Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 12:20:35 +1030 From: Matthew Thyer <Matthew.Thyer@dsto.defence.gov.au> To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org Cc: msmith@FreeBSD.org Subject: DPT or Mylex for hardware RAID ? Message-ID: <38BC776B.7E20157B@dsto.defence.gov.au>
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I will be setting up a largish file server on FreeBSD 4.0-RELEASE
(or maybe 3.4-RELEASE if 4.0 has problems).
The RAID questions come later in this email (for Mike).
The client wishes to have a hot pluggable hardware RAID solution
(which I assume will mandate SCSI drives unfortunately).
My ideas for hardware are as follows:
- Dual processor Pentium III 600 (or 700)
- ABit BP6 motherboard
- 256 MB to 512 MB RAM
- IBM DPTA series (or better) 20 GB (17 GB) UDMA 66 drive for OS
- USB mouse
- USB keyboard ?? - or PS/2
- Richoh (sp ?) 4 in one CD/CD-R/CD-RW/DVD (ATAPI device)
- LG Flatron 17" monitor (has a USB hub inbuilt)
- 3dfx Velocity 100 AGP 2x video card
Firstly, do you think this is a good hardware selection in terms of
- Motherboard... what better dual proc motherboards would people
use ? With RAID controllers using 160MB drives do I need a
160 MB SCSI controller and if so should I be using a 64bit PCI
slot ? and if so, what dual processor motherboards are good with
FreeBSD... (not Rack mounted... just a normal ATX PC case as there
will only be one CD-ROM and one IDE UDMA66 drive internally).
- USB keyboard ? Is it a pain more than anything.... should I avoid
USB altogether ? Nick Himba's recent email to -current states that
USB is too flakey for the GENERIC kernel. Is this true ?
- CPU/Motherboard/RAM selection..... I'd probably like PC133 SDRAM
and dont want to pay for ECC RAM. Intel are having problems
delivering their faster CPUs so I might have to go dual PIII 533
(133 MHz FSB) as opposed to 550s (which are only 100 MHz FSB).
I'd like to know peoples thoughts on which hardware RAID controller
is most supported under 4.0 and 3.4.
Firstly, are there any hardware RAID controllers that use UDMA 66
drives (as they are way cheaper--- IBM DPTA or better naturally).
I do realise I would link the RAID controller to the machine with
SCSI and I am happy to do so but I was hoping for a hot pluggable
hardware RAID solution that didn't require expensive SCSI drives.
Other questions:
- Is it best to go for the name brand or are there some good OEM
devices ?
- Any preferences for Mylex over DPT ?
- For the DPT RAID controller I would be looking at something like:
- Century or Millennium models of 64-bit Ultra160 SCSI
- Is it worth going to the Millennium ?
- does anyone have an idea of what real world
level of usage would justify the extra expense ?
- see www.dpt.com for specs... century comes with
32MB ECC RAM (max 128 MB cache capacity),
millennium comes with 64MB ECC RAM (max 256 MB
cache capacity).
--
Matthew Thyer Phone: +61 8 8259 7249
Corporate Information Systems Fax: +61 8 8259 5537
Defence Science and Technology Organisation, Salisbury
PO Box 1500 Salisbury South Australia 5108
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