Minimum hardware specs for linux file server?

[Carlos]

I am planning on building a linux file server and was wondering what the
minimum hardware requirements would be. I plan on using two large EIDE
drives (maybe SATA w/ a separate hardware RAID card) that can by
accessed by three other computers on the network (1 dual-boot SUSE/XP, 1
Kubuntu and 1 Ubuntu).

What would be the minimum cpu and ram requirements? Would a PII 400MHz
with 256 MB be too slow?

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to be
able to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way (writing
from linux to XP)?

Thanks.

 

[Conor]

I am planning on building a linux file server and was wondering what the
minimum hardware requirements would be. I plan on using two large EIDE
drives (maybe SATA w/ a separate hardware RAID card) that can by
accessed by three other computers on the network (1 dual-boot SUSE/XP, 1
Kubuntu and 1 Ubuntu).

What would be the minimum cpu and ram requirements? Would a PII 400MHz
with 256 MB be too slow?

Only when you boot it. Once it is up and running, it'll be OK.

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to be
able to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way (writing
from linux to XP)?

You don't need to use FAT32 or NTFS because as long as the server
supports the filesystem, that's all that matters. The clients
communicate with the server OS, not the HDDs on the server.

 

[Dan N]

What would be the minimum cpu and ram requirements? Would a PII 400MHz
with 256 MB be too slow?

I've got a Pentium 166 MHz with 128 MB running Apache, Samba and Postfix
under Debian Sarge. It works fine.

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to be able
to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way (writing from
linux to XP)?

You don't have to worry about file formats. Format the drives on both
the Linux and Windows machines to their own native formats. Writing files
to disk is taken care of by the operating system of that machine.
Transfer of files between machines is a different process.

Dan

 

[Steve Ackman]

["Followup-To:" header set to alt.os.linux.]
In <[email protected]>, on Wed, 05 Apr 2006 18:11:58

I am planning on building a linux file server and was wondering what the
minimum hardware requirements would be.

486DX-66 would be fine depending on your needs.

I plan on using two large EIDE
drives (maybe SATA w/ a separate hardware RAID card) that can by
accessed by three other computers on the network (1 dual-boot SUSE/XP, 1
Kubuntu and 1 Ubuntu).

What would be the minimum cpu and ram requirements? Would a PII 400MHz
with 256 MB be too slow?

Too slow for what? It's a subjective call. What
one person calls too slow is fine for another.
You need to define what you mean by "fast enough."
What transfer rates do you require to how many
machines simultaneously?

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to be
able to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way (writing
from linux to XP)?

The only time you need FAT32 is if you are dual
booting, and both OSs need to access the same files.
There is no need to have FAT32 on a Linux-only box.

 

[Snowbat]

I've got a Pentium 166 MHz with 128 MB running Apache, Samba and Postfix
under Debian Sarge. It works fine.

Likewise except mine has 160 MB and also runs MySQL, Fetchmail, NTP and
Spamassassin under Mandrake 9.1.

It can't quite saturate my 100 Mbit LAN through a Realtek 8139c however¹.
The best it can manage is about 65 Mbit when not doing anything else. A
Spamassassin process drops it to around 25 Mbit. I'm awaiting delivery of
a Pentium 233 MMX processor to give it a shot in the arm - a $5 upgrade
these days. hdparm -T /dev/hde is showing a healthy 42 MB/sec (Maxtor
6Y160P0 on a Highpoint Rocket card), up from 21 MB/sec since I removed the
PCI graphics card and set BIOS to 'halt on no errors' to make it boot.


¹ Well it can with the bus at 83 MHz and multiplier 2 but not
surprisingly the box crashes after a few hours.
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*** Encrypt your Internet usage with a free VPN account from http://www.SecureIX.com ***

 

[Walter Mautner]

I am planning on building a linux file server and was wondering what the
minimum hardware requirements would be. I plan on using two large EIDE
drives (maybe SATA w/ a separate hardware RAID card) that can by
accessed by three other computers on the network (1 dual-boot SUSE/XP, 1
Kubuntu and 1 Ubuntu).

As long as you do not run a GUI on that machine, almost every box you find
at the junkyard and get running, should do.
However, _real_ hardware raid controllers are something more then just $25,-
so if you find a cheap one it probably is "fake-raid" and "windows-only"
with a driver floppy supplied for "press F6 for additional scsi or raid
drivers" install step on w2k or xp.
Even if it looks the raid controller bios can set up your raid, it will
often only set up the "persistent superblocks" that the windows driver then
reads for information.

What would be the minimum cpu and ram requirements? Would a PII 400MHz
with 256 MB be too slow?

It would fly as long as the other hardware (raidcontroller, network card)
does not lay all work off to the cpu.

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to be
able to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way (writing
from linux to XP)?

You want samba. The filesystem on your linux box is not seen by the clients.

 

[Sybren Stuvel]

["Followup-To:" header set to alt.os.linux.]
Carlos enlightened us with:

I am planning on building a linux file server and was wondering what
the minimum hardware requirements would be.

I ran an email server on a 386SX, 25 MHz, 8 MB RAM, 80 MB harddisk.
When I suggested a hardware update, the response from the other
network users was "Why, this is fast enough, isn't it?"...

Also, do I need to partition the drives as FAT32 for the XP box to
be able to write it, or is this only an issue going the other way
(writing from linux to XP)?

This is only an issue if you install XP directly onto the same box.
Network access through NFS or Samba has nothing to do with the locally
used filesystem.

Sybren

 

[Carlos]

Thanks for all your input. I'll try using this old pc with either
slackware or debian and see how it goes.

Now for the RAID research...