Successful Install on Igel 4210 LX Winestra thin client

Sifter · Aug 9, 2012, 3:14 PM

Hey robi, does your Igel have an actual CF slot on it? When looking at the Neoware e140 and the CA22's, they only appear to have a 40pin DOM, but no CF slot. Can you post a pic of the inside of your unit? My plan is to use a 4gig microdrive with full install.

robi · Aug 18, 2012, 6:07 PM

@Sifter:

Hey robi, does your Igel have an actual CF slot on it? When looking at the Neoware e140 and the CA22's, they only appear to have a 40pin DOM, but no CF slot. Can you post a pic of the inside of your unit?

Yes, there's an onboard, internal CF slot.
Mine looks exactly like this (except the PCI card, which is different):

@Sifter:

My plan is to use a 4gig microdrive with full install.

Do you think a full install would be better on MicroDrive rather a NanoBSD on CF card? What would be the benefit?
I was always afraid of disk drives used 24/7 since mechanics life in a drive give up service faster… (I've had very bad experience with professional Ciprico video file-servers which had their linux-based operating system running on 2.5" laptop drives inside...)

stevesew · Aug 20, 2012, 6:42 PM

My Winestra 4210LX works great with a 40GB 2.5inch HDD, and with Windows XP.
I also added a cooler, because it seems to get too hot, now with the HDD inside also. This type:http://www.ebay.de/itm/140627034080?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649#ht_5433wt_1197
I created a simple workstation, and maybe I will attach it to the TV to use it like a Media Player. Under XP SP3, it finds itself drivers for audio and video over the internet, via driver update.
Then it works great.

I also tested some linux distros, but so far I'm not so happy.
By the way, in the meantime I bought 2 additional clients, but a bit different ones:
http://www.ebay.de/itm/180940444399?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649#ht_524wt_1393
http://www.ebay.de/itm/140627349364?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649#ht_2749wt_1393
They both have larger coolers, regular DDR memories, but even so, they heat up, in my opinion too much.
Below the last two devices:

Sifter · Aug 21, 2012, 2:53 AM

@robi:

Do you think a full install would be better on MicroDrive rather a NanoBSD on CF card? What would be the benefit?
I was always afraid of disk drives used 24/7 since mechanics life in a drive give up service faster… (I've had very bad experience with professional Ciprico video file-servers which had their linux-based operating system running on 2.5" laptop drives inside...)

The one thing that it would benefit, is allow me to run packages. I ran my x700 with a microdrive and it was flawless, I just want something a bit less power hungry.

robi · Aug 22, 2012, 6:43 AM

Most packages are NanoBSD compatible!

Lex- · Apr 20, 2013, 5:06 PM

I have a neoware CA22 (WinNet P680) unfortunately no CF socket soldered, only pads. I will try to solder a CF socket on my CA22, can someone with a Igel unit (factory installed CF socket) please post a picture of the CF area with the CF card removed of course, I want to see if some missing resistors on mine are populated on the units with factory installed CF socket. Thanks.

robi · Apr 21, 2013, 8:44 AM

In Igels (as can be seen in the photos) there's a 44-pin header which allows connecting a 2.5-inch laptop ATA drive to the same port as the CF. Is that header missing also from your box?
If not, maybe you could get off with an IDE-to-CF adapter.

Lex- · Apr 22, 2013, 3:56 AM

Hi robi, thanks for your reply, my unit have the IDE 44 pin but I can't use it, some broken pins, then I think is more easy solder a CF socket than unsolder 44 pin header then solder a new one… you still have the Igel 4210 unit ? can you take a picture of the CF slot without CF card on it ? or let me know please if your unit have soldered the components marked as D1, R20, R22, R32, R33, R34, R35, R37, R38, R42, R43, R44, R45, R94, R101, R116, R120 (all near CF slot).

Let me know please, thank you in advance.

robi · Apr 22, 2013, 7:00 AM

I still have them both, I'll see what I can do later about photographing.

robi · Apr 22, 2013, 11:18 AM

OK here's how the CF card slot area looks like in mine.

robi · Apr 22, 2013, 11:26 AM

And here's how I added a 2.5 inch HDD to the case, using this ATA cable.

Lex- · Apr 24, 2013, 12:39 AM

Hi, robi, I really appreciate your help, finally my Neoware CA22 is running from a 6GB microdrive obtained from an iPod, also tested with a CF card but the microdrive is faster than the CF card…

Thank you a lot.

robi · Apr 24, 2013, 7:40 AM

Microdrive… what a great idea. I'll see what I can find on eBay.

robi · Sep 17, 2013, 4:56 PM

@robi:

Microdrive… what a great idea. I'll see what I can find on eBay.

Bought 3 different microdrives from eBay, unfortunately the system doesn't boot up correctly with them. Tried installin Ubuntu without success on the microdrives, and although the installation process seems to go through fine, after a reboot, there are weird kernel messages and it's unable to mount the media. :'(

robi · Sep 17, 2013, 5:00 PM

Just a quick update: the new pfSense NanoBSD v2.1-RELEASE tested and works perfectly on this box from a 4GB CF card!

There are still available on eBay thin clients of this type, great prices.

max_rome · Nov 15, 2013, 5:57 PM

Hello, I have the same Igel Winestra 4210 with via cpu 1GHz.
I boot the machine with a usb hard drive, but when I switch off it, my usb hard drive continue to be powered on.
Also your winestra client continues to power on usb ports when it is switched off? Or maybe I can disable it in bios?

Thank you for your response.

Max

robi · Nov 24, 2013, 1:24 PM

I don't use USB storage devices on my Winestras so I don't know.

robi · Jul 15, 2014, 10:51 AM

@robi:

Just a quick update: the new pfSense NanoBSD v2.1-RELEASE tested and works perfectly on this box from a 4GB CF card!

Tested with both 2.1.3 and 2.1.4 - they work out of the box on this hardware.
Very reliable pieces, got one running from January 2012, without a single crash/freeze. And bought them used from eBay.

lt1360hp · Sep 4, 2014, 7:08 PM

Robi,
I also have an HP e140 CA22 (winnet P680 MB) and am interested in fitting it with a toshiba or hitachi 1.8 microdrive (20-40GB) as it sounds like you have done. My interest is to experiment with Squid or snort. Have you tried this? Any particular recommendations on drives or ? If you have tried these packages, did the system still perform OK?

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Dave

robi · Jan 27, 2015, 2:22 PM

Hi!

Yes I've got a couple of 4GB microdrives from eBay. Unfortunately their hardware IDs are pre-coded as removable disks, so it's really tricky to install any OS on them. I failed completely to install any Ubuntu server version, for example, using any traditional methods.

I finally gave up trying to install any other OS on them, because I found a flash-optimized Debian distro, called Voyage Linux, which fits my needs perfectly.
I didn't try pfSense on microdrive, because pfSense has the NanoBSD version optimized to run from flash.

I don't use squid/snort yet, so I don't have any experience with them so far. But i plan to do so in the future, as I see it now, I'd keep the NanoBSD architecture and use some sort of external drive (an eSata connected SSD disk for instance) for these packages.