet 99% of people looking to use an old phone as a server aren't going to do all that either.
- asimops 2y ago
  With most new phones not being designed to have swappable batteries like the S4 anymore, could this be modified by replacing the cells with a capacitor and then powering the phone from USB?
  - tonyarkles 2y ago
    Would be worth an experiment potentially but it’ll depend on where the protection circuitry lives. A modern BMS chip is relatively complicated and will freak out if the attached “battery” is doing this that wouldn’t be safe for a LiPo cell (eg a capacitor will happily drain to 0V but a LiPo drained to 0V has probably been destroyed)
znpy 2y ago
> 4/5 phones I've done this with have become spicy pillows in the 1-2 year timeframe. In their defense, that kind of usage is not what they've been designed for and tested against.
rtpg 2y ago
I just am thinking about how many phones you can find all over the place. And that tiny footprint... just so tempting.
- playa1 2y ago
  I want to respond with a Beowulf cluster joke. Then I remembered this isn’t slashdot and it isn’t 2001. Now I’m reminded of how old I’ve gotten.
  - oso2k 2y ago
    Just remember, BSD is dead now.
  - nocoiner 2y ago
    Slashdot is where I found out about 9/11. I got up one morning and the NY Times (which I usually read first) wasn’t loading. Neither was CNN. After one or two more news sites, I shrugged and went to Slashdot, and that was where I saw the news.
  - tirant 2y ago
    Thanks for the memory lane trip, mate. Yep, we’re old.
- sharpshadow 2y ago
  I saw a throw away container for old phones in a zoo and couldn’t resist to pull out some old bastards.
thom 2y ago
Sounds like even more phones are needed, with a control plane that can let them sleep regularly!
crazygringo 2y ago
I plugged in an old iPhone SE into the Lightning port on a nice speaker and locked the screen to Spotify -- with auto-brightness it worked fantastically. Until it also turned into a spicy pillow after about a year and a half. Really wish there were some kind of system preference to run off wired power only and just not charge/discharge the battery at all.
- walterbell 2y ago
  Some older iPhones can be powered by a $30 "battery simulator" used by repair shops, https://youtube.com/watch?v=jTtGwKS7S0c https://youtube.com/watch?v=jTtGwKS7S0c & DT880 (for specific older iPhone models, there may be other products for newer phones): https://witrigs.com/products/dt880-mobile-phone-current-maintenance-tester https://witrigs.com/products/dt880-mobile-phone-current-main...
- nopelynopington 2y ago
  I've tried but I don't get the spicy pillow reference. Did it catch fire? Or the screen die?
  - Two9A 2y ago
    I believe it's a reference to the look of a failed LiPo battery: it puffs up and looks like a pillow, but if you puncture it fire spews forth. Reddit first came up with the phrase "spicy pillow" to describe that combination.
rexreed 2y ago
Which used enterprise micro PC on Ebay for $30 would you recommend? Trying to sort thru the trash and other options.
- squarefoot 2y ago
  OP probably refers to Lenovo ThinkCentre mini PCs; they're well made, quite expandable and cheap, but if you can't find any, check out used Chromeboxes. They can be unlocked and reflashed with Coreboot in a single step, which makes them more secure aside allowing the native install of your OS of choice. Hardware quality is usually very good. More info here: https://docs.mrchromebox.tech/ https://docs.mrchromebox.tech/ Chromeboxes aside, I've installed various Linux distros on different MiniPCs and the outcome has always been great; the only caveat is to check if your particular model does like to be used without a monitor. In some cases they didn't and refused to boot, but I solved by connecting on the HDMI port one of those cheap "virtual monitor", "dummy monitor", etc. dongles sold to perform this exact function.
- livueta 2y ago
  Sibling comment has good suggestions. I personally like Dell Optiplex models, e.g. 9020. Looks like right now the best you can do is about 40-45 shipped for a complete one, but I've snagged about six in the last year or two for 20-35. They come and go. Beware of sellers posting the same thing for 100+; they're worth max 50.
- NortySpock 2y ago
  https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/hware/hardware.shtml https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/hware/hardware.shtml From the above site I landed on the Dell WYZE 7020 / Zx0Q... Some models of which have 4 cores (also accidentally bought a dual core version), supports 16GB DDR3, are passively cooled without a fan, and cost me about $50 on eBay (add $20 for a 16GB RAM kit to bring the total to $70) It's about as fast as a Raspberry Pi 4, and has been great for letting me spin up a docker container to play around with a database or a message broker or what have you. I limited my search to only fanless designs though; if you are fine with fans then I'm sure there are more performant options out there.
nopelynopington 2y ago
What does spicy pillow mean
- sharpshadow 2y ago
  The battery in the phone blows up from flat to pillow shaped. It’s chemically spicy inside.

saurik 2y ago

FWIW, Samsung batteries explode even if you don't use them as servers, and in fact it was an issue with their batteries being trash (I think I remember it being that they had been contaminated with metal filings, but I might be entirely misremembering the verdict). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfM0GqsIB6c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfM0GqsIB6c

pino82 2y ago
I wanted to learn some details about that story (I heard about it back then, but never digged deeper). Your link seems to lead to some kind of shady video clip portal. Was that intended? If so, is there a textual version as well? Video clips seem to be a poor medium for most kind of actual information transfer.

metadat 2y ago

Did you try direct wiring to bypass the battery? E.g. https://www.instructables.com/Power-an-Android-Phone-Without-Battery/ https://www.instructables.com/Power-an-Android-Phone-Without...

livueta 2y ago
Nope, and that definitely would have helped, but I bet 99% of people looking to use an old phone as a server aren't going to do all that either.
asimops 2y ago
With most new phones not being designed to have swappable batteries like the S4 anymore, could this be modified by replacing the cells with a capacitor and then powering the phone from USB?
- tonyarkles 2y ago
  Would be worth an experiment potentially but it’ll depend on where the protection circuitry lives. A modern BMS chip is relatively complicated and will freak out if the attached “battery” is doing this that wouldn’t be safe for a LiPo cell (eg a capacitor will happily drain to 0V but a LiPo drained to 0V has probably been destroyed)

znpy 2y ago

> 4/5 phones I've done this with have become spicy pillows in the 1-2 year timeframe. In their defense, that kind of usage is not what they've been designed for and tested against.

rtpg 2y ago

I just am thinking about how many phones you can find all over the place. And that tiny footprint... just so tempting.

playa1 2y ago
I want to respond with a Beowulf cluster joke. Then I remembered this isn’t slashdot and it isn’t 2001. Now I’m reminded of how old I’ve gotten.
- oso2k 2y ago
  Just remember, BSD is dead now.
- nocoiner 2y ago
  Slashdot is where I found out about 9/11. I got up one morning and the NY Times (which I usually read first) wasn’t loading. Neither was CNN. After one or two more news sites, I shrugged and went to Slashdot, and that was where I saw the news.
- tirant 2y ago
  Thanks for the memory lane trip, mate. Yep, we’re old.
sharpshadow 2y ago
I saw a throw away container for old phones in a zoo and couldn’t resist to pull out some old bastards.

thom 2y ago

Sounds like even more phones are needed, with a control plane that can let them sleep regularly!

crazygringo 2y ago

I plugged in an old iPhone SE into the Lightning port on a nice speaker and locked the screen to Spotify -- with auto-brightness it worked fantastically. Until it also turned into a spicy pillow after about a year and a half. Really wish there were some kind of system preference to run off wired power only and just not charge/discharge the battery at all.

walterbell 2y ago
Some older iPhones can be powered by a $30 "battery simulator" used by repair shops, https://youtube.com/watch?v=jTtGwKS7S0c https://youtube.com/watch?v=jTtGwKS7S0c & DT880 (for specific older iPhone models, there may be other products for newer phones): https://witrigs.com/products/dt880-mobile-phone-current-maintenance-tester https://witrigs.com/products/dt880-mobile-phone-current-main...
nopelynopington 2y ago
I've tried but I don't get the spicy pillow reference. Did it catch fire? Or the screen die?
- Two9A 2y ago
  I believe it's a reference to the look of a failed LiPo battery: it puffs up and looks like a pillow, but if you puncture it fire spews forth. Reddit first came up with the phrase "spicy pillow" to describe that combination.

rexreed 2y ago

Which used enterprise micro PC on Ebay for $30 would you recommend? Trying to sort thru the trash and other options.

squarefoot 2y ago
OP probably refers to Lenovo ThinkCentre mini PCs; they're well made, quite expandable and cheap, but if you can't find any, check out used Chromeboxes. They can be unlocked and reflashed with Coreboot in a single step, which makes them more secure aside allowing the native install of your OS of choice. Hardware quality is usually very good. More info here: https://docs.mrchromebox.tech/ https://docs.mrchromebox.tech/ Chromeboxes aside, I've installed various Linux distros on different MiniPCs and the outcome has always been great; the only caveat is to check if your particular model does like to be used without a monitor. In some cases they didn't and refused to boot, but I solved by connecting on the HDMI port one of those cheap "virtual monitor", "dummy monitor", etc. dongles sold to perform this exact function.
livueta 2y ago
Sibling comment has good suggestions. I personally like Dell Optiplex models, e.g. 9020. Looks like right now the best you can do is about 40-45 shipped for a complete one, but I've snagged about six in the last year or two for 20-35. They come and go. Beware of sellers posting the same thing for 100+; they're worth max 50.
NortySpock 2y ago
https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/hware/hardware.shtml https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/hware/hardware.shtml From the above site I landed on the Dell WYZE 7020 / Zx0Q... Some models of which have 4 cores (also accidentally bought a dual core version), supports 16GB DDR3, are passively cooled without a fan, and cost me about $50 on eBay (add $20 for a 16GB RAM kit to bring the total to $70) It's about as fast as a Raspberry Pi 4, and has been great for letting me spin up a docker container to play around with a database or a message broker or what have you. I limited my search to only fanless designs though; if you are fine with fans then I'm sure there are more performant options out there.

nopelynopington 2y ago

What does spicy pillow mean

sharpshadow 2y ago
The battery in the phone blows up from flat to pillow shaped. It’s chemically spicy inside.