PC Server up to 2 terabytes storage?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rich
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Rich

I need a drive array.. and I need to use cheap 120gb 7200 rpm HDs.

How do I go about doing this? I would be using Windows 2000 Server on a PC.
 
You CANNOT use cheap 120GB drives and get 2 Terabytes of storage in a
conventional PC. You'll lack adquate controllers and drive mounting space.
 
DaveW said:
You CANNOT use cheap 120GB drives and get 2 Terabytes of storage in a
conventional PC. You'll lack adquate controllers and drive mounting
Click to expand...
space.

Shoot. Now what. What's the cheapest way to get 2tb out of a PC?
Any ideas?

Richard
 
Rich said:
space.

Shoot. Now what. What's the cheapest way to get 2tb out of a PC?
Any ideas?

Richard
Click to expand...
At least one manufacturer, name slips my alleged mind at the moment,
announced the availability of 400gB drives recently. Five of those will give
you the 2tB although while you are at it you might as well put in an extra
to take care of lost space due to formatting. A large tower case should
accomodate six drives even if it takes a bit of metalworking. And adding a
PCI controller will allow a standard MB to control everything when combined
with the ATA channels on the MB. But it ain't gonna' be cheap...
 
An array is just a generic term, what kind of array are you considering?
Mirror? Spanning (JBOD, or Just A Bunch Of Drives), I presume NOT
striping.

The idea of managing 16 x 120GB HDs, yikes!, it gives me chills just
thinkin' about it! If this is a case of JBOD, any single failure on one
drive could mean the loss of data on ALL drives!!! And considering the
failure rate on consumer level IDE drives, you can bet the house at least
ONE of those 16 will fail within 1-2 yrs, maybe more, maybe sooner. Heck, I
don't even know of a single, consumer level RAID controller that can handle
more than 8 (most are 4), and the controller isn't going to be cheap anyway.

This strategy just isn't gonna fly. People or companies that need such
storage use specially built "arrays" that take all of these things into
consideration (HD failure, failover protection, redundancy, etc., even
redundant controllers). Instead, your way, you'll be like the guy on the
old Ed Sullivan show, running around trying to keep all the plates spinning!
But even he was in a better position, at least when one of them broke, the
rest were still spinning and usable, when one of YOUR "plates" falls, you
lose them all!

What may be a better strategy for assistance is to explain your objectives,
rather than assume an implementation. You may be overlooking a simpler,
more economical, and easier to maintain implementation, but it's hard for
anyone to provide more assistance w/o knowing your objectives. All anyone
can do is respond Yeah or Nay on the implementation, not very productive.

HTH

Jim
 
Howdy!

Rich said:
space.

Shoot. Now what. What's the cheapest way to get 2tb out of a PC?
Any ideas?
Click to expand...

200GB drives, a 3Ware 12 drive controller (to support the 12 drives
you should use), and a case made for that setup.

That's not CHEAP - there's NO cheap way to get 2TB. There's just
expensive, more expensive, even more expensive, and "Sir, if you have to
ask, you can't afford it."

RwP
 
space.

Shoot. Now what. What's the cheapest way to get 2tb out of a PC?
Any ideas?
Click to expand...
A proper server case with hot swappable drivebays and a dual PSU setup
for a start.
 
Howdy!



200GB drives, a 3Ware 12 drive controller (to support the 12 drives
you should use), and a case made for that setup.

That's not CHEAP - there's NO cheap way to get 2TB. There's just
expensive, more expensive, even more expensive, and "Sir, if you have to
ask, you can't afford it."

RwP
Click to expand...


A "noname" file server appliance advertises 4TB for about $28K. A 1TB
appliances cost about $14K. EMC is the top-shelf product and I expect
an entry level EMC box costs twice the no-name brand.

One brand sells these in pairs (ie $56K) so you can replicate your data
to anothe location for backup.

By the way, what are you going to do with your TB box ?
 
Howdy!



200GB drives, a 3Ware 12 drive controller (to support the 12 drives
you should use), and a case made for that setup.
Click to expand...

Or go with 300Gb drives (they're reasonably priced, only
10-15% more expensive per gigabyte then the 200Mb
drives). 6x300 would get you up to 1.7Tb or so, you
could go 7x300 if you nix the hot spare (not
recommended).
That's not CHEAP - there's NO cheap way to get 2TB. There's just
expensive, more expensive, even more expensive, and "Sir, if you have to
ask, you can't afford it."
Click to expand...

Rough estimate, probably $3 per gigabyte, including
operating system and server hardware costs. (Which is
basically, 3x the raw cost per gigabyte of the drives.)
Server hardware will run you around $2000, operating
system $800, drives 8x$275 or $2200. Total cost of
around $5000 for 1.7Tb of storage ($2.80/Gb).

Plus, you need to back that system up... tape will
probably run you $6000 for the drive, $100 per tape
(complete guess). Call it $9000 for planning estimates?
Backing up to single IDE platters in an external
firewire or SCSI RAID box could probably be done for
around $1.50/Gb ($2000 for the enclosure, $2200 for the
8 drives again).

.... and we're back above $4/Gb, when raw drive costs are
only $0.75-$0.95 per gigabyte right now. At least it's
still cheaper then SCSI RAID (by 5x-8x?).
 
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