On Thu, Jun 14, 2012 at 12:42 AM, James Dugger <james.dugger@gmail.com> wrote:

Lisa, Thanks I have been looking into VMware, though I hadn't thought of Citrix.

It looks like there's known issues with VMware on this server:
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=865

VMware has observed ESX and GSX Server product instabilities due to hardware problems on Dell PowerEdge 1400SC and 2450 servers (Pentium-III based systems). The failures are due to chipset malfunctions and may lead to several different failure modes including those resulting in VMware errors messages and guest operating systems failures such as blue screens. These problems were observed on both dual-processor and single processor systems. VMware has observed that these failures are usually not tied to particular actions caused by virtual machine users and may happen at any time. In our experience, the average time to failure is inversely proportional to the number of virtual machines concurrently running on the server. Servers running more virtual machines are likely to fail sooner than those running fewer virtual machines. Replacing the motherboard is an appropriate remedy in this case.

This server is not going to be appropriate for ESXi, however you could install plain linux with vmware server.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-virtualization-90/best-practices-setting-up-centos-5-5-esxi-4-0-dell-poweredge-852064/

A citrix XenServer is going to be slow. I would make it a toaster or use it as an Apache lamp server or iptables firewall.

Processors	Dual Intel® Pentium® III microprocessors with a minimum internal operating frequency of 600 MHz
Memory	One or two Intel Pentium III microprocessors with an internal operating frequency of at least 600 MHz and an external operating frequency of 133 MHz
Internal Storage Options	SCSI hard-disk drives formatted capacities ranging from 9 GB to 36 GB
Max Internal Storage	Up to 91 GB of internal storage capacity for support of up to 5 hard drives
Drive Bays
Slots	Three full-length PCI slots, located in a removable expansion-card cage.
Driver Controllers
RAID	An optional integrated PowerEdge Expandable RAID Controller (PERC) 3/Si that supports RAID levels 0, 1, 5, and 10.
Communications
Size	Rack Mount (2U): Height 8.4 cm (3.3 inches) Width 42.4 cm (16.7 inches) Depth 66.8 cm (26.3 inches) Weight 15.87 kg (35 lb) minimum 24.94 kg (55 lb) maximum
Power	AC power supply: Wattage 330 W per supply Voltage 100 to 240 V at 60 Hz/230 V at 50 Hz System battery CR2032 3-V lithium coin cell

James, I will look into AZ State Surplus.

Thomas, I have a 42U rack and have the space for it. However you are right it is not very green. I have thought of gutting it and keeping the 2U case however I don't know if it is worth the effort (or even possible) to retrofit it to work with a new face plate tom increase the number of drive bays. Probably would end up with very poor air flow anyway.

Thanks all.

On Wed, Jun 13, 2012 at 9:11 PM, Thomas Cameron <thomas.cameron@camerontech.com> wrote:

On 06/12/2012 04:20 PM, James Dugger wrote:

I have inherited a Dell PowerEdge 2450 and want to re-task it somewhere
in my network running as a linux server. It was being used two months
ago as a VPN server running Windows 2003 Server.

Here are the secs:

2 - 866 MHz Pentium Processors
Bus 133MHz
cache 256 KB
2048 MB ECC SDRAM
built in adaptec hardware RAID controller
SCSI dual channel backplane - w/1 daughter card installed

4 - 3.5 hot swap drivebays

Man, that thing is going to suck LOTS of power and pump out LOTS of heat.

If it were me, I'd sell it on craigslist or eBay and use the cash to buy a modern multicore motherboard, memory, and processor in a desktop case. Seriously, for a few hundred bucks you can get a system that sips power comparatively, has many more - and much faster - CPUs, and has as much more more memory.

I've given up trying to repurpose machines that old. The cost in power alone over the course of a year makes it smarter to get rid of it.

TC

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Processors

Memory

Internal Storage Options

Max Internal Storage

Drive Bays

Slots

Driver Controllers

RAID

Communications

Size

Power