BUFFALO
TeraStation Pro II Rackmount 4TB: $2,299
www.buffalotech.com

IF THERE ARE TWO COMPUTERS OR MORE IN AN OFFICE, CENTRALIZING THE data from each makes that information easier to manage and protect. The type of network storage you sell will depend on the size of your customer’s business and the type of information with which he’s working. If it’s all about serving up and saving fi les across network computers, consider Buffalo’s TeraStation Pro II. The highest-end TeraStation Pro II—a 4TB rackmount box—is the best bet in situations that demand lots of capacity. The 2U chassis is laced with a removable front bezel and an LCD front panel display that conveys status information. Four fi xed hard drives deliver the system’s 4TB capacity and support for RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, and JBOD modes, while Gigabit Ethernet connects the TeraStation to your customer’s network. Built-in FTP server software and Memeo’s Autobackup software add to the NAS appliance’s value.

D-LINK
DGS-1016D 16-Port Gigabit Rackmount Switch: $1,200
www.dlink.com

A SWITCH ON ITS OWN IS NOT PARTICULARLY NEWSWORTHY for SMBs. But D-Link’s DGS-1016D makes things a bit more interesting by offering a solid entry point into high-speed networking with 16 ports of gigabit connectivity at a sub- $300 price point. And D-Link has another twist to add to the switch story that may turn the heads of environmentally conscious SMBs faster than a reduction in cost-per-port.

The DGS-1016D just picked up “Green Ethernet” status, enabled through two feature tweaks. First, if there is no cable plugged into one of the switch’s ports, that port is put to sleep, saving energy. Ports with cables attached detect the length of the run and adjust power usage accordingly. The only ports running full power would be those measuring 100m.

In order to illustrate the switch’s potential savings, D-Link ran numbers and found that when connected devices are powered down, the DGS-1016D can increase power savings by up to 40 percent.

INTEL
D5400XS Extreme Desktop Board: $559
www.intel.com

HISTORICALLY, INTEL HAS BEEN extremely cautious in its approach to enthusiast platforms. Slowly but surely, though, the company has come to be known as a provider of stable solutions able to encode video, render 3D projects, and multitask faster than anyone else out there. Intel’s D5400XS motherboard is the culmination of those efforts, aimed squarely at the desktop enthusiast. We think this board makes a great workstation play, too. The D5400XS sports two processor sockets and the 5400 chipset. Four FB-DIMM memory slots take up to 8GB of memory, while onboard Gigabit Ethernet, SATA with RAID support, and HD Audio deliver the integrated extras expected from Intel.

Intel’s real ace here is support for two quad-core Core 2 Extreme chips in LGA775 trim and LGA771 Xeon processors. Don’t forget the board’s four PCI Express slots either, which enable AMD’s CrossFire technology and, for the fi rst time, NVIDIA’s SLI.

TRIPP LITE
PDUMH15ATNET Power Distribution Unit: $869
www.tripplite.com

AS A VAR DEPLOYING RACKMOUNT SERVERS, YOU FACE SEVERAL challenges beyond simply building the systems. There’s the issue of getting power from the wall to rack. Then you have to get power from the rack to every installed device. Once you’ve accomplished that fi rst step, the second is solved by installing a power distribution unit inside the rack.

At its simplest, a PDU is a datacenter power strip. But higher-end models, like Tripp Lite’s PDUMH15ATNET, add more advanced functionality to the device’s spec sheet. For example, Tripp Lite’s 1U rackmount PDU features a digital display that measures power consumption in amps, so you can be sure you aren’t trying to pull more current than the wall can deliver. An integrated transfer switch lets the PDU operate from a backup power input should the primary input fail. A sequential power-up sequence prevents a power inrush from affecting equipment on startup.