Got the Cabinet, now I need the guts, please help :)

[Heofz]

Hey guys & gals,

I've got me a 21U cabinet to host my server gear, though it's basically for networking so I can only really have 450mm depth equipment installed in it (500mm absolute tops).

What I'm aiming for is to put in a Windows Server on maybe a 4U enclosure, but have the rest of the rack space reserved for storage. I'm thinking perhaps having the server itself with several mini-SAS ports and have a number of mini-sas drive enclosures?

I would like to have the entire lot running RAID 10, and be easily expandable as I accumulate more data and thus purchase more hard drives.

Looking at 30 TB's worth of space initially (so 60 TB in drives), plus server and storage interface gear.

Not really sure where to go from here though as I've never made a purchase of this size before. Can anyone make any recommendations or have any advice?

 

[Heofz]

what kind of data will you be putting on to the server?

Large media files, namely compressed videos. Produced/Encoded on a different machine, and the final product uploaded to the server machine. Primarily for playback over the network as well as a big screen connected directly to the server.

I picked up a couple... ... ...

Interesting, I'm trying to learn the right terms to use as I go along, but am I right in saying I'm best looking for a "Direct Attached Storage" setup?

I'll have a good scour on eBay tonight for an empty MD1000 or something similar. And you're right, so far it seems virtually impossible to find a 45-50cm depth disk enclosure!

Is there a particular SAS controller you would recommend for my setup? Anything I should be particularly aware of, i.e. paying £1000 for a card when a £100 one will do. Also I assume I shouldn't run every disk in a single RAID10 array, and instead split the logical volumes up into smaller chunks?

Does the disk shelf actually determine the RAID capabilities etc? Or does it simply act as a "shell" with power and so the RAID stuff is determined by the SAS controller card in the server?

Apologies for all the questions, trying to get as much info as possible now as I want to purchase the right stuff first time (Sadly the depth of cabinet was not an option due to room space limitations.

 

[Heofz]

Oops forgot about this thread! doh.

I'm about to buy a couple of MD1000 units, and just picked up an LSI MegaRAID 9280-8e on eBay for £200

Reconsidering my RAID option, will probably go for RAID 6 in the end. Initially didn't want to fork out £800 or whatever for a new raid card but £200 seems to be a bargain for this card.

I guess if I'm doing RAID 6 I should buy a battery unit module to go with the 9280 for resiliency... worth it or a waste?

Also anyone know how much of a ball-ache it is to extend the size of an existing RAID 6 array to add additional drives in future? I imagine there's a lot of rebuilding that has to happen?

 

[Heofz]

Cool, I definitely want to try keeping the budget down on the drives, the SAS drives are nearly twice the cost of these for the same space, and I intend on eventually owning 45 of them

Will look into the BBWC stuff.

Also looking at buying a 3U ATX chassis... found a few 45mm depth ones online, but was wondering: Are there some widely known ATX mobo server grade setup/configs that will serve well as general purpose with decent expansion options? Presumably a regular desktop mobo/cpu/etc will not be suitable due to power usage/heat output/etc?

Obviously the mobo will need to have the PCI-e ports for the RAID card... but beyond that and what I mentioned above, anything glaringly obvious I should be considering?

 

[Heofz]

Ok wow, I totally didn't anticipate the cost of the Dell SATA caddies... £34.20 each ... how is that justified? Just because they can?

If I want to buy 30 of them it's gonna cost me £1026, for empty disk trays!!

 

[Heofz]

Wow, thanks for the info!

Noted on the server chassis. I did end up ordering a short depth 4U chassis, but also finally decided on taking the plunge and purchasing a 24U acoustic rack cabinet with 800mm depth rather than fart about with this thing. Will have 3U extra room too, and hoping the 120mm fan in the 4U chassis will be one less noise source to worry about. Tempted to send the 4U case back if I change my mind though... we'll see.

Note that you can use SATA drives without interposers in the MD1000 but are limited to a single 4 lane connection (up to 1.2GB/s). If you use an interposer you can use both 4 lane connections but are limited to 2TB SATA drives. Found this out the hard way . The interposers are pricey even second user. Raid 5 or 6 will slow your drives down a fair bit but the 9280 is a pretty decent card.

Bought a bunch of interposer caddies for £27 each, they are on the way as we speak. But I had no idea the interposers weren't needed... All the websites/vendors out there say that they are, which is why I bought them rather than the simple tray ones

But are you saying that if I intend on having 4TB drives they are useless? I'm not massively bothered by the speed aspect if I'm honest, so long as I have the storage and data integrity from the RAID 6 and being set up properly... would I be better off taking the interposers off and selling them?

Looked around on the web and can't seem to find anything which makes this completely clear for my particular combination of things, i.e. 4TB SATA drives, daisy chained across 3x MD1000.

So yeah I was wondering, am I being too ambitious to expect 3x MD1000's to be able to run 45x Western Digital 4TB Red drives, daisy chained off a single mini-sas connection from the 9280? (assuming the MD's are running latest A04 firmware), or am I just being paranoid

I would echo what Little_Crow said about having a BBU for any type of parity raid. Not also that BBUs are a disposable item. THey need to be replaced every few years. The other alternative is a card with FBWC (Flash Based Write Cache) which doesn't need replacing. Saying that, the BBUs are not very expensive on ebay but make sure you get the cable and mount too for the first one.

Going to buy an LSIiBBU08 which apparently can mount directly on the card.