Lean Mean Grilling PC Mod

An anonymous reader writes that "This bloke has turned a George Foreman Grill into a webserver using what looks like a mini-itx pc. This really does bring a new meaning to the Lean Mean FAT grilling machine!" This is actually a pretty clean looking design. Very well done.

Let's get this one out of the way

[Stick_Fig]

Obligatory joke about frying one's motherboard.

Re:Let's get this one out of the way

[websaber]

Obligatory joke: It must not be to fast of a server becuase the site is slashdotted.

Re:Let's get this one out of the way

[andy landy]

Obligatory pedantic response...

It's not the server that's slow, it's the poor guy's ADSL line!

The guy is a mate of mine, and I understand from him that the iGrill itself handled things fine, but your average domestic 512kbps ADSL line *really* doesn't like the old slashdot effect!

Re:Let's get this one out of the way

[screwdriver]

This really does bring a new meaning to the Lean Mean FAT grilling machine!"

If he's running Windows on his webserver, then frying his motherboard is the least of his worries!

Re:Let's get this one out of the way

[Gandalf_007]

Actually... in one of the detail pages he noted that the motherboard did die back in November, and he had it replaced.

So I guess you could say his mobo did fry... just not because of /. (that would be his DSL connection!).

Re:Let's get this one out of the way

[networkBoy]

Funny thing is the MB (server) is fine, but the router is not!
-nB

Can't grill anymore

[IO ERROR]

But the grilling functionality is lost!

Very nice how he crammed all that hardware inside there, though.

Oops, now it's /.ed. I bet you can grill on it now!

Re:Can't grill anymore

[Nate Fox]

But the grilling functionality is lost!

Not if he OC'd an AMD

Re:Can't grill anymore

[Psychotext]

..actually, I think these days the joke has moved on to the new Pentium 4. But Cyrix radiator jokes are timeless too. :)

Re:Can't grill anymore

[superpulpsicle]

If they want to cook even faster, a heatpipe straight from the ATI or Nvidia would be nice. I'd like to use an Omaha steak as a heatsink.

Re:Can't grill anymore

[Lussarn]

I bet it's pretty hot right now...

Re:Can't grill anymore

[ziploclogic]

Wonder what we could cook if we overclockerd this puppy. I'm think the hot end of a peltier junction.

Re:Can't grill anymore

[Rolan]

Actually, looks like it's a bandwith problem not a server problem. I hit the site a couple minutes ago, but had the images already cached.

Uptime was:
January 11th 2005 17:49:21
Up 6 day(s), 8 hour(s) 33 min(s)

Re:Can't grill anymore

[nadadogg]

Dammit, where's the helpful person with one of those mirrordot or nyud links when you really need one?

Re:Can't grill anymore

[IO ERROR]

Actually he cheated. Only the HTML is being served off the grill. The images are being served from a box in Southampton University [southampton.ac.uk].

Seems the lean mean grilling machine

[CliffH]

... just overheated.

How many punches before it starts selling cookware

[Datagod]

How many punches can it take before it decides to stop being a webserver, and starts selling hokie cookware to overweight meat addicts?

Re:How many punches before it starts selling cookw

[Ryan Huddleston]

"meat addicts"?

What kind of vegetarian hippie bullshit is this?
If you don't eat meat, you are thumbing your nose at the millenia of evolution man has gone through to fight his way to the top of the food chain.

We didn't come this far to eat salads.

Re:How many punches before it starts selling cookw

[Anonymous Coward]

our millenia of evolution has brought us to the point of having no care whatsoever for other living creatures (look up factory farming sometime)? Wow.

Re:How many punches before it starts selling cookw

[rfmann]

speak for yourself, douchebag.

Re:How many punches before it starts selling cookw

[Teddy Beartuzzi]

No matter where you stand on the issue, this animation is incredibly well done:

What is the Meatrix [themeatrix.com]

New meaning to "frying the web server"

[flitelog]

But I hear web pages server this way contain less fat, but the grill marks sometimes obscure the text.

Re:New meaning to "frying the web server"

[dr_dank]

Best of all, the non-stick cooking surface drains the goatse away for healthier web surfing.

3 comments and down

[Theaetetus]

Are you sure he turned it into a webserver? And not like... nothing?

better the other way around

[AssFace]

I thought it was going to say that he somehow mated his graphics/CPU chips to the grilling plate of a Foreman and used the heat to grill things.
Far cooler IMO.

Re:better the other way around

[Quasar1999]

I thought it was going to say that he somehow mated his graphics/CPU chips to the grilling plate of a Foreman and used the heat to grill things.
Far cooler IMO.

Don't you mean Far Warmer ???

Re:better the other way around

[arivanov]

Will not work with a Via C3 600 Mhz Eden. Standard M motherboard by the look of it. I use them for servers and test kit (have 20-30 around the office, the house and various installations for friends).

Whatever you do the CPU will stay at under 32C in a 1U server, 29C in a normal case. The moment it gets warmer then 40C it starts throttling down (without your intervention, you cannot do anything about it). Practically impossible to fry as long as it has at leas something resembling heatsink on top.

While on

Just curious....

[say__10]

Is the site hosted on the grill???

Re:Just curious....

[albino eatpod]

" And yes, this webserver is hosted on the grill."

Some People Have a Lot of Time on Their Hands

[Class Act Dynamo]

...Said the Slashdot member who posted this Ask Slashdot story [slashdot.org] at one time. Seriously, quite an interesting project he has there.

Got egg?

[Tackhead]

From the website:

> Technically it's lost the grilling-functionality, but with a bit of tin foil on top of the heatsink and a fork-bomb, I reckon I could probably still fry an egg with it.
>
> And yes, this webserver is hosted on the grill.
>
> January 11th 2005 17:28:29
> Up 6 day(s), 8 hour(s) 14 min(s)

Two points come to mind:

1: Optimistic, isn't he?
2: At least he'll get his chance to fry that egg.

Re:Got egg?

[Anonymous Coward]

A third point comes to mind:
Why wasn't the link coralized by the submitter or the editor?

http://www.igrill.co.uk.nyud.net:8090/

I'm really tired from typing those extra characters . . .

Re:Got egg?

[RobertB-DC]

A third point comes to mind:
Why wasn't the link coralized by the submitter or the editor?
http://www.igrill.co.uk.nyud.net:8090/

Well, it's too late, now. From the above link:

Error: 503 Service Unavailable
www.igrill.co.uk: Resource temporarily unavailable

I viewed all the pages already (love that Slashdot Subscription), and it's pretty cool. Not a lot of huge pix, but when I saw that he was actually using it for hosting, I knew it would soon be toasting instead. I've scrounged them from my cache, but

Clearly it's hosted on the grill as well.

[Herbster]

Clearly it's hosted on the grill. Good thing that's built to take some serious heat - /.'ed with 0 comments - smokin'!

What could you fry with a Slashdotting

[VAXman]

Technically it's lost the grilling-functionality, but with a bit of tin foil on top of the heatsink and a fork-bomb, I reckon I could probably still fry an egg with it.

An egg? With how busy it is now he could probably fry a whole cow.

Well, we must have...

[KennyP]

... knocked the FAT outta his server!

Kenny P.
Visualize Whirled P.'s

Re:Well, we must have...

[madsen]

No. We knocked the server off the FAT (Fryer Allocation Table)

Slashdotted

[nmg196]

Now that slashdot has linked to the site (which is hosted on the George Foreman grill PC itself) I think the even the grilling functionality of the case will be restored. Just slap a burger on the heatsink and wait a few seconds...

Well done

[dfj225]

Since it seems that the grill is hosting the website linked from the article (or at least thats what he claims), it looks like this guys steak is going to be well done by the time the /.ing is over.

Passive Meat Coolng systems?

[tinrobot]

Since I can't see the page, I'm wondering if he just throws a steak over the thing to get rid of the heat.

Re:Passive Meat Coolng systems?

[UWC]

I call it... a meatsink!

Re:Passive Meat Coolng systems?

[chiph]

Strangly enough, Presto sold a small appliance in the 1970's called the "meat toaster".

Chip H.

Re:Passive Meat Coolng systems?

[bladesjester]

There are still such things. look at the Hot Diggity Dogger Toaster [x-tremegeek.com]

I'm sure that SGI

[multiplexo]

is going to rip this idea off for the design of their next line of workstations.

What's that I smell?

[paul99se]

Ah yes, it's the delicious aroma of a well-done web server.

See the Loveli Marinades ...

[strelitsa]

If you could fit a 6th Century Scandinavian warrior inside that thing, would that make it a Beowulf server?

is this another MWSF 'leak' ?

[compactable]

I mean, for crying out loud, how desperate are Apple-lovers to find out what Jobs is peddling this January? Mocking up a grill to look like a computer - this takes the "internet appliance" concept too literally. This is the second "headless iMac" photo leak I've seen, and I think it's even less believable than the first one [tecknohost.com]. I mean, where are the RCA jacks? WHERE??!!?

Come on people, the MWSF keynote is on right now, you'll find out what little Stevie has planned for your consumtion soon enough, there's no

Sorry in advance.

[Psychotext]

...and the webserver is toast!

rofl

[testednegative]

google cache http://www.google.ca/search?q=cache:HKBuO90uhxwJ:w ww.igrill.co.uk/+&hl=en i wonder what errors hes getting right now... Forman SysAdmin wakes up. Makes coffee. Finds his webserver is frying itself. If i was him id try doing some bacon on it. :D~

I never could figure out ...

[human bean]

whether to install a Foreman-huckstered product on a kitchen countertop or a tailpipe. Now I have to add network ports...

Super-awesome giant heat-sink

[RaguMS]

He can cook all his food with the intense heat of his Intel CPU!

har har har

Lets just get this out in the open...

[CypherXero]

...That if an open space is large enough for a mini-atx or btx case, somebody is going to mod it to hold one. So this isn't anything new, it's just someone wanting attention because they can cram some hardware in a space.

slashdotted in a ns

[l3v1]

I don't know, please tell me, is there any reasonable justification for posting direct links to a joe sixpack's web server (be it a frying pan, a flying saucer, a lawn mower or else) ?

Slashdot-ing my a$$, let's call this Slashdot/DoS.

I lost weight the iGrill way!

[Anonymous Coward]

Using the iGrill, I went from FAT32 to FAT16. My clusters have never been smaller!

Obligatory Futurama Quote

[the_mushroom_king]

"... with it's patented designed, the fat drains directly into my mouth.", George Foremans Head -- TMK

Next ...

[un1xl0ser]

We know that you can put ITX mobos and embedded hardware a fly, to a nintendo or anything else you have laying around the house.

What is interesting about this, maybe I missed the significance.

Re:Next ...

[shades6666]

My guess is that all those attentive geeks out there recognized this as an old ThinkGeek hoax (April Fools) and went to check before running their mouths off about the /. editors being clueless again.

BTW: I did read the article and yes, I do realise that he was inspired by that hoax.

WORKING mirror

[RobertTaylor]

Worrking google mirror with pics! [google.co.uk]

Brought to you by the letters R O and B.

No it isn't

[aug24]

Google only caches the text, the images are still requested from the original server, which in this case is the now burning George Foreman Grill.

J.

Re:No it isn't

[RobertTaylor]

Ah fair point... when i used it the pictures were still there being served!

Cheers,
rob.

I once used a 386 server as a grill

[91degrees]

Actually it was a barbecue. Found the server in a skip. Threw out the motherboard. Took the (full height!) hard disk drive out. Filled with charcoal and lit up.

Not a lot else I could do with it. I supose an AT case could still have been useful in 1999, but a 386 was a little outdated even for a desktop machine.

Google's mirror cache

[McFly69]

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:HKBuO90uhxwJ: www.igrill.co.uk/+&hl=en

Slashdotted so here is the Google Cache

[krgallagher]

Sorry but it is only the frnt page. Has a nice picture though.

Google Cache [64.233.167.104]

I Don't know about the mod

[MrRuslan]

but I see the server is already medium rear...

Austin Powers-like Joke

[Man in Spandex]

The Grilling PC Mod probably got the admin "fired"

Well Done

[ca1v1n]

I'm sure everything is coming out well done while he's getting slashdotted. Maybe that was the point.

Gatorade Bottle

[NitsujTPU]

I am so going to build a computer in a Gatorade bottle (didn't we do one in an office water bottle not too long ago?), put it on a site with AdSense, post it to /., and fund my education with the hits.

Re:Gatorade Bottle

[Manchot]

Technically, you should be able to submerge a motherboard inside an office water bottle if you are extremely careful. First, you'd need to make sure that the motherboard and the bottle are extremely clean (as in no dust, oils, or salts anywhere). Then, you'd fill it with distilled water, and submerge the motherboard. Since the water's distilled, and you've gotten rid of most of the ions in it (except for those pesky H+'s and OH-'s which will stick around in equilibrium, if I remember my chemistry correctly)

Dielectric constants?

[ClayJar]

The dielectric constant for air at 1 atm is listed as 1.00059. (A vacuum has a dielectric constant of 1.) Water has a dielectric constant listed around 80.4, and I have a bad feeling that may have significant adverse effects on modern computer components.

I know that when you submerge electronics, you generally use nonconductive fluids with low dielectric constants, but I'm not sure how badly the traces would couple, etc, given water's high dielectric constant. Either way, I'd suggest safety glasses.

What's that sizzling sound?

[Epi-man]

His webserver as it gets slashdotted.

and another webserver bites the dust, thanks /.

[charliekowalchuk]

You know, I hear slashdotters have been compared to information hungry virus, they swarm on poor defensless windows 98 webservers and flame em. We consume and then move on to another...

Way to go, MacGyver!

[SmokeHalo]

Now build a server rack for that thing out of a piece of chewing gum, a rubber band, and a paper clip.

Mirror...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.igrill.co.uk.nyud.net:8090/index.php [nyud.net]

Try that for a mirror ;o)

Priceless

[Anonymous Coward]

600Mhz epia mini-itx: $150
Using Gentoo GNU/Linux: $0
Using /. to restore the grill function: Priceless

- wacco [jlpro.nl]

Obligatory puns

[SuperBigGulp]

The job was very *well done*, and servers like these are very *rare*. You seldom see people use a grill to send content over this *medium*. If this is linked to a database, I suppose he'd store the information in *char* fields.

wow, doesn't anyone read comments?

[lowrydr310]

There must be at least fifty nearly-identical comments all along the lines of "Wow, that thing must be hot enough to cook something after being slashdotted!"

This makes me wonder, could a system really heat up after a significant increase in traffic? In my experience, things crash or hang up before they heat up. With a functional heatsink, it doesn't seem like there would be any problems with heat. I recall seeing a video of what happens to various processors when the heatsink is removed. Most of the pro

The image web server is still up

[rrosales]

http://img.igrill.co.uk/~jdsg102/image_mirror/

More bad jokes...

[crazdgamer]

"...This really does bring a new meaning to the Lean Mean FAT grilling machine!" As opposed to a Lean Mean NTFS grilling machine...

oblig. simpsons quote

[Darth_brooks]

Moe: "It can flash fry a buffalo in 30 seconds"

Homer: "30 seconds? awwww, but I want it now!"

Oh yeah. Slashdotted. Time to upgrade.

[Chas]

Recommedation: Start looking at one of those 57,000 BTU Weber units.

Should be big enough to drop in a Quad Opteron unit.

Electric Grill Linux

[jab]

Yes, but is it running Electric Grill Linux [jab.org]?

Uh, okay

[British]

This is yet another $COMPUTER in a unique $PACKAGING, no different than the Lego case, pizza box case, etc.

When are we gonna see some innovative hacks to one's PC? Let's put cosmetics aside and see some function.

Yes, I realized I posted in anticipation and glee in the previous "LED memory" post.

Apple already has this market cornered

[cpt_rhetoric]

I thought Apple already had this covered with the PowerBook G4 laptop?

Google Remember

[WillRobinson]

try this
http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:HKBuO90uhxwJ: www.igrill.co.uk/+&hl=en [64.233.187.104]

I bet I can guess his filesystem....

[gosand]

So is it safe to assume that his filesystem is .... FAT32?

Damn, that was awful.

... Looks underdone ...

[ninjagin]

At first I thought it was pretty neat, then I saw the last pic on page four of the "How" series and I saw all that nasty cabling spouting out of the poor beast. How 'bout we check back in a couple months to assess fit and finish?

I really enjoy people's mods, but the ones I like are well-dressed. You can build a shoebox PC, but the REALLY cool shoebox (or any mod) PC will have neatly routed or concealed cables & ports.

Still, it's a great effort and a neat idea. He gets mad props from me. I just hope

Re:... Looks underdone ...

[t_allardyce]

nope its slashdotted from here too..

Yet another worthless case mod story

[BrK]

Why do these still make it to /.? I feel bad for the person who submitted the story, and bad for the editor that posted it.

Yes, there is just no end to the amount of hollow objects that can hold a modern small form-factor PC system board.

It's no longer considerd creative to wedge a system board into some makeshift case. Hopefully this will be realized before we have to see every possible iteration.

Benchmark proves this is a very fast machine

[Ingolfke]

The OS, Gentoo Linux, took about a week to get fully up and running...

Wow, compiling Gentoo from scratch in just one week? That's amazing performance! Most people take a full revision cycle to get a Gentoo system up and running.

Top 25 Innovations of the Past 25 Years

[JasontheMason]

So now Innovation #1 can be the internet [slashdot.org] *and* the George Foreman grilling machine [slashdot.org]! Or the George Foreman internet grilling machine....quick, someone call CNN!

JtM

That one deserves an award

[starseeker]

First practical use of the slashdot effect!

mirror

[SKPhoton]

Here's the coralized mirror [nyud.net] of the site.

very well done

[flacco]

Very well done.

*groan*

Re:No posts and already gone

[LurkerXXX]

About your webserver... Stick a fork in it. It's done.

Re:No posts and already gone

[wernercd]

Owner: Hrm. My Server is up and running! Man I'm hungry.
*Looks around*
Owner: Now... How can I cook me some lunch. Oh I know how to get things fired up...
*Loads up /.. Posts story. stands back as grill again is able to cook a hamburger*
Owner: Mmmmm. Mabye I should have used a P4 tho, took so long to cook with a good cpu.

Re:No posts and already gone

[Carl_Cne]

http://www.mirrordot.org/stories/eb39a4f75d9Fae2ad 2275d4854fb1b48/index.html [mirrordot.org] Mirror w/ a picture of it...

Re:No posts and already gone

[Golias]

79 comments and nobody has asked me to imagine a Beowolf cluster of these yet. C'mon, /. trolls and crapflooders, you're losing your touch.

Seriously, though... If he did have a cluster of them, it might have stood up to the Slashdotting, and he could have cooked a whole cow at once!

Re:If only...

[mrchaotica]

...and then eat his ass?!?

Sicko!

Re:You people constantly amaze me.

[SumDog]

There are a couple of sites that do instant slashdot mirroring, grabbing the latest articles and mirroring the pages they link to, however shouldn't slashdot be responsibly for doing this themselves? At least create a google like cache and cache the websites, and give links to both the original site and the cached copy with a slashdot banner at top!

Re:sorry, but

[aichpvee]

I don't know, still looks a lot better than an iMac to me.