A few people at the meeting on Wednesday were asking about the three enw AMD64 machines I have that I bought online for next to nothing, new, with name-brand parts and components. It looks like the prices have dropped a bit since I bought them a month ago (arg!). At the time, the 4600+ was the best price/performance out of the chips listed there, but with the price drops, it probably makes sense to go to a higher-speed CPU: Here's the link: http://www.smksuperstore.com/874/Catalog/Barebones_With_AMD_Athlon_64_X2_(Socket_AM2).htm I bought my first AMD64 from BestBuy around Christmas of 2006 (and of course, paid too much, but I needed it quickly to fill an emergency). I liked it so much, I decided to shop for another to replace two 24x7 servers I have running here (BSD and Linux). I shopped around and found SMK, and bought two more near-identical units. I put 4gb of DDR800 RAM from G.Skill in each machine, replaced the cases with a Thermaltake Tsunami[2], and upgraded the PSU from the 450W to an Antec 550W NeoHE (high-efficiency) unit[3]. With the cpufreq capabilities of the recent Linux kernels, I can back the 2.4Ghz AMD64 chip down to 1Ghz on-demand (which is now slower than the machines its replacing), the PSU will lower its output, case and CPU fans will slow down or turn off, reducing heat and wasted power... which ultimately reduces my power bill to keep them running 24x7. I'm pretty happy with the machines, they're quiet, *EXTREMELY* fast, and eat a lot less power than the machines they're replacing, and didn't cost that much. The highest cost in the whole assembly was the RAM itself. I could have saved hundreds there by going with slower-speed DDR2 RAM, but performance was important to me, so I went with a better speed RAM. [1] http://www.thermaltake.com/xaserCase/tsunami/tsunamimenu.htm [2] http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=28550 -- David A. Desrosiers - desrod at gnu-designs.com "There are four boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury and ammo. Use in that order. Starting now."
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