This is a build with a twist. I have been asked to put together a system for a garage and MOT centre which is opening shortly. Basically the system will be used for general office and web use, customer records, Autodata (database of car info, parts etc), MOT stuff (not sure the finer points) and anything else anyone can think of a computer at a Garage might be used for. It needs to back itself up....customers records are valuable, and also there will be information that will be need to go to accountants, tax etc at the right time of the year. I was thinking along the lines of the HP servers, but they don't come with an OS and if you put Win 7 on them, you don't get support...has to be certain flavours of Linux or MS Server. The criteria of the guy who asked me for it, was 'lots of memory', presuming he means disk space and not actual ram. There is also the possibility some luddites will use it at some point, so nothing too fancy or breakable. Am totally confused as where to start, except with an Antec Titan case with 650W truepower PSU, big case with loads of room for disks, that stays cool. Any ideas ?
You could actually throw together a pretty cheap system for some thing like this i3 or AMD based. I'd be tempted to go for an AMD rig with on board graphics . Some thing like the X4 620/630 would do the job. The main thing is to keep it simple and robust because of the environment it'll be living in. Even down to the key board and mouse keep it simple.
Thanks. I was thinking an i3 with the onboard graphics on the chip, a Gigabyte board, 4gb of ram and a couple of 1tb green drives in raid 1...but i'm not sure.
Yeah, thats pretty much the way to go. The main consideration with a system like this is reliability and good back up solutions.
You wouldn't even need that much space because keeping records on spreadsheets doesn't take up all that much room. You could put in an SSD as a boot and program drive then a couple of 1TB HDD's in RAID so all data is backed up on the second drive. A chip with onbaord graphics would do fine so I agree with bulldogjeff on that. I doubt you'd need 650W of power or even close to it so I wouldn't spend too much money on a high power PSU
I was thinkin of using my 'old' i7 parts, EVGA Le X58 board, i7 920, patriot 6gb ram and selling my 980X and building a new sandybridge rig for myself. Just wondering how long the mobo would last in a work environment, as its been overclocked already....but never missed a beat. Would save him and me some cash. Would run it at standard speed.
Not a bad idea. The board should last quite happily. That build would keep going for years for what is required of it as it's serious overkill! You could even underclock it.
Yeah, I was considering that. I bought a 12gb ram set, which I could only use 2 sticks of for Sandybridge, so I could throw in 1 stick of 4gb. I need to work out what the EVGA LE board and 920 are worth approx, and just charge him the 2nd hand value relatively. Then buy the rest of the parts. With the money from my 980 (bought on a whim and never really needed) and the money for the other i7 bits I should be able to build a good Sandy system, when I work out what and when I can get the bits that don't break..... rep given for all input fellas, thanks.
As said above, a high spec system is not needed in this situation. I would go for an i3 based system, relying on the on-chip graphics. A 920 is not really needed and would give absolutely no increase in real-world performance for the tasks. Sure, it might cost a bit more than using old components, but those components are still free to make a different build that might need the extra performance. Depending on how important the data is, RAID 5 or 6 can be used. Both RAID setups use parity, meaning you have 'backup' data split up across that can rebuild a failed drive. RAID 5 uses single distributed parity - parity data is created once then split up across the drives. RAID 6 uses double distributed parity creating 2 sets of parity. This allows 2 drives to fail, but all the data to be recoverable. If you are recreating a disk when another disk fails, then you see why RAID 6 is so useful. RAID 5 has a space efficiency of 1-1/n, where n is the number of drives. It requires 3 drives minimum. RAID 6 has a space efficiency of 1-2/n, but it requires 4 drives minimum. Both of these methods allow far more space to be used than RAID 1, which has a space efficiency of 1/n. Example: 4 drives, RAID 1 Space of only 1 drive available. Data is copied to every drive. 4 drives, RAID 5 Space of 3 drives available. Data and parity data is split over drives. 4 drives, RAID 6 Space of 2 drives available. Data and double parity data is split over drives. Have a look at this for more info about RAID. EDIT: Ninja'd by three posts! EDIT2: 920, not 980X...
RAID IS NOT BACKUP Sorry, had to get that out there. If something is deleted of one drive, it will be deleted of all the other drives in the same instant. What you want is a backup solution consisting of 3, or more harddrives. HDD1: Main harddrive, you work on this and all changes are made directly to this. HDD2: Backup drive, placed in the same machine. Preferably a same size harddrive, but from another batch to ensure that you are covered against production errors. You then use Acronis True Image to mirror your entire HDD1 to this drive, once every 24 hours. In case of a c*ckup, you simply restore the data of HDD1 from HDD2, this way you only lose, at maximum, 24 hours of work. HDD3: Offsite backup, also mirrored from HDD1. Can be connected via ethernet, or simply a long USB cable, but is has to be placed at a distance from the main computer. If a fire occurs or someone spills a boatload of coffee down the computer and HDD1 and HDD2 dies, you still have this as a backup solution and can restore from it. This can be combined with a RAID array for even better protection, BUT, RAID alone is not backup and should not be used as such. All this can be automated so noone in the shop would actually have to do anything except call someone with a bit of computer knowledge if the **** hit the fan. All knowledge is a result of reading Pookeyheads posts on backup and raid solutions.
Misread the post, saw the part about selling the 980X and got confused. I know, but redundancy is also very useful to avoid hardware failures. Backup is to protect against human error and acts of God.
It was not supposed to come across as a rant, but RAID only secures you against hardware failures - proper backup secures you against both
Rants are good Backups take a few days to get reloaded, even so, it disrupts the entire system and can grind a business to a halt. RAID setups can continue working even if a HD fails, enough time to get a new HD to continue full operation.
for a garage I would also suggest one of those plastic keyboard covers, and both the keyboard and mouse to be wired so they dont get lost easily.
In my experience, most repair databases are online, using systems like Alldata, etc., so neither a big hard drive, nor RAID is necessary. Something low-spec with a 500GB hard drive will be more than enough.
Rubbish! I can restore my entire system from back ups in 45 minutes (both drives). What makes you think it takes days? LOL A simple system like this, with probably only 50GB of stuff on it will back up to a fast eSATA external in 10 minutes, and restore in 15 max. RAID offers redundancy against drive failure, but doesn't offer back up. What if some garage employee decides to browse something dodgy on his lunch break and gets a virus? What if the garage is broken into at night and the computer stolen? RAID offers no protection against this. I'm not saying don't use RAID, as it's always a good idea, but a RAID should also be backed up. In this case however, I'd suggest back up is more important. My advice is ditch RAID, and go for a second drive that's just over twice the size of the drive in the PC, and stick it in a eSATA external and use that for back up. Build him something too compicated and you're destined to be his IT support forever! Build him something simple and he can just take it to PC World's "Tech Guys" to get it sorted. He can then take his external drive home with him at night should a break in occur.
