Need Workstation Advice

[halb]

I have an opportunity to get at about one-half price one of two very slightly used Dell Precision 5400 workstations. Both have the new Intel Xeon 5400 series, 45nm quad processors. One has the E5450 3GHz cpu and 4GB of ECC memory. The other has the E5430, 2.66 GHz cpu and 8GB of ECC memory. They both have high speed hard drives and decent, entry level nVidia Quadro graphics boards. They are both running XP Pro with x64 for the 8GB one.. The price is about the same for either, and it is high enough that I cannot afford to upgrade the 5450 machine to 8GB anytime soon.

The workstation will be used primarily for heavy-duty multitasking, for example in an extreme but actual case, Photoshop, Word, Powerpoint, Acrobat Pro, a web browser and a couple smaller programs such as MathType, email and a dictionary all up at the same time.

I have looked at a lot of performance comparisons, but am still very uncertain which will be the better match for the type of work that I do although I am leaning toward the one with 8GB. Also, I tend to change to a new machine only every few years but I do upgrade what I have as prices drop on components. Maybe in a year or two I could afford more memory or a second processor.

I really do need some guidance, and any advice will be greatly appreciated.

halb

[jcarle]

Due to the sheer price of ECC memory, I'd get the 8GB version if you can afford it.

[nmX.Memnoch]

If the prices are that close definitely go with the 8GB model. The reason I say that is not only do they use more expensive ECC memory, but the current line of Precision workstations also use FB-DIMMs, which adds yet another price premium to the memory cost.

I can say with certainty though that you will love the machine. I'm currently typing this on a Precision 490 w/ Dual Xeon 5160 3GHz, 4GB FB-DIMMs, 2x250GB SATA RAID1 and a Quadro FX 4600 768MB video card. The build quality of the case is top notch, the machine is very stable and performance is through the roof.