Archive for January 2009
64-bit Quad-Core Opteron computer for under £200
I started thinking about getting a new desktop and giving my son my existing Dell desktop a few weeks ago. He now has my old Dell and I have a new desktop with the following specs for under £200!
AMD Opteron Quad-Core 2.1Gh CPU
Connect 3D x1050 256Mb PCI-E Graphics Card
250 GB SATA Drive
2Gb RAM
DVD-RW
A friend gave me the idea of buying a budget server and that was the key. I purchased a HP Proliant ML115 G5 server from cbccomputers for £165 (the prices on these servers seem different everytime I look at their site). I replaced the 512Mb of installed ram with 2Gb from crucial for £20 and the on-board graphics with the graphics card mentioned above for £18 at play.com.
Being a server there is no OS supplied but I have already have XP running on the machine and my next task is to install the 64-bit Ubuntu Studio.
I must say I am delighted with the purchase! I was orginally looking for a Xeon based ML110 Proliant but I couldn’t find any in stock anywhere. From what I read the Xeon may be quieter than the ML115 but I think I was just use to my Dell machine making practically no noise. The fans go mad on the Ml115 at startup but they quieten down after 10s. I worked with servers and often wondered why the fans work so hard on startup, will have to look into that. I think I also read the ML115 has better graphic slot support than the ML110 but I can’t confirm that.
Anyway, my last job is to pickup a soundcard as the ML115 doesn’t come with one. If you like buidling computers and don’t want to have to worry about how much thermal paste to use and are tight like me this is an excellent option.
ML115 G5
