Archive for February, 2009
DIY 16 core workstation part 1: The motherboard
Posted by Ivan Bohannon in Computer Builds on February 17th, 2009
TYAN S4980G2NR
I love virtual machines. Unfortunately running lots of them on one server can get very expensive. A 16-core Dell PowerEdge R905 for example, will set you back about 12 grand (without OS). So I set out to try and build my own system for less – and I’ve succeeded!
About a month ago I was doing random motherboard searches on NewEgg and I found exactly ONE quad socket motherboard for sale: the TYAN S4980G2NR Quad 1207(F) NVIDIA nForce Professional 3600 Extended ATX Server Motherboard.
The only catch (for me) was that this motherboard used AMD Opteron cpus, and I knew nothing about them. But there are no Xeon quad socket motherboards readily available, so AMD it is. Theres alot of backstory on the Opteron / Xeon battle for market domination, but really it doesn’t matter if you can’t find quad socket Intel Xeon motherboards. So AMD wins the 16 core workstation battle for now.
Anyways… The Tyan S4980 sells for around $400. Tyan has a good reputation, and they have all of the manuals online. Also I can vouch for this motherboard, since I’ve built my 16 core workstation with it.
16 CPUs in Task Manager
Affordable inkjet printing
Posted by Ivan Bohannon in Desktop Printing on February 8th, 2009
You realize how expensive printing is when you have to buy new ink. So I decided to figure out what it costs per page to print in color and black and white.
I assumed that laser printing would be the most cost effective way to print, since the toner cartridges can usually print thousands of pages and cost less than $100.
So lets look at laser printing and see how much one solution actually costs per page. The HP LaserJet P1006 costs about $99 and it prints 17 pages per minute. The replacement toner cartridge is the $68 HP35A (CB435A), and HP says it has a 1500 page yield. So that comes out to costing us 4.5 cents per page ($68 / 1500) . Of course the big catch with this printer is that it can’t print color.
For Color and some nice “All-In-One” features like scanning, fax and photocopying, the HP Photosmart C4480 All-in-One is a good value. Its only $99. If you buy the HP 74XL Inkjets, you can get your per page cost down to 4.6 cents. ($35/ 750)
OEM HP 74 (CB335WN) Black Ink Cartridge $15 for 200 pages. (7.5 cents a page)
OEM HP 74XL (CB336WN) Black Ink Cartridge $35 for 750 pages. (4.6 cents a page).
OEM HP 75 (CB337WN) Color Ink Cartridge $20 for 170 pages (11.7 cents a page)
OEM HP 75XL (CB338WN) Color Ink Cartridge $40 for 520 pages (7.5 cents a page)
Ok so color printing is expensive part, which makes sense because those color cartridges are actually 3 ink tanks in one.
But the great thing about the HP 74/75 cartridges is that you can get them refilled at places like Cartridge World, or you can simply buy them refilled online at your favorite inkjet website.
I was quoted around $20 for a refilled 74XL cartridge at Cartridge World — that brings the price down to 2.6 cents a page.
So let me summarize: Look for a decent HP printer that takes the HP 74/75 cartridges, make sure to buy the large “XL” size cartridges, and you can get your combined average color & bw printing down to about 5 cents a page.
