Server Spec

Cyanide

Cyanide

Cyanide

Soldato
Joined
5 Mar 2006
Posts
3,975
Location
Nottingham
Hi guys,

My boss asked me to run up a spec for our office as he's just had a quote for over £6k for a not particularly well specced server.

We've got an aging Sandy Bridge Xeon at the moment, RAM's almost maxed out and it's struggling to cope. It's used for emails, printers, shared document access etc.

Not got a budget but anything less than £6k is obviously good, still got to sort out an OS but we'll discuss that with our software guys.

Just after something plain and simple that'll cope for a good few years, hence probably going hugely over on the specs we'll actually need. Any tips on how it can be improved?

My basket at Overclockers UK:

Total: £1,616.75
(includes shipping: £15.90)
​


​
 
Last edited:
nox_uk said:
Hmmm, can't see any redundant psu or remote management tools in that list (like ilo or Idrac etc). Hot swap drive bays? Onsite 4 hour warranty? That's where the extra 4.5k has gone.
Click to expand...

It was more the £3500 they'd specced on a 2 generation old 4c4t xeon, 16gb ram and 1tb hdd that got the boss thinking. He can live with the cost of software setup and support.

We know these things are expensive but the price for the unit itself was stupidly high :p

nox_uk said:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/fuji...r-server-e5-2620-v3-8gb-no-hdd-sv-006-fj.html
Click to expand...

Cheers, didn't spot that. Been having a hard time speccing things up with the new site layout and navigation :(

Armageus said:
Few things -

- what is the server for as file server, database server, exchange server, domain controllers all have different requirements.

64gb ram requires enterprise rather than standard edition windows server. You also want ecc ram.

Graphics card has no place in a server - get something with onboard.

Ssds whilst they will work are not enterprise standard, depending on role, hard drives may be more suitable. Hot swap drives are important if the server is critical.

If money is a big issue I would buy something returned, E.g a HP Dl360g6.
Click to expand...

Pretty much just a file server now, we're considering moving the email from the current exchange on to Office and just letting MS host it all.

Need a GPU - 2011 doesn't have iGPUs
 
Armageus said:
Maybe just get a NAS to replace the file server side of things? Keep your existing server for exchange until you move it to the cloud.

You don't need a GPU, as the motherboards you should be looking at even for 2011 have separate onboard graphics. You do not want a consumer graphics card in a server.

You won't get good feedback here for a self build server - it is just a bad idea. Honestly do yourself a favour and look at some refurbed HP or dell servers. Look at generation 7 HP stuff, if you want a tower server then something like a Ml350.

Once you have had redundant PSUs, hot swap drives, remote management, email alerts, and readily available spares there is no going back to self build.
Click to expand...

Fair points, I hadn't realised quite how much stuff I'd need to put in to it. I'll speak to him tomorrow and see if we can get some better quotes :)
 
Wow... wasn't expecting to get so much flak after already agreeing that building from scratch was a bad idea!

Suffice to say I'm getting more quotes in for a properly managed system. Could a mod close this one down please? :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom