As I finish up the third day of frustrating testing with the Netgear WNR 3500 Wireless-N Gigabit router, I’ve come to a simple realization: There just aren’t enough channels at 2.4 Ghz to make 300 Mbps wireless N work.

Wireless-G has 11 channels (conveniently numbered 1 thru 11). There does seem to be a bit of a bleed into adjacent channels, so if your neighbor has a router at channel 6, you may not be able to set yours to channel 5 or 7 and get reliable connections.

Wireless N gets to 300 Mbps by combining 4 adjacent channels into one big, fast 300 Mbps channel. So the channel options become more limited:
Channels 1 – 4, 2 – 5, 3 – 6, 4 to 7, 5 to 8, 6 to 10, and 7 to 11. So there are only 7 possible choices.

But where it gets difficult is if you have neighbors or interference in any of the 802.11 channels. If channel 3 is being used by a neighbor, then you only have 2 choices:
6-10 or 7-10.

If you have a neighbor on channel 3 and a neighbor on channel 7, then you don’t have any choices, aside from upgrading to dual-band wireless N, which will give you channels and 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz.

Kingston 1GB DDR2 ECC REG.

-Continued from Part 2-

It was a little tricky finding the right memory for the Tyan S4980 motherboard. You have to make sure that you use ECC, Registered DDR2 DIMMs  400, 533 or 667 Mhz. If you buy memory that doesn’t say ECC and REGISTERED on the box it won’t work.  You can use 1GB, 2GB or 4gB DIMMs, and you MUST install at least 2 DIMMs per CPU. Here’s a few part numbers I know work in the motherboard:

1GB $18.49 Kingston 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Server Memory Model KVR667D2D8P5/1G

2GB $30.99 Kingston 2GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Server Memory Model KVR667D2D8P5/2G

4GB $84.99 Kingston 4GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Server Memory Model KVR667D2D4P5/4G

Heatsinks:

You have lots of options here, and a few snags.  Since the CPU’s are spaced fairly close to each other, you will need compact ones.  The 2U case fan cooled heat sinks fit nicely.  The snag: there are 4″ and 3.5″ pitch versions. This is basically how far apart the mounting screws are spaced. The Tyan S4980 motherboard needs the 3.5″ pitch ones. See all figured out for you! Here are some good choices.

1. Dynatron F558 77mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler – Retail – $32.99

This CPU cooler comes with an unnecessary CPU support plate – the S4980 comes with them pre-installed. This is the one I purchased. Its noisy at full speed.  This one won’t work in 2U cases.

2.  Dynatron F661 60mm 2xBall CPU Cooler $24

This CPU is quieter on paper, doesn’t come with the CPU support plate, and its $9 cheaper. I should have bought this one. This one does work in 2U cases.

AMD Opteron 8347

As you read in part 1, we are building an AMD 16 core workstation, so we need to find four Opteron quad core processors.

Our Tyan S4980 motherboard only supports AMD “Barcelona” Opterons.  Barcelona’s have two main product lines: the 23XX and 83XX. We want to avoid the 23XX for this build, because those quad core CPUs only support two in a single motherboard. Nice little hitch to avoid.

Note: AMD is now shipping “Shanghai” Opterons. These processors are faster, better  (more expensive)  and they don’t work in the Tyan S4980 motherboard we are using. Unfortunately, the Shanghai Opterons have the same 23XX and 83XX numbering scheme, so one more little caveat to be aware of.

8347 (1.9Ghz),  8350 (2 Ghz), 8354 (2.2 Ghz) , 8356 (2.4 Ghz) , 8358 (2.5 Ghz) , 8360 (2.6 Ghz).

There are also two high efficiency versions (these use 55W instead of 75W) of these chips which work just fine: 8346 HE (1.8 Ghz) and the 8347 HE (1.9 Ghz) . I used four 8347 HE in my build.

The least expensive Quad core opteron on New Egg is the 8346 HE. it runs $549 for the OEM packaging, which does NOT include any cooling.

Another option is to shop eBay for these cpu’s, you can find them for much less, but make sure to buy the right part numbers.

Oh before I forget..One last detail, make sure to use four identical CPUs. I don’t know if you can mix 8347 and 8347HE on the same motherboard. Good Luck!

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

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.

Western Digital MyBook 2TB NAS

This is a great looking product,  extremely easy to use, holds a massive amount of files, and its one of the cheapest Network Attached Storage (NAS) products you can buy.

Unfortunately, its performance is TERRIBLE.   The average new SATA hard drive in your desktop PC can write files at around 60 MB/s  (60 megabytes a second), or a 5GB file in about 2 minutes.  The MyBook World Edition can only write files at around 5 MB/s so that same 5GB file would take 17 minutes.  I don’t understand why this product would be more than 10 times slower than a regular hard drive. Heck the Buffalo 1TB external USB hard drive I reviewed last month  writes files at 25 MB/s – five times faster than the MyBook.

The MyBook has a Gigabit Ethernet port, which has a max rate of 125 MB/s, it also has TWO internal hard drives, that we know should be able to do 60 MB/s (assuming they are SATA drives, which they probably are). So WHY is this drive so dang slow?

I checked to see if I could reformat the hard drive to make it RAID 0 striped, hoping to improve the performance. Unfortunately the MyBook only offers Raid 1 (redundant data) or drive spanning.  So ultimately, because of the bad performance this product is unacceptable.  I’m planning on continuing my investigations into NAS products to see if I can find  something that actually comes close to maxing out Gigabit Ethernet.  I know nothing on the box said “Its really fast!” but I can’t help but feel a little misled.

Today I gave up waiting for a hardware to show up and called them on my day off. After 38 minutes of hold music I finally got to speak with someone in customer service. The first thing they told me was that one screen in there computer said I had received the hardware, and another screen said I hadn’t. Then she said she would get the hardware right out to me. I told her NO THANK YOU!  So in two days the DSL service I never got to use will get disconnected.

Netgear WNR 3500

This router is the main ingredient of the fastest wireless performance I have ever seen. A few weeks ago I wrote about getting 70 Mbps with the Trendnet TEW-624UB and this router.
What I wanted to know however, was how well this router does with other wireless adapters, and how fast. So I assembled the following assortment of wireless products and put the WNR 3500 through its paces:

1. Trendnet TEW-624UB Rev A (USB)
2. Linksys WUSB100 (USB)
3. Netgear WN511T (PC-CARD)
4. Linksys Wireless-G PCI (plain vanilla wireless G)
5. Trendnet TEW-624UB Rev B (USB)
6. Linksys WUSB600N (USB)

Let me make this quick and painless: There are 3 modes you can configure the WNR 3500 to: 300 Mbps, 144 Mbps, and 54 Mbps. If you want to get the claimed 300 Mbps you have to set it for that mode. If you do that, the ONLY adapter I could get this router to work consistently with is the Trendnet TEW.

Thats right, the only 2 adapters of the 6 I listed that work AT ALL in 300 Mbps mode are the Trendnet adapters.

The same was true in 144 Mbps mode. Only the trendnet adapters worked reliably enough to do any performance testing.

In plain old 54 Mbps mode, this product worked well with all of the test adapters. So there it is.

My theory: Too many varieties of Draft Standard N products are floating around.

The pathetic part is that even the Netgear WN511T, which is the recommended USB adapter on the back of the Netgear WNR 3500 box didnt work in 300 Mbps mode. Now it could be interference, but I would remove the other adapters, and plug in the Trendnet adapter, and every time it would work perfectly. So if it is some interference problem, the Trendnet is able to deal with it, and the other products can’t. So either way this is ugly for Netgear.

The one key thing to note, is that the WNR 3500 is 2.4 Ghz only. And that dovetails into another theory: 2.4 Ghz is ruined. It’s just too crowded with wireless phones, microwaves, baby monitors, your neighbors wireless routers, etc. 2.4 Ghz is a mess. In some places your lucky to get 54 Mbps working, and 54 Mbps only requires 1 channel. 300 Mbps requires 5 channels. So good luck with that.

I think if you want your own safe and uncrowded place for wireless networking, your going to have to get Dual-Band wireless N products. So even if this router is great, and the other non-Trendnet adapters are just shoddy, you really want a product that can go fast AND slow. Dual Band routers promise to do that, you can configure a 54 Mbps compatible 2.4 Ghz band (and only take up 1 channel), and then configure the 5 Ghz to be 300 Mbps. At least until all your neighbors upgrade to 5 Ghz.

Good luck and happy networking.