[clug] advice on drives for raid

[Andrew Janke]

2008/8/13 Nemo <clug at nemo.house.cx>:
>
> I'm in the process of building up a new machine to be the personal file
> server I need it to be - and I'm thinking of going down the "multiple
> 1TB drives in a raid5" configuration.
>
> At first glance the idea is 4x 1TB drives, with 900GB of each in raid5
> for roughly 2.7TB shared space, the remaining 100gb to be split between
> system space, and more paranoid raid1 /home and /backup spaces.

Hi Nemo,

I have done this many many times as a cheap backup/sync alternative to
tapes in various places about the traps. Given the price of 1TB drives
as of late it is insanely cheap storage.  And if you play with LVM/SW
raid then you are reasonably protected. In our case we just build two
identical systems, put them in geographically distant places and sync
to both.  The recipe:

   1x Intel Quad Core (these machines are used as part of a cluster too).
   5x Seagate 1TB ES series drives
   1x System drive (often a 2.5" job or as of late even SSD/RAM/USB based).

   1x Antec Sonata III or Antec Sonata II case.

   Motherboard, ram, etc.


The Antec Sonata is not a cheap case but well worth it. I has 1 big
120mm fan at the back and mounting for another inside to cool the
drives. All fans are mounted on silicon grommets as are all the drives
meaning you end up with a machine that can be still very very quiet.
Just be sure to pick both a Motherboard and a Video Card with no fans.
What seems to make all the noise is the number of fans as they all
start to beat against each other and create resonance.

I usually use a thermally controlled fan inside the case, and the
powersupply on the ANtec Sonatas also will throttle its fans to a
standstill if it can.

For the brave you can get a 6th and indeed 7th drive in the Antec
Sonata if you take over the 5 1/4" spaces at the top.... :)  An 8th
generally required double sided tape and the inside of the lid, not to
mention another SATA controller!


-- 
Andrew Janke - andrew.janke at anu.edu.au
Department of Geriatric Medicine, ANU
(a.janke at gmail.com || http://a.janke.googlepages.com/)
Canberra->Australia +61 (402) 700 883