New Computer

[Thomas Droege <tdroege2@earthlink.net>]

I am still thinking about a new computer.

I presently run most of the data through a Tyan Thundersomething with 1 GB
memory and two 1500 AMD (Athelon?) processors.  This takes about 12 hours
to process two systems' data for one night.  I have a third somewhat slower
computer where I process the third system.  It takes about 18 hours to
finish a summer evenings' run.  I am looking forward to fall when I should
be getting a lot more data.  Not so for winter as it is usually cloudy
here.  A good night could take more than 24 hours to process and several
good nights in a row would overrun my buffer capacity.  No, more disks will
not really help much.  I need the clear the decks before the next data
comes in.  

I am considering a Tyan Tiger MPX system.  I am interested in suggestions. 
Particularly I want to here that you have run Mandrake linux on anything
suggested.  The Mandrake web site lists the Tyan Tiger as qualified to run
9.1.  I have been bit several times buying computers not on the Mandrake
list which would not run Mandrake linux.  Well I am sure the problems are
small, just a kernel patch or two for you experts.  I need something that
runs out of the box.

The code does not take advantage of multi-processors.  So one feature of
the extra processor is that I can muck around while the pipeline is running
without slowing things down.  I believe the pipeline is mostly compute
bound.  It also does not appear to use a lot of memory.  At least that is
what "top" indicates. Michael might comment as he knows best what the
pipeline uses.   I plan to buy relatively large disks, but would like to
hear arguments as to why I need a lot of memory.  I was thinking of 1GByte.
(Sigh!  Now 1Gbyte is not a big memory.  When I was spending millions on
DEC computers, I doubt if they had strung a GByte of cores.)

I have been searching Price Watch for the best places to deal.  I would be
interested in anyone with recent experience buying dual CPU machines.

This processor might eventually end up as an "image server" if Doug Welch's
project works out.  

Tom Droege