Re: Systems advice pls: Server(s)? Strong laptop? Laptop/wkstations?

From: Alex McKenzie (reverseof7318cam8137_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 02/20/04 

Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2004 20:37:11 GMT

Thank you, the posts are giving me a concrete path. Please see in-line
additional questions, below.

> nkjg" <anonymous@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:130f601c3f7c5$bc66fd70$a101280a@phx.gbl...
> For the time being, if you are the only person in your
> company, I would say get a powerful desktop to do all
> your development,

Thanks, this helps focus it vs. trying to do it in a powerful laptop.

If you (or others) are familiar with the server side of things:

Does your comment address how to deal with server software, such as SQL
Server (comes in SBS 2003 and might come in Windows Server 2003) and
Sharepoint services/server? If that's not a focus here, I can pick a
Microsoft server newsgroup, get an answer of whether I can put that on a
desktop or need a dedicated server or more. But I think I'm also getting
twisted around with the difference between having server software and using
server boxes. If I have to have standalone server boxes, should I use
"server" hardware or desktop?

> and a laptop if you need the mobility
> or to do presentations or the like.

More on that after at the paragraph after the Hyper-Threading

> Hyper-Threading is a
> must if you're going to be doing a lot of video editing,
> since it will speed that up considerably.

OK, in other words I don't need the laptop to have Hyper-threading? (I
don't know if they even do.)

> In terms of mobility, your laptop that you described
> should be fine.

Makes sense. I'd lose the ability to do two high-end things well, I think,
and I'd also have to deal with keeping the data current with the desktop.

The two high-end things are:

--Voice recognition. I can do without that, but I'd lose the ability to
demo it also. I guess I could demo at a lower accuracy, and then tell them
what results I get at the desktop.

-- Recording long church recordings direct to a laptop. For very special
events I guess I can cart the desktop. We do the recordings on a passive,
turn on the camera and ignore it basis. VHS works fine for that because
there are long tapes. Digital cassettes are too short. So, without direct
recordings, we'll keep doing to VHS, and hand off to the congregants, and if
they want, we can refer them to services that convert VHS to DVD. The
digital video editing other than that is at a starter hobby level, and in
most cases we'd have the extra work of importing the VHS, and we'd have less
quality, so I think we'll put off ramping up the church recordings to
digital unless someone else comes up with a high end laptop (or a desktop to
put there permanently). I can't justify spending my own one to three
thousand $ just to be able to change from VHS to DV for congregants'
no-charge recordings<g>.

Or to use the laptop to record, but not edit, could I just bump up the hard
drive on the 800 mhz laptop, or perhaps upgrade to a faster laptop but still
not a high end one? I ordered the used laptop in order to have something
that would meet my needs right away but I can sell it for about the same and
get a stronger one.

And regarding keeping the data current with the desktop, a quick search on
synchronizing My Documents comes up with a lot of programs. Any ideas, and
any ideas about keeping application settings synchronized? One idea I have
is just using the laptop's hard drive to store active projects, but that
defeats having the high end 10000 hard drives.

> I'm assuming (since most laptops have
> this) that you have a video port on your laptop so you
> could hook it up to a projector if needed.

Yes.

> Also, it's got
> the specs you need to install XP. Do it.

Will do, thanks. As per another's recommendation, I'll use XP Pro 32 bit,
not 64. (I guess 64 would need a better laptop anyway.)

Any recommendations on the partition/don't partition conflicting info? Both
for the laptop, and for the desktop? And for that matter on the server box
or boxes?

> As for video software, I would recommend Sonic Foundry's
> Vegas. It's got lots of useful features and is really
> powerful when it comes to splicing clips and whatnot.

Thanks, I just tried a search on it. It looks powerful alright but for
volunteer work it's a bit pricey. If we make a jump to charging, then it's
a different ball game.

> Windows MM2 is crap in comparison, and only allows you to
> save in .wmv format.

I think I left out telling you I have MYDVD. (That's why my first post was
so short<g>.) I have that software. The MYDVD documentation says that it
can burn MM2 movies to DVD-video. I thought MYDVD was from Adaptec, that's
what's on the box, but it also says Sonic, I wonder if that's related to
Sonic Foundry.

> Vegas allows just about any format
> to be written (the default is uncompressed .avi, big
> files so your 160 gig hard drive will come in handy).
> Along with this a copy of Dr. DivX or something of the
> like will come in handy to make the files a little bit
> more reasonable sized (I made a 4 minute 800x600 video
> clip in Vegas, and it rendered it into a 1.2 gig file =P
> Now it's a nice 30 meg DivX).

I see, lots of room for the raw recording, but it boils down to a good size.

> From the list that Peter posted, there's only one thing
> that I would say might not be necessary. I don't know if
> you really need the professional sound card unless you're
> going to be including 5.1/DTS sound in your videos. If
> you're just looking at stereo sound, then my guess is
> that a mid-range, non-expensive card will do well enough.
> This is probably the first place that you would want to
> cut corners. If you are looking at higher end sound,
> ignore this paragraph.

The paragraph's helpful, I'll use the advice I'm finding about voice
recognition to drive the sound card decision.

As closing comment, sorry if I misguided about digital recording/editing.
The current thing of just recording long VHS tapes and giving them to
congregants isn't really broken, I just want to take it to another level if
feasible. I've tested it by bringing in a PC but I won't do that every
time, it's too much work and maybe bad for the PC anyway. The digital
recording and editing doesn't have much of a budget of its own, it mostly
has to take advantage of hardware that the income-earning work justifies my
getting anyway.

Another closing, the only thing I'm not feeling close to resolving is the
server products and server hardware if needed. And whether to put a RAID
card in the nice workstation you recommend.

Thank you!

Relevant Pages

  • Systems advice pls: Server(s)? Strong laptop? Laptop/wkstations?
    ... and what server products do you recommend I install ... --Get a super laptop or use the approx 800 mhz one. ... --video recording (portable would be great, but the recording I do away from ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware)
  • Re: 2nd Branch Server and Laptop configuration suggestion
    ... please share all printers and folders the laptop user ... This newsgroup only focuses on SBS technical issues. ... now, that way, each branch is independent of any possible Server down at ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)
  • Re: How many computers in the house?
    ... Ruby, RubyCocoa & ... Kieran - my wifes laptop which is generally hooked upto a 22 inch ... runs XP but very badly for some reason and only has 512mb ram. ... Server - My server, cobbled together from bits I had left over from ...
    (comp.lang.ruby)
  • Re: Trust relationship failed with domain
    ... I cannot ping the server by name. ... Laptop still not trusting the domain or vice versa ... How to Setup Windows, Network, VPN & Remote Access on ... Workstation Linux ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.network_web)
  • Re: Is there a Dummies guide to SBS and laptop users??
    ... Thanks for using the SBS newsgroup! ... In this way you need setup the SBS server box as the VPN server, ... Private Network or the Internet in Windows Server 2003 ... >Subject: Re: Is there a Dummies guide to SBS and laptop users?? ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs)