Re: Hardware purchase question

>>>>> "BS" == Bo Stewart <bstewart(at)marketingsolutionsinc(dot)com> writes:

BS> The servers listed above are the dell 2650's which have perc 3
BS> controllers. I have seen on this list where they are know for not
BS> performing well. So any suggestions for an attached scsi device would
BS> be greatly appreciated. Also, any thoughts on fibre channel storage
BS> devices?

I have a 2450 and a 2650 both of which are totally sucking IO wise.

The 2650 has a PERC3 card (LSI based) and has one channel holding a
mirrored pair for the pg_xlog and OS, and the other channel has 14
U320 disks in a RAID5. If I'm lucky, I'll get 30MB/s out of the
disks. Normally it hovers at 5 or 6MB/s on the big RAID.

I'm currently shopping for non-Dell hardware to replace it :-(

However, I keep getting conflicting advice. My choices are along
these lines:

Dual Xeon 64bit with built-in 6-disk RAID10 or RAID5 (LSI RAID card)
Dual Opteron 64bit with built-in 6-disk RAID10 or RAID5 (LSI RAID card)
Dual Opteron 64bit with external RAID via fibre channel (eg, nstor)

I'm sure any of these will whip the bottom off the Dell 2650, but
which will be the fastest overall? No way to know without spending
lots of money to test. :-(

Dell claims their new 2750 will be faster, but they've lost the battle
already, and won't commit to any performance numbers. Won't even give
me a ballpark number.

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