First I want everyone to know how much I appreciate this forum. I've been desiging websites for a number of years, and see the potential profits that can be derived from having my own server. Since I am in the computer sales and service business, it makes sense for me to also offer web hosting packages. I already have a complete office generating system, and a number of large apc systems in place. I'm relatively new to linux, but I have been gathering a lot of information and am trying to set up a linux box as a web server. I've installed a copy of v 7.3 on an older pc to help me familiarize myself with it. I want a STABLE box, so I would like to see what kind of hardware that ya'll recommend I use. MB,RAM,PROC,HD,NIC ?? I'm having a 768k line installed for the server, and anticipate using a linksys router. I've checked out and found a lot of useful information there, but any input received is greatly appreciated.
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Ideal Server Hardware 1
- Thread starter aopc
- Start date
My thoughts on this are that it really doesnt matter as far as your hardware as much as it does stability. I had a small 133mhz machine that we had as a parts box, it had 32 megs of RAM, installed FreeBSD as a test to see if it would, it wound up with a 54 day uptime. Of course in the server world that isnt so great(Woulda stayed up but it was run at my home, for fileserver, external FTP server, and a small ircd host, and my power went out). Now dont get me wrong, hardware does play some role, but its not the deciding factor. As for some basic stats, if you think your site is going to see a large amount of traffic i might suggest getting at least a 800mhz CPU with 256 megs of ram as the bare minimum. I would also suggest SCSI, but thats my personal preference. 3COM is my pick for NIC's, reliable and works with alot of different OS's. These are just my opinions but i hope its helpful.
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You say a copy of v7.3...
Just a helpful nitpick..
You are referring to a distribution release version number
which is not the version of linux you are dealing with.
Each distro has their own distro numbering scheme.
The kernel versions are numbered: ver % 2 == 0 = stable.
kernel 2.4.14++ is a good bet right now.
An older distribution probably has a lot of security
problems so it is best to avoid low numbered distros
for a newcomer.
Stability..
Linux(and BSD)are very stable. I've used NT and
Netware and I've found that linux is capable of
handling a much greater range of tasks with better
performance and stability than either of these platforms
(NT 4 sp6 was very respectable as a file server however)
given comparable hardware.
For a business expecting any amount of traffic I would
not go with an underpowered machine. 500mhz-1ghz p3 equiv
(I like amd..tbird/athlon, just my personal pref..),
super fast IO(scsi is good) and tons of RAM. At least
500+ megs. Redundancy through hardware raid is good,
but linux soft raid and LVM offers you other routes if
you don't want to spring for a raid box. A journalling
file system with LVM is very flexible, but journalling
fs with hard raid and static partitions is just as good.
You are using business grade DSL?
What are you using for a router?
Just a helpful nitpick..
You are referring to a distribution release version number
which is not the version of linux you are dealing with.
Each distro has their own distro numbering scheme.
The kernel versions are numbered: ver % 2 == 0 = stable.
kernel 2.4.14++ is a good bet right now.
An older distribution probably has a lot of security
problems so it is best to avoid low numbered distros
for a newcomer.
Stability..
Linux(and BSD)are very stable. I've used NT and
Netware and I've found that linux is capable of
handling a much greater range of tasks with better
performance and stability than either of these platforms
(NT 4 sp6 was very respectable as a file server however)
given comparable hardware.
For a business expecting any amount of traffic I would
not go with an underpowered machine. 500mhz-1ghz p3 equiv
(I like amd..tbird/athlon, just my personal pref..),
super fast IO(scsi is good) and tons of RAM. At least
500+ megs. Redundancy through hardware raid is good,
but linux soft raid and LVM offers you other routes if
you don't want to spring for a raid box. A journalling
file system with LVM is very flexible, but journalling
fs with hard raid and static partitions is just as good.
You are using business grade DSL?
What are you using for a router?
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