Install TOR Proxy on a $8 - $10 PogoPlug.

I was able to set up a TOR proxy on a cheap PogoPlug V4 in a few minutes. I was motivated to do this after reading a bunch of news about some hackers building a firmware for cheap, portable TP-Link pocket routers. Those pocket routers go for $35 and up and I figure I could do it with a cheaper alternative, the PogoPlug V4. Yep, nothing beats a cheap $10 ARM based computing device and I have a few of these lying around. The v4s are often on sale anywhere from $8 to $10 bucks. Here is a link to Adorama.

What is TOR? It is an acronym for THE ONION ROUTER. It is an open network designed to disguise and make normal network analysis hard to pin-point your activities on-line. In short, help you browse anonymously. It does so by randomly moving and encrypting your internet traffic across various, different random TOR nodes. This makes it hard to pin-point you. This is the tool that Eric Snowden used to evade the NSA.

If you have ArchLinux ARM installed on your PogoPlug, the steps are really easy.

All you need to do is install tor and make some simple configuration changes.

First, install:
pacman -S tor

Then create a directory for the tor files:
mkdir /var/tor

Then, all you need to do is add this to your config which is usually at /etc/tor/torrc.

RunAsDaemon 1
SocksPort 9050
SocksListenAddress 192.168.0.40
Nickname PogoPlugRelay
ORPort 9143
BandwidthRate 20 KB # Throttle traffic to 20KB/s
BandwidthBurst 50 KB # But allow bursts up to 50KB/s
ExitPolicy reject *:*
DataDirectory /var/tor

I bolded some of the things you need to be aware of. You will need the IP address of your PogoPlug. In my case it was 192.168.0.40. And you can adjust the Bandwidth rates to your liking.

Thats it. All you need to do is then run TOR.

For your clients, you need to point to the TOR router and adjust your SOCKS proxy. Here is an example in OS X. I ran iftop in the background and you can definitely see the network randomization. Pretty cool.

I tested this on a Yosemite build of Mac OS X and everything works. Now, for TOR, I simply made another Network configuration I can easily toggle when I want some privacy.

This is a SOCKS proxy set-up. I'll probably look into the transparent proxy configuration and write back if I want to go that route. A quick Toggle in OSX Network Location is actually quick and more preferable for me.

This was my first exposure to TOR so things were a bit weird. I'm used to using private OpenVPN and I normally expect Google to localize my search engine to whatever language I am remotely connected to but TOR was a different beast altogether. Every few seconds, every few web access, my IP address would randomize to a different IP. That was cool but some things were off. For example, having multiple tabs caused some weird issues that Google thought I was doing something malevolent.

Does TOR ensure complete privacy? No, as there are many gotchas and things you need to account for. However, in the right hands, it works pretty good. I wouldn't use TOR to download large files or media. It is definitely slower than using a VPN service but I like how this is a single, portable product that any of my computers can use with little configuration to their network (or browser settings).

PogoPlug V4 now $8.

Adorama (via Amazon) now has the V4 PogoPlug for $8.

Dang, this thing is getting cheaper by the day. Sure, it isn't as fast as the E02s but they are good for hacking ArchLinux and converting these to cheap AirPlay servers running Shairport. I currently use two of them in my 12 AirPlay Speaker set-up. They're also good to use a micro RSYNC servers, TimeMachine backups, or Linux Motion camera servers.

If you've been reading my blog for the past few years, I love running Linux on these low power ARM devices. You can read my up on original review of the V4.  At $8, you can't complain. You can find a use for them if you want to dive into ArchLinux.

BTW, I've been asked a few times on this. PLEX media server. You can install PLEX but this thing isn't fast enough for transcoding. You'd need to rip your media into a suitable format so no WMV, MKVs,etc. People have been using these as cheap Chromecast servers. Even then, I don't recommend it for running PLEX.

UPDATE: 2014-07-28. Sale is over. That went fast!

1st gen G4 Mac mini vs PogoPlug Classic

I took out a G4 Mac mini out of the storage and thought about junking it. It has been in storage for over 5 years now. I googled, "What to do with an old G4 Mac mini" and found some surprising results. People are retiring them into low-powered servers.

Before throwing it out, I figure I find a way to recycle it into my current tech lifestyle.
I have the very first gen G4 with 1GB DDR RAM, 100 GB PATA drive. I also have a GPower USB/Firewire external matching enclosure hub.

The original 1.25 GHz PowerPC G4 first generation Mac mini consumes about 32-85W (Max). At idle, 32W is decent but not what I call low-power.

I found some people debating whether or not an ARM based lightweight device like a PogoPlug would compare. PogoPlugs run at 4-5W and can be hacked into full Linux servers running mySQL, web,FTP,rsync, miniDLNA, torrent boxes, Squeezebox music server,  you name it.
They are often discounted at $15-20.

I personally have 8 of these Pogos running various things. However, I also have a whole closet full of Firewire drives that could be put to good use and shared over the network. Hence, I thought of re-using the Mac Mini.

Another cheap Pogoplug Airplay Express setup

Here is another quick hacked PogoPlug running ArchLinux as a Apple Airport receiver. You can read more about Pogo and Airplay here.

Total part cost less than $50:

PogoPlug in the discount bin online $15-20.

Cheap USB powered Logitech speakers (regular $30, onsale $12).

Sabrent USB sound card dongle. $7

Extra USB stick for ArchLinux install (free from the recycle bin). You can get away with a 1-2GB USB stick if you are just using Airplay, Airprint, Google ChromePrint.

Of course, I will be using this Pogoplug for other things like Motion USB webcam surveillance. Furthermore, these speakers aren't the greatest but they don't require an extra power outlet. This is just to demonstrate that you can quickly build a very portable, self-contained Airplay sound system with a little bit of geek "elbow grease." I had a few extra Pogos and left-over parts lying around, so I figure why not. The speakers and sound card were extras in the drawer so they were brought back to life. The whole process took less than 20 minutes with an existing image I made for another PogoPlug.

There is only one AC power jack required. The speakers are USB powered by the Pogoplug itself.

I plug the USB sound card in the front so I can adjust volume and do other things more accessible.

Rear is the USB power and OS bootable USB stick.

This thing is so cheap and disposable, I can throw one in the garage or workshop.  I continue to be amaze at the ultra cool factor of the pogoplug and its ability to be versatile. If you don't care for Airplay, you can also install a Squeezebox client into one of these just as easily.




Links:

Logitech Z120 USB powered speakers: http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Stereo-Speakers-Powered-980-000524/dp/B004ULOZPQ

Sabrent USB 2.0 USB sound card dongle:
http://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-Virtual-External-Surround-USB-AUDD/dp/B00D69U1B0/

PogoPlug Airport Airplay Express Music Receiver

Thanks to user,delakota555, who replied to a recent Airplay post.  I went ahead and looked into Shairport. Shairport is an open source AirTunes emulator. It runs in Linux and I installed it on my hacked $15 ArchLinux PogoPlug.

OK, this is pretty awesome. I had a spare $3 USB sound card dongle lying around and in less than 15 minutes, I had an Airplay remote speaker set-up using a PogoPlug V4 I had lying around. Why is this awesome? $20 in parts and you have yourself a streaming Airplay iTunes receiver. You can buy a few of these and litter them around your house for remote speaker set-ups.

Pictured below is the V4 PogoPlug, a USB stick, the USB sound card, ethernet and voila, Airplay!

The Pogoplug instantly shows right up on my iPhone.

On iTunes, I can stream music to multiple speakers around the house. I think I'll be investing in some more $15 PogoPlugs shortly.

As you can see below, I can stream Airplay music to multiple Airplay devices including the PogoPlug. I love this. I love the ability to walk from room to room, floor to floor and hear the same music streamed throughout the entire house.

I followed this blog post for a pre-compiled binary and that was it.

Link: Shairport

PogoPlug Series 4 (ArchLinux) review

If you've been reading my blog, you will know by now that I am a big fan of the PogoPlug. For $15-20, you can get yourself a hackable NAS. I've basically re-purpose these little ARM computers to run ArchLinux; providing a variety of network services from proxy, file, rsync, to full LAMP web application servers. They're amazing devices at $15. With an ArchLinux USB stick, I can pretty much do a lot of cool things and replace slow and aging Intel servers.

Well today, I am going to give you my impressions of the newer, PogoPlug Series 4 (v4) running the non-stock firmware, ArchLinux. You can't quite get them on the electronic bargain bin of $15 quite yet. They go for $60-90 and I was able to snag one when my discount notification announced it was $40 shipped.

First of all, the older E02 model is still a better unit for most purposes. It has a faster processor and more  RAM. E02 sports a 1.2 GHZ Kirkwood CPU with 256MB RAM. The Series 4 comes with an 800 MHZ processor and 128 MB of RAM. I would say the new Series 4 is similar to the Pink B02.

Now what makes the new Series 4 unique is the USM SATA dock and USB 3.0 support. This is why I got the device. I have a bunch of USM and 2.5" drives I want to use. Furthermore, I could not get more than 20-30 MB/sec read and writes through the network with an existing USB 2.0 attached PogoPlug. I figure, I'd take the risk and see if the newer V4 justified the premium.

For hacking and re-purposing purposes, the Series 4 is close to the Mele A1000 Android Mini PC TV device.

The Mele A1000 made a big impression because you can hack it to run Linux. It also has a USM Sata dock on the top and unlike the PogoPlug V4, it has video output via component, VGA, and HDMI. It can be made into a desktop workstation. I declined to go that route for three reasons. The Ethernet on the Mele is not gigabit and it has serious performance issues with the GPU under Linux. Since I use my Pogos as headless servers, the Mele A1000 was not even a consideration. Last and most importantly, the ArchLinux community is much more entrenched with the Pogo devices.

My impressions.

The box has a nice small form factor. I totally dig the size difference compared to the older Pogos (pictured to the left). The top comes off to reveal the USB 2 and SATA port. For ArchLinux, only these two ports will be bootable. Apparently, the SATA connector has port multiplication. In theory, this means you can connect the PogoPlug Series 4 to an external 4,5,8 Bay eSATA RAID enclosure that requires port multiplication. I did not test this feature.

I tried the PogoPlug Series 4 with a brand new 1TB Seagate Backup Plus USM drive. I also attached a 1TB USB 3.0 Western Digital Passport drive. In addition, I tried the SATA connector with a bare SSD and 7200 rpm Seagate XT Momentus hybrid drive. The only problem I have with the USM dock is that it is not wide enough to fit the older Seagete Go-Flex (pre-USM) drives. The newer USM classified Seagate Backup Plus drives fit perfectly fine.

Pogoplug E02 vs PogoPlug Series 4

As you know by now, my posts about Pogos usually involves them being hacked to run ArchLinux. I do not run them stock and these blog posts are tailored for those interested in them running Arch.

In my testing, the V4 provided mixed results. I formatted all my drives Linux  EXT3 for the best results. All the drives were empty and freshly formatted at the time of this testing.

First, I tested the disk read and writes from the terminal console to see how fast the device would read and write internally.

The USB 3.0 did surprisingly OK. In some results, it was better than using the USM docked Seagate. 

The SATA connection was a letdown. I thought it would produce better results. The first results is typical of people who plan to use it with a USM device. The results may be attributed to the fact the Seagate portable 2.5" backup plus drive spins at 5400 rpm.

I then proceeded to test with a brand new 7200 rpm, SATA III 6Gb/s Seagate XT Momentus hybrid drive with a 8MB SSD cache. I have this particular drive as data drives on my laptops. On both my Mac and Thinkpad running Linux with EXT3, this drive consistently breaks the 100 MB/sec barrier when connected to a SATA III channel.

There wasn't much of an improvement.

I went one step further and tested with a Samsung 830 SSD. Again, my suspicions were correct, the SATA channel is probably running at SATA I speeds.

Compared to a USB 2.0 E02, the Series 4's numbers are way, way better.  Here is an E02 connected via USB 2.0 for comparison.

Still, I was disappointed I couldn't get better speeds. I was hoping for at least 80 MB/sec.

Now, the speed I/O isn't a big issue if network access was good. After repeated tries, I could not get the  V4 to perform better than the older E02. The previous E02 could easily hit Gigabit's limits. No matter how much tweaking I could do to the V4, I could not get more than 70 MB/sec network throughput.

Samba performed poorly to my surprise. The first two screenshots below are the V4 with a USM drive and an SSD connected to the SATA port. Connecting to the USB 3.0 port provided similar results.

Now compare it to the older E02. The older E02 has a USB 2.0 connected external drive and it performed consistently better.

This translated in the real world with real copies. Even with the SATA drive advantage, copies were much slower.

PogoPlug V4

PogoPlug E02

In the end, it did not matter that the newer model has SATA, sd card slot nor USB 3.0. It simply perform slower than the previous E02 Classic Pogoplugs running as a server. In some use cases, running directly off the SATA and running applications like MySQL, you'll benefit from the faster local reads on the newer v4. However, the majority of people will be using the Pogoplugs with network file access. As a SAMBA file serving NAS, the E02 is still a better buy. It really boils down the hardware. The Classic E02 has a faster processor and more RAM. That is why it performs better.

There is one saving grace, the V4 is a good looking piece of kit. You don't have dangling wires everywhere when you use only the USM SATA dock.

PogoPlug ArchLinux Speed Testing and Notes

If you've been reading this blog, you know I'm a big fan of the $15-20 Pogoplugs. They're really popular with people who want to run a low-powered embedded ARM Linux server. Depending on drive, they consume a mere 4 to 15 watts of power. The platform of choice and most popular is ArchLinux.

This post is tailored for those who are want to run ArchLinux ARM on their pogo and use it as a NAS/File Server. I also assume you have already ventured into the PogoLand with your unlocked Pogo with Arch installed.

I'm going to go over my findings and offer my recommendations.

First of all, before you do anything, make a full backup of your bootable Arch USB. There are a few ways to do it: DD, rsync, and tar gzipping.

Here is a link to get you started: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Full_System_Backup_with_rsync

I personally do a TAR gzip of my USB so I can unzip back to a USB stick that may be a different size.

I believe most or all of the Pogoplugs come with Gigabit standard. However, network speed and copies will be dependent on a few things. The filesystem, the limitation of USB mass storage and your network file sharing protocol.

Out of the box, the Pogos run at 60 Megabytes per second in theory. This is serving from RAM and synthetic benchmarks. When you attach a USB drive, that speed will drop considerably. I would say around 35 MB/sec in super ideal situations.

You can stream 720p MKV and H.264 comfortably in most cases.

There are a few things you should take into consideration and YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary).

After making a backup, the next thing you should do is experiment with Jumbo Frames if your router/switch and network supports it. Start off at 4000 and try slowly going up to 9000. If your system is unresponsive, most likely your guest computer or network switch is incompatible. Worst case scenario, something is wrong with your Pogo and you will need to restore from a backup clone.


As you change your MTU to Jumbo frames, test the transfers using a tool like iperf.
To change MTU, you do like you do in any Linux distro:

ifconfig eth0 MTU XXXX

As you can see in the screenshot above, I started to average 110 Megabytes per second which is near the Gigabit's theoretical limit of 125 MB/s.

Now, when I drop it back to normal frames of 1500, you can see my network speed drop to normal of 65 MB/sec.

Changing to Jumbo Frames can also have undesired consequences. If your other client computers do not have Jumbo Frames, performance will suffer. For example, if you are connecting an iPad or Android device to your Pogo via Samba, there is no way to change Jumbo frames on most mobile devices.

In some cases, mismatch MTUs from client and server produced disastrous results. So YMMV. See below. 2.58 MB/sec.

You may be wondering why bother with network speeds when USB disk access is slow (next section).
Well, with faster Gigabit, you can network mount shares from other sources into your Pogoplug. For example, if you plan on building a Squeezebox music server and just the server itself, you can NFS mount from another file server. The same goes with running a torrent server and saving the files elsewhere. Importantly, if you have multiple disk with multiple shares, you want to ensure each client is not using up all the bandwidth.


Disks Considerations:

The most important thing that affects PogoPlugs (and Linux in general) is the filesystem you plan to use. Native  EXT3/EXT4 is the only way to go.

NTFS and FAT32/ExFAT is not recommended if you want speed. Fuse based Filesystems have to go through several layers.  NTFS and ExFAT is nice because you can store files larger than 4GB. However, Linux EXT filesystems also support large files as well.


The only problem with using EXT3/EXT4 is you can't easily unmount your USB drive and connect to non-Linux running computers. If your main platform of choice is Windows, you may want to stick with using NTFS. I have plenty of Linux computers around the house at my disposal so this is not an issue.

Just for comparison,using the same drive (a 1TB Western Digital Passport drive), NTFS was a slower. Especially in writes, it was horribly bad at 6.5 MB/sec vs 27 MB/sec using EXT3

Here are NTFS disk benchmarks

and EXT3.

I use DD to write and test the same drives. If you plan to use the Pogo as a dedicated server, it is highly recommended to use EXT3 or EXT4.

This also translates over to Network file access. Using Blackmagic's Speed Test on a Macintosh with Samba, I see similar results.

And with EXT3

Interestingly, using Netatalk, I was getting close to 35MB/sec reads.

Encryption will also take your speeds down quite a bit. With SCP/SFTP, you will only get around 5 MB/sec.

NFS did not really fare any better. The best I could get is 8 MB/sec.

In short, if you want the best performance, stick with EXT3 and Samba. USB 2.0 is really the bottleneck with PogoPlugs. They're great at what they do but dont expect them to replace a Synology or any other dedicated NAS for heavy duty work. 25-35 MB/sec is pretty respectable for a USB drive hosted NAS. Backups, Rsync, and Time Machine do not require much more. Then again, a Pogo plus Harddrive consumes 10 watts!

Hopefully this has changed with Series 4 of the PogoPlug. The V4 has a USM SATA dock connector and USB 3.0. However, unlike the Classic Pogos, they don't go for $15-20.
I have one on order and plan to report back soon.

Stocking up on PogoPlugs

I've been stocking up on these little PogoPlug devices. I have 5 total (3 at work and 2 at home).

$18.50 shipped on sale at Adorama is a no-brainer. I've installed ArchLinux and they've been running all sorts of things for me - BIND DNS, MySQL backups, Rsync Daemon, LAMP (PHP and MySQL). They are great fun to play with. I make a point to do everything from my phone and iPad to make sure I am "Intel/X86" free. I definitely think ARM is the future. I have a bunch of old USB sticks lying around so these put them to great use.

With an iPad, it takes a total of 20 minutes from start to finish to build a LAMP server with SAMBA/AFP access. Once you enabled SSH, you are pretty much free to do whatever you want with ArchLinux ARM. Go ahead, install WordPress and host a blog from your house for less than $2 a month in electricity.

Link: http://archlinuxarm.org/

Gadget lust for bargain bin (linux hackable) electronics

I have knack, or I should say an affinity for bargain-bin gadgets that have tinkering potential.

Ever thought about using an alarm clock as a 3G wifi hotspot for your car?
Or ever thought about converting a NAS into a MySQL server for backup and replication?
Throughout the years, I have bought countless useless gadgets that fall under the cheaper than $39.99 price point.

Here are some of them. They all run some form of Linux which makes them fun to experiment with

There are some great gadgets that never seem to get any consumer traction and eventually fall into the bargain dumpster bin. Deals can be found on slickdeals.net, fatwallet or dealnews.com.

For example, the original Chumby retailed for $179. I would never pay that much for a glorified alarm clock. However, for $30, a Best Buy branded Insignia Infocast is something you can tinker with. The infocast is pretty much a rebranded Chumby.
It has a USB dongle and can be hacked into a 3G wireless hotspot or a surveillance camera server.
It is good for streaming Pandora or Squeezebox by the bedside. There is pretty much nothing to do. SSH can be enabled and you are pretty much ready to go.

Next is the ZipIt Z2 Wireless Messenger.
The XScale PXA270 is the same processing power as a Dell Axim or original iPhone. Originally $149,
the device was tailored toward teenagers as an instant messenger (AIM/MSN/Yahoo) companion device.Long before the iPhone and during the sidekick heyday, this device was a commercial flop.
At $20-$30, you can turn it into a mini Debian Linux computer.

I still haven't found a compelling use case for this except to show teenagers that power of the Linux OS in a small form factor.

Now for my cheap favorite hackable device. The PogoPlug.

This originally retails for $99. In fact, it is a pretty good NAS/File Server/Host your own private cloud solution. This device basically allows you to load up a bunch of USB drives and share them out in your own private cloud. I use one as a private DropBox. I have about 20 portable 2.5" USB drives and dozens of USB sticks that have a place to go for gadget retirement.
I primarily use it as a my remote backup device for my Android and iOS smartphone/tablet.

Whenever, I take a picture on my iPhone or Galaxy Nexus, my photos and videos are automatically synched. Another good feature is the ability to share out files like dropbox or box.net.
Hence, I think it is a worthy product.

It becomes a killer product when you can pick them up brand new for $20 or lower ($18.50).

Now, this is where all the fun begins! I installed ArchLinux, a full LAMP (Mysql/PHP) server, rsync, GIT server, and netatalk on one device. You can't go wrong with $20! I have my servers background backup to this device. It makes a fantastic low-power MySQL replication server.

Total time to setup is about half an hour. I even have webmin running one. I once brought one of these on-site on a job and everyone was giving me the "WTF" stare and when I said my MySQL database on was on it, everyone had a good laugh.

The one to get is the E02 model which has the 256MB of RAM.

After installing PHP, I was surprise to find out I could install stuff like wkhtmltopdf ( as webkit engine to convert HTML webpages to PDF). Seriously, I could use this a dev LAMP server. I wonder how my clients would react if I brought one in during a demo.

So there you have it. I won't go into the details of what you can do with some of these devices. There are countless forums and tutorials on them.

So the next time you see some discontinued tech gear in the $20 bargain bin, give it a second look. If it runs an ARM architecture and Linux, there is a great chance it can be hacked.