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TFP: Project Oscar

We are looking for a new server. Please post links/quotes/suggestions for the following server specifications:

4u (or smaller) rackmount case
quad CPU motherboard with 133mhz or faster bus, built-in LAN/Video
4x 2.6ghz processors
2x 10K rpm 30gb SCSI drives with RAID controller
4gb registered ECC DDR RAM
...and a cd-rom

If I missed anything, it's because I haven't messed around with hardware in a while.

that kind of hardware is gonna cost ya

i found www.rackservers.com and i did a config to your specs

rackservers.com
Unit 9 Saxon Business Park, Windsor Avenue,
Wimbledon, London SW19 2RR
Tel: 020 8544 0022 Fax: 020 8544 1001
email: sales@rackservers.com
web: www.rackservers.com
Date:
Quote Ref:
25 June 2003
S4802
Quotation for 1 Unit(s)
Component
Specification
Motherboard
Quad Intel Xeon,[P4QH8],6x 64bit PCI-X, 2x Ultra320 SCSI ,ZCR PCI Raid,Video,Intel 10/100
Chipset
Serverworks GC-HE
Info
6 x PCI (Total);0 x AGP;All PCI = 6x PCI-X
Ports
2 x USB V1.0 (Rear), PS/2 Keyb, Mouse
Maximum RAM
32GB = 16 x 2GB (Uses 4 Way Interleaving)
On-board Graphics
8 MB
On-board SCSI
2x68 pin Ultra320 [Adaptec 7902]
On-board RAID
Embedded Intel RAIDIOS [requires PCI ZCR board]
On-board LAN
1 x 10/100 Intel Ethernet
On-board Audio
No
CPU
4 x Intel Xeon 2.0GHz MP, 256k L2 and 2MB L3 Cache
RAM
4,096 MB Total using 4 x 1GB PC2100 DDR Reg. ECC [Use only in groups of Four]
SCSI HDD
2 x 36GB 10,000 rpm Ultra160
RAID Controller
Embedded Intel RAIDIOS [requires PCI ZCR board] on-board motherboard
SCSI Controller
2x68 pin Ultra320 [Adaptec 7902] on-board motherboard
CD / DVD
Slim IDE CD included with case
Rack Casing
4U S862,Quad Xeon,4xSCA Hot swop,660MM Deep,Slim CD,FD,3xRedundant PSU(700W) (White)
Rail Kit
Telescopic Rail Kit included with case
Ethernet 1
1 x Intel PRO/1000MT Gigabit 32Bit PCI Adapter
Ethernet 2
None
Backup/CDR
None
Graphics
8 MB graphics on-board motherboard
FDD
Slim FDD included with case
Operating System
None
Maintenance
1 year return to base, all parts and labour
Unit Price ex. VAT

£ 18,296.00
VAT

£ 3,201.80
Total including VAT

£ 21,497.80
VAT to be added to all prices. Terms and conditions apply.
This quotation is valid for up to 7 days from first quotation date.

that comes out to 35,781.73 USD
THATS ALOT OF F'n money

I'd stay away from Aberdeen if possible, just because they are so expensive. I've had a lot of success ordering from www.mwave.com and www.tcwo.com

I'd consider a larger RAID too as in more drives, plus a mirror (RAID 0+1) The striping will help greatly when people download from your system.

I haven't built a server for this kind of use, but I have to question the benefit of a quad board. Are you sure you'd really see a significant benefit from this. Seems to me like bandwith is your largest hurdle??.

I just talked to our PC guru and he agrees that the quad processor will be a waste of money. Dual will give you some advantage, but that's really all that would be practical. Note too that the quad board will use Xeon processors.

The Ram and your drives will be the biggest bottle neck, along with the speed of your connection to the internet.

I second that. It really doesn't take much CPU grunt to serve web pages. It's usually the onboard bus, drives, and network connection that's the bottleneck. Even a double-processor box might be putting your money in the wrong place.

Look for hardware RAID over SCSI, double-speed ram, and a place to host that offers a Gig-E connection.

Where IS the TFP server hosted, anyway? I assume you colocate?

Another note about the RAID. There really isn't that much advantage to going SCSI anymore except in one area. If you need a lot of drives hooked up, or hooked up in a separate box, you have to go scsi since IDE is limited to 2 devices per port, and 18" max cable length (and yet vendors sell 24" cables :rolleyes: ).

IDE is just about as fast, and a whole lot cheaper. 3rd party RAID cards can give you the ability to stripe more drives than what you'd be limited to with an onboard controller, and you have the ability to swap it out later if it breaks or becomes obsolete. Serial ATA is the next big thing, and will give you the daisy chaining ability of SCSI, but it's very new and expensive. Not to mention hard to find.

Quote:

Originally posted by mtsgsd
I'd stay away from Aberdeen if possible, just because they are so expensive. I've had a lot of success ordering from www.mwave.com and www.tcwo.com

Ive dealt w/ TCWO at the company i used to work for. They usually have good prices but will sometimes try to fuck you on warranty replacements

guys, FYI, the TFP's current traffic is bringing the CPUs to their knees. Dual 1.8Ghz, 2gb ECC DDR RAM. The TFP isn't just serving webpages. It's serving server-side scripts.

Ok, faster cpus are called for, but extra ones aren't necessarily going to help.

pogolinux.com gave me wonderful workstation. they also do servers, but I'm not sure of their competitive pricyness in that region.

you could also look into load balancing server requests between multiple machines all mirroring the same information. not sure how dirty you have to go to get that though, but I know some of the sites i've worked on have done that in order to serve their million+ users

I'd do some CPU time monitoring.

But without even doing so, I'd guess the search function on TFP takes up tons of that CPU time. Perhaps extending search interval limit could temporarily aid the server's disposition.

Hell, maybe you could even make it so non-contributing members can't search? I don't know if vB will let you limit by post count like that, though.

Hal. hears a question. howmuch you looking to spend?

Set up a Beowulf cluster; that'll compete with a Cray if you configure it right.

I agree with sweeze. Load balance. Scale out. (Plus point can load balance network traffic also).

Scaling up for web apps not really a cost effective thing.

Good luck.

Quote:

Originally posted by mtsgsd
Another note about the RAID. There really isn't that much advantage to going SCSI anymore except in one area. If you need a lot of drives hooked up, or hooked up in a separate box, you have to go scsi since IDE is limited to 2 devices per port, and 18" max cable length (and yet vendors sell 24" cables :rolleyes: ).

IDE is just about as fast, and a whole lot cheaper. 3rd party RAID cards can give you the ability to stripe more drives than what you'd be limited to with an onboard controller, and you have the ability to swap it out later if it breaks or becomes obsolete. Serial ATA is the next big thing, and will give you the daisy chaining ability of SCSI, but it's very new and expensive. Not to mention hard to find.

Bzzzt...*WRONG*

IDE drives and controllers max out at 133MB/sec; even SATA only does 150MB/sec. Currently shipping SCSI gear does 160 and 320mb/sec. Mind, these are maximum -burst- speeds between controller and disk only. The difference is truly realized when you consider that IDE I/O uses more CPU time/system resources than SCSI to get the same amount of work done.

SATA controllers do not support daisy-chained devices; one drive per cable only. The same goes for most IDE (now also being called "Parallel ATA") RAID solutions, such as 3Ware & Promise.

The only reason to choose an IDE or SATA RAID solution over SCSI is not being able to afford the higher price that better technology is well worth.

Most of the IDE/SATA hard disks on the market are consumer-grade mechanisms; most of the SCSI disks are designed and engineered to work in more demanding environments. They will last longer and can better handle higher workloads.

(I -am- quite anxious to check out WD's new Raptor 360 disk, because it is being touted as the first legitimate server-grade SATA mechanism...)

Back to the topic at hand...for this Quad Xeon solution...
Retail, you should expect to pay something in the range of

4000-4500 for an Intel SRSH4 'Shasta' base unit, see link 1 below
1500-6000 for -EACH- CPU
1000-1500 for the memory
500-600 for the disks.

Also, Xeon MP CPU's presently only go up to 2.0 GHz, unlike the DP which go up to 3.06...see link 2.

Link 1: http://www.intel.com/cd/channel/rese...iefs/44739.htm

Link 2: http://www.intel.com/cd/channel/rese.../faq/35968.htm