select hardware

[ThisObject]

I want to set up a Tomcat server on RedHat but I am not sure which hardware to chose. Back-end implementation is done in Java. I am not sure whether I should go with regular P4 or get a real server (which is much more expensive). In the beginning I cannot expect huge traffic but eventually I hope it will grow. If I go with P4, will it really affect the performance? I understand there is an issue of how code is written and how often I hit the database. But if drop all software concerns, just from the hardware perspective, what would be the most reasonable thing to get? Is it really bad to run a web site on a P4 machine with one processor?

Thanks

 

[robbieguy2003]

Hello,

A P4 server machine should run nicely if the website isnt going to be getting hit by lots of people all the time.

The best advice i could give is make sure you get a decent chassis/board to start with (Supermicro if your building yourself), Dell or HP if your buying the machine.

I'd also consider SCSI disks over IDE/SATA as the performance is much better and is especially important when running Databases/Webservers (logs are constantly being appended to, database files written to) as performance can massively suffer if the disk system isnt upto it.

Throw a load of Memory in the machine as well (1GB minimum) and it should run nicely.

If you have the money consider getting a Dual Xeon machine with 1 Chip and then throwing a second in when you need more performance as your application/traffic grows.

If its running a site look at bandwidth considerations as well. If its going to be busy at certain times and your putting it on a T1 in your office then it might not be enough.

Consider getting it Colocated with an ISP where you can take advantage of a better network which again will be important.

Good Luck

I wish someone would just call me Sir, without adding 'Your making a scene'.

Rob

 

[tf1]

It may be a simple choice by answering this question...

Is this a mission critial server (e.g. is it going to make money whilst it is running: lose customers whilst it is down)?

If the answer is yes, then don't think of anything less than something like an HP ProLiant with good redundancy such as hardware RAID 1 (mirrored drives), on line spare memory, redundant PSU and Fans, etc.

ProLiants are very expandable, so if the server starts to received increased hits, you can easily improve its performance by adding a RAID 5 data array, more memory and a second processor without having to throw away existing hardware.

Regards: tf1