File Server Parts for Boss

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soulesschild

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I posted this in General Hardware but got recommend I post here instead.

Some general stuff.
1. I know it's better to buy from Dell/HP/whatever to get a SA and shits. Boss doesn't want to spring for a new server/case and stuff. Our budget is extremely tight but we need increased storage/performance. So sort of a lose/lose situation. It sucks but I still gotta get the parts.
2. We use RAID6 currently with the current FS, but its performance is extremely slow, so...

Requirements:
RAID card that can do RAID6 at a good speed or (not preferred but might have to be if we want the performance we wnat), 3x RAID5

CPU/Mobo/RAM that will allow for the RAID6 setup preferably.

Support up to 24 Hot-swaps, and 2 internal. We have an old Supermicro case we'll be recycling for reuse.
 
im interested as well. I'm looking at getting a norco and filling it up with drives and was wondering what card would handle all of them
 
For disk controller: Adaptec 51645 can be had for around $750 (maybe cheaper), and nobody beats their storage manager interface.

Mobo: its very hard to tell what you need since you provided no information about the kind of loads your server needs to deal with.
 
You should like what I had to do for my work. I ended up going with an AMD processor 940 phenom + gigabyte board with 2 gig onboard nics. After that a norco case with 20 harddrive Bays. I went personally with a promise supertrak 16650 but I later found out that acera and adaptec offer much nicer line ups. You can have a 5405 single sas port card with a chenbro sas expander and do a raid 6 with 20xWD RE3 1tb drives.. In my current system of 16 drives I've seen it go over 400megs read/writes but I don't know a program that does a speed test on such a large partition.. Just kinda throwing it out there..
 
Get a Supermicro board and an Areca card (1280ML or 1680ix-24 depending on your drives). The SAS expander route, while good, is impractical due to the difficulty in acquiring one unfortunately.
 
For mobo we basically just need good performance out of RAID6. So whatever can satisfy RAID6 with 24 hot swaps, that's the one we want.

I'll take a look at the adaptec cards, I've heard a few bad things about em so I was looking at ARECA and LSI mostly.

Also for drives, we're using Seagate Barracudas.
 
1) How much is the budget?

2) RAID5 / 6 speed is down to the adapter implementation. A more expensive adapter will be significantly faster than a cheaper one.

3) Why 24 drives? Would a Dell MD1000 (refurb or whatnot) be better?

What roles will this server be fulfilling? What kind of DR have you got?

Storage needs to be holistic, not miopic.
 
Unfortunately I don't know any of that. He just said keep it cheap. If we have to spend more on a better RAID card but sacrifice the mobo, that's fine.

Why 24 drives? I don't know, that was just the requirement. It's generally a file server as he asked for Open Filer or Solaris support.

DR? (Not too familiar with FS acronyms)

It's just a file server basically.
 
soulesschild said:
DR? (Not too familiar with FS acronyms)
Click to expand...

DR = Disaster Recovery.

Basically do you have written plan on how to find and restore any lost data in the case of an emergency (flood, fire, brownout, other natural or manmade disaster). Wiki entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disaster_recovery

Are you using the ES Barracuda or the regular Barracuda? The case that you're reusing already has 24 hot-swap bays and 2 internals correct?

EDIT: Here's a prelim build:
$205 - Xeon X3430 CPU
$200 - SUPERMICRO MBD-X8SIL-F-O Intel 3420 mATX Motherboard
$101 - Kingston 2 x 2GB DDR3 1333 ECC Unbufferred RAM
---
Total: $506 plus tax and shipping.

Add another $1000 to $1500 for the RAID controller. Either of the RAID Controllers that Blue Fox recommended are good choices.
 
Last edited:
Danny Bui said:
DR = Disaster Recovery.

Basically do you have written plan on how to find and restore any lost data in the case of an emergency (flood, fire, brownout, other natural or manmade disaster). Wiki entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disaster_recovery
Click to expand...

But do you have a recovery plan for that recovery plan?

That aside, unless this box is going to be crunching through something I'd consider a dual core cpu to save money if the budget is restricted, even if that means swapping motherboards too.
 
Danny Bui does that supermicro mobo with ipmi actually let you ip kvm into the computer? If it does that probably is one of the better solutions.
 
File server (storage) or Database server (iops)? How much space are you going for? Maybe go for SSD RAID array with a HDD backup array or something. More details?
 
@Danny

For DR we have tapes daily with weekly Iron Mountain pickups

ES Barracudas

Yes using a supermicro with 24 hot swaps and 2 internals
 
Jerky_san said:
Danny Bui does that supermicro mobo with ipmi actually let you ip kvm into the computer? If it does that probably is one of the better solutions.
Click to expand...

Not 100% sure. Apparently it's not working.

@ soulesschild
Ok. Then I would recommend that you got the webpage for the two controllers that Blue Fox recommended and see which one will support the Seagate Barracuda ES drives you're planning on using.
 
What is the server load, intended purpose, applications used by your organization, number of users, etc...
 
Danny Bui said:
Not 100% sure. Apparently it's not working.

@ soulesschild
Ok. Then I would recommend that you got the webpage for the two controllers that Blue Fox recommended and see which one will support the Seagate Barracuda ES drives you're planning on using.
Click to expand...
Both support those drives.
 
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