Forum Moderators: phranque
Goal 1 web server 1 mysql server to handle 350 forum users and about 25-50 people viewing a rdbms heavy review/product system.
What components would you choose? What CPU would you chooose, how would you configure your disks? Any secrets out there?
I'm looking at Athlon XP or P4 systems (not really interested in celeron) and if available an opteron would be nice but that would bump out of price range.
What are your ideas?
You can get them cheap on the big auction site, although they are PIII you get two sockets (just make sure the processors are matched pairs). On-board everything, just add a case, processors, memory and a SCSI hard drive. I succesfully installed dozens in 2U 19inch cases.
Aopen ft9100 barebone 1U chassis: $250 includes mobo, ps, cdrom, and floppy
2x 1.0 ghz PIII: 2x$94 = $188 (fastest it supports)
512meg mem - $160
160 GB 7200RPM 6mb cache: $105
totals at $700. I culd have done a lot better had I bought a 2U case, but when you pay by the U by the month, it pays to be small.
Right now I haven't bought the 2nd processor and large harddrive yet, and am using what some that I already have, and it is performing fine for my use.
To be under $500 my guess is you'll need to buyld your own and do it 2U.
Case w/ PS - $132
512 meg DDR - $90
80GB 7200RPM 8mb IDE - $75
AMD 2600+ CPU - $90
mobo (ASUS KT400
has been a recent favorite, but not especially suited to server use, ie, it has onboard audio and only 1x lan, but it does have onboard video) ~$110
that puts you at $497. At lease in a 2U uses standard floppy and cdrom sizes, you so can put those in for about $30.
-pj
although the above mentioned with dual processor should do the trick but of course above $500
thanks
Henry
To build a low cost system with NEW components you are restricted to buying (generally) the lowest spec components available today rather than the lowest spec components that will do the job.
The best way to get the most for your money will always be to buy used/reconditioned. Buying a used machine that has all the parts you need rather than sourcing individual components and doing the build yourself would be my choice.
A lot of hardware is available cheap from auction sites and others. Companies going bankrupt, companies changing their existing products etc continue to provide a healthy flow of used machines to the big market for used equipment that developed in the aftermath of the dot com bubble bursting.
Now about finding used/reconditioned box
Where do you look?
Dell etc.. or more specialized sites if so what names come in mind?
Where do you look?
Google comes to mind ;-)
Seriously though do some searches for used servers and you'll find many sites specialising in that. You do get a lot of this stuff at places like ebay too.
Big name companies may occasionally sell some of their own brand kit that they have taken back from customers who've upgraded. But as they need to do full tests and put a label on the kit saying "D*ll officially reconditioned" - or something like that - the stock may be a bit more expensive.
True, the above system was basically a regular PC in a rackmount case, but that's what most of the non-dual colo servers you rent for $150 a month are too.
IMO, the single CPU 2500+ I speced above will outperform the dual server I mentioned.
A dual PIII-S tulatin would be nice, and better than most lowend P4 systems. $750 is about the pricepoint for lowend servers, IMO. Getting lower than that is going to be a hard find or a system that's pretty low-end. If that's all you need then its fine I guess, but in that range, every extra $100 can buy a lot more.
[edited by: JordanAutomations at 8:59 pm (utc) on Feb. 26, 2004]
For $650 you can often get dual 1.0G PIII 512meg 2x18GB SCSI. I would hardly buy anything less powerful
SCSI is highly overrated. As is dual processor operating. A 2.2 GHz P4 with a 10K rpm Raptor SATA drive will trash those specs on most tasks.
better than some lowend 2xP4 systems
Companies going bankrupt, companies changing their existing products etc continue to provide a healthy flow of used machines to the big market for used equipment that developed in the aftermath of the dot com bubble bursting.
Exactly, there are other auction sites other than ebay that specialize in liqudation of assets etc, some very high end kit can be snapped up at a bargain over a website catalog then telephone auction. We picked up multiple brand name servers sold as single lots with decent specs. for way under the budget mentioned here.
SCSI is highly overrated. As is dual processor operating. A 2.2 GHz P4 with a 10K rpm Raptor SATA drive will trash those specs on most tasks.
I agree with this if performance is your only goal, however in the world of servers you are looking at a balance of performance/reliability. If you can identify the server platform that fits your needs (in our case our inhouse built machines all had dual PIII, 10k SCSI, ECC registered memory and Intel server boards) then you should be very happy with the performance and the total cost of ownership. TCO should include reduced calls to your support team and fewer support tasks conducted on the hardware. In any case a machine's lifecycle should see an increase in load, once the load gets to a certain stage you have a choice, upgrade or replicate (cluster).
That's a new one :-) I didn't know that dual processor Pentium 4s even existed.
But Xeon solutions do exist.
[added]In any case the budget we mention here is exactly what google work to when building machines for their DC's so it is possible and a significant increase in performance can be achieved with used parts.[/added]
TCO should include reduced calls to your support team and fewer support tasks conducted on the hardware.
Exactly - realize that SCSI has long, proven track record of reliability for intense server operations. SATA will need another 10 years of maturation and relentless serving.
I definately agree macro, but try to put one of those systems together in less than $650, and in 1U too.
>better than some lowend 2xP4 systems
oops, I mistyped. I meant single p4. Dual xenons would be better than dual PIII in almost every way, of course.
On the dual vs single proc issue, for any given speed, an extra cpu will almost always make servers more snappy, if they under load like our web-applications servers are. However, there's nothing magic about dual that makes them able to overcome a single that is current generation and significantly faster.
The main advantage is that older dual-cpu mobo's were more expensive in their time and thus designed for server operation and have lots of features that make remote management more admin-friendly. A fast cheap new single-cpu mobo often does not have all the often-useful bells and wistles that an older higend system has.
IMHO you can find a hosting company offering similar config for just a couple of bucks a month, works fine if you get remote access.
Except you want to do something more sophisticated, then of course your money limit would prevent you from going there...
That's why you won't find new 20 GB hard disks or new PII 400 MHz.
Greetings,
Herenvardo, the garbage seeker ;)
