Computer Comparison - which is "better"

Posted by David Murdoch on Super User See other posts from Super User or by David Murdoch
Published on 2010-05-25T17:22:19Z Indexed on 2010/05/25 17:33 UTC
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A company I work with recently replaced their old server and gave it to me. Their old server is a Dell PowerEdge 2600. I've been playing with the machine and even installed Windows Server 2008 on it...and it seems to run it pretty well.

Here are the specs for the two machines:

Dev Machine:
AMD Athlon64 3000+ 2.38 GHz (overclocked from 1.8GHz [@ 280x8.5] - it is stable-ish)
Memory (RAM): 1x1GB OCZ PC3200 (Dual-Channel)
300GB HD
OS: Windows XP Pro (32bit)
SuperPi 1M digit test: 40 seconds

Dell PowerEdge 2600 Server:
Intel Xeon CPU 2.8GHz 2.8GHz
Memory (RAM): 512MBx2 (PC2700, not dual channel)
68GB HD (RAID 5)
OS: Windows Server 2000 (32bit)
SuperPi 1M digit test: 56 seconds [using 1 processor] (Themes and Aero-Flass UI turned off, of course)

I use my computer to regularly run Photoshop CS5, Illustrator CS5, Flash CS5, 5 browsers (Chrome, FF, IE, Safari, Opera), iTunes, Visual Studio 2010, and Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 [sometimes simultaneously :-) ].

The SuperPi test has my dev machine coming in about 30% faster than the Server machine...though this could be due to the server running "Vista" with background processes prioritized.

Do you think it would be realistic/advantageous for me to move from my dev machine to the Dell PowerEdge 2600?
Is it possible to install additional DVD drives/burners on the server?
Can I install my internal 300 GB hard drive on the server?
Can I add some USB 2.0 ports? Note: I'll probably install Win XP Pro on the dev machine if I do switch.

If not, are there any creative and useful way for me to take advantage of this server (with the goal of faster computing)?

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