Jay Gaulard Blog

A New Computer - What Should I Get?

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

This one is for those people out there who know about computers. When people are searching for a new computer, they usually ask me what to get. I say something like, “I design websites, what the heck do I know about computers?” That usually gets some mean look and the person walks away. I haven’t been known for my bright attitude at times.

Well, I usually do ok, but I am getting a little tired of buying computers. I want my next one to last. I bought the one I am working on about 6 months ago. I am going to keep this one for something, but I need a monster. Here is the issue…I work with tons of files. One of my sites has 59,000 image files that I need to copy/paste, delete, move, whatever. That’s just one example. I also have very large files that I need to open/close, etc… My problem isn’t the need for processor power to run huge applications or for gaming, I just need something for big, and lots of files. Uploads and downloads are my middle names. I have been working on getting the fastest servers available and now my bottleneck has become my PC.

Here is what I am thinking:

- Dell Precision T7400 Workstation
- Quad Core Intel® Xeon® Processor E5405 (2.00GHz,2X6M L2,1333) (Do I need a 2nd processor?)
- Genuine Windows Vista® Business, with Media (I’m willing to move on from XP. Plus, Vista actually puts the computer in sleep mode, like I never got XP to do. Big power savings.)
- 3 Year ProSupport for End Users and 3 Year NBD On-site Service (This is important because I want someone in this house if the computer breaks.)
- 256MB PCIe x16 nVidia NVS 290, Dual Monitor DVI Capable ( I know absolutely nothing about video cards.)
- 4GB, DDR2 SDRAM FBD Memory, 667MHz, ECC (4 DIMMS) (I want more.)
- C23 All SAS drives, RAID 5, 3 drive total configuration ( I also know nothing about RAID. I basically want the speed of SAS drives, the speed of two drives working together and the redundancy of a third drive. I don’t know the difference between RAID 0 and RAID 5.)
- Three 146GB SAS Hard Drives, 1 inch (15,000 rpm) (How much faster are SAS drives than SATA drives?)
- PERC6/i SAS/SATA Hardware RAID Card - For Connecting Internal Hard Drives
- Dell 1505 Wireless-N PCIe Card

So there you have it. I already have a monitor, so that’s cool. I think I can save a few bucks by switching out the SAS drives for SATA drives. It depends on what I find out about them. I want more RAM, but didn’t see the option for more. I am wondering about another processor and the video card.

Well, any advice? Am I missing anything?

Open Source, Ubuntu, Windows Vista and Gmail

Thursday, December 27th, 2007

The Flexibility of Open Source

One of the things that has been a strong point of Open Source Software (OSS) for years, even if it hasn’t been held at the forefront of the battle, is the flexibility that OSS offers.

The Economist: Ubuntu is the source of Linux’s rise

The Economist makes three technology predictions for 2008, two of which concern web surfing and the third of which concerns everyone, whether they surf the web or not. The Economist’s third prediction is that the technology world will open up:

Windows Vista Service Pack 1 RC1 vs. Shipping Vista

Microsoft just rolled out the first publicly available release candidate for SP1 of Windows Vista, and we snapped it up, eager to see if it’s faster than the currently shipping version of Vista. To test its speed, we ran a series of benchmarks on exactly the same machine, first with the original version of Vista, and then with the RC of SP1

2007 In Numbers: More People Using Yahoo Mail Than Gmail

Suprising but True …. at least according to this research….

Top 20 Linux Apps for 2007

It seems like every blog on the internet has one of these, so here’s my picks for the top 20 Linux applications. I’ll be covering programs from all different categories that I think stand out and shine as true wonders of Linux and will be presented in no particular order.

Adobe Photoshop CS3 Received and Installed

Monday, December 17th, 2007

The UPS man just handed me a little package…Adobe Photoshop CS3. That was very nice of him.

I am trying to upgrade most of my software before the end of the year. I have been doing a pretty good job of it. I just installed the program and resized one photo and used some filters. Everything seems pretty similar to my old version, which is nice. I am sure there are loads of new features…most of which I will never use. The reason why this upgrade is nice is because it works well with Windows Vista. My last version came out way before Windows Vista did, but it still worked. I figure this new version will do me just fine for about another ten years.

Recent Windows Update

Saturday, November 17th, 2007

I run Windows Vista. It’s ok. I am not the kind of guy who goes nuts over operating systems out there. I am sure there are some great features with other ones, but I needed a computer because I have work to do.

I have been pretty happy with Windows Vista, although there are some strange things that never seem to work correctly, like ActiveSync. I am not sure why Microsoft can’t seem to get this right. I am running a Microsoft operating system and running Windows Mobile on my PDA. Why is it that I have to break the relationship every so often, because the phone refuses to sync with the computer? I have no idea.

Recently, I purchased Outlook 2007 and installed it. At about the same time, my computer restarted itself to finish installing the most recent updates. Ever since then, whenever the computer goes into sleep mode, I can’t wake it up by shaking the mouse. I used to be able to do this. Now, I have to give the power button a quick push to wake it up. That’s fine, but what happened?

It just puzzles me that it is always a guessing game with what’s going to happen when I install some software or update existing software made by the same people.