Pentium D, Xeon...or is this all overkill?

[qwicker]

Hi, I'm looking to purchase a small server for my house. I have about 2-4 computers that will be accessing the server on a given day. The basic need for the server is data backup and consolidation. It is of utmost importance that certain files and databases are kept safe. I will also be using it to host a home domain(just AD, no webhosting or anything) and I would also like to use it for VPN and Remote Desktop. Please help me to 'decide' which system below looks better. My main questions are about the processors, and the RAID/Datasafe solutions. Is Xeon really better than the D? Can I expect any of these systems to perform much better and protect my Data? I have not heard too much about Dell Datasafe, but it seems pretty good...
Thank you!!! P.S. All are priced within $100 of each other so price is no option.

Dell Precision 380:
-Intel® Pentium® D 920, 2.80GHz/800MHz/2x2MB L2 cache, Dual-core
-2GB, 667MHz, DDR2 SDRAM Memory, ECC (2 DIMMS)
-2x250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache™ for RAID 1.

PowerEdge SC1420:
-Intel® Xeon™ Processor at 2.8GHz/2MB Cache, 800MHz FSB
-2.0GB DDR2, 400MHz, 4X512MB,Single Ranked DIMMs
-CERC 6-Channel SATA RAID Controller
-2x250GB 7.2K RPM Serial ATA Hard Drive

XPS 400:
-Pentium® D Processor 940 with Dual Core Technology (3.20GHz, 800FSB)
-2GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz- 2DIMMs
-DataSafe 250GB (Includes main hard drive plus a hidden reserve hard drive)

 

[LawnBoy]

Personally, I wouldn't dream of putting critical data on SATA. We're running about 30% failure rates on SATA on our Optiplex desktops.

Critical = SCSI, imho.

 

[PaulGillespie]

The processor type won't make much differance for your needs. I'd recommend hardware raid which the poweredge has. I have 4 Poweredges with SATA drives and about 30 PC with SATA drives and never lost one yet but i have heard others mention poor reliability of the drives but i have had scsi drives go om me before. Either way, get RAID 1 on a Card and you'll have the redundancy you require.

Sorry never used the datasafe software.