Building a batch of Gaming machines

po0k

I and a few others are trying to hammer out the specs for 16 gaming machines and a server.

Looking something like this so far:
*1.6GHz A Northwood P4
256MB minimum PC3200/2700 DDR, CAS2/2.5
*decent motherboard - Abit or Asus or something - tied in with CPU choice
GeForce4 Ti4200 128Mb DDR, DVI, TVOut
SB Audigy I suppose - though decent onboard sound would be fine too.
17/19" monitors - decent, have to last for a quite a while.
24x/12x/40x minimum CDRW Drives
40gig minimum 7200rpm UDMA133 drive
92mm Pabst fans all round - machines have to be quiet enough
100Mbit Nics - looking at 3Com 905C-TX-Ms
anyone care to reccomend a deceent keyboard model? Are Cherry still around?
May have to go for cheapo mice, cos they have the tendency to sprout legs.
~350W PSU - decent reliable power supply is important
Good, easy to work in case, with fan mounts - looking at some Antec ones....
Surge+Spike protected power strip

Server - are they doing dual P4s yet?
Might go Athlon MP route, but I've heard they're not th best.
Might just get 2.2Ghz P4, 512 or a gig or ram, more storgae and a ****e graphics card, say a second hand matrox for video quality.

A 24-port 100Mbit switch I think I can provide myself.

This is only preliminary

Gerry

I reckon you should go for optical mice, ( lack of cleaning ). If you reckon they will walk, look at some way of securing the mouse connector to the back of the machine.

If each machine doesn't have a 5 speaker setup, do they really need an audigy? I don't think so. Get an sb128 or an sblive value or something.

Do they all really need cdrw drives?

Don't go overboard on the psu, a decent quality ( non codegen ) should be fine. If you can find a 300w antec you are sorted.

I don't think the graphics card needs tv out, but I suppose they all come with it these days.

Personally I'd pare down the spec as above, and make sure that you get 17" or 19" trinitron monitors.

For a server, I'd go for a dual p3 tualatin 1.2 - 1.53 ghz 512k machine.

Could go for a dual xeon either, motherboard is main cost (chips are only about 10-15% dearer).

Grand_Izer

This sound rather trivial, but you can't go wrong with a couple of decent anti-glare screens as well. If anything, they may protect the monitor from fingerprints and the usual grime/spills etc...

po0k

Yeah, it needs a bit por revision.
We have about €35k to play with, and I was giving ball park figures last night, reckon we could do it for €25, making us look good

The monitors would have to be good allright. CRT too.
TFT are uesless for games, and I just don't trust them.
19" trinitron/flatscreen that can do 100Hz at 1200xwhatever should be fine. Might be able to get bulk orders too
They'd most likely have headphones.
If we're going for optical mice, I have a good relationship with my logi dual optical at home, and I'd reccomend them. The MS ones are a bit bulky for the desk space.

The burner drives are needed, because there are bock all of them in the college and they'd get good use, bringing in revenue.
They'd be extremely handy if we can link it to our compsoc server too
Just while I'm thinking of this, a 250meg Zip drive would be very handy too.
There's a zip drive in every Computer services lab, so some people have them at home allready.
Buying in bulk gets us a bit of a discount, and having them in every machine means you don't have to scrambele to get a certain machine.
Good, secure cases are needed too. Midi tower size though, as I'm guessing they'll be on the desk beside the monitor or under the desk ie: we won't have them all stacked in a room out the back with long cables running everywhere giving shíte signals to the desktop equi[ment.
Storage space is another area that cold be beefed up, and maybe ram.
The TV-out (or VIVO maybe) could be handy if someone wants to do a bit of light video editing/putting a home video on CD, and adds little cost to the card per machine for the chance of the extra revenue.
I don't think there's anywhere in galway that'd give this kind of service.
The internet connection is an area we have to hammer out.
DSL is an option, fine for browsing, email and normal gaming (not Tribes2 and OPFlash with the full 16 going at once), though it might want to be the 2meg full on no caps version.
I don't think we're allowed use the HEAnet connection, as this is a commercial venture and would be in contravention o the charter or something.
Good looking monitor, case, keyboard and mouse will attract people, hopefully we can get them all in similar colours.
A nice Sun blue would be sweeeet

the dual tuatulin server is a good suggestion, had forgotten about that
A gigabit-over-copper nic is also a possibility.
That would depend on switch configuration.

po0k

Originally posted by Grand_Izer
This sound rather trivial, but you can't go wrong with a couple of decent anti-glare screens as well. If anything, they may protect the monitor from fingerprints and the usual grime/spills etc...

A sheet of clear contakt™ (stuff your mother may have covered your schoolbooks in) might be an option. Aslong as there's no problem with the adhesive, they can be replaced like the stuff F1 drivers have on their visors.
The glare screens look hideous and would be out of place along all the rest of the nice looking kit.
The place they're going to be is a newly built coffee house place, with the veneered fibre board tables and 'wood-effect' thing.
All modern etc.

JustHalf

Don't forget that the Trinitron monitors (at least the Sony ones) have a special coating that must be preserved or you get "scratches" across your screen.

You can't dust them with dusting fluid, for example.

You should see me going mental with a lint-free cloth

po0k

hehhehe

Have a sign up saying "Hey kids! These aren't touch screens!" and then ive akick up the arse to the muppet who's rubbing his filth covered mits all over meh luverly masheens....

Dual 1.2Ghz Tuatulins work out at about 190 sterling each + 400 for the mobo.
I don't think we even need SMP tbh.
This would be something to run a handful of dedicated game servers on, routing network connections, a bit of file serveing maybe.
Woldn't need to be all that hot on the raw cpu front I think, just ram and storage.

Gerry

I think the server is much better off being a dual machine. A quake3 server needs about a 400 - 500mhz cpu for a decent sized game, what if someone starts leeching files off it as well?, and running other servers like cs and op flash. Server definitely needs 10k scsi disks though, keep away from ide. When one server is switching levels, you do not want a spike in cpu usage.

On the burners, you are going to have to look around in forums like on storagereview.com, find out what are the most reliable models. You certainly don't want them dropping like flies after a few months.

Cooling in the machines needs to be very carefully thought out. Its important to have the machines as quiet as possible, also make sure to have good cooling of all the components. You don't want hard drives failing.

The graphics card fan should be given careful attention too, these can start getting noisy and failing, causing you untold grief.

Remember also to sort a good air conditioning system, that can handle the heat output of 16 pc's + monitors, as well as the people using them. Very important.

po0k

I suggested making the server a SCSI machine last night, kind of got shot down
Once I get a more deffinate pricing on the client machines, I'll see what we have left to play with (literaly) for the server

The dual tuatulin is the last level before Xeons (which I haven't a clue regarding current pricing of chips or baords).
Would SCSI RAID be a bit of overkill?
about ~40 gigs total usable storage should be fine. Can fit an OS, proggies and the games and mods themselves into that no problem.
14krpm drives are noisey and hot, so the 10k models might be our only option, as I'm not too sure where the server will be physically located.

A mate of mine was talking alst night about his IDE RAID controller, 0% cpu usage going flat out copying across between a few drives.
Something like that would do fine, along with the performance of scsi 160.
It might have to be a Win2k machine, not every game has a linux version of the server (HL and quake being the big exceptions)

Gerry

I don't think you need scsi raid, its more that scsi can handle more transactions concurrently.

10k fujitsu scsi drives are quiter than the seagate barracude IV ( I have one in my work machine, and can't hear it).

po0k

Yeah, noise will be an issue.
Looking at getting papst fans all round, throttling them down a bit maybe.
The room has plenty of ventilation.

Getting the cash freed up for this is another thing of course....bloody college politics. :rolleyes:

Gerry

Originally posted by SyxPak

Getting the cash freed up for this is another thing of course....bloody college politics. :rolleyes:

The college are going to give you 25k for gaming machines? To be honest, I wouldn't expect them to. This must be some parallel universe that I don't know about.

po0k

It's 35k to kit out a café place with machines for web access and lan games - it's actually a business venture.
There's no emphasis on games, but we want to put together a spec that's capable of playing the newer stuff comfortably, and that are of a high enough quality, both build and stability wise, that they can be left running for the next year without anyone ahving to open them again or do any major work.
The money is also for furniture and the actual network.
A man I know has talked to the guy 'holding the purse' so to speak, and he is happy enough about the proposal, but doesn't want it in the hands of the student union, who seem to have blown 1.4 million allready doing up the café/recreation thingummy.
in that respect spending 35k on something that would be earning itself back and generating secondary revenues though people buying food there, lock-ins etc., I think they'll go for it.
This has not just been pulled out of a hat either.
We were origionally supposed to be able to play games in there (for say €3 an hour) since Januaury/February.

Gerry

Sounds good, pity there isn't the will for anything like it in maynooth.

TomTom

Where abouts are you setting up this cafe?

Bosco

Hi SyxPak,

Don't forget the cost of the operating system and other software when deciding whether to build yer own machines or to buy them in. Even when buying in bulk you may find that it's much cheaper in terms of both time and money to just ring Dell.

zAbbo

Never actually thought that anyone bought them anymore .

Gerry - I reckon you should go for optical mice, ( lack of cleaning ). If you reckon they will walk, look at some way of securing the mouse connector to the back of the machine.

At my college all leads coming out or going into the desktop are secured with those tie strap jobbies and a small padlock. Sure it would be easy enuff to snap these but what kinda skanger is gonna rob them when there is some secuirty involved.

Hope all goes well. BTW where are your sourcing the machines from.

po0k

Not too sure, looking at buying them off a place in england.
As for the OS....OpenSource / OpenBox

Gerry

Yeah bazh, that would work pretty good. Perhaps use some metal clips instead of cable ties, and make doubly sure