3D Server File Server

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 11:36

I am looking at a server at the moment for a fast file server for our 3d team. However, as we are on a bit of a buget at the mo and i need a short term fix. I am thinking about building a server rather then using a HP one as normal.

I am thinking about using 8 SAS 15K drives with a Adaptec 5805 RAID controller.

I need to achive around 500MB/Sec bandwith with the NIC, so i am looking at the Intel quad port NIC.

Ill be using a HP2810 Switch as well, this is completely deicated for the 3D Teams use with no other LAN traffic on it.

It also need to be quiet as well, so it rules out most of the Prolaints, which was my first though.

Software wise they are using 3D Studio Max

Does any one have any idea's?

Thanks

Andy

m4cc45 · 13 Nov 2008 at 11:57

Can you not put the server somewhere quiet and then network it to the clients?

For what you want is really something along hte lines of a DL380 I can't see building it being that much cheaper (if at all).

Just my 2P worth.

M.

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:01

m4cc45 said:
Can you not put the server somewhere quiet and then network it to the clients?

For what you want is really something along hte lines of a DL380 I can't see building it being that much cheaper (if at all).

Just my 2P worth.

M.

That was originally my first thoughts. However, due to what the requirements / budget are a DL380 is not possible. So I am a stuck at the mo. I have a deadline of 5th December to have it all in and installed by.

Andy

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:04

My first thoughts are to go with some thing along the lines of

Asus P45
E8500
4GB RAM
Intel Quad PT NIC
Adaptec 5805
8X 146GB SAS Drives
2X 74GB 10k SATA Drives RAID 1 for OS

Andy

atomiser · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:09

with respect, if this is for a business then it should be business grade hardware with a proper on-site warranty. even self build this is gonna cost a few quid, so why spend this out now on a 'short-term' solution and then have to re-visit it to put something proper in which will then cost even more money... do it right first time?!

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:18

atomiser said:
with respect, if this is for a business then it should be business grade hardware with a proper on-site warranty. even self build this is gonna cost a few quid, so why spend this out now on a 'short-term' solution and then have to re-visit it to put something proper in which will then cost even more money... do it right first time?!

I am full aware of this.

To do it correct the first time its going to cost 50K+ due to it needing new switchs, servers etc and at the mo we dont have 50K ish to spend. We are looking for a short term fix at the mo.

bobby_valentino · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:20

8 SAS's is a lot of HD's and expensive. The best thing to get is the new intel SSD's and RAID them which have an average read of 200MB/sec so you would only need 3 of those. You also get the added benefits of the SSD's e.g. no moving parts, constant read. a lot of bandwidth though!

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:24

bobby_valentino said:
8 SAS's is a lot of HD's and expensive. The best thing to get is the new intel SSD's and RAID them which have an average read of 200MB/sec so you would only need 3 of those. You also get the added benefits of the SSD's e.g. no moving parts, constant read. a lot of bandwidth though!

I need roughtly around 700/800GB of fast storage. As much as i want to use SSDs, they just work out too much unfort.

I've been limited to 5K and i am finding it a bit hard going

atomiser · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:30

if your budget for this is 5k then i'm fairly sure you could get a poweredge 2900 iii for that - quad core 2.5 ghz cpu, 4 gigs ram, upgraded raid adaptor, 2x 15k sas for o/s in the flex-bay, 8x 15k sas for data in the drive array, quad nic, dual psu, 3 years 4hr on-site warranty... decent kit, and then if you ever go for this 50k + solution your still left with a seriously capable piece of hardware for something else...

bigredshark · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:33

I'd be looking a specialist NAS for that kind of cash instead maybe, an HP DL185 Storage Server with 2.4TB in 300GB SAS drives costs about £6-7k depending on how friendly your reseller is. Take out come of those disks and you're close to £5k.

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:34

atomiser said:
if your budget for this is 5k then i'm fairly sure you could get a poweredge 2900 iii for that - quad core 2.5 ghz cpu, 4 gigs ram, upgraded raid adaptor, 2x 15k sas for o/s in the flex-bay, 8x 15k sas for data in the drive array, quad nic, dual psu, 3 years 4hr on-site warranty... decent kit, and then if you ever go for this 50k + solution your still left with a seriously capable piece of hardware for something else...

Cool, ive never used Dell servers.

However, i need to take Dual/Quad NICs and a Switch out of that 5K as well. So its a bit tight

Ill have a look at that, Thank you for the info

Andy

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:36

bigredshark said:
I'd be looking a specialist NAS for that kind of cash instead maybe, an HP DL185 Storage Server with 2.4TB in 300GB SAS drives costs about £6-7k depending on how friendly your reseller is. Take out come of those disks and you're close to £5k.

I cant go over 5K, i am luckly to get that at the mo as its coming from the 3D budget not our IT. One Cisco 3750E would be the budget used. :mad:

I need roughtly around 700/800GB Fast storage Switchs and NICs all out the 5K

This is my problem

bigredshark · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:40

If it was me I'd just say it can't be done, either spend more or don't bother at all. Don't know if you have that option but I'd stay clear of doing it on the cheap as it'll doubtless land on your head if it doesn't work as well as they'd like.

atomiser · 13 Nov 2008 at 12:46

andyd said:
However, i need to take Dual/Quad NICs and a Switch out of that 5K as well. So its a bit tight

when i was looking at the dell servers i included an intel quad nic into the mix...didnt know you had to get a switch out of it though too... in which case, im with brs on this one!

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:04

bigredshark said:
If it was me I'd just say it can't be done, either spend more or don't bother at all. Don't know if you have that option but I'd stay clear of doing it on the cheap as it'll doubtless land on your head if it doesn't work as well as they'd like.

I dont have that choice, we been backed in the corner which is not nice. I am also fully aware of that.

What sort of speed can i expect from the HP then?

Ive worked out i have £3400 ~ to spend on a sever after ive got the Switch and NICs for the desktops. Each Desktop (5 in total) ideally needs to have around 250MB/Sec to it, but they can get away with 100~MB/Sec ideally .

Thanks for you help chaps.

Andy

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:18

The Dell Power Edge 2900 is coming at around £3300 so thats good.

8XSAS drives for the Storage
2XRAID 1 for the OS

How loud are these boxes? Also would this spec see 500MB/Sec or more in terms for performance?

This is the spec:

Base Quad Core Intel® Xeon® E5410 2x6MB Cache, 2.33GHz 1333MHz FSB
Additional Processor No second Processor option
Memory 2GB Memory, 667MHz (4x512MB Single Ranked FB DIMMs)
Keyboard No Keyboard Required
Monitor Display Not Included
Floppy Drives and Additional Storage Devices No Floppy Disk Drive required
Mouse Not included
Network Cards Intel® PRO 1000VT Quad Port Gigabit Network Card, PCI-E
Optical Devices 48X SATA CDRW/DVD Combo Drive, IDE, Half Height
Shipping Documents English - Documentation and UK/Ireland Power Cord
2nd Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
Tower/Base Orientation Tower Chassis
Base warranty 1Yr Basic Warranty - Next Business Day
Support Services 3Yr Basic Warranty - Next Business Day
Installation Services You have chosen not to take the Dell PowerEdge installation service
Raid Connectivity C11 Integrated SAS/SATA, RAID5/RAID1 using add in iPERC controller, 3-8 HDDs, FlexBay 2 HDDs
Power Supply Two Hot Plug Power Supplies for Redundancy
1st Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
2nd Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
3rd Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
4th Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
5th Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
6th Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
7th Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
8th Hard Drive 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug)
Order Information PowerEdge Order - United Kingdom
TCP/IP Offload Engine Enablement TCP/IP Offload Engine (2P TOE) Ready
Powercord Power Cord, PDU (Rack)
Extra Internal Hard Drives (Media Bay) Two 73GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Flex Bay Hard Drives (Hot Plug)
1st RAID or SCSI Controller Card PERC 6/i Internal RAID Controller Card (256MB cache, battery backup)
Factory Installed Operating System Microsoft Windows Server® 2003 R2 SP2, Std Edition with 5 CAL and docs (12GB Partition) English
System Documentation Electronic Documentation on OpenManage CD kit (no paper documents included)

atomiser · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:26

is that quote from the website, or from an account manager at dell, or from a var?

if its from the website you will get it quite a bit cheaper by talking to someone.

double check your drive configuration since the drives in the flex-bay are normally listed as either 'single' or 'pair'... just to make sure your pricing is right.

consider getting 4 gigs of ram too since it's only 20 quid extra iirc.

i dont have any raw performance stats for this hardware.

i've been impressed with one i bought not so long ago but it's being used for something totally different so i cant really compare it.

bigredshark · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:26

andyd said:
I dont have that choice, we been backed in the corner which is not nice. I am also fully aware of that.

What sort of speed can i expect from the HP then?

Ive worked out i have £3400 ~ to spend on a sever after ive got the Switch and NICs for the desktops. Each Desktop (5 in total) ideally needs to have around 250MB/Sec to it, but they can get away with 100~MB/Sec ideally .

Thanks for you help chaps.

Andy

250MB a second? As in 2Gbit/s?? Thats close to native disk speed even for SAS, I'd try everything to get the price down I guess.

Slower CPU in the servers and the minimum possible RAM (always upgradable later if needs be). I'd definately go for 10k rather than 15k drives and I'd be sorely tempted to use lots of SATA drives instead of SAS given the cost issues.

A DL185 (I just happen to have that price list handy today) is £4-4.5k with 8x 500GB SATA drives (assuming ~100MBps for each drive, 8 in RAID10 you'll get at least 400MBps, which should be fast enough). IF you have a very friendly reseller you might be able to do better on price, or the equivalent dell box is likely cheaper.

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:49

atomiser said:
is that quote from the website, or from an account manager at dell, or from a var?

if its from the website you will get it quite a bit cheaper by talking to someone.

double check your drive configuration since the drives in the flex-bay are normally listed as either 'single' or 'pair'... just to make sure your pricing is right.

consider getting 4 gigs of ram too since it's only 20 quid extra iirc.

i dont have any raw performance stats for this hardware.

i've been impressed with one i bought not so long ago but it's being used for something totally different so i cant really compare it.

Its from the website. So i hope to get a bit more off with a account manager.

RSR · 13 Nov 2008 at 13:51

bigredshark said:
250MB a second? As in 2Gbit/s?? Thats close to native disk speed even for SAS, I'd try everything to get the price down I guess.

Slower CPU in the servers and the minimum possible RAM (always upgradable later if needs be). I'd definately go for 10k rather than 15k drives and I'd be sorely tempted to use lots of SATA drives instead of SAS given the cost issues.

A DL185 (I just happen to have that price list handy today) is £4-4.5k with 8x 500GB SATA drives (assuming ~100MBps for each drive, 8 in RAID10 you'll get at least 400MBps, which should be fast enough). IF you have a very friendly reseller you might be able to do better on price, or the equivalent dell box is likely cheaper.

Yes thats correct 250MB/Sec (2Gb /Sec)

Nice one. Thanks chaps

Andy