Re: server

[Al - image hosting services <azick%zickswebventures.com@localhost>]

Hi,

On Fri, 25 Apr 2008, Christopher SEKIYA wrote:
> On Apr 25, 2008, at 3:55 PM, Al - image hosting services wrote:
>
> > Would I be able to put 3 - 500 drives and have 3 network cards in
> > any of
> > the SGI systems that are supported by NetBSD?
>
> Yes.  Obtain an Indigo/Indy with a decently clocked r5ksc, attach
> external drive sleds, and fill the GIO slots with eBay-sourced NICs.

One of the reasons for looking at SGI systems is they look like they are
smaller. I need to colo a box and for example my G3 is too expensive,
because of its size. A 1U or 2U would be better priced, but they can only
be 24" deep (this even eliminates an Xserve). Although, I can colo
desktops and towers. A tower would need to be: 6x9x20 (or smaller) and a
desktop would need to be 3x18x20 (or smaller).

> > The other issue is I would really like something that would be
> > faster than an Apple G3 blue & white.
>
> You haven't defined "fast".  (I have seen your messages on port-alpha,
> and suspect that your definition of "fast" is not computationally-
> based)  For a non-slashdotted webserver, the above will suit you fine.

I would like to have something faster than say a P3 1.3 ghz system (I am
using a 450 mhz G3 right now and from what I understand they would be
comparable with the 1.2 p3).

> Wish in one hand, and do something else in the other, and see which
> one comes true.  You've given yourself artificial constraints,
> according to the data in port-alpha; if you choose a non-mainstream
> platform, you cannot expect it to match the performance of the high-
> bandwidth/clocked hardware that you despise.

Well, I don't know if you can say I really hate PC hardware. I just can't
get any that works. I have about 25 websites right now. A couple of years
ago I had the main one running on a 2.3 Xeon, but I was getting complaints
every morning that it was down. This website was in the top 120,000 sites
according to the alexa rating based on traffic. I endup putting it on my
G3 b&w. I have another website that was running off a dual-core dual
processor server. It was crashing so much that I had "shutdown -rf now" in
crontabs to run every 2 hours. Sometimes it didn't make it the 2 hours and
it would crash anyway. It had all kinds of hardware failures and even
still it had performance issues. I can't see how people can say that
performance is good on what I would like to call the dual-core disaster.
So, now that site is running off the G3 too. That site was in the top
500,000 according to the alexa rating the last time I checked. Anyway,
this server takes between 400-500 hits a second. I also have an Amiga with
a 68060 that does some of the work too. It maybe takes an additional
100-150 hits per second during peak times. If the G3 had larger drives
(maybe a 3rd drive for performance reasons) and if I could fix the issue
with lighttpd and php built with fastcgi, then it could probably do it by
itself. I have been working on 2 SuperMicro dual-processor P3 systems. Php
with fastcgi seems to work correctly on there. Of course, I have had
hardware failure after hardware failure with them. The one box is dead,
but I still don't have the other working completely. I have it netbooted
because of some strange issue that I had with it. First of all, I could
not make a server out of it if I wanted to because it uses SCA drives and
I really need about 1.5 Tbytes of space. I am working on another email
with more about this server. I also have a dual processor P2 with an intel
motherboard. I guess it was ok, if you didn't mind swapping out the
harddrive or the video card in it every few days. It seems to me that it
also had alot of network card failures. The fact is that I use an intel
network card in my G3, so I guess I am not completely against more main
stream stuff, it just has to work and should not need to be replaced all
the time. I must admit that I think that PC performance is all hype and
very little real performance (because of my past experiences). I did ask
some questions on the AMD64 list because I thought about trying them. Of
course, I don't know what kind of motherboad to get since all of them seem
less than reliable. I have tried Intel, SuperMicro, Dell, Compaq, AOpen,
and I can't see using any of them. Also, I had heard not to use a VIA
chipset from one person that says they are cheap and have problems and
from another person they say they are the best. So, which is it? I will
say this, the dual-processor single core AMD64 is fast, but I don't think
that I want to try another of the brands of motherboards that I listed
above.

Alot of people we know think that because we work online that we also
repair computers, so they were constantly bringing us computers to repair.
My oldest son did most of the work. Most of the time he would find a bad
motherboard, less often he finds a bad cpu, also we seem to find alot of
bad powersupplies. Most of the time, they ended up saying they that they
don't want to fix it because it will cost too much and we can just keep
it. So, my son built a K6 system, because that was the only motherboard
that was good that we also had a cpu for. I have even been considering
getting a 2U case for it and coloing it.  We don't work on PC hardware
anymore for other people because when they do say they want it fixed, it
always costs me money, because in the end they are not willing to pay for
the new parts. Right now, I really don't have enough money to get a new
server, but I need one desperately.

Thanks,
Al