On 3/5/2012 3:26, Invisible wrote:
> Ooo, check this out:
>
> http://tinyurl.com/67c4p8

"Imagine a college freshman made out of gigabytes. This would be his dorm room."

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

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>> OTOH, it seems that any equipment that says "rack mountable" on it is
>> instantly 5x the price, for no apparent reason...
>
> Of course, the engineering that goes in designing the special connectors
> to power and manage these boards, as well as keep them ventilated comes
> free of charge, in your world...

What "special connectors"?

Buy a UPS that sits under your desk. That's £50. Buy a UPS that is rack 
mountable. That's £800, minimum. Sure, they probably don't sell rack UPS 
with capacities as low as they do for the desktop. But 16x the price? 
Really? For a battery and an inverter?

Buy a 12-port desktop switch. £30, maybe? Now buy a rack mountable one. 
That'll be £200 please. Sure, it's physically bigger. There's more metal 
in it. Metal costs money. But does it cost /that/ much money?

(Before anyone asks - no, just because it can be rack mounted, that does 
/not/ mean it has management features. When I joined the company, we had 
a whole rack full of switches, all rack mounted, none of them managed. 
And all about £400 each.)

Redundant power supplies cost extra. RAID controllers cost extra. 
Hot-swap drive bays cost extra. And yet, a server that has these costs 
nowhere near as much as a rack-mount server. Now sure, making something 
like a server actually small enough to be rack mounted is nontrivial. 
There's a reason laptops cost 5x the price of a similar desktop. I 
understand that. But for goodness' sake, if you make a /wire clamp/ 
that's rack mountable, suddenly it goes from being £2 to £80. It's like 
it's a license to print money...

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Le 2012-03-06 04:11, Invisible a écrit :
>>> OTOH, it seems that any equipment that says "rack mountable" on it is
>>> instantly 5x the price, for no apparent reason...
>>
>> Of course, the engineering that goes in designing the special connectors
>> to power and manage these boards, as well as keep them ventilated comes
>> free of charge, in your world...
>
> What "special connectors"?

I was talking more about "blade servers", since the original topic was 
the Google servers, where each blade gets its power, remote management 
and network connections from a central backplane.

but even if we are talking about a "desktop" PC case vs. a 
rack-mountable server with a similar CPU.  The rackmountable server will 
have a lot more consideration put into its ventilation and heat 
disspation since it is made to be in a closed space full of other 
heat-generating devices.  Secondly, rack-mounted servers usually come 
with a lot of extra feautres not usually found on classical desktop 
hardware, such as hot-swappable disks, power supplies, and in some 
cases, memory and CPUs.

You need to realise that these things also contribute to the price of a 
rack-mountable server.

>
> Buy a UPS that sits under your desk. That's £50. Buy a UPS that is rack
> mountable. That's £800, minimum. Sure, they probably don't sell rack UPS
> with capacities as low as they do for the desktop. But 16x the price?
> Really? For a battery and an inverter?

It depends on the battery.  And besides, you are comparing apples and 
bulldozers.

Maybe besides size there are other factors to consider...  Let's compare 
a "home" unit, vs. a rackmountable unit of the same power rating and 
same supplier.

"Home" UPS

http://www.apc.com/products/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=BE750G&total_watts=200

Output capacity: 450W/750VA.
Run time @400W: 3 min.
Run time @100W: 40 min.
Recharge time: 16 hrs.
Alarms: power/on battery/replace battery led display.
Management: N/A
Price: ~100$

"Rackmountable" UPS

Output capacity: 480W/750VA.
Run time @400W: 8 min.
Run time @100W: 50 min.
Recharge time: 4 hrs.
Alarms: Audible alarms when on battery/low battery/Replace battery
Management: vis DB-9, RS-232, SmartSlot or USB.  Network management card 
optional.
Price: ~500$

So the rackmountable unit recharges 4x faster and has much better 
management capabilities - I mean what good does a LED display do you in 
an unattended server room? - for 5x the price.  Seems reasonable to me.

The "entry-level" rackmountable unit has a lot more to offer than the 
"top-of-the-line" standalone unit, besides mounting brackets.

>
> Buy a 12-port desktop switch. £30, maybe? Now buy a rack mountable one.
> That'll be £200 please. Sure, it's physically bigger. There's more metal
> in it. Metal costs money. But does it cost /that/ much money?

What's the MTBF of your 30$ desktop switch?   Does it have remote 
management capabilities?  What about problem diagnostics?  How many 
packets per second can it process?  Does it support vlans?  QoS?  PPPoE? 
  802.1x authentication?  Etc...

>
> (Before anyone asks - no, just because it can be rack mounted, that does
> /not/ mean it has management features. When I joined the company, we had
> a whole rack full of switches, all rack mounted, none of them managed.
> And all about £400 each.)

Not manageABLE or simply not managed? Also [citation needed] brand and 
model?

>
> Redundant power supplies cost extra. RAID controllers cost extra.
> Hot-swap drive bays cost extra. And yet, a server that has these costs
> nowhere near as much as a rack-mount server.

[citation needed] Brand and model?

> Now sure, making something
> like a server actually small enough to be rack mounted is nontrivial.
> There's a reason laptops cost 5x the price of a similar desktop. I
> understand that. But for goodness' sake, if you make a /wire clamp/
> that's rack mountable, suddenly it goes from being £2 to £80. It's like
> it's a license to print money...

Then make one and sell it for only £50 and drive the £80-clamp guy out 
of business, if it's that easy.

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>> What "special connectors"?
>
> I was talking more about "blade servers"

Oh, right.

Yes, those really /are/ expensive. If nothing else, each manufacturer's 
blades only fit in their own blade centre. So once you have their blade 
centre, they are the only people who can sell you blades. So they can 
charge any arbitrary price they want.

> but even if we are talking about a "desktop" PC case vs. a
> rack-mountable server with a similar CPU. The rackmountable server will
> have a lot more consideration put into its ventilation and heat
> disspation since it is made to be in a closed space full of other
> heat-generating devices. Secondly, rack-mounted servers usually come
> with a lot of extra feautres not usually found on classical desktop
> hardware, such as hot-swappable disks, power supplies, and in some
> cases, memory and CPUs.
>
> You need to realise that these things also contribute to the price of a
> rack-mountable server.

When I joined the company, we had floor-standing servers with hot-swap 
drives, dual redundant power supplies, a floor-standing UPS, and all the 
rest. It still didn't cost anywhere near what a rack-mountable setup 
would cost.

My original point was, /anything/ sold as rack mountable seems to 
suddenly jump drastically in price, regardless of whether it's anything 
special beyond having the necessary mounting points.

Heck, a USB keyboard costs, what, £2 maybe? Oh, but if you want a 
keyboard draw for a rack? Suddenly it isn't £2 any more. More like £200. 
Sure, the draw runners clearly cost money. Do they cost £198? I don't 
think so.

> Maybe besides size there are other factors to consider... Let's compare
> a "home" unit, vs. a rackmountable unit of the same power rating and
> same supplier.
>
> "Home" UPS
>
> Output capacity: 450W/750VA.
> Run time @400W: 3 min.
> Run time @100W: 40 min.
> Recharge time: 16 hrs.
> Alarms: power/on battery/replace battery led display.
> Management: N/A
> Price: ~100$
>
> "Rackmountable" UPS
>
> Output capacity: 480W/750VA.
> Run time @400W: 8 min.
> Run time @100W: 50 min.
> Recharge time: 4 hrs.
> Alarms: Audible alarms when on battery/low battery/Replace battery
> Management: vis DB-9, RS-232, SmartSlot or USB. Network management card
> optional.
> Price: ~500$
>
> So the rackmountable unit recharges 4x faster and has much better
> management capabilities - I mean what good does a LED display do you in
> an unattended server room? - for 5x the price. Seems reasonable to me.
>
> The "entry-level" rackmountable unit has a lot more to offer than the
> "top-of-the-line" standalone unit, besides mounting brackets.

I don't see why management facilities should cost 5x extra. If somebody 
can make something as complex as a mobile phone and sell it for £10, 
building something which closes a connection when a voltage goes below a 
threshold can't be that damned expensive.

I don't know why there's such a massive difference in recharge time. 
Since I don't know what's different about the second unit which allows 
it to recharge so much faster, I can't say whether or not that justifies 
the price difference.

>> Buy a 12-port desktop switch. £30, maybe? Now buy a rack mountable one.
>> That'll be £200 please. Sure, it's physically bigger. There's more metal
>> in it. Metal costs money. But does it cost /that/ much money?
>
> What's the MTBF of your 30$ desktop switch?

Isn't MTBF an arbitrarily-chosen marketing number?

> Does it have remote management capabilities?

Unlikely. (Although not impossible, believe it or not.) But then, for 
£200 your rack mount unit probably won't either.

> What about problem diagnostics? How many
> packets per second can it process? Does it support vlans? QoS? PPPoE?
> 802.1x authentication? Etc...

Same statements as per management.

>> (Before anyone asks - no, just because it can be rack mounted, that does
>> /not/ mean it has management features. When I joined the company, we had
>> a whole rack full of switches, all rack mounted, none of them managed.
>> And all about £400 each.)
>
> Not manageABLE or simply not managed? Also [citation needed] brand and
> model?

No management features. You just plug them in, turn them on, and they 
work. (Once they finished learning MAC addresses, anyway...)

I don't recall the exact model off the top of my head. They were 
definitely SMC "EZ switch", but I can't remember the precise model 
numbers. A mixture of 12-port and 24-port units.

>> Redundant power supplies cost extra. RAID controllers cost extra.
>> Hot-swap drive bays cost extra. And yet, a server that has these costs
>> nowhere near as much as a rack-mount server.
>
> [citation needed] Brand and model?

A cursory inspection of the nearest product catalogue indicates that the 
starting price for a HP server is about £200, while the cheapest 
possible rack-mountable unit is £400. Which, actually, isn't nearly as 
bad as I'd expected. (I was thinking nearer £2,000. It /is/ HP, after all.)

>> Now sure, making something
>> like a server actually small enough to be rack mounted is nontrivial.
>> There's a reason laptops cost 5x the price of a similar desktop. I
>> understand that. But for goodness' sake, if you make a /wire clamp/
>> that's rack mountable, suddenly it goes from being £2 to £80. It's like
>> it's a license to print money...
>
> Then make one and sell it for only £50 and drive the £80-clamp guy out
> of business, if it's that easy.

It just seems that being rack-mountable is one of those "premium" 
features that makes manufacturers instantly put the price up, just 
because they can.

It's like printers with network cards. A network card costs, what, 
£0.0016? And yet, a printer without one is £30 or something, but one 
with it is £150. Presumably because they figure that your average home 
user doesn't give a fig whether there's a network card, they just want 
the cheapest one in the shop, but your average business user cannot 
afford to do without one, and won't think twice about splashing a few 
hundred pounds for something they actually need...

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> It's like printers with network cards. A network card costs, what,
> £0.0016? And yet, a printer without one is £30 or something, but one
> with it is £150. Presumably because they figure that your average home
> user doesn't give a fig whether there's a network card, they just want
> the cheapest one in the shop, but your average business user cannot
> afford to do without one, and won't think twice about splashing a few
> hundred pounds for something they actually need...

You do know that a network card for a printer is actually a print server, right?

Regards
Aydan

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On 06/03/2012 04:40 PM, Aydan wrote:
> Invisible<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> It's like printers with network cards. A network card costs, what,
>> £0.0016? And yet, a printer without one is £30 or something, but one
>> with it is £150. Presumably because they figure that your average home
>> user doesn't give a fig whether there's a network card, they just want
>> the cheapest one in the shop, but your average business user cannot
>> afford to do without one, and won't think twice about splashing a few
>> hundred pounds for something they actually need...
>
> You do know that a network card for a printer is actually a print server, right?

You do know that a laser printer already has an entire computing 
environment inside it running an embedded PostScript engine, right?

Adding an embedded TCP/IP stack can't be /that/ damned hard.

Also, explain this:



How can the entire printer be /cheaper/ than just the network card?! 
That makes no logical sense!

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> On 06/03/2012 04:40 PM, Aydan wrote:
> > Invisible<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
> >> It's like printers with network cards. A network card costs, what,
> >> £0.0016? And yet, a printer without one is £30 or something, but one
> >> with it is £150. Presumably because they figure that your average home
> >> user doesn't give a fig whether there's a network card, they just want
> >> the cheapest one in the shop, but your average business user cannot
> >> afford to do without one, and won't think twice about splashing a few
> >> hundred pounds for something they actually need...
> >
> > You do know that a network card for a printer is actually a print server, right?
>
> You do know that a laser printer already has an entire computing
> environment inside it running an embedded PostScript engine, right?

You were talking about a 30GBP printer.
You don't get a laser printer for 30 pounds.
Even if you do it's unlikely that the printer supports PostScript.
The cheapest postscript capable printer I could find on short notice is a
Lexmark E260 for 169 Euros.

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Le 2012/03/05 19:54, Francois Labreque a écrit :
> Le 2012-03-05 14:42, Orchid Win7 v1 a écrit :
>> On 05/03/2012 18:47, Alain wrote:
>>> I agree, rack mounting normal motherboards is not the brightest idea.
>>
>> OTOH, it seems that any equipment that says "rack mountable" on it is
>> instantly 5x the price, for no apparent reason...
>
> Of course, the engineering that goes in designing the special connectors
> to power and manage these boards, as well as keep them ventilated comes
> free of charge, in your world...
>

Also, don't forget that most rack mountable components are hot swapable. 
That account for some price increase.
Want to change that board holding those 4 old single core CPUs with one 
holding 6 8 cores CPUs of the last generation? Disable the board, pull 
it out, push in the new one, fire it and you are good to go.

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On Tue, 06 Mar 2012 14:38:27 -0500, Alain wrote:

> Le 2012/03/05 19:54, Francois Labreque a écrit :
>> Le 2012-03-05 14:42, Orchid Win7 v1 a écrit :
>>> On 05/03/2012 18:47, Alain wrote:
>>>> I agree, rack mounting normal motherboards is not the brightest idea.
>>>
>>> OTOH, it seems that any equipment that says "rack mountable" on it is
>>> instantly 5x the price, for no apparent reason...
>>
>> Of course, the engineering that goes in designing the special
>> connectors to power and manage these boards, as well as keep them
>> ventilated comes free of charge, in your world...
>>
>>
> Also, don't forget that most rack mountable components are hot swapable.
> That account for some price increase.
> Want to change that board holding those 4 old single core CPUs with one
> holding 6 8 cores CPUs of the last generation? Disable the board, pull
> it out, push in the new one, fire it and you are good to go.

Most server-class hardware also comes with a support contract with fast 
turnaround.  Service is like insurance - expensive, and you hope you 
never need to use it.

Jim

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> Most server-class hardware also comes with a support contract with fast
> turnaround.

Yes, but you can perfectly well get tower servers with that too. So 
comparing that to a rack-mount server would seem to nullify this point.

> Service is like insurance - expensive, and you hope you
> never need to use it.

Yep - usually because when you /do/ need it, you find out it isn't very 
good. ;-)

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