Network Computing is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them. Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

Small Server Bonanza: Page 8 of 23

Dell's warranty is a little more complicated than those of the other products. It comes with three years next-business-day on-site parts replacement and a one-year warranty on labor. You can upgrade from there, including the aforementioned four-hour on-site support and three years of labor coverage.

PowerEdge 600SC, starts at $499; price as tested $989. Dell, (512) 338-4400, (800) 289-3355. www.dell.com


The 920 is a solid performer; the unit we received even incorporated a small Travan tape drive with software. Recently, Gateway has been making strides in the server game, and the small-business market is the perfect place for the company with Holstein-patterned boxes to get its hoof in the door.

At $897 with a tape drive and 512 MB of RAM, the Gateway 920 provided many desirable features at an excellent price point. Hardwarewise, it's eclipsed only by the advanced processor and features of the HP ProLiant ML330. However, the included software was below par, which hurt its score.

The motherboard has four 64 bit, 33-MHz slots and one 32-bit, 33-MHz slot, and is powered by the ServerWorks Grand Champion SL chipset, like most of the machines in our review. For connectivity, it has two USB 1.1 ports, one standard serial port, one parallel port and a copper Gigabit Ethernet port. Storage is provided by an 80-GB ATA drive, a CD-ROM drive and the aforementioned tape drive.

We particularly liked the 920's case; pushing apart two large thumb levers on the back of the unit causes the side case to pop off. The only system easier to access was the IBM eServer xSeries 205.