comments about hardware
Dear People,
My bioinformatics research group at Duke is buying a server, which will
mostly be used as a server, particularly for web based services. The idea
here is that a user will submit a request for some bioinformatics
calculation via a web interface (often using Python or R or similar), the
server does the calculation, and returns it as a web page.
None of us are experts about recent hardware, so would appreciate any
feedback about hardware specs.
The following quote is from Monarch Computers.
We plan to run Linux on this. It has not yet been decided yet what, but it
seems most likely that it will be either some Red Hat variant (Fedora
Core, CentOS), or Debian (possibly Ubuntu).
Ok, so here are some specific questions.
1) Dual core Opterons first came on the market in April. The sales rep
said that AMD Dual Core Opterons did not work with Fedora Core. Since they
only install Fedora and SuSE, they had no info about Debian. Any idea what
the status is here? How well are they supported, and how stably do they
run under Linux?
Also, I was told that a dual core Opteron, which is somewhat more than
twice the cost two regular Opterons of similar speed, is not equivalent to
two regular Opterons in functionality. Can anyone point me to information
about this, or offer a comment?
2) I'm wondering if the listed motherboard is the best choice. I see it
listed in
http://alioth.debian.org/docman/view.php/30192/27/mainboards.html
We are looking for the motherboard that has the least known issues.
Preferably something that will work right out of the box.
Google found me http://lists.debian.org/debian-amd64/2004/09/msg00443.html
but would be interested in other reports.
The specs are here
http://www.tyan.com/products/html/thunderk8spro_spec.html
It looks like both the graphics card and the ethernet cards are onboard.
Looks like the graphics card is ATI RAGE XL PCI, which supposedly works
with the 'ati' driver. Is this under XFree 4.3?
The ethernet cards are an Intel Ethernet Pro 100, which supposedly works
with the e100 driver and a Gigabit Broadcom which works with the tg3
driver. There seem to be two cards here. Is that correct?
I'm kinda allergic to onboard cards. They are often trouble.
Has anyone had experience with Debian Sarge installation with this? Does
anyone have a board to suggest that they prefer to this?
3) I'm also wondering if peple have thoughts about the RAID setup. The rep
said he would be using RAID 1, but I see RAID 10 is listed. I'll have to
check on this. Anyway, assuming this corresponds to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redundant_array_of_independent_disks#RAID_10
with each RAID 1 set as two drives, and 4 RAID 1 sets striped together,
does this seem reasonable?
Thanks. Faheem.
***********************************************************************
ITEM NUM PRICE PER ITEM TOT
Monarch Empro Custom 2U Rack S 1.00 75.00 75.00
RMC2K2-9I-XPSS,2U,8 Bays,SATA, 1.00 725.00 725.00
AIC 2U Riser Card/Rear Window 1.00 112.00 112.00
Tyan S2882G3NR-D Dual Socket94 1.00 394.00 394.00
Amd OSA265FAA6CB Dual Core Opt 2.00 851.00 1,702.00
Thermal Grease, Shin-Etsu G675 2.00 14.00 28.00
THERMALTAKE A1838 AMD Opteron 2.00 25.00 50.00
WESTERN DIGITAL 250 GB 2500JD 1.00 115.00 115.00
3WARE Escalade 9500S-8 - 8-por 1.00 485.00 485.00
RAID 10 Setup 1.00 25.00 25.00
WESTERN DIGITAL 250 GB 2500JD 8.00 115.00 920.00
SONY DWD-56A 8X4X2.4 DVD RW+/- 1.00 129.00 129.00
SUSE Linux 9.3 Professional Ed 1.00 92.00 92.00
24/7 TECH SUPPORT+ONSITE 3 YR. 1.00 199.00 199.00
Net Order: 5,051.00
Freight: 75.00
5,126.00
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