Looking for advice. Which flavor/version for a home server? 2

[ei8ball]

I plan to install a server in my home for backup of my wives home business files along with other server functions I might find of use. I am a network admin of mostly w2K/XP experiece, but have dabbled in linux here and there.

I plan to install this on a P3 800Mhz machine with possibly three harddrives and one cdrom.

So one system disc and the other two I was hoping to mirror for data. And of course I will need to access all data from a windows computer and manipulate it as such, so I assume I need samba.

So my question is what brand/versions do you recommend for a newb like me?

Also, once i setup the mirror, upon disc failure, how do I get my data back? is it similiar to how it is done in W2K?

Thanks for your time!

Jason

You were born an original. Don't die a copy!

 

[ericbrunson]

I'm currently running RH9, RH9, Xebian (for XBox) and Fedora Core 1.

I've been very happy with Fedore Core Test 1.

I'm sure everyone will have some input.

Do not get Fedora Core Test 2, the SELinux is not ready for prime time, I'm still only using it on a laptop to play with.

I was not pleased with Lindows at all, very bloaty, very slow, very ugly. I lasted a full 18 hours on my machine.

e.

 

[paleogryph]

Fedora is great.

Be careful however running up2date and then having major hassles with X not starting because certain packages didn't load all the way or were corrupt.


>Think for yourself<
...or someone else will do it for you.

 

[ericbrunson]

I like yum over up2date, but again, personal pref.

 

[ei8ball]

So, fedora and RH both support mirroring harddrives? And how difficult is it to get data back if one drive dies?
Thanks for these responses

You were born an original. Don't die a copy!

 

[ericbrunson]

All recent versions of the linux kernel support the multi-drive (md) device which allows several levels of raid, including mirroring. I don't know how hard it is to break and remirror the pair if one drive fails, I've never had to do it.

 

[cgswong]

For a newbie I'd recommend Mandrake Linux 10. It's stable, fast and very user friendly. Have used Red Hat in the past but not Fedora as yet.

If you mirror your data disk then if one disk fails your system/data will still be available and accessable so there's no data to get back. To get back your RAID 1 redundancy you'll have to break the mirror, swap out the failed disk for a new one, and re-establish the mirror which will re-synch the data again.

Hope this helps and good luck!

Snr Unix System Admin/DBA
Digicel Jamaica (

http://www.digiceljamaica.com)

 

[ei8ball]

You guys/girls rock.

Many thanks!!

You were born an original. Don't die a copy!

 

[HondaSir]

SuSE is a good basic, easy to use OS and is okay for server apps... My take would be Fedora

 

[mattjurado]

Also, have you considered that if data gets corrupted or deleted, then mirroring really doesn't do you any good. I always make sure I have good tape backups for my servers. However, this being a home server where data might not be too big, it may be more cost effective for you to use a cd burner.

I can't tell you how many times I have seen data lost because the previous tech relied on mirroring to protect data, and then it just gets corrupted. And I also can't tell you how many times I've seen controllers or bad power kill all hard drives in a system. Mirroring has only been useful to me if you have two different drives on two different controllers (disk duplexing), and one drive fails. You swap the drive, regenerate the mirror, and bam, you avoid reloading the OS. I don't even bother to mirror data, I just implement good tape backups, and test them often.

Besides that scenario, tape is the only real safe bet from my own personal experience. So go cd burner on a desktop if you want to save money, but if the data is important, I would invest in a good tape.

Whichever router you pick, test your backups frequently.

Matt J.

Please always take the time to backup any and all data before performing any actions suggested for ANY problem, regardless of how minor a change it might seem. Also test the backup to make sure it is intact.

 

[ei8ball]

Ah good point Matt. I will look into a tape backup. It's disappointing that out local computer stores in Des Moines have stopped selling tape backup systems and tapes. I guess I'll have to start checking around online.

Many thanks again!

You were born an original. Don't die a copy!

 

[noellees1]

Ive seen this mentioned above what is samba? can someone help me out here? Ive posted in thread619-820449 a similar question to this thread.
So do i need samba to make a windows box talk to a linux box?
Cheers

http://www.spano.co.uk

The way web design should be

 

[sleipnir214]

Samba is the open-source implementation of SMB ("Send Message Block", now called CIFS "Common Internet File System") that is used by Microsoft's file and printer sharing system.

It is required if you want to make Linux filesystem spaces available to Win32 under Win32's native networking system.

Your Linux distribution should have shipped with a version of Samba. In any case, for more information, see

http://www.samba.org

Want the best answers? Ask the best questions!

TANSTAAFL!!