[CentOS] Looking for server recommendations

Thu Jan 12 20:03:11 UTC 2006
Troy Engel <tengel at fluid.com>

We're going to replace an older Solaris7/Netbackup/TapeRobot server with
a new Centos box using backup-to-disk-to-tape (probably using Arkeia).
The specs are up in the air, but generally:

- CentOS/RHEL friendly (3Ware SATA? SCSI?)
- 2U/3U/4U-ish form factor
- hotswap RAID5
- dual PS, hotswap a plus
- USB2.0 port(s) (*)

To give you an idea of where I'm starting to look, take a gander at this
page:

http://www.serversdirect.com/system_dept.asp?dept_id=SD-043

Obviously we'd like to keep the price low, but realize that a major cost
will be the 400GB drives. We may only start with 4 or 5 of them and add
more as time goes (LVM), depends on how the costs break down. We've even
looked at a Dell 2850 as an option, fyi.

Anyone have some good ideas? My main concern is choosing a motherboard
with a disk controller that's robust, tried and true with the current
standard kernels (or maybe the unsupported branch, but I'd like to stick
to the stock RPMs).

thanks!
-te

(*) for those wondering, we like jacking in cheap external USB 1TB lacie
drives, syncing data over to them using rdiff, and carrying offsite

-- 
Troy Engel | Systems Engineer
Fluid, Inc | http://www.fluid.com