Linux Terminal Server Project

Todd O'Bryan | 1 Aug 2012 01:49

Best server drives?

Do people have suggestions for the best kinds of drives to use in
servers? My lab is all fat clients and I have /home and the rest of /
on separate physical drives. I guess that means that the server has a
little bit less work to do than a thin client server, but disk access
still seems to be a bottleneck in my lab.

I'll take well-researched views or just off the cuff anecdotal advice.
Since I only have one lab, I only buy a drive every couple of years
and feel like I'm just taking a shot in the dark.

Thanks!
Todd

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Live Security Virtual Conference
Exclusive live event will cover all the ways today's security and 
threat landscape has changed and how IT managers can respond. Discussions 
will include endpoint security, mobile security and the latest in malware 
threats. http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfrnl04242012/114/50122263/
_____________________________________________________________________
Ltsp-discuss mailing list.   To un-subscribe, or change prefs, goto:
      https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ltsp-discuss
For additional LTSP help,   try #ltsp channel on irc.freenode.net

headers

rob | 1 Aug 2012 02:08

Re: Best server drives?

We use  Western Digital RE4 series drives with hardware raid .  For us the RE 
series has been very reliable over the last 5 years. We're a small company and require high 
availability as we need servers to work around the clock every day of the week.

On Tue, 31 Jul 2012, Todd O'Bryan wrote:

> Do people have suggestions for the best kinds of drives to use in
> servers? My lab is all fat clients and I have /home and the rest of /
> on separate physical drives. I guess that means that the server has a
> little bit less work to do than a thin client server, but disk access
> still seems to be a bottleneck in my lab.
>
> I'll take well-researched views or just off the cuff anecdotal advice.
> Since I only have one lab, I only buy a drive every couple of years
> and feel like I'm just taking a shot in the dark.
>
> Thanks!
> Todd
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Live Security Virtual Conference
> Exclusive live event will cover all the ways today's security and
> threat landscape has changed and how IT managers can respond. Discussions
> will include endpoint security, mobile security and the latest in malware
> threats. http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfrnl04242012/114/50122263/
> _____________________________________________________________________
> Ltsp-discuss mailing list.   To un-subscribe, or change prefs, goto:
>      https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ltsp-discuss
> For additional LTSP help,   try #ltsp channel on irc.freenode.net
>

(Continue reading)

headers

Jeff Siddall | 5 Aug 2012 23:02

Re: Best server drives?

On 07/31/2012 07:49 PM, Todd O'Bryan wrote:
> Do people have suggestions for the best kinds of drives to use in
> servers? My lab is all fat clients and I have /home and the rest of /
> on separate physical drives. I guess that means that the server has a
> little bit less work to do than a thin client server, but disk access
> still seems to be a bottleneck in my lab.
>
> I'll take well-researched views or just off the cuff anecdotal advice.
> Since I only have one lab, I only buy a drive every couple of years
> and feel like I'm just taking a shot in the dark.

On the anecdotal side...

I run a few servers and a few dozen fat desktops.  In the past 10 years 
I have replaced the majority (as in >50%) of the "server grade" drives 
and one or two desktop drives.

I had a bad batch of WD RE2 drives where all but one of the six drives 
in the system failed within the 5 year warranty period.  I even had a 
number of the drives which were replaced under warranty also fail again 
under warranty.  I also had 3 of four the Seagate ES drives in two other 
machines fail so the problem doesn't just happen to one manufacturer.

Bottom line: I couldn't find any compelling reason to buy the enterprise 
grade drives, other than perhaps the warranty.  I don't think all 
enterprise drives are bad but I also don't think they are anything 
special.  The last server I built used a RAID1 array of desktop drives 
and has been entirely trouble free.

What I would _highly_ recommend is using a variety of drive

(Continue reading)

headers

Michael Pope | 6 Aug 2012 01:16

Re: Best server drives?

I've been using two Intel 320 series SSD's in a RAID 1 for two years in 
a multi-tenant office with about 8 staff members on my LTSP server and 
everything runs very fast. The Intel 320 series also come with a 5yr 
warranty which is one of the reasons I moved to Intel instead of OCZ.

Michael

On 01/08/12 09:49, Todd O'Bryan wrote:
> Do people have suggestions for the best kinds of drives to use in
> servers? My lab is all fat clients and I have /home and the rest of /
> on separate physical drives. I guess that means that the server has a
> little bit less work to do than a thin client server, but disk access
> still seems to be a bottleneck in my lab.
>
> I'll take well-researched views or just off the cuff anecdotal advice.
> Since I only have one lab, I only buy a drive every couple of years
> and feel like I'm just taking a shot in the dark.
>
> Thanks!
> Todd
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Live Security Virtual Conference
> Exclusive live event will cover all the ways today's security and
> threat landscape has changed and how IT managers can respond. Discussions
> will include endpoint security, mobile security and the latest in malware
> threats. http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfrnl04242012/114/50122263/
> _____________________________________________________________________
> Ltsp-discuss mailing list.   To un-subscribe, or change prefs, goto:
>        https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ltsp-discuss

(Continue reading)