Hi All, I've been given the go ahead to build a new server for the company. They will be based in Ghana, so keep the heat and high humidity in mind. Budget is £600. Storage isn't as important as speed and power in this case. Ideally I'd like a quad core CPU with 8GB of RAM, and I'm wondering if I should throw in an SSD as a boot drive. Server OS will be purchased separately and will most likely be Server 2008 or 2012. Need two drives as one will be a backup drive. I won't be using RAID. Keyboard, mouse, and monitor are not included in build cost.. Go nuts! Thanks Betty
Do you want actual server grade hardware (ie Xeon) or something built from desktop (Core ix) hardware?
Something built from desktop hardware please! Nothing Dell/HP. As good as their service may be, its pointless in Ghana. Server will be used for serving files, rdp, and accounting and payroll software.
As good as SSD's are, is it worth having one as a boot drive ? After all it will get booted once and then left on 24/7 ? CPU get a none K series i5/i7.
I see your point. What about having windows and the main software installed on it? Snappier at opening the programs etc?
Worth noting that an SSD will be less prone to failure due to high temperatures. Mechanical drives are the first thing to die when exposed to high temps, the rest of the hardware will continue to work way after the HDD has given up. Cooling is going to be the main thing to deal with first, so Case and HSF... the rest of the spec is easy. Are you going to be shipping the server assembled or can someone at least part assemble it at the other end? That will limit your choices in HSF.
I'll probably have to build most of the server myself and send it with somebody. I suppose the HSF can be installed when it gets there.
I'd say go for RAID1 and backups to offsite location (or at least different machine), backups in the same server are not backups. Also if you budget allows it - ECC ram (this rules out all consumer grade motherboards). Skimping on server HW migh look nice then buying parts, but it becomes a bit headache a year or so later. What will be the purpose of the server? Usually your are better off adding more ram than an SSD.
As I said, I'm staying away from RAID for the moment. We will have off site backups, though. I'm trying g to build a server that falls within their budget, with parts that can readily be replaced. Granted, skimping on server grade hardware isnt smart, but they can't afford to be down for two weeks while they wait for replacement ECC ram to arrive by courier from the UK or US. This is where Dell or HP could make a killing. Building servers for Africa with some consumer grade hardware for easy replacement. The purpose of the server is mainly accounting software (myob). There will be a maximum of five people working via rdp for now. Basically they could use a desktop for this, but I'd rather they had some room for improvement in the future. As a comparison. The Zambian office has a Phenom X4 945 with 8GB of RAM. They've never used more than 4GB, even with 10+ users logged in and doing their thing.
You could easily get away with a high end i3 for this if it's only around 5 users. If you could stretch to an i5 that would allow for some expansion in users over time. I wouls use an SSD for the boot drive and a seperate SSD for the accounts data. You should consider doing RAID 1 for the boot and data drives. The most expensive part of the project will be your RDS Cal's
Tell me about it! Expensive as hell.... I will consider RAID at some point, but from a layman's point of view, if the array fails, they have almost no support where they are. The backups to a second drive will be twice a day or more. Offsite backups will be daily too. I'd rather they lose a day than have a RAID array fail and lose more.
This is my 2 cents, but I would suggest a top-down cooler like the Noctua NH-C14. The air blown toward the motherboard would help to cool the memory, VRMs and surrounding components. As suggested, avoid K's CPU as they lack some virtualization extensions. About memory, I would suggest low voltage and/or very low profile modules like the Crucial Ballistix Sport VLP (Low profile will increase CPU heatsink compatibility and won't block the air flow from front fans) The Kingston LoVo series is great too and can runs stable as low as 1.2V. Less voltage = less heat. Supermicro makes consumer oriented motherboard (regular core ix cpu and regular RAM). I know it might be more expensive than Asus and ailkes, but it's so damn stable.
Thanks for those suggestions. I've added the Crucial VLP to my basket and am sitting here looking at the price of the Noctual cooler. Ouch!
Yes, the Noctua's pretty expensive but it is a great cooler. There're other top-down coolers that are more affordable. I've suggested this one because I own it and I'm more than happy with it. It comes with a 6 years warranty and in a few years you'll be able to get new socket mounting for free from them if you send a proof of purchase.
I'm having trouble following your train of though, if one hdd in raid fails they loose nothing (RAID1 is mirroring, no one is suggesting RAID0 or that there should be no backups), have no downtime and all they have to do is swap faulty hard drive. If whole array fails (which is pretty unlikely) they loose, at most, a day worth of data and have to recover from backup, just as your proposed solution with one hdd. With your solution they always loose some data if main drive fails, hows that even an option?
Sorry I had RAID0 stuck in my head. Can I use the onboard controller or do I need a pricy raid card? Last time I used the onboard controllers they were.....temperamental.
I've used the onboard controller for years (2 HDDs in RAID0 for the OS + 2 HDDs in RAID1 for data). You'll be fine this way.
Had been using one on my p6t deluxe for 5 years now, had two hdd failures and everything recovered fine, hadn't had any problems with intel integrated raid on other instances either, so I'd say yes, you can. I's say put everything in arrays, while you'll be able to recover boot drive from backups without loss of data, it will still mean some downtime and someone having to do the recovering. While faulty hdd in array can be swamped out even by accountant.
