New Server (Really) on the Way

I mentioned a while ago that a new server was on the way. Well, at least that’s what I thought.

It turns out the CPUs were on a massive backorder, so my estimated ship date plunged from 9/11 to 12/2 in a matter of days. Intel’s hasty announcement of their line of P4 and Xeon CPUs with EM64T was made far before they were ready to put them to market. It’s tough — if not impossible — to find any retailers selling these chips yet, even though they’ve been popping up in reviews since July.

Working with my sales rep — who was remarkably helpful — I was able to get my order to the top of the queue. Even with the estimated ship date of 12/2, I received notification yesterday that the server had shipped. Intel must have provided them with a batch of CPUs, one of the first of which went in my computer and it’s finally on its way, making the journey from Guadalajara, MX to our rack at work.

I can’t wait to play around with 64-bit Linux. We already have two other 64-bit servers at work — one’s a dual Opteron, the other an IBM dual POWER4+ — but since they’re production servers I haven’t had the chance to really play around with them. This will be my own personal test-bed server. Sadly, I’ll have to retire one of my Dell PowerEdge 400SCs. (More details on that later.)