20040220: specs for functional PC machine to run all Unidata apps

>From: Unidata User Support <address@hidden>
>Organization: Unidata Program Center/UCAR
>Keywords: platforms

Hi Clint,

First, how come you can't stay up in the face of a power outage ;-)

Next, Mike Schmidt asked me to forward the specs for a computer I
put together for the Universidad de Costa Rica.  The machine I
assembled from low cost parts was used at the Seattle AMS meeting
to ingest all of the data available in the IDD; decode it into
both GEMPAK and McIDAS formats (natch), and simultaneously run
GEMPAK, McIDAS, and the IDV.  Here are the specs:

Dual Athlon MP 2600+, 320 GB ATA 133 RAID, 80 GB ATA 133 system, etc.

Qt Part                                 Price Vendor                  Shipping
--+------------------------------------+-----+-----------------------+--------
2  AMD MP 2600 w/fans                   $376  SpartanTechnologies     incl.
3  Samsung 1 GB ECC REG 2100 DDR        $630  AC Micro                incl.
2  Samsung 160GB 7200RPM 8 MB SP1614N   $236  Monarchcomputer.com     $11
1  Tyan Tiger 760 MPX S2466N-4M         $187  Monarchcomputer.com     $6
1  Antec Full-T case w/400W SX1040BII   $ 80  Newegg.com              $19
1  GeForce Ti4200 128MB 8X AGP          $ 88  House of Computers      $13
1  Samsung 80GB 7200rpm 8MB SP0802N     $ 74  Monarchcomputer.com     free
1  Promise FastTrak S150 TX2+ RAID      $ 59  Monarchcomputer.com     incl.
2  3COM 3C905B-TX 10/100 PCI            $ 24  Safeshopper.com         $36
1  Samsung 40x12x40 EIDE CD-RW 8MB      $ 30  MicroTech Computers.com free
1  Creative Labs Audio-PCI Sound CT5200 $ 10  Safeshopper.com         incl.
1  Sony 3.5 1.44MB Floppy Disk          $ 10  Acortech.com            $3
1  Microsoft Inernet Keyboard PS2 OEM   $ 10  Acortech.com            free
1  Microsoft Intelliwheel optical mouse $  8  Acortech.com            free
2  CompUSA 80mm BallBearing Case Fan    $ 16  CompUSA                 1.22
   RG-6/U coax cable & fittings         $ 12  J.B. Saunders           1.79
-                                       ----                          ----
                                        1822                          88
Total: $1910

The system is overkill for a simple IDD node, but is nice for a site
that wants to experiment with getting a lot of data and keeping a
reasonable amount of it online.  You will note that the list above does
not include a monitor.  I would recommend purchasing a 19" LCD display
since it offers a large enough display without running the price up too
much (expect to pay about $600 for a decent 19" LCD display).

The next iteration of this machine will probably see:

- faster processors (AMD 2800+ or faster)
- more disk in the RAID (probably 0.5 TB)

I loaded the server with the freely available Fedora Core 1 version of
Linux that is available from www.redhat.com and have had good success
using to run the LDM, decoders, and all display applications.  I have
to quickly add, however, that we have been having problems with other
machines running Fedora Core 1 that seem to be related to NFS and/or
the automounter.  Yesterday, we finished loading Fedora Core 2 on a
system that is virtually identical to the one detailed above; we will
be testing the NFS/automounter viability on it over the next
days/weeks.

Cheers,

Tom