Requirements for a UNIX workstation?

[Greenthumb]

Hi there all.

I was wondering if someone here could tell me what the "requirements" for a UNIX workstation are.

So that means not the absolute minimum, but what you would want in an office if you would have to get like 50 workstations.

I need to know this for a school assignment, but have no idea what would be a good setup.

I have been reading the web for this, and come accross workstation with a 400Mhz processor, and 8 GB SCSI drives.

Is this normal?

Well thanks for all your help.

[jaclaz]

1) Do you mean UNIX or Linux (Linux Is Not UniX)?

2) As a general rule a lan server does NOT need computing power (fast processor) NOR a large amount of RAM memory (you do not need to run X or any other GUI video), but some might be neede.

The thing you need are:

- FAST disk access and transfer

- Storage capacity

- if possible a nice way to keep data as safe as possible (RAID disk system)

- if possible ability to change faulty disks without going off-line (RAID + Hotswap capability)

- if possible a nice way to back up data (Tape or MO storage)

- if possible a front panel indicating status/errors

THe above sums up as:

- Redundant power supplies

- VERY good cooling

- FAST SCSI RAID subsystem

Lan server hardware is generally speaking more reliable, more EXPENSIVE then "common" PC one, mainly due to the lesser volume of manufacturing.

Just as an example, browse a little bit here:

http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/prodserv/servers.html

http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers...s/index-ml.html

to see how processor and memory is not usually a problem.

jaclaz

[Greenthumb]

Well, this part of the assignment was to compare the requirements for a UNIX workstation and a Windows NT workstation.

The "company" for this would be supposed to be is something like a social security office, with about 300 employees.

Now for windows BT i have the following required setup:

-1,5 Ghz processor

-on-board sound

-on-board LAN

-64 MB GPU

-100 GB Harddrive

-Standard keyboard and mouse

-Dvd-rom drive and floppydrive

-512 Mb memory

So in other words, a standard miditower.

Now i have been looking around, but can't seem to find anything on workstations for UNIX, just servers.

So can UNIX be used on a workstation, or should i ask my teacher if they made a mistake and meant Linux?

[suryad]

http://www.netbsd.org/gallery/preinstalled.html

That is just one link if you are interested.

For the absolute lowest requirements I am not sure but a p3 500 mhz proc would do the job. You wont need scsi. Just any old pc should do the trick. I would not venture too far from a p3 however for performance reasons. Any hard drives work....basically if XP runs on something chances are UNIX will as well.

[jaclaz]

Sorry, I misread the question.

The reference to "50 workstations" led me to think you were wantng a PC to "serve" those 50 workstations, not the 50 workstations themselves.

Any PC on the market will fulfill your requirements.

Your requirements for windows NT (you sure NT, not 2k or XP?) are FAR too high.

As a rule of thumb you take what Microsoft says as a MINIMUM for memory and processor requirements and double it and have a "fairly working" PC, if you multiply them by four, you have a "jolly fastish" PC:

NT:

http://www.microsoft.com/ntworkstation/Pro...nts/default.asp

Win2k:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/profe...eqs/default.asp

XP:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/upg...ng/sysreqs.mspx

A workstation in an office (if connected to a LAN) does NOT need:

-100 GB Harddrive - a 40 Gb will be more than enough, you won't find smaller disks anymore

-Dvd-rom drive and floppydrive - newish machines do not use floppies at all, for the rare times you need it you can use an external USB floppy (WARNING:partially NOT compatible with NT, OK with Win2k and XP) - same with the CD/DVD drive, personally in an office like that I would make just a few workstations with a CD/DVD burner and se for all the others, when needed, an external USB unit

About UNIX:

1) Generally speaking, UNIX workstations DO NOT use a graphical windows, only Command Line Interface so their requirements will be MUCH less

2) There are so many UNIX versions that it is impossible, without knowing the EXACT version/release to tell the requirements

3) If the workstations are supposed to have a graphical interface, you can take as an example requirements of the Solaris OS for Intel processors, which is a form of UNIX with graphical interface

http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/specs.jsp

(apply the same x2 or x4 multipliers to memory/CPU speed)

About Linux:

Same considerations as per UNIX above.

In case of graphical interface, you can take requirements for the Fedora Linux:

http://bfn.org/~ch952/sysreqfed.html

Links to more:

http://bfn.org/~ch952/sysreq.html

jaclaz

[Greenthumb]

Wow, thank you very much for all this info.

I guess you are right about the PC for windows NT being over the top.

I will look into solaris, since i think this would be a good system for my assignment.

Have some cookies from me for your help .