The deal is that I can get a Dell PowerEdge SC430 server for a dirt cheap price - $398 delivered. The hardware is a P4 2.8Ghz Dual Core CPU, 256Mb RAM, 80Gb SATA HDD.

Now I want to buy this and use it for a bit of gaming / bit of home use. Obviously the RAM will need an upgrade and I'll have to get a PCI-X mobo but does anyone know how the Dual Core CPU & the whole server motherboard setup would perform?

Edit: Box comes with 3xPCI-X slots upto 8x

wth, give me one

Clicky

Offer ends today though!

And leads me to the next question, whats a semi-decent PCIX video card that wont break budget .. thinking about $200-300, something that can play the odd bit of WoW or ET.

And if they end up being a 16x PCIX will it drop back to running at 8x?

man, ever so tempting to get one to replace my old p3 1ghz linux box :/

If i had some cash i'd definately get one to replace my machine.

Dell often has sales like this to clear out old stock, so you can always just wait till the next one :0

Umart pricing on something equivalent;

$110 - Antec ATX Mini-tower case
$309 - Intel P4 2.8Ghz Dual Core CPU
$148 - Intel mobo
$79 - Seagate SATA 80Gb HDD
$60 - Estimate on 256Mb RAM .. not alot listed on the site

do it trog, i did

edit tard

last edited by jmr at 15:09:20 30/Mar/06

Albatron 128MDDR PC6600GT PCI Express Video
Internet Price: $185.00
Retail Price: $195.00

im not really to up to date on video cards but this looks pretty good.


also for and extra $50 you can get that server with a 160gb hdd


edit: that price is from umart

last edited by d[o_0]b at 15:02:47 30/Mar/06

wonder if you have to use ECC in it?

wonder if you have to use ECC in it?

it uses the E7230 Chipset also seems you do need ECC on it a whrilpool Thread about the system.

last edited by 0z at 18:15:45 30/Mar/06

Welcome to the SC430 party. You are late.

Current $398 deal with Dell expires today, but they've been running similar deals since January so it may be renewed

It's not really a box that can be used for gaming, but it makes a very powerful server/general browser box

It takes DDR2 ECC *UNBUFFERED* memory, generally in pairs. Don't make the same mistake i did of buying buffered ram, get the stuff nintek is selling with a new shipment in next week $430 for 2GB certified for the SC430

Everything you could want to know about this box is in the Whirlpool Dell SC430 FAQ or in the 40+ page threads on Whirlpool and OCAU.

In brief summary:

It's a 2.8GHZ Pentium D, which is dual core 64 bit. Only 2 PCI ports, DDR2 ECC Ram, 7 USB, No firewire or Sound, 1x IDC, 2x Sata, pretty much non-standard powerconnector and box, and the options on additional video cards are either s*** or very expensive. It's a server, forget games. Dell doesn't support it running windows XP (and you have to use Win2k3 drivers). Basically at $398 delivered you aren't paying very much more for the whole system than you are for the CPU itself from the cheapest online retailers ($305 acc staticice last week).

If anyone has any questions not covered by the FAQ or need quiker answers fire away. Myself and close to everyone at my work has bought at least one of these in the last four weeks or so :-)

last edited by natslovR at 18:56:51 30/Mar/06

Thanks nats, glad I saw that before buying one..

i hope my description didn't put anyone off. they are awesome boxes. basically it's cheaper to buy this box than to buy the chip itself from most retailers

as a net browser/whatever for your gf, if she already has a POS box then this is hard to pass up, plus you can run vmware/virtual-server on it for your domain or whatever.

it's pretty damn awesome.

and being a dell server, it's tested and laid out really nicely. once i get my 2gb installed from nintek i'll be installing win2k3-64 on it and checking that out properly.

They have renewed the deal. Same thing same <$400 price.

That is cool, I am very tempted to get one. I have a Linux box which has sat there rock solid running as my firewall/gateway for more than three years and I'd feel bad replacing it just because of a good deal though :)

The Dell disk comes with all the drivers and s*** you need for Redhat and some other distro too.

It can be a bit tricky to find on their site so here's a link. Workmate that bought one Thursday night got the 3 year warranty added on for slightly under $90, and the $160GB sata is less than $50 extra (i.e. 80gb more for $50)

The specs on that link page say it has the intel 16MB onboard video, which is supposedly slightly better than the one in my box.