Computers and servers

Three different machines that are easy to confuse

From the outside they are the same black boxes, but inside they are built for different jobs, and the part that saves one of them is simply expensive ballast in another.

• Gaming PC. What matters is frames on your monitor. The money goes into the graphics card and a processor that keeps up with it.
• Workstation. Runs for many hours every day: rendering, CAD, editing, simulation. Priority goes to memory, PCIe lanes and cooling that survives sustained load.
• Compute server. Several accelerators, fast networking and a storage subsystem. Lives in a rack, is managed remotely, runs around the clock.

How to tell which one you need

The question is simple: how many hours a day the machine will be at full load, and how many people will use it. A few hours in the evening and one user means a desktop build. Around the clock with several users over the network means looking at server platforms with redundant power and hot-swap parts.

The second question is about space. A 19-inch rack, a pedestal under a desk and a shelf in a cabinet are different dimensions and different noise expectations.

Ready system or custom build

Ready configurations ship faster and are already checked for compatibility. A custom build makes sense when there are specific requirements: a particular card model, memory sized to your model, quiet operation in an office.

Describe the task in your own words and we will propose an option, explaining why these parts rather than more expensive ones.