Nix Server Farm
Repurposing old computers to help sustain the planet.
iMac 12,1 rebuild
The first project for Nix Server Farm is rebuilding an iMac 12,1 purchased from the thrift store.
This iMac was purchased from a thrift store for tweleve dollars. I was able to plug it in and see it boot to the Mac OS login screen, so I knew the computer was functioning.
Cleaning
This computer was fairly dirty, I had to peel the price tag the thrift store had affixed to the screen. Thankfully Apple used solid glass, so I was able to peel the sticker off and then use some Goo Gone to remove the sticker residue. I then wiped down the entire unit using some natural cleaning solvent. iMacs are well built, I did open it up and inside the was no dust or debris, so I did not to clean the inside of the computer at all.
Hardware
This iMac is version 12,1 produced in Mid 2011, so at the time of writing, this machine is fourteen years old.
Processor: Intel Core i5 2.5 GHz(I5-2400S)RAM: 4 GB (2 x 2 GB)Hard Drive: 500 GB SATA I did not make any hardware changes, although the unit would benefit from upgrading the hard drive from a spinning SATA drive to a SSD drive.
Operating System
I installed MX Linux as the Operating System. The install was less than 15 minutes and all of the necessary drivers were installed by default so everything on the iMac worked. I took a screenshot with htop and neofetch running so you could see what it looked like.
Use
This repurposed iMac can be used as a daily driver computer for basic everyday tasks. Things like checking email, light web surfing, listening to music and light coding/scripting. It can also run as a web server or a database server if needed but you would want to wipe MX Linux and install your Operating System of choice if you go this route.
Conclusion
This was a sucessful repurposing of this iMac 12,1. Since it is an all in one computer, I will be using this machine in my garage/workshop area. It is a compact unit that has WiFi and Sound, so I can lookup youtube videos when building/repairing items, or if I need to do a quick search to find some information. For the overall cost ($12) and time it took to rebuild and customize this computer (less than one hour), I was quite pleased with the final result. Check back soon for an update as we continue to repurpose computers and save them from being scrapped!
