Considering a change of computers:

[petrusbroder]

I have five computers of the slow kind: celerons, PIII and a AMD Thunderbrid. All of the the running @ 1.2 GHz or less. They have been crunching 24/7 for quite a few years now and are ready for retirement.
The PSUs are also old - less than 250W, and with a 20-pin connector only.
The HDDs are 40 GBytes IDE or less and very slow (but defragged and maintained).
The graphic cards are older then Nvidia 4400-series.
The mobo /petrus is shaking his head/.
The RAM only 384 MBytes - DDR - but quite slow.

I am consisering to change them for some C2D computers and can buy some Acer 2000 "thin clients" with E6600, 2 GByte DDR-II RAM, 160 GByte SATA HD and an external "brick" for a PSU. You can find the specs in the pdf-file here. The price is - IMHO - quite reasonable: approx. 680 US$ incl. keyboard, mouse, and an Acer 17 inch LCD (which I will not need and thus will try to sell).
There is no way I could get a E6600, 2 GByte of 800 MHz DDR-II-Ram, mobo, DVD-drive, PSU for that price in Sweden (and if I purchased that stuff in an other country, a customs duty (for components from outside the European Union +10%) and the VAT would be added (+25%).

The questions I have: Are the comps reliable? Noise? Is the cooling good enough? Is the idea running DC on a thin client wrong?

The advantages are the small form factor, the lower energy use. The disadvantages: the proporietary PSU, more expensive components (i.e. harder to repair or upgrade) ... any thing else I should think of?

I have looked among components in Sweden and for that same price I would get a system with an E6300, 1 GByte 800-MHz-DDR-II, 80 GByte HD, DVD-reader, a reasonably good mobo and a 300 W PSU - but no case, no keyboard, no LCD-screen, no mouse ...

Oh, if I choose this comp (or a similar one, or components) I will get 3 or 4 of them ... 5 cores out - at least 6 cores in ...

 

[kmmatney]

The part I'm not sure about is cooling - the Core 2 Duos run pretty cool, but they still warm up if crunching 24/7. That would be my only concern - the cooling. Looks like a decent deal. Doesn't look like you'll be overclocking at all.

If you don't mind overclocking, then the E4300 cpu will give you dual-core, with a "free" overclock to 2.4 Ghz by just setting the FSB speed to 266 Ghz, which even the cheapest motherboards and memory can easily handle. The E4300 has a 9x multiplier which makes it very good for overclocking with low cost motherboards and RAM. You can draw a conductive line between 2 pins on the E4300, and it turns into an E6600 (with half of the cache) on all motherboards. Just another idea...

 

[caferace]

What OS are they running? XP Home, Pro or Embedded? Embedded is common on thin-clients, and makes for a great OS for that platform, but is something that requires some different strategies to use for DC.

-jim (who does a lot of crunching on XPe...)

edit: OK, I looked at the specs like I should have first.

It'll run most any OS. Good. Next thing is you should know that there isn't much of an upgrade path. Not a big deal. They're crunchers, not gaming boxes. I suppose you might be concerned about cooling. These little boxes are designed for biz apps, not 24/7 full-throttle. And there will not be much (if any) room inside to add fans or larger heat-sinks.

 

[petrusbroder]

Thanks kmmatney anf caferace ...

Originally posted by: kmmatney
The part I'm not sure about is cooling - the Core 2 Duos run pretty cool, but they still warm up if crunching 24/7. That would be my only concern - the cooling. Looks like a decent deal. Doesn't look like you'll be overclocking at all.

If you don't mind overclocking, then the E4300 cpu will give you dual-core, with a "free" overclock to 2.4 Ghz by just setting the FSB speed to 266 Ghz, which even the cheapest motherboards and memory can easily handle. The E4300 has a 9x multiplier which makes it very good for overclocking with low cost motherboards and RAM. You can draw a conductive line between 2 pins on the E4300, and it turns into an E6600 (with half of the cache) on all motherboards. Just another idea...

Sounds interesting - because that chip (E4300) is so much less expensive (the difference is approx 130 US$). I do not mind OC-ing at all. Do you have a link to which two pins to connect (I know that the warrenty goes ... but I could do that after one year, when the warrenty has expired anyhow) and what "pen" to use?

Yes, it is the cooling I am concerned about too. The temp in that room will be lower (approx . 19 - 21 ºC) and I will have great air flow (I will use a kitchen hood with a fan mounted over the computers to remove the hot air, which then will be conducted to a heat exchanger ...) but I am not sure if that cooling is sufficient ...

No, these are crunchers: the only service they will get is a regular dust removal, defragging the HDD, updating the OS (Win XP Pro or Win XP Home or Linux Ubuntu) and updating the crunching application. They will be hooked up through a KVM-switch, so there is no need for keyboards, mice and screens.

 

[BlackMountainCow]

I yet have to use a thin client, but I'd be concerned about the limited maintenance possibilities. I just love to toy with my machines and upgrade them, repair, dust and what have you. Have you heard one of the machines under full load? I'd assume that due to the small case the fans would give a pretty high pitched noise. Dunno if there are any noise/dB specs on the Acer site. On the other hand, if they are located in a separate room, noise isn't much of a prob after all.

Just the cooling worries me. I like big fans, low rpms. But if ambient is around 20 °C, that shouldn't be a problem after all, even in summer time.

 

[Crazee]

They are not thin clients. Thin clients have limited local processing and basically connect to a server where the processing occurs (see Wyse) This is a Small form factor PC. I recently bought a Dell XPS 210 from the outlet which is a small form factor with an E6700. It runs fine and the cooling is good. I don't overclock it, but for the money it was hard to beat.

It sounds like a really good deal to me. $680 US sounds like they "fell of the truck"

 

[caferace]

Originally posted by: Crazee
They are not thin clients. Thin clients have limited local processing and basically connect to a server where the processing occurs (see Wyse) This is a Small form factor PC. I recently bought a Dell XPS 210 from the outlet which is a small form factor with an E6700. It runs fine and the cooling is good. I don't overclock it, but for the money it was hard to beat.

It sounds like a really good deal to me. $680 US sounds like they "fell of the truck"

Your point is well taken, Crazee. These ARE just small form factor boxes.

jim

 

[petrusbroder]

I agree that these are not "thin clients" - that is why I put that expression i quotation marks.
Thanks for the input.
I think that I will purchase one of these computers, test it for a month or so and then parhaps order a few more ...

 

[Wolfsraider]

heat is not an issue at all peter

Thats a great price mine cost me 609 here minus the lcd

give me a few days more healing and i'll write you a review, but c2d are awesome