SFF server platform

[Tony Alfrey]

David Bandel wrote:
<snip>
> 
> Yep.  $125 install, $45/mo rental.  No worries (that's my job, along
> with keeping it up to date).  These folks like the price (I like them
> capitalizing my company).  Less than $400 in my hands.  What I sell
> them is expertise in Firewalls (I don't even mention the OS).

What I was getting at is that $400 didn't seem like much to just buy 
outright.  And in a year or two, the box is kinda out-of-date (?) and 
then you have paid-for-but-old boxes piling up in a couple years.  But 
if they keep it for more than a year, it's gravy.  Presumably you don't 
have to fuss with their system too much?  My experience with working for 
places with networks is that the servers (albeit with windoze) are 
always crashing and the system administrator (if not on-site) is always 
getting hassled.  So does your rental fee include this "repair", is that 
extra or is repair just not necessary?
Not trying to go into business doing this myself, just always interested 
in the logistics of small businesses.

<snip>

> 
> Brick is a 110v to 12v converter that plugs into the wall and powers a
> board that connects to the motherboard and provides 12v, 5v, 3.3v. 
> Think about a laptop, but no batteries and no keyboard/screen. 
> Headless.

Thanks.  My notion of a "brick" was one of those DC/DC PC-board-mounted 
converters.  It had never occured to me to run a non-laptop box from one 
of those wall-plug blobs.

<snip>


-- 
Tony Alfrey
tonyalfrey at earthlink.net
"I'd Rather Be Sailing"