Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Determining Functional Requirements
First, we sat down to think through our own requirements for a mainstream
system. Here's the list of functional requirements we came up with:
Reliability
First and foremost, the mainstream system must be reliable. We expect
it to run it all day, every day, for years, without complaint. The key to reli-
ability is choosing top-quality components: particularly the motherboard,
memory, hard drive, and power supply. These components don't need to
be the largest or fastest available, but they do need to be of high quality.
Balanced performance
A mainstream system is a jack of all trades and master of none. We expect
it to perform any task we might give it at least competently, if not better.
But, because this is not a cost-no-object system, we need to balance com-
ponent performance against price. For example, we expect this system to
be capable of serious number crunching, but the fastest processors cost
more than we can justify for this system. Accordingly, we'll aim for a bal-
anced design that allows the system to do most things very well and ev-
erything else at least acceptably well.
Noise level
Most mainstream systems are used in environments where noise is an
issue. Accordingly, we'll design this system for quiet operation, but we
won't spend much extra money to do so. That means, for example, that
we'll choose the hard drive, case, and power supply based on noise level,
but we won't spend $50 extra to replace the stock CPU cooling fan with a
silent unit or $100 extra for a fanless power supply. Our goal is a quiet PC,
not a silent PC (if there can truly be such a thing).
Hardware Design Criteria
With the functional requirements determined, the next step was to establish
design criteria for the mainstream system hardware. Here are the relative pri-
orities we assigned for our mainstream system. Your priorities may, of course,
differ.
Price ★★★✩✩
Reliability ★★★★✩
As you can see, this is a well-balanced system. Other than expandability and
video performance, which are relatively unimportant, all of the other criteria
are of similar priority. Here's the breakdown:
Size ★★★✩✩
Noise level ★★★★✩
Price
Price is moderately important for this system, but value is more so. We
won't attempt to match the low price of commercial systems built with
low-end components, but we won't waste money, either. If spending a bit
more noticeably improves performance, reliability, or usability, or if it adds
features we want, we won't begrudge the extra cost.
Expandability ★★✩✩✩
Processor performance ★★★✩✩
Video performance ★★✩✩✩
Disk capacity/performance ★★★✩✩
