Ross,

DUAL processors makes a huge difference. You neglected to mention that in the original.

I *suspect* that pricing in that range may be reasonable for multi-processor systems. There are a lot of extra electronics needed to synchronize the "common" parts. So it may not be government money-sucking after all.

Cheers,
Jim N

>>>I am ordering a Compaq server that will run MS SQL Server. To upgrade from 256 to 512 pipeline burst cache costs $1000, so I'm told. Is it worth it? I'm not even sure what pipeline burst cache is.
>>>
>>>Thanks,
>>>Ross
>>
>>Funny, it cost me about $50. But I don't use a Compaq. I have been told that with EDO RAM pipeline cache is not as important as it was. I have not confirmed this but they seemed pretty confident. If you have a non-EDO RAM memory PC and the Compaq pipeline is < $100 (like it should be -- or you can search for a better outlet) then it is worth upgrading to.
>>
>>Tom
>
>The supplier said the cache is so expensive because of the dual processors. The real reason is probably because with government purchasing contracts the suppliers know we aren't allowed to buy from anyone else. Anyway, we ordered the cache mainly because we had a problem on another server with somebody installing cheapo RAM; I'm afraid somebody will come alomg and try to put in some $19.95 cache and crash my server, so I thought it best to fill it up now.
>
>Thanks for all the comments.