Server recommendations

[Darrin Chandler]

On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 06:15:23PM -0700, Eric Shubes wrote:
> I agree. (Hi, Darrin!)

(Hi, Eric!)

> $2500 for raid 5? Do you really need raid 5? Would LVM do?
> I could see using raid 1 however. I'd consider using Linux software raid
> too, if you think raid is necessary.

I repsectfully disagree. If you *need* RAID then software RAID (Linux or
not) is not a great solution, and neither is LVM. There's a time and
place for real hardware RAID.

But you are right that RAID-5 shouldn't cost $2500! You can buy a good
quality controller plus fast, reliable SCSI drives for far less. I did.

> What sort of web app are you talking? That's an awful lot of horsepower for
> a simple web server. What does the application require? That should lead you
>  in the right direction.

Good points to ponder. Some web apps do require that kind of horsepower,
with heavy database backends, etc. Most do not, of course.

> I'd certainly have a look at what Dell can offer. Their prices have always
> been competitive (at least) when I've shopped there.
> 
> I'd buy a bare bones box, and load CentOS4.4 on it. CentOS is essentially
> the same as RHEL4, simply repackaged. Security updates are timely, and the
> system is quite stable (much more so than Fedora!).

If the horsepower is really needed, I'd stay away from whitebox server
and lean more towards a nice supermicro or similar class server
hardware. For half the quoted price you can have a very nice server with
high quality components, and have someone put it together, burn it in,
and give you a warranty.

As I mentioned previously, I had someone build me a totally sick box for
$3200. Dual Opteron, RAID-5 hot swap SCSI, redundant hot swap power
supplies, etc., etc. All name brand, wicked fast, redundancy, Open
Source supported hardware. That's not cheap, but when you need server
class hardware it's not wasted money.

If you *don't* need server class hardware then that's different, and
your suggestions are very good in that case. Why waste money for
reliability and redundancy when, if it should blow a gasket, you can go
pick up a replacement component at Fry's and replace it the next day? Or
buy two cheapos and do failover (or manual swap)?

-- 
Darrin Chandler            |  Phoenix BSD Users Group
dwchandler at stilyagin.com   |  http://bsd.phoenix.az.us/
http://www.stilyagin.com/  |