[lug] Fast workstation recommendations?

[Bear Giles]

Amazon.

*High-CPU Extra Large Instance*

7 GB of memory
20 EC2 Compute Units (8 virtual cores with 2.5 EC2 Compute Units each)
1690 GB of instance storage
64-bit platform
I/O Performance: High
EBS-Optimized Available: No
API name: c1.xlarge
It's $.66/hour but you can shut it off on evenings and weekends if you
don't need it. That works out to $40/week (with 12 hour days M-F) or <$200
/month. There's an even bigger bang if you can parallelize your work.

What about owning the hardware? The cost of renting a server at Amazon (or
Rackspace or whatever) for a year is the cost of buying a server outright,
in loose terms, so that's a fair question. There are several points to be
made:

1) you don't have to worry about hardware failures with a virtual host.
That means, e.g., you don't have to worry about backups beyond what you
need for business purposes. The hosting companies keep multiple copies at
widely distributed locations - you aren't going to be losing data.

2) you can be up and running in about 5 minutes.

3) you can be up and running on a second system in about 5 minutes. This
can't be overstated - once you have the ability to create add'l systems at
lost cost you'll find solutions to problems you never knew you had. You
need a clone for training purposes? To demonstrate to potential clients? To
try out new software? This is a real pain with real hardware but trivial
with virtual servers. And if you don't need it you can either nuke it or
just leave it sitting for a trivial cost.

On Mon, Aug 6, 2012 at 6:34 PM, Steve Sullivan <sullivan at mathcom.com> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Do you have recommendations for a fast workstation for
> numeric and statistical use?  I'm looking for ...
>
>   Quiet
>   Mem >= 16 GB
>   Processors >= 8
>   Fast CPU and memory
>   Reasonable support.
>   If possible, no custom drivers as I install my own debian
>     and would rather not fight driver battles.
>   I don't care much about video cards.  Whatever's quiet.
>
> Any concerns on Intel vs Amd?
>
> Some possibilities I've dug up ...
>   dell.com precision
>   system76.com
>   zareason.com
>   pogolinux.com
>
> Any suggestions?
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Steve
>
> --
>
> ========================================
> Steve Sullivan      sullivan at mathcom.com
> 720-587-7498        http://www.mathcom.com
> ========================================
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