[geeks] the biggest, baddest workstation...

[Lionel Peterson]

On May 13, 2009, at 7:16 PM, "Jonathan J. M. Katz" <jon at jonworld.com>  
wrote:

> What's the biggest, baddest workstation one can build these days?
>
> I figure 16 cores (4x4) in some shade of Intel Xeon or AMD Opteron.  
> Who sells 'em?
>
> Just curious...

I'd second SuperMicro, they sell workstation SuperServers with case,  
PS, and MB installed, but on an absolute scale of what's possible,  
they are likely pretty tame.

On a side note, I just downloaded a new BIOS for an older SuperMicro  
MB, a PDSGE, to handle 8 Gigs of RAM - the update was published in  
March of this year, but the MB is at least 5 years old. I was  
plesantly suprised they had a BIOS update so long after the board went  
off-market...

Truth be told, I think the BIOS has been around for a while, but in  
beta, until March of this year.

I just breathed new life into a dual-core Intel 930-based system with  
8 Giga of RAM ($100), and 4x hot-swap trays with a quiet (to me) power  
supply/cooling system...

It's really quite nice, and 8 gigs of RAM can make up for it being an  
older CPU family.

Lionel