Reasonable spec for a file server..

Skyrunner

Skyrunner

Skyrunner

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I work at a fairly small defence engineering company, with around 20 of us. Our server (glorified NAS box) is somewhat lacking so I proposed a move to some new hardware.

Despite working as an IT consultant for 6 years full time and as a sideline I turned the job down as I don't want the hassle of having to support it when I leave.

We've had a local business come in and quote us for a system... Now a file server for 20 people, which in honesty only has around 50GB on it they have quoted us just under £6k.

Their proposed spec:

  • HP Proliant ML350 w/ 2GB Registered DDR2 (£1100 + £120 for RAM)
  • 3 x146GB SAS-SFF 10,000RPM drives for storage (£682)
  • 2x 76GB SAS-SFF 10,000RPM drives for operating (£400ish)
  • 5x Small Business Server 2003 CALs to upgrade our 10 (£682)
  • Labour (£600)

There are a few bits in there as well but that’s the core.

Personally I don't think and ML350 is required for what is essentially a low use small file server?

The other oddity is why they are insisting on using SMB2003 when we have SMB2008 ready to upgrade to? Have I missed something here?

I've basically given them a revised requirement spec and asked them to go off and quote on it, they seem like a the type of company that saw my MD coming (I'm the first technical guy to look over the quotes) as he didn't have a clue what we were buying!

I'm proposing:
  • Lower end Proliant (ML1xx or ML310)
  • 2GB Registered ECC DDR2
  • 3x 1TB 7,200RPM SATA-II drives in RAID-5
  • 5x SBS 2008 CALs

I wanted the opinion of some other people knowledgeable in the area, price isn't majorly important but as with all small businesses we have to keep costs down and I reckoned this was a fairly OTT quote for our requirements?

I have been given the final say on this and ATM I'm standing my ground with them on this.
 
if all you want is a file server, how comes your using small business server? are you using any of the sbs features, such as exchange etc? if not, then yeah you could probably go for a lower spec server and just stick with server 2003 or 2008 and sata drives. if yes, then i would recommend sticking with the 350, sas drives, and even upping the memory to 4 gigs. alternatively, look at the poweredge 2900 series of servers, as they may come in a bit cheaper for you. personally i would also recommend running the os volume on one array of drives, and your data volume on another. if this is not possible, then at least seperate them out into different partitions on the same drives. what are you doing for backups, networking switching, and un-interuptable power?
 
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SBS has been chosen by sales (since we already have the licensing), the Chief Engineer wants HP, the day anybody actually takes note of the backup policy I wrote I will fall over dead. The IT policy is awful to say the best, networking gear is basic Net gear switches, no UPS, wonder why I didn't want to do it?!

For reference the current file server is a 5 year old Dell running Windows XP!

Boot volume will be on a separate drive for obvious reasons.

I want to cut the server costing down as with 15 users (soon to be 20), very low data transfer I feel it's OTT for our needs and the funds can go to other areas. TBH I am contemplating washing my hands of the whole affair!
 
For what you are using it for any pc with a modern cpu 2*350 gig hd 3 gig ram would be all you need you could get 2 of these pc's for a few hundred quid and have one as backup so you dont need fancy raid. You could backup to dvd with the small amount of files you have.

I worked for a small company like that and we used all the pc's in the office assuming the data isnt confidential we used to copy it across with a batch job running robocopy at dinner time to other office pc's most pc's have lots of free space on the HD so why was it. It meant if the server went down you could get your files from another office pc instantly.
 
No major expansion on the horizon, data security is important; a lot of our data is encrypted using proprietary software depending on the client (MOD, DOD etc).

No AD, possibly exchange, but unlikely. The only reason someone got the idea of an upgrade was we’ve had access issues due to WinXP limiting 10 connections on the file shares, sales panic, the MD panic, they get an IT solution company in who sell them what I think is an unnecessary spec.

All it is is a glorified file dump and place to centrally store phone logs etc, last time I checked it was handling less than a gig in transfer a day.

With regards to RAID, I generally feel happier with some redundancy as no-one will back up more than monthly so when the drive dies we need to be able to at least partially recover data.

Lower end systems like this really aren’t my area, I used to manage systems with 100-150 so this is a bit smaller than what I’m used to!
 
Id look at ether RAID5 with a hotspare or RAID 6 personal in this type of setup. I would probably chose the ML310 over the ML110 as you have more options for redundancy on the box. i.e Spare PSU etc...

SAS Drives are complete over kill for this style of setup, SATA would be the way to go in IMO.
 
My thoughts exactly. Why on earth you would want to use SAS Drives for a file server anywhere other than key enterprise infrastructure is overkill to the definition.

It would make sense to have a RAID Setup with 2 SAS Drives for the OS Storage (windows server 2008), and then have as said, 2 or 4 RAID configured 7200Rpm 1.5TB to give you redundant low cost storage.
 
# 3 x146GB SAS-SFF 10,000RPM drives for storage (£682)

Also, this only gives you ~450GB storage - how on earth did they think that was enough for a file server? :s

I work for an IT Company in Manchester, so if your based near and want a quote then i can forward you to the right person if need be. Hope it all goes well!
 
SMN said:
I work for an IT Company in Manchester, so if your based near and want a quote then i can forward you to the right person if need be. Hope it all goes well!
Click to expand...

Unfortunatly we're in Maidenhead, bit far!

Hopefully I'll get a revised quote tomorrow, they were a bit annoyed a made some fairly specific requests for the spec change!
 
ML110 with 4x xxGB 'raid' type sata drives with a decent RAID card, something like a 3ware 9650SE with a BBU. (extremely important)

4x500GB drives will give you 1TB usable and you can lose 2 drives and still keep your data.
 
Lithium said:
ML110 with 4x xxGB 'raid' type sata drives with a decent RAID card, something like a 3ware 9650SE with a BBU. (extremely important)

4x500GB drives will give you 1TB usable and you can lose 2 drives and still keep your data.
Click to expand...

Id personally stay away from the ML1XX, as it doesnt offer a lot in terms of PSU reduncy etc...

However, that said it all would come down to buget. What about a HP ML330 G6?

Andy
 
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Hmm, we use a small HPML115 here in work. I would not suggest using SATA drives with SBS as its so resource intensive. The SATA drives here are sluggish at best, thats with a 3ware 9650SE as suggested above, with 8GB of RAM.

Also, you have under proposed yourself the amount of RAM to start with if you want SBS2008. The minimum SBS 2008 requires is 4GB. After immediate installation SBS here is using well over 3GB. (We are only 9 users too)

I would definitely use SAS drives as storage in any SBS2008 environment. (Perhaps SATA if you are using SBS2003)
However, I do feel that if it's only going to be a file server without AD/Exchange, you can get away with 2008 Standard.

Some companies are still scared of outputting 2008 as their OS, so that is probably the way they are not suggesting it. (and that it requires beefier hardware)

I can't seem to work out where you/they got 6K from, using the calcs above?
 
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MarkA said:
Also, you have under proposed yourself the amount of RAM to start with if you want SBS2008. The minimum SBS 2008 requires is 4GB. After immediate installation SBS here is using well over 3GB. (We are only 9 users too)
Click to expand...

Remember, exchange store process will allocate as much as it has available to itself.
 
I've just got a quote for 4k on an IBM box that's got a 3TB SATA RAID5, and then a few 146Gb SAS disks for C: and 16gb of RAM, that quote is way over price.

Look up a company called Kelway, that's who we deal with here.

(I don't think they can be classed as a competitor, as OCUK doesn't deal with enterprise level customers or sell IBM X-Series hardware...)
 
SMN said:
# 3 x146GB SAS-SFF 10,000RPM drives for storage (£682)

Also, this only gives you ~450GB storage - how on earth did they think that was enough for a file server? :s

I work for an IT Company in Manchester, so if your based near and want a quote then i can forward you to the right person if need be. Hope it all goes well!
Click to expand...

ROFL, 450gb is MORE than enough for a file server. For a standard office (not talking about anything big like CAD, software houses etc), I'd say 450gb would be enough for 400~500 users. He already said the file store is about 50gb
 
MasterPlan1 said:
I've just got a quote for 4k on an IBM box that's got a 3TB SATA RAID5, and then a few 146Gb SAS disks for C: and 16gb of RAM, that quote is way over price.

Look up a company called Kelway, that's who we deal with here.

(I don't think they can be classed as a competitor, as OCUK doesn't deal with enterprise level customers or sell IBM X-Series hardware...)
Click to expand...

Thats way over spec and having seen some of the build quality from IBM recently on the x series, I wouldnt touch them personally. Something with a single Xeon dual/quad core CPU, 2gb ram and some SATA drives is more than enough for 20 users.

A quick visit to the Dell website says 1k is more than enough for this sort of spec with redundant PSUs etc.

Another vote for kelway though, very good company to work with
 
450GB for 400 users? So your users are OK with 10GB each? What about items such as roaming profiles, large PST's being stored on the file server, large applications, call centre solutions which store recorded calls and archive for 3 years, etc. I think a ROFL was a tad harsh ;)
 
iaind said:
Thats way over spec and having seen some of the build quality from IBM recently on the x series, I wouldnt touch them personally. Something with a single Xeon dual/quad core CPU, 2gb ram and some SATA drives is more than enough for 20 users.

A quick visit to the Dell website says 1k is more than enough for this sort of spec with redundant PSUs etc.

Another vote for kelway though, very good company to work with
Click to expand...

I was using that quote as a comparison as to how over quoted the OP was, that server is for a dev SQL DW box :)
 
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