[geeks] Dual Xeons - the Saga continues

[Mark Benson]

On 08/02/2018 16:52, Lionel Peterson wrote:
> Understood - I have a dell dual-core PE1950 III that sounds like a vacuum
> cleaner running, but I can stuff two large SATA drives into it and take the
> ram to 64 Gigs quite affordably, and with dual quad-core Xeons w/
> hyper-threading I can spin up a ton of small VMs and get decent performance,
> but only when SWMBO is out of the house (understandably, if her hobby was as
> loud as that server I'd complain also!).
> 
> My new boxes are intended to run silently in the garage 'datacenter'...

I got the FreeDOS USB stick sorted out and the firmware updated. It has 
changed some things. There are 1 or two extra BIOS options. Not much 
else though.

The Intel IDA CD now works. That's allowed some configuration to be 
done. I setup the BMC at an IP address via NIC2 but it doesn't seem to 
want to talk to me. Tried Web, SSH and Telnet.

I also found a DOS System Event Log viewer... hurray...

I configured the SDR for the right fans and chassis intrusion for the 
switch on the case (which is plugged in and closed, yes). Still spinning 
every fan in there at 100%.

==

As regards a future machine, I tend to find in the UK Workstations are 
overpriced for what they are. They aren't in nearly the levels of 
surplus here as they are in the US and are sought-after enthusiast items.

I looked at Dell's Refurbished site and the UK department doesn't do 
servers and they only have a handful of workstations all north of a grand.

I can see plenty of Rx10s on eBay that are in decent condition and noit 
silly money. I'll consider picking one up sometime.

-- 

Mark Benson