Editor's Pick: Server-caliber Computer Doubles as a Mobile Workstation

By Anthony J. Lockwood

Dear Desktop Engineering Reader:

Eurocom is taking the wraps off a new version of its PHANTOM-X Mobile Server, which is built around the 3.0GHz Intel Xeon Quad Core X3370 processor. And it's built around you. Eurocom doesn't do pre-wrapped systems. It builds individual configurations that you spec out to meet your needs.

The PHANTOM-X is not an everyday notebook, although you could easily use it for surfing the sports sites and your favorite blogs — it has built-in wireless after all. But the PHANTOM-X is really for traveling engineering IT professionals, software developers, training instructors, military personnel, emergency relief personnel, service organization field staff, and so on. It's for all of you out there who are always schlepping somewhere in a hurry and who need an engineering workstation with the performance and power to run and test your CFD, MCAD, modeling, database, CRM, and similar compute-intensive applications but have been making do with a semi-tricked out home notebook. As its name implies, the PHANTOM-X Mobile Server is powerful enough so that you can rush to a client's site, to your field office, or to some site where you have to run a technical training class and deploy it as short-term LAN-based solution.

Check out these specs to see what I mean about power: Quad Core X3370 processor with 12MB of L2 cache, up to 8GB of DDR2-800 memory, up to 1.5TB of storage and RAID 0/1/5, built-in uninterrupted power supply, onboard one Gigabit Ethernet port, 1333MHz front side bus, and CRT and DVI-D ports for two external displays. It has an integrated 17-inch LCD display, and graphics are powered by a 1GB NVIDIA Quadro FX3700 accelerator card. All hardware is 64-bit compliant, and you can use the operating system you prefer — Windows XP Pro 64, Vista 64-bit; Linux, or Server 2008. And Eurocom's PHANTOM-X systems are fully upgradeable — hard drive, memory, optical drives, processors, and graphics — so it can grow as your needs evolve.

In short, nothing about the Eurocom PHANTOM-X Mobile Server notebook is run-of-the-mill. But everything about the PHANTOM-X is about having engineering-class workstation and engineering-class IT server power with you as you run down the road to solve your next mission-critical assignment. You can learn more about the PHANTOM-X from today's Pick of the Week write-up.

Thanks, pal. — Lockwood

Anthony J. Lockwood

Editor at Large, Desktop Engineering Magazine