Show Us Your Racks

DRZ · 21 May 2014 at 14:06

Some FEX neatness upgrades:

If anyone wants more detail, just ask!

leigh_boy · 21 May 2014 at 16:49

thats a lot of fiber .. mmmmmm

easyrider · 8 Jun 2014 at 03:24

XL5 said:
These two run, along with the tape library, look after the house services, AD, DNS etc

What's that HP thingy in the drive bay?

Kei · 8 Jun 2014 at 09:53

It's an ultrium LTO tape drive. I use an external ultrium SAS 3000 in work for backing up avid projects & media to LTO 5.

XL5 · 9 Jun 2014 at 13:55

Kei is right, the server has this internal LTO2 drive, attached also is a 24 tape library with two more of these drives.

easyrider · 9 Jun 2014 at 14:17

XL5 said:
Kei is right, the server has this internal LTO2 drive, attached also is a 24 tape library with two more of these drives.

why?

Burnsy2023 · 9 Jun 2014 at 14:21

easyrider said:
why?

Lots of storage for backups?

easyrider · 9 Jun 2014 at 14:30

Burnsy2023 said:
Lots of storage for backups?

6.25TB?

would hardrives not be more cost effective?

Burnsy2023 · 9 Jun 2014 at 14:34

easyrider said:
6.25TB?

would hardrives not be more cost effective?

Not really. If you want a daily rotation, that's a lot of harddrives, tapes are cheaper and more reliable. You may lose a file on a tape, but you're more likely to lose a whole volume on a HDD.

easyrider · 9 Jun 2014 at 15:58

Burnsy2023 said:
Not really. If you want a daily rotation, that's a lot of harddrives, tapes are cheaper and more reliable. You may lose a file on a tape, but you're more likely to lose a whole volume on a HDD.

Curiosity quashed

DRZ · 10 Jun 2014 at 15:58

Tape is a pain in the arse at the best of times but it is very good at what it does - backing up/archiving large amounts of data for the long term.

Caged · 10 Jun 2014 at 20:33

DRZ said:
Some FEX neatness upgrades:

If anyone wants more detail, just ask!

That Cisco/Linksys switch definitely doesn't belong there

oli356 · 10 Jun 2014 at 20:37

Top of rack management switch maybe?

Trifid · 10 Jun 2014 at 20:42

DRZ said:
Some FEX neatness upgrades:

If anyone wants more detail, just ask!

Have you terminated the fibre directly into LC connectors? With no patch panel?

DRZ · 10 Jun 2014 at 21:16

Caged said:
That Cisco/Linksys switch definitely doesn't belong there

oli356 said:
Top of rack management switch maybe?

Exactly that. Waste of money to put anything more fancy than that in.

Trifid said:
Have you terminated the fibre directly into LC connectors? With no patch panel?

They are made to order but yeah. They are actually intended for interconnecting patch panels but they work really well for this role.

Trifid · 10 Jun 2014 at 21:43

DRZ said:
They are made to order but yeah. They are actually intended for interconnecting patch panels but they work really well for this role.

Interesting. I hate how delicate the fibres feel though. At least with proper patch fibres they have a bit more protection and are easily replaced if damaged.

Caged · 10 Jun 2014 at 21:52

DRZ said:
Exactly that. Waste of money to put anything more fancy than that in.

I dunno, it doesn't have the bandwidth requirements but it still has the reliability requirements. I've had so much cheap stuff fail due to components going bad (dead power supply, RAM/flash etc.) that I just won't touch cheap gear. At least it's not TP Link I suppose.

DRZ · 10 Jun 2014 at 21:57

Trifid said:
Interesting. I hate how delicate the fibres feel though. At least with proper patch fibres they have a bit more protection and are easily replaced if damaged.

They don't feel hideously fragile but I know what you mean. I've considered the fragility but, unlike servers and stuff, Fabric Extenders are pretty static and the 5Ks are end of row so pretty much out if harms way. The upsides are the inter-rack fibres take up 90% less space in the tray and they are 1000% neater

DRZ · 10 Jun 2014 at 22:04

Caged said:
I dunno, it doesn't have the bandwidth requirements but it still has the reliability requirements. I've had so much cheap stuff fail due to components going bad (dead power supply, RAM/flash etc.) that I just won't touch cheap gear. At least it's not TP Link I suppose.

It's cheaper to buy an entire rows worth of these than it is to get smartnet on a single 2960. They've been pretty reliable so far and iDRAC really isn't mission critical although it would be annoying if/when one dies.

Caged · 10 Jun 2014 at 22:23

That's a really bad comparison but I get your point. If you have easy physical access to the stuff then you can just buy a couple of spares as well.