Is it feasible to place BOE so that it uses 1 CPU on the server for the DEV environment? This is the initial installation with no repository files. However, down the road this may change to many more files… Does that even make a difference?
indy (BOB member since 2004-04-08)
Depends on what you want to do with your DEV BOE environment, how many develeopers will be accessing it, etc.
Otherwise I suggest to go with a virtualized server with 1 CPU, 2,5 GHz+, 4GB RAM (Windows Server) to get started (with all BOE components installed on one server). As demand increases you can add CPUs to the virtualized server and scale horizontally as well (meaning: adding new servers/BOE clustering).
Note:
Make sure you stay compliant regarding your SAP BOE licenses.
Andreas 
(BOB member since 2002-06-20)
We have always run our Development environment with one processor. Earlier this year we converted it to a VMWare server. We have 2 GB of RAM and a 3.16 GHz processor. We haven’t experienced any performance problems with the Business Objects. I would think in most cases, you will have fewer users in the development environment than in your QA and Production environments anyway.