[Tfug] Server purchase (!)

[Stephen Hooper]

The real question to ask yourself shouldn't be what kind of server,
but what kind of service level you need to provide.  Then  purchase
the server to fit it.

Don't skimp on the service level by thinking of it only in terms of
the clients.  Think of it on your terms as well (most things you think
of for yourself can be shown to be good ideas for the clients in any
case).

Depending on those requirement, if I were you I would probably first
look at buying something that will hardware RAID, and hot-plug hard
drives, and get you redundant power supplies.

If you want to use a RAID-5 for the data, that is great, but trying to
rebuild everything from scratch to get to your data can be very
frustrating: I would recommend a separate isolated mirrored disk for
the OS.  I know you can re-install RedHat in a few minutes, but
things always take longer than you think.

The less you have to think about, the better the possibility that you
won't have any hugely complicated beast hanging over you for the rest
of your life, and that you may actually get to just phone it in and
forget it.

Redundant power supplies are also a no brainer, but depending on the
situation, may not be justified based on the level of  service you
need to provide.

Finally, some other things that make a nice server (especially a
fileserver), are the beefiest possible backplane, and fast spindles on
your disk.

The backplane speed now is usually a non-issue, but if (for example)
you were trying to feed all those disks, and write 2 LTO tapes all off
the same PCI bus, then you will end up with longer windows.

Just my opinion.

Is it your money?

On 10/10/06, Claude Rubinson <rubinson at u.arizona.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 10, 2006 at 04:03:09PM -0700, Brian Masur wrote:
>
> > If you aren't concerned about speed or ram, then I think the only
> > guiding factor on how cheap you can go is how much space you need.
>
> I've thought about going that route (it would certainly save a lot of
> money over purchasing new).  The only thing that I'm concerned about
> is reliability; in particular, the heat and vibration problems that 4
> (or more) drives might cause.  Thoughts or experiences, anyone?
>
> C.
>
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