[Tfug] Advice on building a new machine

[John Hubbard]

OnSunday, February 19, 2012 11:32 PM, John Gruenenfelder <jetpackjohn at gmail.com>wrote

 
After what seems like far too long, I've finally been given the go
>ahead (and funds) to replace our aging and crippled server/workstation
>in the office.  I can handle choosing most of the parts myself, but I
>would very much appreciate some input and advice on some aspects of
>the hardware which I either have little firsthand knowledge or which
>have changed markedly since I last put a computer together.
>
>
It might help people if you go into a little more details about how this machine will be used... You mention describe it as replacing a crippled server/workstation; are you going to be using this machines as a file server, db server, development machine...?  



>* Solid state storage
>As we need a decent amount of storage on this machine, I will be
>installing between two and four regular hard drives in either a RAID1
>or RAID5 configuration.  But, for the OS (and perhaps /home) I was
>considering a SSD.  But, I do not own one nor have I ever used one.  I
>know they're much faster, especially for random I/O, but I've always
>been a bit worried about their longevity.  Considering that the drive
>would be used for at most five years, is this something I need to be
>concerned with?  The machine will be on 24/7, of course.  Would I have
>to do anything special with regard to frequently written areas like
>/var/log?  Maybe put them on the HDD instead?  It's a solid state
>drive, but I suppose I should still put in two in a RAID1 setup, just
>to be safe?
>
>
As far as SSDs go an interesting article to read would be http://www.anandtech.com/show/5518/a-look-at-enterprise-performance-of-intel-ssds.  They go into a lot of details about longevity and performance. 



 
-john

To be or not to be, that is the question
                2b || !2b
(0b10)*(0b1100010) || !(0b10)*(0b1100010)
        0b11000100 || !0b11000100
        0b11000100 ||  0b00111011
               0b11111111
        255, that is the answer.
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