G'day Allan In my opinion an Access Grid these days can successfully be run on either a single of multi-node configuration.
The thing I would recommend is to investigate the type of usage you expect for your Access Grid. Ie, is your AG going to be used for relatively small sessions or will it regularly participate is Large (multiple site) sessions. The other thing I would seriously think about is future usage, as I would expect to see the use of High Definition Video incorporated into the Access Grid some how and this will of course require a lot more grunt from and computers utilized as part of your AccessGrid. I have a number of Access Grids including both small and room based AG's that the types of computers used varies on it's how it is indented to be used. Details of these AG's can be found here: http://hpc.cqu.edu.au/accessgrid.html In all honesty, I think how you want to use the Access Grid will decide on the hardware required. Thanks, Jason. -------------------------------------------- Jason Bell, B.I.T. B. Info. Tech. (Honours) Student Network Engineer Information Technology Division Central Queensland University High Performance Computing Support Officer Central Queensland University Research Assistant to the Nonlinear Intelligent Systems Research Group Faculty of Informatics & Communication Central Queensland University E-mail : [email protected] Phone : 07 4930 9229 -------------------------------------------- Patience is a virtue. But if I wanted Patience, I would have become a Doctor. -------------------------------------------- -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of aspale1 Sent: Tuesday, 14 June 2005 6:04 AM To: [email protected] Subject: [AG-TECH] Single PC vs Dual PC Setup Hello, I was looking to possibly configure either a single or dual PC setup as an Access Grid node. In the past, the people on the ag-tech mailing list have recommended using a dual PC setup-- one PC for display and one PC for audio and video capture. More recently, it seems that more sites are choosing a single PC, dual processor configuration. My question is that if this setup is used as a "full AG node" that will drive 2-3 displays besides the node operator's display (total of 3-4 displays) and has 3-4 video capture cards, what would be the setup that provides the best performance. Also, if a 2 PC setup is used, should each PC be configured as dual processor? What clock speeds and RAM amounts should I be looking for? Somewhat related to this question-- can RAT utilize on-board audio or must there be a separate audio card? Any feedback or past experiences would be appreciated. Thanks. Allan Laboratory for Advanced Computing National Center for Data Mining University of Illinois at Chicago
