I have a mate that is planning to put a PC together specifically to run as a CS server.
He can build PC's in his sleep but isn't 100% about the spec he needs for the job.
So can anyone suggest a CPU, RAM and Graphics card?
It's going to be about a 12 slot on a 1 or 2 mb ADSL line. The PC will never actually have to play CS so I don't think a powerful graphics card is needed? The PC will also be running windows rather than Linux and will be plumbed into his existing home network.
Cheers
My own server is a PIII 600Mhz with 1Gb of PC133 SDRAM (running as PC100 'coz it is cheap crappy memory) on a Tyan MB and it copes fine running HLDS.
To expand on this, and to put things in perspective, the machine is heavily loaded. It runs Windows 2000 with Active Directory, DHCP, DNS, IIS, FTP, VNC, is a file and print server, a Domain Controller, collects my Firewall logs (through SNMP), runs McAfee Anti Virus to scan everything that goes through it and still has time to run HLDS. It connects to my network on full duplex 10/100 NIC and is fed from the internet by 1Mb/256k Cable Modem.
To summarise, you don't need a lot :-)
Oh, and it has a 2Mb ATI Mach64 Graphics card that i have had since 1994!!!!
That will do nicely Sir :)
remember with ADSL he is limited to 256Kbit/s upstream..... unless he lives in london or on an unbundled exchange in which case I've seen ADSL as high as 2MBit/s up 8Mbit/s down.
He says he can run a reasonable server for about ten/twelve people
On my server the limiting factor is not the hardware but the upstream bandwidth. I have been informed by all who know that 256k up will allow me to give a decent service to between 5 and 8 people. So no matter what hardware hehas he should look at his upstream bandwidth. Oh and if he has a 1Mb upstream link through the worlds worst routers then he would probably be better off on 256k through a good host :-) HTH?