what to do with them?

[BraveStarr]

My friend managed to snag 6 dual pIII 550mhz workstation towers from his work (they were throwing them away). Other than a folding farm, would these computers be good for? Should they be stripped for parts are put to some server (game, mp3, file) use? Can they still hold their own? Thanks!

[rogerdugans]

Not sure how well the ywould work as game servers- I have pretty limited experience with that but I think faster is much better for that use. ;)

But for regular network use they are fine: file and/or print server's or as firewall machines.
For most of the uses "Joe Sixpack" uses a computer for they would be fine- they can run Win2K/XP fine with a decent amount of ram (128 for W2K and at least 256 for XP) and while they will take a bit longer to open a word document than a 3Ghz machine, they WILL do it. :)

My bro-in-laws business is mostly run on computers slower than that- and he is a database developer. :)

[eli]

You've found a goldmine friend. Put linux on them, and the possibilities are endless. Win2k should run great on them as well.

Cluster them and render something huge... that's fun too.

[dustybyrd]

i agree...a piii 550 in a single cpu machine isn't that bad at web surfing or office apps with a decent amount of ram...

and a dual 550, well that is a pretty decent machine...you could even do photoshop nicely on that baby...

[cmcquistion]

WECOME TO THE FORUMS!!!

Dual PIII's, even 550 MHz ones, aren't a bad system. Good for server applications, or just casual computing.

If you are interested in turning them into game servers, that is going to depend on the game. Some games really need lots of RAM, but not much CPU, to run a decent server. Others, require a lot of CPU horsepower. It is going to be specific to the game.

For file servers and stuff like that, they will be just fine. I still use a dual PII 350 File Server, at work.

[pummer]

give one to me?!? *prays*



but seriously, if you don't need all of them, you could probably ebay them for at least $100 apeice...