Spec a raided server

Xandos

Xandos

Xandos

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Joined
19 Aug 2006
Posts
596
Hi guys, I'm looking to build a server, probably laid out as such:

mirrored SSD - only running OS
2x mirrored pairs of HDDs (one is high data throughput, the other needs to be ultra stable, no corruption or anything)

What would be the best way to go about this?

I'd be thinking 2x OCZ vertex 60gb, 4x Samsung F3 2TB - after that what would be a good set-up? CPU/RAM unimportant pretty much, overall needs to be ultra stable.

Tips greatly appreciated!
 
Why do you want SSDs for the OS partition? I don't think you'd see any benefit that would justify the cost.

CPU/RAM will depend on what you’re expecting the server to do. If it's just serving files then it shouldn't matter too much (if it is just serving files wouldn’t a NAS make more sense?).

If this is for a commercial environment then do yourself a favour and buy a real server with a decent warranty.
 
Yeah, I guess the SSDs might be pointless... It is basically serving files, but will also be running a source control and render farm manager, so it needs to be running windows server edition....

It is for a commercial environment, and I'd be open to seeing off the shelf servers, but I guess we're trying to keep it relatively low cost, and wouldn't the difference be about 400%?
 
Off the shelf rack servers from the company that also makes Ultrasharp monitors can be had for very little. Starting at like £300.
 
A real server will look expensive if you're comparing it to something built out of desktop parts, but that isn't a fair comparison.

The most important thing about a real server is the warranty and support. What would it cost the company if the server was down for a week because replacement parts needed to be found?
 
Xan_Molbjerg said:
Yeah, I guess the SSDs might be pointless... It is basically serving files, but will also be running a source control and render farm manager, so it needs to be running windows server edition....

It is for a commercial environment, and I'd be open to seeing off the shelf servers, but I guess we're trying to keep it relatively low cost, and wouldn't the difference be about 400%?
Click to expand...

Definately not worth using SSD for OS. For what you've said it will be doing,the use of the OS HD will be minimal. As long as there's a decent amount of RAM that is.

As other have said, an off the shelf low end server from one of the big brands can be very reasonable. I just had a very quick mooch on a certain site and a decent tower server can be had for under £300. Bear in mind this is almost certainly ex VAT. From experience I'd suggest a cheap box from the company, then add the additional hard drives etc yourself, as they tend to charge massively for the upgrade items like extra memory or hard drives.

E-I.
 
Also worth considering a proper hardware RAID 5 or 6 setup for your data rather than a simple mirror. Its gives you both a performance boost and redundancy.

I usually suggest people balance the importance of the data against how much they spend on the hardware. In our offices we have large file servers that run raid 6 and have 24Tb of storage. Each server sits on a uninterruptable power supply and also has battery backup units on the raid cards (3ware). Then as backing that amount of data up to tape isn't really practical, each server has a mirrored server housed in a different location.

Obviously this is fairly OTT, but appropriate to what financial impact losing the data would have. It's often a good discussion to have with the financial controllers at your workplace, they may suddenly find some more budget!
 
Thanks for the replies guys. Following my chat with the bosses we are appropriating an older Raid 5 rackmount which previously used to be used as a NAS basically, (an actual NAS is replacing that system), so it seems all is well. No support for it though.... Hehe.



Thanks a lot for your input!
 
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