nate wrote: > Rudi Ahlers wrote: > > >> I think my action plan now will be to figure out how to install CentOS >> on a USB memory stick and make it boot on any machine (making it easy to >> replace if need be), and then to play around with the RAID a bit and see >> how well it works. >> > > Another option you may want to consider is a PATA->CF adapter. I use > these for my OpenBSD firewalls and have them installed on 1GB CF cards. > Performance should be better? Compatibility certainly is better, there's > no way I could boot to USB off these aging P3-800 systems. The CF cards > just show up as regular HDs > > I use these ($7): > http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=SY-ADIDE2CF-B1&cpc=SCH > > Paired with Lexar CF cards. Not all CF is created equal, well maybe it is > today. I found my Lexar CF cards were 5-10x faster than my Kingston cards > of the same size, which surprised me. Not that I need high performance in > firewalls that do no disk I/O but it was painful for the OS install to > take hours(Kingston) instead of minutes(Lexar). Both pairs of CF cards > are a few years old, today maybe everything out there is reasonably > fast. > > At least with the above adapters be aware that those adapters above > do stick up. I think a 2U chassis can fit them(I have tons of experience > in supermicro systems). But no guarantees. You may need another adapter > or perhaps a male to female IDE cable so that you can mount it another > way in the chassis. > > I suppose you could even get two and run RAID. > > Just don't put your swap on the flash if you can avoid it. > > nate > > > ______________________________________________ Thanx, nate That's a good suggestion, but I think the USB memory sticks could work better / more reliable, and will be easier to access in the cabinet. I'll play around with it a bit and see how it works. -- Kind Regards Rudi Ahlers CEO, SoftDux Web: http://www.SoftDux.com Check out my technical blog, http://blog.softdux.com for Linux or other technical stuff, or visit http://www.WebHostingTalk.co.za for Web Hosting stuff