RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. I can understand that with a home machine you're going to be taking the top off at regular intervals to play with it (err; upgrade hardware etc) but why on earth would you ever open a server unless it has a fault? We have servers that go their entire life without being opened up. Is there some major bit of server management that I'm missing by not taking it apart on a regular basis?? Steve List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Rochford Sent: 08 November 2005 08:49 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions I can understand that with a home machine you're going to be taking the top off at regular intervals to play with it (err; upgrade hardware etc) but why on earth would you ever open a server unless it has a fault? We have servers that go their entire life without being opened up. Is there some major bit of server management that I'm missing by not taking it apart on a regular basis?? You mean you don't open your servers up to hoover up the binary code when it falls off the disk platters? List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Agreed. That bit of history is exactly what I was thinking as I wrote that. Those things that today are not enterprise ready, may be tomorrow. Not sure if the thing has to change or if my perception of the enterprise does, but change is constant ;) Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). -ajm From: ASB [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 08:13:22 -0500 ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Personally, I usually schedule physical maintenance once per calendar year on all my servers. Primarily, I have the muffler bearings lubricated inside. We also check the bit bucket and empty it if need be. Sometimes a buffer overflows into the bit bucket, unpatched machines in particular tend to need to be emptied. Thanks, Brian Desmond [EMAIL PROTECTED] c - 312.731.3132 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Rochford Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 3:49 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. I can understand that with a home machine you're going to be taking the top off at regular intervals to play with it (err; upgrade hardware etc) but why on earth would you ever open a server unless it has a fault? We have servers that go their entire life without being opened up. Is there some major bit of server management that I'm missing by not taking it apart on a regular basis?? Steve List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Add to that - SATA is not for the desktop only. Check out some of the SAN coming out from most vendors, EMC included. Those drives and connections look a lot like SATA to me. Rick [msft] -- Posting is provided AS IS, and confers no rights or warranties ... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ASB Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 7:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
..well.. a drive in a member server dropped off the raid the other day and I had to open up a box and replace a SCSI drive. And quite frankly those SATA connections 'on' the drive feel flimsy enought to snap off if I'm not careful, or not solid enough that a Calfornia earthquake would jolt them off. Steve Rochford wrote: I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. I can understand that with a home machine you're going to be taking the top off at regular intervals to play with it (err; upgrade hardware etc) but why on earth would you ever open a server unless it has a fault? We have servers that go their entire life without being opened up. Is there some major bit of server management that I'm missing by not taking it apart on a regular basis?? Steve List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
I've seen the SAN vendors these days include SATA drives. Al Mulnick wrote: Agreed. That bit of history is exactly what I was thinking as I wrote that. Those things that today are not enterprise ready, may be tomorrow. Not sure if the thing has to change or if my perception of the enterprise does, but change is constant ;) Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). -ajm From: ASB [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 08:13:22 -0500 ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
I know our Clariion has shelves with 14x320GB raw storage. It's great low cost storage for things which you don't need the performance of a scsi/fc disk from. We use it for stuff like archiving. Thanks, Brian Desmond [EMAIL PROTECTED] c - 312.731.3132 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 10:33 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions I've seen the SAN vendors these days include SATA drives. Al Mulnick wrote: Agreed. That bit of history is exactly what I was thinking as I wrote that. Those things that today are not enterprise ready, may be tomorrow. Not sure if the thing has to change or if my perception of the enterprise does, but change is constant ;) Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). -ajm From: ASB [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 08:13:22 -0500 ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
SATA cables look to scale a whole lot better. They're a whole lot less cumbersome than the IDE/ATA ribbon cables, and you can get a lot more plugs into less space. Ed Crowley MCSE+Internet MVP Freelance E-Mail Philosopher Protecting the world from PSTs and Bricked Backups!T -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rick Kingslan Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 6:50 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Add to that - SATA is not for the desktop only. Check out some of the SAN coming out from most vendors, EMC included. Those drives and connections look a lot like SATA to me. Rick [msft] -- Posting is provided AS IS, and confers no rights or warranties ... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ASB Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 7:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Rick Kingslan wrote: Add to that - SATA is not for the desktop only. Check out some of the SAN coming out from most vendors, EMC included. Those drives and connections look a lot like SATA to me. We have SATA bricks attached to our SAN. They have some issues that, in my opinion, make them not quite 'enterprise' ready. A different vendor just dropped off a rack full of disks (SATA and FC) for us to test as part of a NAS investigation. The SATA based arrays are slower than the FC based arrays. Not as much as they used to be but still significantly slower. That said - we haven't moved anything real important to the SATA volumes yet. Mainly archives and temp storage for data reprocessing right now. al Rick [msft] -- Posting is provided AS IS, and confers no rights or warranties ... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ASB Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 7:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Right. They do include them. What's the failure rate and why don't you use them for things like day to day file and print? Is it because EMC lives on site and is constantly doing the replacement shuffle or is there another reason, perhaps non-technical? What I'm getting at is that SATA drives have a place in the world. They were intended to be a desktop solution (presumably where failures are more tolerated because they only take out one or two productivity hours to replace in case of failure.) They are migrating to other applications that SAN vendors are pushing to drive down the costs of raw storage. Does that make it ready for enterprise class storage? I think it does if you change the meaning? I define it as supporting storage for a centrally located resource that supports greater than 1000 concurrent users. I don't consider it performance issue directly, but rather a problem with reliability. I don't think the reliability is there yet. It will be I'm sure. Does it work well for backup/archive solutions? I think it's well suited for that purpose because it's AT LEAST as reliable as tape but much faster and likely cheaper over time per MB. That's a familiar path that SCSI based systems took as well and I'm sure it'll have similar results long term. FWIW, I'm not convinced it's the transport but the media being used in those devices. I don't think anyone bothered to care as much about quality as they did price/space. When that changes so will my thinking about the capabilities of SATA in a centrally deployed, user dense environment. Until then, it's cheap and disposable and can be utilized to support cheap and disposable (read that as reliability is not important to the task) usage scenarios. I'll use something a little more reliable until then at a higher cost. Risk/Benefit - different for everyone but just because EMC puts it into their solutions doesn't make it right. Heck, EMC doesn't always do what I consider to be in my best interest anyway. I can only count any vendor to do what brings them revenue; after that it's on a case by case basis. Al From: Brian Desmond [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 10:55:32 -0500 I know our Clariion has shelves with 14x320GB raw storage. It's great low cost storage for things which you don't need the performance of a scsi/fc disk from. We use it for stuff like archiving. Thanks, Brian Desmond [EMAIL PROTECTED] c - 312.731.3132 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 10:33 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions I've seen the SAN vendors these days include SATA drives. Al Mulnick wrote: Agreed. That bit of history is exactly what I was thinking as I wrote that. Those things that today are not enterprise ready, may be tomorrow. Not sure if the thing has to change or if my perception of the enterprise does, but change is constant ;) Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). -ajm From: ASB [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 08:13:22 -0500 ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
In the division I work in we use HP Proliant DL-360's and run only RAID 1 ( Mirrored ) we only use RAID 0+1 ( 10 ) when we require very fast I/O such as on a heavily used Exchange server or SQL server. Personally I think it is a waste of resources to run AD on RAID 0+1 ( 10 ), it would not hurt to have faster disk I/O, but unnecessary. Sincerely, Jose Medeiros ADP | National Account Services ProBusiness Division | Information Services 925.737.7967 | 408-449-6621 CELL -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Al Lilianstrom Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 8:16 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Rick Kingslan wrote: Add to that - SATA is not for the desktop only. Check out some of the SAN coming out from most vendors, EMC included. Those drives and connections look a lot like SATA to me. We have SATA bricks attached to our SAN. They have some issues that, in my opinion, make them not quite 'enterprise' ready. A different vendor just dropped off a rack full of disks (SATA and FC) for us to test as part of a NAS investigation. The SATA based arrays are slower than the FC based arrays. Not as much as they used to be but still significantly slower. That said - we haven't moved anything real important to the SATA volumes yet. Mainly archives and temp storage for data reprocessing right now. al Rick [msft] -- Posting is provided AS IS, and confers no rights or warranties ... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ASB Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 7:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Either you haven't noticed the perf hit or have a small DIT that is all cached or you haven't used your AD as hard as some others then. I have seen in several companies RAID-1 configs crumble under AD with no idle time and disk queues going through the ceiling. Exchange can easily peg a DC that has to go to disk for DIT often and that disk is a mirror. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Medeiros, Jose Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 11:43 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions In the division I work in we use HP Proliant DL-360's and run only RAID 1 ( Mirrored ) we only use RAID 0+1 ( 10 ) when we require very fast I/O such as on a heavily used Exchange server or SQL server. Personally I think it is a waste of resources to run AD on RAID 0+1 ( 10 ), it would not hurt to have faster disk I/O, but unnecessary. Sincerely, Jose Medeiros ADP | National Account Services ProBusiness Division | Information Services 925.737.7967 | 408-449-6621 CELL -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Al Lilianstrom Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 8:16 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Rick Kingslan wrote: Add to that - SATA is not for the desktop only. Check out some of the SAN coming out from most vendors, EMC included. Those drives and connections look a lot like SATA to me. We have SATA bricks attached to our SAN. They have some issues that, in my opinion, make them not quite 'enterprise' ready. A different vendor just dropped off a rack full of disks (SATA and FC) for us to test as part of a NAS investigation. The SATA based arrays are slower than the FC based arrays. Not as much as they used to be but still significantly slower. That said - we haven't moved anything real important to the SATA volumes yet. Mainly archives and temp storage for data reprocessing right now. al Rick [msft] -- Posting is provided AS IS, and confers no rights or warranties ... -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of ASB Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 7:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). Fair enough... :) -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/8/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Agreed. That bit of history is exactly what I was thinking as I wrote that. Those things that today are not enterprise ready, may be tomorrow. Not sure if the thing has to change or if my perception of the enterprise does, but change is constant ;) Like I said, I wouldn't want it today for an enterprise class machine (large centralized enterprise for clarification, where 1000 people concurrently rely on it for business critical service). -ajm From: ASB [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 08:13:22 -0500 ~ I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). ~ Depends on the size of the enterprise SATA has its place in the server segments of smaller orgs for sure. It's not too long ago that Windows and Intel processors were considered not designed for the enterprise... -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Al Mulnick [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
The defaults will be more than adequate for a domain of the size you are discussing. Personally, I don't tend to build servers today without at least 1GB of RAM, and any modern CPU with 1GB RAM will easily handle the DC needs for the that you're talking about. Here are some other guidelines that I use/recommend: http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/?File=ServerSpecs.TXT -ASB FAST, CHEAP, SECURE: Pick Any TWO http://www.ultratech-llc.com/KB/ On 11/7/05, Edwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Currently there is an open thread entitled RAID suggestions for DC; maybe OT. I didn't want to dirty that thread by introducing my question that builds upon it. How about other hardware requirements such as CPU, Disk Size and RAM? RAID configuration I think is documented very well but how can you scale Active Directory's growth? I downloaded ADSizer (http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/tools/new/adsizer-o.asp) but the recommended hardware did not display good results in my opinion. It was suggested that I have a machine with 4 x 933 Xeon Processors and 512 MB or RAM. It just does not make sense to me to have so much CPU but so little RAM. ADSizer does recommend Disk recommendations, but my results returned a System Disk in RAID1 but nothing for Log or Database Disks. In the environment that I wish to deploy a new domain, I will have around 150 or so member computers and possibly 50 or so others that are stand alone workstations. MS Exchange 2003 will also be a part of the domain. Initially, I do not think that any attributes other than the required defaults will be used on user objects, but eventually I would like to populate or add this information in the future. Are there guidelines on recommended hardware for DC's in a domain? MS Exchange seems to be well documented on this but I have not found much on DC's. Thanks, Edwin List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Wow. A four-proc machine (933 MHZ?) for 150 users and Exchange? Wow. My personal opinion: When it comes to architecture, you have to decide between scale up or scale out. In AD, scale out is often preferred because it does this well out of the box and because you want a second copy of the IAA system (Identity, Authentication and Authorization) for some hardware fault resiliency purposes. New hardware has come a long way since Windows 2000 (6 + years old). In the case of that recommendation, you have several things to contend with: Usage patterns, applications (Exchange mentioned but are there others?) etc. If Exchange is the biggest consumer then likely you can get away with two smaller DC's vs. one really big one. If you're not planning a tremendous amount of updates, then disk is likely not a big deal other than for resilience of the application. A couple of mirrored drives and you're likely going to find it's plenty of performance. You almost can't buy machines 2.5GHZ these days without real effort. Memory? That's different, but .5GB to 1GB is likely plenty for that environment with some room left over. Some wildcards: Exchange usage. It's hard to guage what your impact will be with Exchange on the DC's. 150 users usually don't put a serious hurting on a DC but it's possible. If so, then scale up disk and memory and go with dual proc vs. single proc to increase performance. If Exchange is handling less than 2 million messages a day, I wouldn't bother with different DC hardware and I would seriously consider it even if I was because you only have 150 possible destinations in the first place :) Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). My $0.04 (USD) anyway. From: Edwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 07:52:39 -0500 Currently there is an open thread entitled RAID suggestions for DC; maybe OT. I didn't want to dirty that thread by introducing my question that builds upon it. How about other hardware requirements such as CPU, Disk Size and RAM? RAID configuration I think is documented very well but how can you scale Active Directory's growth? I downloaded ADSizer (http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/tools/new/adsizer-o.as p) but the recommended hardware did not display good results in my opinion. It was suggested that I have a machine with 4 x 933 Xeon Processors and 512 MB or RAM. It just does not make sense to me to have so much CPU but so little RAM. ADSizer does recommend Disk recommendations, but my results returned a System Disk in RAID1 but nothing for Log or Database Disks. In the environment that I wish to deploy a new domain, I will have around 150 or so member computers and possibly 50 or so others that are stand alone workstations. MS Exchange 2003 will also be a part of the domain. Initially, I do not think that any attributes other than the required defaults will be used on user objects, but eventually I would like to populate or add this information in the future. Are there guidelines on recommended hardware for DC's in a domain? MS Exchange seems to be well documented on this but I have not found much on DC's. Thanks, Edwin List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Robert Moir Microsoft MVP (Security, Virtual PC) Senior IT Systems Engineer Luton Sixth Form College He's back, and this time he's got a portable bulk-eraser!!! List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Ok, Sue, you know that when you leave a dangling diss like that someone is going to ask you to support it ;-) Beyond the connectors coming undone (something I have not experienced with Dell desktop SATA), do you have specific criticisms about the Dell towers? Thanks -- we are about to buy several of them (and rack-mounted too). -- nme -Original Message- From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 9:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Remember my space.we don't do racks much in SBSlandso your mileage in big server land may vary. I have a Dell OEM just so I can have a Dell OEM and see what they screwed up in that OEM image and test things on itand ..uhit even sounds cheap. It's about support as well. HP was ready to go supporting Windows 2003 sp1 when SP1 hit the streets we had to wait for Dell to release their Open Manage 4.4 to support SP1 for a month before they would. The HP patch notification mailings are better than Dells. In my case it's not just about the look of the inside of the box...it's about the support as well. Dell in my space has the rep of being salesmen of boxes and not much else. Noah Eiger wrote: Ok, Sue, you know that when you leave a dangling diss like that someone is going to ask you to support it ;-) Beyond the connectors coming undone (something I have not experienced with Dell desktop SATA), do you have specific criticisms about the Dell towers? Thanks -- we are about to buy several of them (and rack-mounted too). -- nme -Original Message- From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 9:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Depends on the model. We've got some low end Dell stuff for external DNS (PowerEdge 800s) where i'm not too bothered if it dies, and the build quality is less than the normal Dell server standard (there's an open statement!). As for the cables, they're the same no matter what so they're just as easy to knock out, but with the drives held in a decent cage on some of these servers that steers the connectors away from where your hands usually go when fitting stuff it isn't as bad as it could be. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Noah Eiger Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:22 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Ok, Sue, you know that when you leave a dangling diss like that someone is going to ask you to support it ;-) Beyond the connectors coming undone (something I have not experienced with Dell desktop SATA), do you have specific criticisms about the Dell towers? Thanks -- we are about to buy several of them (and rack-mounted too). -- nme -Original Message- From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 9:13 AM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http://www.threatcode.com List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/ List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made comfortable with SATA reliability yet) or 140's with 1GB of memory each would be more than needed based on those parameters. I'm glad to hear someone else say this. SATA can work but you need to look closely at what you're buying and what the manufacturer recommends. If the manufacturer doesn't trust their own products for the sort of 24*7 hammering you often get in a server then why bet against them? Who are we to assume we know a product better than the people who designed and built it? If you virtualize anything on top of that, some other considerations would be needed of course. (or Dell or IBM equivalent of course). I'd still personally be uncomfortable with virtualising all my DCs, even onto different physical virtual server hosts, I just don't believe in adding extra layers of complexity to fundamental network services if I can help it. -- Letting your vendors set your risk analysis these days? http
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Nope, DASD to a Apple G5 Xserve for a very small amount of Apple clients (10) with very high storage requirements. To be honest, the thing that made me go for this solution in the end was that performance was better using the native Apple stuff end to end and writing to SATA than it was having to translate at some point on the network in order to write to SCSI. So now I have a nice complicated totally seperate Apple Open Directory Domain with trusts into the Windows Forest so that all the pain of making it work falls on me and the network support team here instead of on the desktop user. Which is how it should be after all, and it doesn't do the old resume any harm to have this all on there! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 18:53 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay, but I'll report back in another 2 years and let you know. I can't speak for the Dell rack stuff, but the Dell tower stuff...lemme just say I'm glad Brian steered me towards HP. Rob MOIR wrote: -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: 07 November 2005 15:13 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Bottom line, I would guess that two HP 360's (SCSI; I haven't been made
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
Interesting. If that solution becomes a problem, have a look at http://www.centrify.com and see if you can change some of that :) Seriously, it is interesting and I'm interested to hear of the long term results as they occur. Shall we check back in a year or so? Al From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 19:07:28 - Nope, DASD to a Apple G5 Xserve for a very small amount of Apple clients (10) with very high storage requirements. To be honest, the thing that made me go for this solution in the end was that performance was better using the native Apple stuff end to end and writing to SATA than it was having to translate at some point on the network in order to write to SCSI. So now I have a nice complicated totally seperate Apple Open Directory Domain with trusts into the Windows Forest so that all the pain of making it work falls on me and the network support team here instead of on the desktop user. Which is how it should be after all, and it doesn't do the old resume any harm to have this all on there! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 18:53 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've accidentally bumped the connection off my workstation at home twice while adding the Happauge card and what not. In SBSland early on we had issues with them getting loaded up, if they are underpowered, we're seeing a bit of bottlenecks, and as one of the SBS support gang said out of Mothership Los Colinas, if your vendor won't guarantee that equipment for 3 years, do you really want to put that data on that device? So far the SATAs that we have running around in SBSland servers are okay
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 20:41 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Interesting. If that solution becomes a problem, have a look at http://www.centrify.com and see if you can change some of that :) Hmmm either their demo does a poor job of explaining their product or their product would actually be a downgrade for us! To cut a long story short, we use no 3rd party software, it's all done with default Apple and MS tools. We're using AD to hold all of our user objects and most of the group objects, so our password and security policies are already enforced out of the box. OS X desktops have computer accounts in an AD OU in order for the machines to authenticate to AD, and join the domain as part of their install routine. What exists in Open Dir is one or two built in groups that we drop AD groups into and various other objects which describe various default settings to apply to desktop machines (vaguely like GPOs but not as sophisticated). The stuff that goes here is really minimal from our point of view but those little bits make a big difference to the user experience. Seriously, it is interesting and I'm interested to hear of the long term results as they occur. Shall we check back in a year or so? Surely. I'm certain I'll have either set fire to the Apple servers we have now by then or purchased another one. We installed our server in August and while it's only been a few months now things have been working very well so far I have to say, and once the config was complete this setup has required very little day to day admin time. It's far more robust than I was probably making it sound earlier! rob List info : http://www.activedir.org/List.aspx List FAQ: http://www.activedir.org/ListFAQ.aspx List archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/activedir%40mail.activedir.org/
RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions
I found a MSFT site for planning domain controller capacity. If anyone is interested, you can find it via the URL http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windowsserver2003/library/DepKi t/4af3271a-4407-4ca5-9cd5-e05b79046d08.mspx Edwin -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Al Mulnick Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 3:42 PM To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Interesting. If that solution becomes a problem, have a look at http://www.centrify.com and see if you can change some of that :) Seriously, it is interesting and I'm interested to hear of the long term results as they occur. Shall we check back in a year or so? Al From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 19:07:28 - Nope, DASD to a Apple G5 Xserve for a very small amount of Apple clients (10) with very high storage requirements. To be honest, the thing that made me go for this solution in the end was that performance was better using the native Apple stuff end to end and writing to SATA than it was having to translate at some point on the network in order to write to SCSI. So now I have a nice complicated totally seperate Apple Open Directory Domain with trusts into the Windows Forest so that all the pain of making it work falls on me and the network support team here instead of on the desktop user. Which is how it should be after all, and it doesn't do the old resume any harm to have this all on there! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 18:53 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions That's a desktop user? The apple desktop? I don't have a problem with SATA (an upgrade from PATA) if used as designed. It's designed for desktop storage. Not that it can't be adjusted to server/enterprise, but it's price point and architecture are intended for desktops (i.e. cheap but not as reliable as a shared resource). Used appropriately, I'm quite happy with it. But it's intended to be cheap and replaceable. Cheap, fast, reliable - pick two (or something like that ;) That shouldn't last if history is any indication, but for now I'll try not to build too many centrally required applications on that technology unless I can put a lot of abstraction in front of it (large pools that aren't bothered by the loss of several components at a time.) From: Rob MOIR [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org,ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 18:36:10 - I've deployed SATA for storage of large files in Apple XRaid units in a Raid 5+1 config, and so far so good. Ask me in 3 years if I'm still just as happy ;-) but it was the only way to give the user what they wanted inside the budget we had. One advantage of the XRaid is that it's fitted out from the get go to use SATA disks and the only reason you'd ever have to do anything to it is to replace a drive that you already know has gone bad. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Al Mulnick Sent: Mon 07/11/2005 17:34 To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions silly no-hair-color alert SATA == Desktop drives. They weren't originally concepted to be enterprise class storage. I see them as being back-engineered to be used this way, but most of what I've seen has been to deploy them as a JBOD in situations where you can absorb the continuous loss of hardware and not impact performance and availability. Typically in pools of disk and hsm solutions (what is it that hsm is called now? ILM? :) If you plan to deploy DAS solutions (internal or external), SATA is not likely the way to go right now. You may want to wait a bit longer if the data is important. For large pools of inexpensive disks, SATA might be worthwhile to investigate if you have a large loading bay, a good support agreement, and close access to the highway. -ajm From: Susan Bradley, CPA aka Ebitz - SBS Rocks [MVP] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org To: ActiveDir@mail.activedir.org Subject: Re: [ActiveDir] Hardware Suggestions Date: Mon, 07 Nov 2005 09:13:19 -0800 Stupid blonde alert I personally have SATA experience in the tower/desktop world but none in the rack units. Are the physical connections any stronger in the rack world? I like SCSI and IDE not only for their proven track record [server and desktop respectively] but because the dang cables don't get knocked off each time I reach into the case. Those cable connections on the back of the SATA drives are a little worrying. I've
