A few days ago, John Pierce made a comment about Intel network cards and that they are more reliable and a better overall card than most. (This is not exactly what he said, but rather I am paraphrasing) My small cluster of servers all had generic PCI nics in them (I was not using any onboard NICS).
Today, I replaced the NICS with Intel Pro 1000 PCI-E NICS and replaces our small 5 port TP-Link GB switch with a nice 8 port Cisco GB switch and what a world of difference. The network is zippier for sure. Copying large files between machines using 'scp' is faster, our websites come up better (testing from my wife's work) too.
I know some have joked about the PB conversation in terms of not realizing the amount of electricity and space it will take, but I really do read and pay attention and try not to ask totally stupid questions.
John Pierce, thank you!
-Jason