Here's what I recommend for a server. This is all Intel-sourced
hardware, not clone crap, engineered to work together in basically a
"white box" server platform. I've built dozens of these systems and
have found them to be very reliable. These are the same exact
building blocks (mixed about evenly with SuperMicro hardware, the
other big player in the whitebox business) you'll find for sale from
dozens of the "2nd tier" server vendors such as Iron Systems.
They're made available to system builders who assemble the building
blocks and resell them as their own branded servers. Binary Tribe is
registered as an Intel reseller and has accounts in the distribution
channel, so I have easy access to the parts, and more importantly can
get warranty support and part replacement. The warranty on these
parts is 3 years. I'll happily purchase and build the server for
KPLUG at my cost. Here are the details, prices are roughly what my
cost is, they vary slightly by distributor and I didn't go
competitive price hunting yet:
First we start with the "platform" Intel Server System SR1530CL ($685):
http://www.intel.com/design/servers/platforms/S5000vcl/99319.pdf
- Intel Server Chassis SR1530
- Intel Server Board S5000VCL
- Configured for two non-hot-swap SATA drives
- 400W power supply
- All requisite internal cabling
Into that platform we have to add our choices of CPUs, drives and
memory:
CPU choices - The server board is a dual socket and is engineered to
take the new Core-architecture Intel dual core Xeon chips. So it
could be a quad core machine, though I suspect that's overkill. Here
are the CPU choices and pricing, see what you think about quantity
and speed:
- Xeon 5120, Dual Core 1.86GHz, 1066MHz FSB - $290
- Xeon 5130, Dual Core 2.00GHz, 1333MHz FSB - $355
- Xeon 5140, Dual Core 2.33GHz, 1333MHz FSB - $495
I think a single 5130 would serve quite well - it's worth the extra
$65 for the faster FSB, but I'm not sure it's worth another $140 for .
33GHz of speed. All those CPUs are 64-bit and support Intel's VT
virtualization extensions.
Memory - I usually build with Kingston memory, but market prices
vary. Best I can tell is that 4GB of 667MHz DDR2 ECC memory is going
to run around $600 - 700. It seems that a pair of 2GB sticks is only
slightly more than four 1GB sticks, so that'd be my preference. The
server board has a total of 6 memory slots.
Drives - The slimline DVD-ROM for the 1U chassis is $90. Then we'll
want a pair of SATA drives, and my recommendation is the Seagate
Barracuda ES series (previously the "NL" line). These are drives
engineered for 24x7 storage environments, supposedly less sensitive
to vibration and thusly with higher MTBFs than the standard desktop
SATA drives. They're SATA-2 drives with NCQ, supported by the
controller on the server board. We'll have to RAID1 them through
software however. 250GB drives are $94/ea, 400GB are $145/ea and
500GB are $198/ea.
So... there you go. :) This should be one of the more cost effective
ways to get a server, since we're paying only for parts and not
someone else's labor. A reasonably configured server with a single
Xeon 5130, 4GB of RAM and 2x250GB drives comes to right about $1920.
--
Joshua Penix http://www.binarytribe.com
Binary Tribe Linux Integration Services & Network Consulting
--
[email protected]
http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-steer
