[K12OSN] Saving money on memory

[Timothy Legge]

Bill Bardon wrote:
> I am in the process of spec'ing a K12LTSP server.  Currently looking at
> the Dell PowerEdge SC1420.  Getting enough RAM in this thing is
> expensive!  If I get it from Dell, 4GB of ECC memory will cost me almost
> $1500, more than the server itself!  I've tried other penguin-friendly
> vendors and they are at least as much, or more.
> 
> I assume I can't substitute non-ECC memory and order it from somewhere
> else.  I've seen 1GB non-ECC DIMMs at memory4less.com for $140, giving
> me a total of just $560 for RAM.  I don't think using non-ECC will work,
> though.

It really depend on the processor/board.  As I have seen it a basic rule 
of thumb might be that server boards/cpus require ECC Registered ram.

That is based on the sumtotal of two boards (one dual ASUS board with 
Xeon cpu and one Tyan dual Opteron based board) so it is hardly gospel. 
  If you put anything other than ECC registered ram in the board (and I 
did) they will just beep at you.

AMD and Tyan are both very good Linux/Open Source sponsors and well 
worth considering.  For the price you are quoting it will be tight.  I 
went to http://www.shoprbc.com (currently my favourite online Canadian 
retailer) and priced out a dual opteron.  These prices are *Canadian* 
but total 2,600 USD):

4 GB Kingston ValueRam (4x1GB) PC2100 ECC DDR Memory 		$1164.00
2 Maxtor Atlas 10KV 73.5GB U320 SCSI Hard Drive, 68-Pin 	$830.00
AMD Opteron DP Server Model 242 Processor, Retail 		$506.00
Tyan Thunder Dual Opteron MB w/Video/2GBLan/SATA/RAID/SCSI 	$741.00

Add on a case and it is a very capable machine but it still blows your 
budget.  Dropping back to a single CPU would save some money as would 
SATA drives.

Good luck

Tim