I still believe that we should get a mac  
because of:
 all the in house expertise (kenton/etc)thriving ucsf community
 it works out of the box /networking&otherwise
 it is(now)fully UNIX, &has always had most of what you want from Linux
 you can run Linux(&even windows)Right on that(dual-core)Intel chip (as well)
 You can also dual boot(intel based)Linux on it; indistingushable from a Dell
 it isn't much more than a dell
 getting just one would let us, be deversified(which is better than mono-culture/lock-in)
 most of the lab has macs at home, &it could work rather seamlessly
 We could get one .Mac account, and have network backup/viewing of our machines,even w/o serving IP


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Since we don't have sysadmins, I suggest the easiest to maintain boxes.
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Two 2.66GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon [8core option] 
8GB (4 x 2GB) [can double it later] 
four: 750GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s = 3Tb(toomuch)
AppleCare Protection Plan for Mac Pro; total $6,643
	& this is before an edu discount is applied
(That is overkill really, you can get one for 1/2 that
	or to test the waters a mini for 1/10th that) ??
I've also priced out a similar system for 3k or even 2k.

or go w/Linux; 
you can even get2micro clusters for this price, http://littlefe.net/
but w/o the support http://www.calvin.edu/~adams/research/microwulf/