[Bioclusters] Setting up a small cluster

[Malay Kumar Basu]

Hellow Cluster gurus:

I have finalized the following for my small cluster. See whether you can 
find and flaw in it. I would appreciate any comments for improvement of 
configuration without streching my budget.

Please ignore the "show prices" comments. They are for my vendor only. I 
had to go for Intel P4 not Athlon. It turns out that in India Athlon 
support is very rudimentary. Tyan motherboards are almost impossible to 
lay hands on.

# Master Node
==================================
1. Intel SE7505VB2 Motherboard with dual Xeon processor (>=2.8Ghz, 512 
L2 cache 800/533 FSB)
	
	* Show prices of followings:
	Xeon 2.4 MHz 512L2 800 FSB
	Xeon 2.4 MHz 512 L2 533 FSB
	Xeon 2.8 MHz 512 L2 800 FSB
	Xeon 2.8 MHz 512 L2 533 FSB

2. Adaptec 2020S Ultra 320 SCSI RAID controller

3. 36 GB x 3 SCSI Ultra 320 hard drive (>=7200 rpm)(Seagate chetaah)

4. 2 ( 1GB x 2 DIMM) GB ECC registered DDR 266 SDRAM. This is a dual
	channel RAM board. Use only compatible DIMMs
	Check http://support.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/se7505vb2

5. ATI Raidon 9000 64 MB AGP graphics card

6. 1 CDRW drive

7. 1 CDROM drive

8. 1 floppy drive

9. Evercase/Chenbro/AIC/CiDesign/MaCase - 4U Rack mounted chasis or Mid 
/ Full  tower.
	Should support 2 x 5 inch bay and one 3.5 inch bay and 5 internal drives.
	No Hot swap. Single power supply. See power supply compatibility.
	check
 
http://support.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/se7505vb2/chassis_list.htm
	Get the cheapest one

#4 computing nodes
==============================
1. Intel S875WP1-E motherboard

2. One Intel P4 2.4 Gz 512 L2 cache with 533FSB

3. 1 GB (2 x 512) PC2700 (333MHz) or PC2100 (266MHz) ECC DDR SDRAM
	attached for dual channel.

4. 1 floppy drive.

5  1 x 20-40 GB Ultra ATA hard drive Seagate Barracuda >=7200 rpm

9. Evercase/Chenbro/AIC/CiDesign/MaCase - 4U or less Rack mounted chasis.
	Should support one internal drive and one 3.5 inch bay
	No Hot swap. Single power supply. See power supply compatibility.
	Check
	http://support.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/s875wp1-e/chassis_list.htm
	Get the cheapest one

# One 8 port KVM capable of SVGA display (Dlink DKVM-8E)  with 5 cables

# One 8 port full duplex gigabit switch (3com/d-link)
	DLINK  DGS-1008T

# Viewsonic P75f+B or P95f+B or G90fb 17"/19" monitor (black cabinet)
	Show prices for all monitors
   	
# 50 meters CAT5e cable certified for Gigabit ethernet with RJ45 gigabit 
certified connectors (12 nos)
	GigA cable from D-link

# One Keyboard PS/2 104 key IBM 31P7415 stealth black ( or can be of any 
good make)

# One optical  3 button PS/2 mouse Logitech Mouseman


-Malay

Malay K Basu Ph.D.
curiouser@ccmb.res.in