Which Server Machine To Go With

Hi gals/guys

My company has finally decided to get a new Server machine as the current one is unable to server the needs of the clients.

So we have been ask to check the best possible solution in terms of our budget. Anyways what i need to know specification of machine that could easily suit our need.

Current Desktop users: 80+ and will be more than 100 within this month

Laptop User: 20

Basic Functions of the Server: Work as the PDC (Gateway for both wired and wireless users, running Database and Mail Server)

Hi,

unfortuantely i can't help you out with model or part suggestions, but i might be able to provide a word of advice.

"always prepare for the worst case scenario"

In this case the worst case scenario will happen when the new server needs to be replaced X years down the line. So the bearing that in mind when buying new hardware i always first ask:

What is my budget?

Then i go away and find the most powerful machine that is within that budget. Obviously its not quite that simple as you need to take reliability and upgradeability and expandability into account, along with service costs but my suggestion would be to ensure you know what the absolute maximum you can spend would be and then spend it. I always say (figures made up here)

Do you want to spend 1000 on something that'll last 3 years, or scrape the bottom of the barrel to get 1500 to buy something that'll last 6?

The math makes the final case for you. :)

(hope this was useful and that others might be able to give you some hardware advice to)

Obviously we will be going for the best machine within our allocated budget, but if we can spend more than our budget to get something thing will last long our needs then surely we can do that.

As far as replacing the old server..... well believe me this server needs to get replaces, you can search my post relating lots of issues that we are facing with the current one.

The reason why i posted is that i need to know the specification that can suit my envoirnment...... What we have come up for the moment is this: -

Intel Xeon DP (1.5 Ghz with 3MB L3 cache)
120 GB SCSI Drive
2 GB RAM
Intel 7250 Series M/B

Also ... Exchange and SQL (if that is the database and mail system you're using) don't work well together on the same machine (they'll both wanna run off with all the resources) ..I'm not saying it's theoretical not possible ...I'm just saying ...don't do it unless you're looking for trouble.

So use the old server as database server and the new one for everything else ...maybe ...I'm just thinking out loud here ;)

.C.

greetings Fanacool...

What is your approximate price range? And are you looking for a tower or a wrackmount?

HP's Proliant ML 310 series is probably a good place to start with a tower configuration. Relatively cheap, you can get them with dual-core Pentium D (which should be plenty of horsepower unless the Database you're talking about is queried nonstop), and the chassis supports 4 drives... that could either be RAID 5 (preferably) or 0+1.

To go upwards from there...

I guess my biggest concern would be the drives. You might want to break out system and storage into two different arrays. Do a RAID1 system drive (2 drives) with a RAID 5 storage array (4-6 drives) for example. Something like the Proliant ML370.

Dell also has a good option in the PE 1800 series (I have a few of these myself). There are 6 drive bays in these chassis, and you can do two CPUs (better than the Pentium D option, IMHO, although more costly). The 2800 is a good model as well - comperable to HPs ML370. Call Dell and HP, though... the reps can get prices 20-30% below the website!

Before people start flaming me for not included AMD-based systems in any of my recomendations, I'll just add that if you could get a reasonably priced tower with excellent build with an Opteron in it, I'd definately pick it over the P4/Xeon. For DB work and high demand I/O, I would prefer an Opteron ENORMOUSLY. But good luck finding a tower-based opteron from a tier 1 OEM.

Cemetric

Well at the moment we are running MDaemon as mail server and SQL as database but yes in our future program we might be running lots of Microsoft products.... and Exchange is one of them. The old one we are sending to our up country branch. Well have planned to move our database on another machine which will be a database server only, but not yet.

@tt!tud3

We would rather prefer a tower casing, but its not mandatory. The database is not queried non-stop but very frequently. You have provided me detail information. Well a friend also recommended me AMD server rather than getting Xeon but as far as desktop systems are concerned i have bad experience for using AMD..... So little shaky about them, dunno how good this server machine is.....

I will definetly consider your recommendations and thanx.