Mailing List Archive: DRBD: Users

Could you please recommend hardware?

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jrbcast at gmail

Dec 28, 2011, 3:39 AM

Post #1 of 5 (403 views)
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Could you please recommend hardware?

Hi,

I would like to implement a new DRBD solution to one customer. The problem
is that I don't know what hardware to acquire for an enterprise architecture
that is compatible with Linux.

I would like something from HP, Dell, etc.. (recognized mark):

- At least 2 TB.
- Hardware RAID.
- Hot swappable disks.
- As much expansion bays as possible.

We have 12000 euros available for each server (we want two). We have been
having a look at automatic-failover + replication NAs but no luck yet...

Thanks in advance,

Jose.
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tc at cataneo

Dec 28, 2011, 5:09 AM

Post #2 of 5 (379 views)
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Re: Could you please recommend hardware? [In reply to]

Am Wed, 28 Dec 2011 03:39:47 -0800 (PST)
schrieb kankamuso <jrbcast [at] gmail>:

> I would like something from HP, Dell, etc.. (recognized mark):
>
> - At least 2 TB.
> - Hardware RAID.
> - Hot swappable disks.
> - As much expansion bays as possible.

We're running drbd on a pair of Sun X4150 in a primary-primary
configuration. OS comes from Proxmox, which is based on Debian-Lenny.
Setup worked without any problems but of course these servers are 3 years
old and today you won't get them with hardware support, only second
hand, but I think there is a follower X4170 for those who still prefer
Oracle/Sun.

> We have 12000 euros available for each server (we want two). We have
> been having a look at automatic-failover + replication NAs but no
> luck yet...

A little bit offtopic, but if you need something out-of-the-box with
professional hardware support you should have a look at Stratus-Avance:
http://www.thomas-krenn.com/en/products/complete_solution/stratus-avance-cluster.html

It's intel-hardware but actually www.stratus.com/avance runs on IBM as
well.

And no, I have no experience, no profit and no uncle who is working for
one of the companys mentioned above. ;)

Regards,
Tobias.
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michael.kushnir at nih

Dec 28, 2011, 8:41 AM

Post #3 of 5 (382 views)
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Re: Could you please recommend hardware? [In reply to]

If you don't mind paying for overpriced hard drives from Dell, go with the C2100 2.5" chassis. It takes 24 drives. With 1 x E5620, 12GB RAM, 10GbE Mezzanine card, LSI 9260-8i, and 10 x 1TB Constellation.2 SATA drives it should cost you around $8600-9000 each. Their tech support sucks for the C-series. But their hardware support is good (next day on site in US). However, be aware that Dell only provides drive trays for DELL BRAND drives bought directly from Dell. So , for example, if you buy Crucial/Intel SSDs directly from Dell, you still don't get drive trays. And, finding trays for these servers online has been very hard.

If you don't need the support and are willing to put the servers together yourself look at http://www.supermicro.com/products/chassis/4U/417/SC417E26-R1400U.cfm.

Michael

-----Original Message-----
From: Tobias Crefeld [mailto:tc [at] cataneo]
Sent: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 8:09 AM
To: drbd-user [at] lists
Subject: Re: [DRBD-user] Could you please recommend hardware?

Am Wed, 28 Dec 2011 03:39:47 -0800 (PST) schrieb kankamuso <jrbcast [at] gmail>:

> I would like something from HP, Dell, etc.. (recognized mark):
>
> - At least 2 TB.
> - Hardware RAID.
> - Hot swappable disks.
> - As much expansion bays as possible.

We're running drbd on a pair of Sun X4150 in a primary-primary configuration. OS comes from Proxmox, which is based on Debian-Lenny.
Setup worked without any problems but of course these servers are 3 years old and today you won't get them with hardware support, only second hand, but I think there is a follower X4170 for those who still prefer Oracle/Sun.

> We have 12000 euros available for each server (we want two). We have
> been having a look at automatic-failover + replication NAs but no luck
> yet...

A little bit offtopic, but if you need something out-of-the-box with professional hardware support you should have a look at Stratus-Avance:
http://www.thomas-krenn.com/en/products/complete_solution/stratus-avance-cluster.html

It's intel-hardware but actually www.stratus.com/avance runs on IBM as well.

And no, I have no experience, no profit and no uncle who is working for one of the companys mentioned above. ;)

Regards,
Tobias.
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linux at alteeve

Dec 28, 2011, 9:02 AM

Post #4 of 5 (378 views)
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Re: Could you please recommend hardware? [In reply to]

On 12/28/2011 06:39 AM, kankamuso wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I would like to implement a new DRBD solution to one customer. The problem
> is that I don't know what hardware to acquire for an enterprise architecture
> that is compatible with Linux.
>
> I would like something from HP, Dell, etc.. (recognized mark):
>
> - At least 2 TB.
> - Hardware RAID.
> - Hot swappable disks.
> - As much expansion bays as possible.
>
> We have 12000 euros available for each server (we want two). We have been
> having a look at automatic-failover + replication NAs but no luck yet...
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
> Jose.

This is a near-religious question, you do realize. :)

When clients have healthy budgets, I go for HP Proliant ML360/365 G7
(Intel/AMD). Any tier 1 vendor will over-charge you for storage, I've
found. Your requirements are modest and your budget is healthy, so you
should be fine.

Regardless of who you go with, be sure to get a good RAID controller
with either BBWC or FBWC (battery or flash backed write cache). Stick as
much cache onto the controllers as you can afford (1GB at least).

If you expect your disk I/O to exceed a sustainable 125 GB/sec, you will
want to look at 10 Gbit NICs for DRBD. Regardless, I've found it a
worthy investment to have dedicated, bonded (mode=1 Active/Passive)
interfaces dedicated to DRBD and a separate network connection for other
traffic.

hth

--
Digimer
E-Mail: digimer [at] alteeve
Freenode handle: digimer
Papers and Projects: http://alteeve.com
Node Assassin: http://nodeassassin.org
"omg my singularity battery is dead again.
stupid hawking radiation." - epitron
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pascal.berton3 at free

Dec 28, 2011, 10:21 AM

Post #5 of 5 (378 views)
Permalink

Re: Could you please recommend hardware? [In reply to]

Hi, Kankamuso!

Following up Digimer's reply, at HP the Proliant DL180g6 is also a good
model I think : It's available in 25 hot-plug 2,5" HDD slots (or 4, 8 or 12
3.5" slots, but I personnaly prefer the 25 slot version). It's a 2 way Intel
server, able to host up to 192GB RAM. One of its best features is its
chipset : the same as the one of the DL380, aimed at IOs, which makes it a
good candidate for what you intend to achieve. It features 4 PCI-e I/O slots
in standard : one 16x, two 8x and one 4x. Enough for instance to host a
SmartArray P812 RAID card with 1Gb BBWC, one dual ported 10GbE card for
replication (There are 2 internal GbE ports in standard), and whatever you
need for something else : FC HBA, additional GbE ports or another P812.
It's one of the cheapest HP servers, it will certainly cost below $10k for a
comfortable configuration... Well, depends on how many disks you actually
need those days...

Hope this helps.

Best regards,

Pascal?

-----Message d'origine-----
De�: drbd-user-bounces [at] lists
[mailto:drbd-user-bounces [at] lists] De la part de Digimer
Envoy�: mercredi 28 d�cembre 2011 18:03
��: kankamuso
Cc�: drbd-user [at] lists
Objet�: Re: [DRBD-user] Could you please recommend hardware?

On 12/28/2011 06:39 AM, kankamuso wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I would like to implement a new DRBD solution to one customer. The problem
> is that I don't know what hardware to acquire for an enterprise
architecture
> that is compatible with Linux.
>
> I would like something from HP, Dell, etc.. (recognized mark):
>
> - At least 2 TB.
> - Hardware RAID.
> - Hot swappable disks.
> - As much expansion bays as possible.
>
> We have 12000 euros available for each server (we want two). We have been
> having a look at automatic-failover + replication NAs but no luck yet...
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
> Jose.

This is a near-religious question, you do realize. :)

When clients have healthy budgets, I go for HP Proliant ML360/365 G7
(Intel/AMD). Any tier 1 vendor will over-charge you for storage, I've
found. Your requirements are modest and your budget is healthy, so you
should be fine.

Regardless of who you go with, be sure to get a good RAID controller
with either BBWC or FBWC (battery or flash backed write cache). Stick as
much cache onto the controllers as you can afford (1GB at least).

If you expect your disk I/O to exceed a sustainable 125 GB/sec, you will
want to look at 10 Gbit NICs for DRBD. Regardless, I've found it a
worthy investment to have dedicated, bonded (mode=1 Active/Passive)
interfaces dedicated to DRBD and a separate network connection for other
traffic.

hth

--
Digimer
E-Mail: digimer [at] alteeve
Freenode handle: digimer
Papers and Projects: http://alteeve.com
Node Assassin: http://nodeassassin.org
"omg my singularity battery is dead again.
stupid hawking radiation." - epitron
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