this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2025
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Title is a little sensational but this is a cool project for non-technical folks who may need a mini-internet or data archive for a wide variety of reasons:

"PrepperDisk is a mini internet box that comes preloaded with offline backups of Wikipedia, street maps, survivalist information, 90,000 WikiHow guides, iFixit repair guides, government website backups (including FEMA guides and National Institutes of Health backups), TED Talks about farming and survivalism, 60,000 ebooks and various other content. It’s part external hard drive, part local hotspot antenna—the box runs on a Raspberry Pi that allows up to 20 devices to connect to it over wifi or wired connections, and can store and run additional content that users store on it. It doesn't store a lot of content (either 256GB or 512GB), but what makes it different from buying any external hard drive is that it comes preloaded with content for the apocalypse."

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[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 45 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

Has room for a porn folder too right?

Seems like an amateur apocalyptic preparation oversight that it wasn't included already.

[–] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 24 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

Just check under homework.

[–] InvertedParallax@lemm.ee 15 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

My documents/faxes/saved faxes/Trash/receipts/

You forgot "taxes."

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 5 points 17 hours ago

I know a guy who can hook you up

[–] suburban_hillbilly@lemmy.ml 30 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

WikiHow

One of these things is not like the others

[–] solarvector@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 17 hours ago

Thank you, they've been ruining search results since the day SEO was coined.

[–] kn0wmad1c@programming.dev 7 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

Yeah, but won't you need enough electricity to power a monitor, keyboard, and mouse for this to work?

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 7 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

That doesn't take much power, a solar panel or two should be more than sufficient, or you can rig something up w/ a defunct ebike (just run the motor backwards to generate electricity).

[–] MangoCats@feddit.it 3 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

If the monitor draws even 20W, you're gonna be tired of that eBike generator solution really quick.

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 3 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

You'd be charging a battery, not running directly off the bike. Still, solar panels are extremely cheap these days. I picked up a 120 watt panel for 50 bucks recently, it could keep something like this running for hours each day.

[–] MangoCats@feddit.it 2 points 13 hours ago (2 children)

So, I believe a tolerable generator load for most people to pedal is around 10W... battery charge / discharge is maybe 80% efficient, so you're netting 8W into your storage. Pedal relatively hard for an hour and you might get 20 minutes use of your IPS LCD screen.

Solar panels are indeed the way to go.

I mention ebikes because if we're in an apocalypse situation, your solar panels may not be very efficient. There are a ton of electric motors out there, so generating power is totally feasible in a prepper situation even if the sky is torched Matrix style, just attach any electric motor to a bicycle and you're good to go (or water or wind turbine, etc).

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 1 points 13 hours ago

This unit can connect to a cell phone, that'd be a much less energy-expensive way to interface with it.

[–] 5too@lemmy.world 3 points 13 hours ago

It sounds like you can connect with your phone, which reduces the energy footprint quite a bit.

[–] MangoCats@feddit.it 3 points 14 hours ago

A single rooftop solar panel can do that, and charge a battery for a little after dark use while you're at it.

A true prepper will get an eInk monitor and resist the urge to scroll until they read all the way to the bottom of the page, but even a normal monitor uses a small fraction of a solar panel. Keyboard? Near zero. Mouse? Near zero x10 but still near zero when compared with 200W. RasPi? less than a normal monitor.

[–] Usernameblankface@lemmy.world 10 points 16 hours ago (2 children)

Is it also hardened against EPM's?

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 6 points 13 hours ago

EMPs are overrated by Hollywood, who like to show sparks and electrical arcs and robots exploding and whatnot. In reality EMPs are mainly a threat to the power grid, because they operate by inducing an electrical current in a conductor and the longer the conductor is the more powerful the induced current is. Power transmission lines are thousands of kilometers long, they'll build up fearsome currents and fry stuff plugged into them (assuming circuit breakers and fuses don't manage to protect it). But a device like this has wires a few centimeters long, so they don't pick up nearly as much as long as they're not plugged in. They're more delicate, sure, but I like my odds.

An EMP can also be shielded against by a wrapping of tinfoil, as mentioned below. As long as there aren't large gaps (no, tinfoil hats don't work) it acts as a simple farraday cage. So if you really want extra protection keep this in a metal box. Assuming its case isn't metallic to begin with.

[–] mesamunefire@lemmy.world 5 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Wrap em in foil. Boom protected. But kinda moot if there's no power.

[–] Frozengyro@lemmy.world 10 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

Make sure to etch your foil with how to rig up solar cells for power.

[–] Usernameblankface@lemmy.world 6 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

That's my next question. If things are bad enough that the Internet is gone, what reliable source of power would survive the unknown scenario that got things that bad?

That power source would also need to power a separate computer or smartphone that would also need to be kept protected from whatever happened.

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[–] treadful@lemmy.zip 7 points 16 hours ago

I was hoping it would be one of those drives built to last hundreds of years. Oh well.

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 13 hours ago (8 children)

It should at least be in a (sorta-)Raid1. What good does it do if it implodes?

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[–] WrenFeathers@lemmy.world 6 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) (4 children)

Not sure if this is allowed, but I had to see if this was true, and also if it was expensive- it isn’t!

(I do not work for, or with anything involved in this)

[–] golden_zealot@lemmy.ml 4 points 12 hours ago

I just purchased 18 TB of surplus disks for 200 CAD, the price there doesn't seem that good to me.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 2 points 11 hours ago

I feel like the $190 they want for the Pi 4/microSD version would've been a reasonable price for the Pi 5/NVME version.

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[–] Apple87sagan@lemmy.world 0 points 17 hours ago

Just ordered mine!

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