Hi
1. Mac vs. Linux (which flavor?) vs. Windows
Ubuntu - just works(TM). Gentoo - install only if know vi :-)
2. Graphics cards
any NV quadro series. Buy at least one year old card so that linux will
have drivers. Intel integrated cards also work well and have good
drivers (Coot/ono shows good performance if you have > 1.5GB system RAM).
3. Displays
Budget dependent.
4. Processors - multiple processors, multiple cores? Speed?
I would suggest a quad core Xeon or Opteron (with Debian - you need rock
solid) that will be a workhorse (where I put images also) to do
refinement jobs that users can ssh -X into. make sure the directories in
the remote machine are available for exports via NFS/autofs.
For local workstations (use ubuntu to get the bling) any AMD/Intel Core2
series would be OK (that way my office would be quiet and cool). Even I
can hibernate to save power.
Regards,
Karthik
About half of what I do involves ~1.0 A X-ray structures - data
processing, rebuilding in Coot, refinement, and so forth - so my
current desktop (Optiplex GX745, Radeon X1300) machine drags on
graphics sometimes. I don't seem to need stereo these days, for what
it's worth.
Anybody have suggestions or specs they'd like to share? Thanks in
anticipation of your advice.
Regards,
Anna Gardberg
My workstations and data servers:
1. Linux (Fedora Core 8, currently, as this distro is well supported in
xtallography circles--I'm tempted to try Ubuntu next upgrade cycle)
2. If stereo is not an issue, any 8000 or 9000 series GeForce NVidia
card is fine. I avoid ATI because of flaky Linux drivers. The 9600GT
Nvidia is a bargain, but an 8600 is OK, too.
3. I use a 24" Samsung LCD display. You need CRTs only if doing stereo,
but then you would need a really expensive Quadro card with stereo outputs.
4. Quad cores are so cheap right now, there is no reason not to go this
route.
I built my workstations from really cheap Intel DG35EC boards with Intel
Q9300 processors. 250Gbyte drive for the OS and programs, and a 400
Gbyte drive for data, all SATA-300. I loaded up with a memory card
reader, SATA DVD-writer, and packaged it all up in a tiny cubical
micro-ATX box. You can build the whole workstation for under $1500,
including the LCD monitor. My data and backup servers are installed on
junk machines salvaged from offices and labs. Anything with a Pentium 4
is fast enough to be a data or backup server. The nice thing about
building your own computer is when it comes time for an upgrade, you can
save many of the parts (case, power supply, DVD writer, etc.) and just
upgrade the motherboard, CPU, and maybe the hard drives.
