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El Reg reports
A chap named Ross, says he "Just switched off our longest running server".
Ross says the box was "Built and brought into service in early 1997" and has "been running 24/7 for 18 years and 10 months".
"In its day, it was a reasonable machine: 200MHz Pentium, 32MB RAM, 4GB SCSI-2 drive", Ross writes. "And up until recently, it was doing its job fine." Of late, however the "hard drive finally started throwing errors, it was time to retire it before it gave up the ghost!" The drive's a Seagate, for those of looking to avoid drives that can't deliver more than 19 years of error-free operations.
The FreeBSD 2.2.1 box "collected user session (connection) data summaries, held copies of invoices, generated warning messages about data and call usage (rates and actual data against limits), let them do real-time account [inquiries] etc".
[...] All the original code was so tightly bound to the operating system itself, that later versions of the OS would have (and ultimately, did) require substantial rework.
[...] Ross reckons the server lived so long due to "a combination of good quality hardware to start with, conservatively used (not flogging itself to death), a nice environment (temperature around 18C and very stable), nicely conditioned power, no vibration, hardly ever had anyone in the server room".
A fan dedicated to keeping the disk drive cool helped things along, as did regular checks of its filters.
[...] Who made the server? [...] The box was a custom job.
[...] Has one of your servers beaten Ross' long-lived machine?
I'm reminded of the the Novell server that worked flawlessly despite being sealed behind drywall for 4 years.
(Score: 4, Informative) by NotSanguine on Friday January 15 2016, @06:14PM
My oldest system acts as a router/firewall. It's a Pentium Pro with 96MB RAM purchased in 1994 and has been continuously in its current role since 1996.
It's been rebooted numerous times, but the system itself has yet to fail.
I've had to replace (cheapo) ethernet cards and I upgraded (by choice, not due to failure) the hard drive (IDE) to 8GB.
Granted, routing/firewalling for a residential internet connection isn't very taxing, but this system may well be older than some Soylentils.
WRT the system the biggest question I have is what to replace it with when it finally fails. Most consumer grade routers are crap and don't provide the level of flexibility of my 22 year old device. The Wifi routers (used in bridge mode on my network) I've purchased haven't lasted more than three years or so.
If I'm lucky, the family members who clean out my house after I die will wonder if it's a museum piece and get confused when 'net access stops working when they unplug it.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 15 2016, @06:48PM
The Wifi routers (used in bridge mode on my network) I've purchased haven't lasted more than three years or so.
I would look to your power. It sounds like the wall warts are burning out and not giving up enough power. I went thru 3 wall warts before I found a better solution. I plugged them into a decent power strip that smooths out power spikes. They need to be replaced every 10 or so years though.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 15 2016, @07:38PM
K62-400 w/ 128M 10GB HD 3x PCI NIC but it's backup... 486sx 12MB 273MB HD with 2x ISA 10baseT NIC.
The K62 HD been screaming for a while 6yrs. Just filled the box with cardboard. Quiet and working great.
I do have RPi as a bridge router via my phone so all bases covered.
(Score: 1) by Frost on Saturday January 16 2016, @11:45AM
Pentium Pro with 96MB RAM purchased in 1994
Wow, 1994? I built a cutting edge PPro system in 1996 at great expense. I can't imagine using that level of hardware for just firewall/routing. Hmm ... wikipedia says [wikipedia.org] the PPro didn't go on sale until November 1995, which is consistent with my recollection. I suspect you got yours in 1996 too, if not later.