Desktop vs. workstation: Introduction

Hi, my name's Dave Buckley, and I'm the product line managerfor workstations in North America for Hewlett Packard. I'm here today to talkto you about the desktop versus the workstation. We're going to do anintroduction segment to learn a little bit more about how the desktop and theworkstation compare.

So, to start, let's talk about the desktop. I've drawn alittle illustration of a desktop here. Let's talk about how the desktop isoptimized. First, it's clearly optimized around cost. If you've got an ITmanager who is looking to roll out 5,000 desktops, it's certainly important toget an $800 cost versus $1,000 or $1,200 cost.

The second area that the desktop is optimized around isimage. You want to make sure that the common operating environment that everyuser pulls up when they fire up their computer in the morning is easy to manageacross that whole desktop topology. So, stable image is important.

The third area that's important is security. You want tohave decent security when it comes to your data and also your hardware. Those threeoptimization points are really what characterize the desktop.

Now, let's talk about the workstation. What characterizes aworkstation? First and foremost, a workstation is optimized around performance.The way that a workstation delivers performance is actually three ways. First,CPU performance. Although you can buy a desktop today with dual-coretechnology, with a workstation you can actually get dual-socket technology aswell as up to four cores. So, with CPUs in a workstation, you can bring as manyas eight cores to bear on a particular problem.

Also, workstations are optimized around graphicsperformance. That comes in the form of video RAM. It also comes in the form offaster vector processors, so that you can do those extremely difficult graphicsjobs.

The third area is I/O or input/output. What I'm talkingabout here is not just having a standard SATA drive like you'd have with adesktop, but also having choices when it comes to serial-attached SCSI drivesas well as faster drives. Not just a 7200 rpm drive, but also a 10k or a 15kdrive.

What else characterizes a workstation? Certifiedapplications. What I'm talking about here are mission-critical applicationsthat customers use in the engineering space or in the digital content creationspace, maybe in oil and gas or geographic information systems, or even insituations you've got an office environment where it has a number of ExcelPower users. You may need to have a workstation to address that problem. So,certified applications are key.

The third area that is important is expandability. When I'mtalking expandability, I'm talking about slots, watts and bays. Using myillustration on the board here, I'm talking about, perhaps, the PCI card cagewhen it comes to slots, as well as the number of RAM slots that are availablein a workstation. When I'm talking watts, I'm talking about significantlylarger power supplies between a workstation and a desktop. And of course, whenit comes to bays, you've got your hard drive and optical bays that characterizea workstation.

And, then, the final optimization for a workstation isaround life cycle. We have a number of customers who are looking for a littlebit longer life cycle with a product than they get with a desktop. So, with adesktop they may be able to get nine months or maybe even twelve on theoutside. With a workstation, they're able to get between twelve or eighteenmonths of life cycle. This can be absolutely critical for OEM customers who arelooking to extend that life cycle.

So, basically, what characterizes a desktop and aworkstation is cost on a desktop side and, ultimately, performance on theworkstation side.

For more information, go ahead and hitwww.hp.com/go/workstation.