hardware consultant

[Nestersan]

Cloudd9 I think you might have a good idea I have a problem that I think I recently solved but let me throw it out at you I want to see how you would handle it. Also other than hardware what else are you good at? are you mobile?

I need to build a server to run SBS 2003, this box will be my PDC, I will purchase 5 additional CAL's the main application is an accounting package (ACCPAC) running SQL Server. I need total redundancy if a HD fails my box must continue to operate I also need a cost effective external backup device as well as a device that will enable me to move backups offsite once a week. I have a T1 internet connection from CWJ my network is 100mbs and I use a managed switch my router device from CWJ is UPnP.

Thats it dont think I left anything out.

Total Redunancy means at Least RAID above Striping, either 0+1 or 1 +0. I forget which or even Raid 5 if budget allows. My experiences with SQL running a database,plus couple other databsaes means Xeon level CPU, plus about 4 GB of RAM.

Backup= Backup Exec, running on an External SCSI tape. It backs up to HD and Tape. TAPE = Daily, HD= REAL tIME. TAKE OUT TAPES OFFSITE, and Duplicate HD for use as TOTAL DISASTER Recovery.

Works for me.

[cloud9ja]

lol this isnt realy a chalenge to anyone i recomend a 4+ drive raid 5 if u use the minimum 3 drives u cant gurantee data protection in case of multi drive failure

in your cse i dont see much need any serious power but u gonna need a dual core to help manage all them hard drives and the extra core will help greatly while one is dancing with norton and the other dealing with your raid transfers and outing it to external storage

righ now hard drives are cheap but how safe are they in case of damage? can u keep em safe?

if your data isnt so much i can recomend dvds but if it is then well tape drives
u could give me an idea of how much data ur backing up off site ohh and why use all the technical names we want our readers to understand our mumbo jumbo lol then again they can google someof it


but dvd (dual layer also)could be a cheap option

im kinda tierd right now went to bed at 3 woke up at 5 not my idea of fun


so how did u solve your server prob dutch?

[pogi_2nr]

dutch seems to be putting all his eggs in 1 basket so I would suggest at least
a dual cpu setup w/ raid5+hotspare storage.

For backup purposes backup exec w/ the sql server agent for hot database
backups would fill your needs if tied along with some sort of mini tape library.

[Dutch]

Tech terms are used because I am lazy and this is a techy website. I dont mean to offend anyone or act like I know it all. One thing I can say is that seven techys seven different minds and ultimately solutions.

This is what I did I used a 3.0 Pentium CPU,Two GIG Memory,2 NICS,Five 120 GIG SATA HD's

I configured the drives using RAID 1 for the OS & RAID 5 for the data I bought a USB HD and used it for daily backups and a dvd double layer for the offsite stuff I dont use veritas I used the backup software that comes with SBS 2003. the router was pluged directly into nic1 and the LAN in nic 2 thats basically it.

One mistake I made was going with 5 disk's from the same manufacturer (Seagate) when I checked they were all made one after the other based off the serial numbers now I am saying to myself what if there is a fault with that batch?? I should have mixed manufacturers maybe seagate and samsung (I have no luck with WD)

ok guys tear me apart what else could I have done better or not done at all

[cloud9ja]

well u could have just put em all on a raid 5 if u ask me data protection is definatle their in numbers on raid 5 plus u get speed u weaken ur rraid 5 when u have les drives so raid 5 can be better than raid 1 or worse depending on amount of drives

[pogi_2nr]

well u could have just put em all on a raid 5 if u ask me data protection is definatle their in numbers on raid 5 plus u get speed u weaken ur rraid 5 when u have les drives so raid 5 can be better than raid 1 or worse depending on amount of drives

I am not sure of what you are trying to get at but Dutch is going for robustness.

- Adding more than 3 disks to your raid5 set increases risk of data loss.
- OS = raid1, thats just best practices

[cloud9ja]

yes but if u onnly have 3 drives in aa raid 5 if 2 fail u screwed
raid 5 in 3 drive mode can only tolerate the loss of 1 drive

also if u read up u will notice raid 5 can be just as good if not better and just as safe as raid 1

[pogi_2nr]

so you are saying raid5 with 5 drives in the set can tolorate more than 1 disk failure?

no matter how many disks you have in raid 5, if you lose more than 1 disk you
will have data loss. unless you have a few hot spares in the mix.