Re: Looking for a cheap upgrade (RAID)

On 5 May 2003, Ron Johnson wrote:

> On Mon, 2003-05-05 at 11:31, scott.marlowe wrote:
> > On 3 May 2003, Ron Johnson wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, 2003-05-02 at 13:53, Chad Thompson wrote:
> > > > I have a server on a standard pc right now.
> > > > PIII 700, 1Gig ram (SD), 40 Gig IDE, RedHat 8.0, PostgreSQL 7.3.1
> > > >
> > > > The database has 3 tables that just broke 10 million tuples (yeah, i think
> > > > im entering in to the world of real databases ;-)
> > > > Its primarly bulk (copy) inserts and queries, rarely an update.
> > > >
> > > > I am looking at moving this to a P4 2.4G, 2 Gig Ram(DDR), RedHat 8,
> > > > PostgreSQL 7.3.latest
> > > [snip]
> > >
> > > How big do you expect the database to get?
> > >
> > > If I may be a contrarian, if under 70GB, then why not just get a 72GB
> > > 10K RPM SCSI drive ($160) and a SCSI 160 card? OS, swap, input files,
> > > etc, can go on a 7200RPM IDE drive.
> > >
> > > Much fewer moving parts than RAID, so more reliable...
> >
> > Sorry, everything else is true, but RAID is far more reliable, even if
> > disk failure is more likely. Since a RAID array (1 or 5) can run with one
> > dead disk, and supports auto-rebuild from hot spares, there's really no
> > way a single disk can be more reliable. It may have fewer failures, but
> > that's not the same thing.
>
> What controller do you use for IDE hot-swapping and auto-rebuild?
> 3Ware?

Linux, and I don't do hot swapping with IDE, just hot rebuild from a
spare drive. My servers are running SCSI, by the way, only the
workstations are running IDE. With the saved cost of a decent RAID
controller (good SCSI controllers are still well over $500 most the time)
I can afford enough hot spares to never have to worry about changing one
out during the day.