servers Show us your Servers - 2014 Edition

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

I am confused.  I dont have a server, nor do I even have a RAID array.  I have a 2TB Caviar Black that has about 200 1080p movies on it - I strem wirelessly to my TV.... And I can never decide what to watch.  And so many of them can be removed because I will never watch them again.  And everything is backed up on an external and on cloud.

 

So I ask, why a server ?  Is it a case of "well I want to tinker with it, I dont need it in the slightest sense, just feel cool having one ?" 

What does it do faster than mine ?  Because whatever I do on my main desktop - I never have to wait... for anything.

 

I am not saying I dont approve, I am saying, "why ?"  because maybe I want to do something like this in the future...well...no I wont.

 

For what you're doing, not very much. For what I'm doing (these are mission critical only servers - Exchange 2013, SharePoint 2013, etc for a Oil & Gas services corporation and a few other uses - the rest are hidden).

 

Redundancy is the biggest gain, more speed (again, not that big of a deal on BIG file streaming). The only time a home NAS would be worth upgrading would be if you noticed lag when streaming a 1080p Blu-Ray, 4k or something along those lines and buffering was not the problem due to networking.

[Praetor]

Correct, 3 servers (now 4), redundant supplies on separate circuits, on separate UPS. Have to have them stay online until the generator kicks over (and I'd rather have a buffer for a what if scenario).

 

you could have used 1 big ass UPS with redundant power connectors (so you could connect to two different power circuits) or 2 UPS for redudancy...

i guess the 3rd one is just for making up when the power lines are struggling, which is OK.

 

i personally have lots of experience with APC UPS, and so far very few completely died (and the ones that did were low enterprise grade ones, like 500VA or 700VA); it's more usual the batterie(s) die then the whole UPS.

[Sikh]

you could have used 1 big ass UPS with redundant power connectors (so you could connect to two different power circuits) or 2 UPS for redudancy...

i guess the 3rd one is just for making up when the power lines are struggling, which is OK.

 

i personally have lots of experience with APC UPS, and so far very few completely died (and the ones that did were low enterprise grade ones, like 500VA or 700VA); it's more usual the batterie(s) die then the whole UPS.

 

Yes you are correct UPS's dont die, but in order to change / recharge batteries you need another UPS to pick up the load, also it helps you have N+1.

[Crisp]

Where did you get your rack from and how much?

 

I'm in the UK, so I guess price wouldn't really matter. I missed out on a good deal for the same rack on eBay, which went for ?90. I paid ?160 for mine. The rack itself is the 4postrack12 from StarTech.com I did however get the top shelf for cheap off eBay. Also picked up some StarTech casters for it.

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

you could have used 1 big ass UPS with redundant power connectors (so you could connect to two different power circuits) or 2 UPS for redudancy...

i guess the 3rd one is just for making up when the power lines are struggling, which is OK.

 

i personally have lots of experience with APC UPS, and so far very few completely died (and the ones that did were low enterprise grade ones, like 500VA or 700VA); it's more usual the batterie(s) die then the whole UPS.

 

Unfortunately enough I wanted to, but not possible.The office I'm in is in the floor level/street front of a grand hotel (used to be a barber shop way back in the day) that was built in the late 1800's. Bonnie and Clyde actually stayed at the hotel before they were killed (useless fact).

 

Point being, the wiring is old as old gets. They barely got it up to code with 15A (fuses, yep, not breakers  :/. Elsewhere is fine, Everything in the office is off of two main circuits - both 15A, and with the servers at full load plus the rest of the office operating I didn't want to risk a blown fuse dropping a branch of PSUs and sending the other side sky high (in the 4U server, they are 1.5A per PSU, unless one goes offline, which then one goes to 5-6A by it self - you get the picture).

 

Each UPS sitting down there is at 80% load basically right now, and that means barely any run time during a loss of power condition (which is all too possible with the building as old as it is) but both sides of each PSU are on the battery backup side, not just surge side. 

 

Ironically, whenever speccing out the load I had to do a ton of research due to the wiring, and trying to utilize what I had without ripping everything out and redoing it.  :woot:

 

Edit: If you want to contribute to the research I'm all ears, I've about pulled my hair out on the office trying to figure out how to push the envelope here - if utilizing the 220V would be worth it (but then found out they branched two 110V together to make the 220V - one of those 110V I believe comes off one of the two 110V circuits in the office).

 

Crisp, what's your budget?

Edited March 26, 2014 by Tech Greek

[+LogicalApex MVC]

Unfortunately enough I wanted to, but not possible.The office I'm in is in the floor level/street front of a grand hotel (used to be a barber shop way back in the day) that was built in the late 1800's. Bonnie and Clyde actually stayed at the hotel before they were killed (useless fact).

 

Point being, the wiring is old as old gets. They barely got it up to code with 15A (fuses, yep, not breakers  :/. Elsewhere is fine, Everything in the office is off of two main circuits - both 15A, and with the servers at full load plus the rest of the office operating I didn't want to risk a blown fuse dropping a branch of PSUs and sending the other side sky high (in the 4U server, they are 1.5A per PSU, unless one goes offline, which then one goes to 5-6A by it self - you get the picture).

 

Each UPS sitting down there is at 80% load basically right now, and that means barely any run time during a loss of power condition (which is all too possible with the building as old as it is) but both sides of each PSU are on the battery backup side, not just surge side. 

 

Ironically, whenever speccing out the load I had to do a ton of research due to the wiring, and trying to utilize what I had without ripping everything out and redoing it.  :woot:

 

Edit: If you want to contribute to the research I'm all ears, I've about pulled my hair out on the office trying to figure out how to push the envelope here - if utilizing the 220V would be worth it (but then found out they branched two 110V together to make the 220V - one of those 110V I believe comes off one of the two 110V circuits in the office).

 

Crisp, what's your budget?

Isn't this universally the case in the US? Since we push power in 120V we achieve 240V lines by bonding two 120V lanes together.

[Praetor]

Unfortunately enough I wanted to, but not possible.The office I'm in is in the floor level/street front of a grand hotel (used to be a barber shop way back in the day) that was built in the late 1800's. Bonnie and Clyde actually stayed at the hotel before they were killed (useless fact).

 

Point being, the wiring is old as old gets. They barely got it up to code with 15A (fuses, yep, not breakers  :/. Elsewhere is fine, Everything in the office is off of two main circuits - both 15A, and with the servers at full load plus the rest of the office operating I didn't want to risk a blown fuse dropping a branch of PSUs and sending the other side sky high (in the 4U server, they are 1.5A per PSU, unless one goes offline, which then one goes to 5-6A by it self - you get the picture).

 

Each UPS sitting down there is at 80% load basically right now, and that means barely any run time during a loss of power condition (which is all too possible with the building as old as it is) but both sides of each PSU are on the battery backup side, not just surge side. 

 

Ironically, whenever speccing out the load I had to do a ton of research due to the wiring, and trying to utilize what I had without ripping everything out and redoing it.  :woot:

 

ouch, sorry to hear that.

 

80% load? those batteries and UPS are in the max load according to APC; even at that the runtime must be really low, maybe with not enough time to shutdown properly the server/network equipment. Do you do calibrations to the batteries? It's a great way to check if they are dieing.

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

Isn't this universally the case in the US? Since we push power in 120V we achieve 240V lines by bonding two 120V lanes together.

 

220V is the normal feed, 110V outlet circuits are usually a 220V split down - but in my particualr case I can find two 110V (one of which I suspect the 220V uses, which is already near peak load) but the other 110V I can't find as it goes into the hotel/basement/beyond. I was thinking about tempting it but if it's using both 110V circuits from the office then I'll be in trouble as BOTH 110V in the office are already near full load and I fear for the wiring age and heat (don't want to burn down this piece of history). 

 

70-80% load depending on the time of day. They are merely a fall back for the generator to get plugged in but that's why the new ones are on the way to add more buffer.

[+LogicalApex MVC]

220V is the normal feed, 110V outlet circuits are usually a 220V split down - but in my particualr case I can find two 110V (one of which I suspect the 220V uses, which is already near peak load) but the other 110V I can't find as it goes into the hotel/basement/beyond. I was thinking about tempting it but if it's using both 110V circuits from the office then I'll be in trouble as BOTH 110V in the office are already near full load and I fear for the wiring age and heat (don't want to burn down this piece of history). 

 

70-80% load depending on the time of day. They are merely a fall back for the generator to get plugged in but that's why the new ones are on the way to add more buffer.

Yeah every place in the US, at least probably built newer than the last 50 years, has 3 wires coming in from the electric utility. 2 120V lines, Neutral. The 2 120V lines are usually bonded at the breaker box and each 120V line is on different phases. Pushing a breaker onto both phases allows it to serve 240V.

 

But it makes sense that they are capable of doing something else for business environments. I'm only familiar with residential electricity setups as a limited amateur.

[Praetor]

220V is the normal feed, 110V outlet circuits are usually a 220V split down - but in my particualr case I can find two 110V (one of which I suspect the 220V uses, which is already near peak load) but the other 110V I can't find as it goes into the hotel/basement/beyond. I was thinking about tempting it but if it's using both 110V circuits from the office then I'll be in trouble as BOTH 110V in the office are already near full load and I fear for the wiring age and heat (don't want to burn down this piece of history). 

 

70-80% load depending on the time of day. They are merely a fall back for the generator to get plugged in but that's why the new ones are on the way to add more buffer.

 

hum...there isn't much you can do, since the lines are only 15A and it seems they are overloaded (some 5KVA UPS need like 30A when powered on, for example, and then they go down to a good 24A). Also i'm from EU, so 230V is the norm here (50hz).

 

i would call a good electrician to inspect the main power to see the options you have there, but since it's a old building i doubt there's much you can do without some serious work done.

[Praetor]

But it makes sense that they are capable of doing something else for business environments. I'm only familiar with residential electricity setups as a limited amateur.

 

In my country you can rent Three Phase if you need more juice; it' possible either for home or business as well.

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

Yeah, the problem is that the majority of the wiring in the building is older than I am (I'll take a picture of the rape basement tomorrow to give you a good idea, that's where all the meters are, Swepco hates reading the meters). 

 

In business/multi-plex environment you sometimes will find it up towards the 400 range (480V I believe), and in some places, three phase and all of that junk just adds into more  :angry:.

 

The good news is that my office is above the basement  and it's almost a straight shot down to get to the meters but I'm stuck on whether or not I should pay for it out of pocket or bug the new owner to upgrade the wiring. I don't have a leg to stand on, because it's grandfathered in code wise so legally he's sound and safe. 

 

Electricians around these parts are junk - I know more than 90% of them and I just deal with the IT Side of electricity!  :|

 

EDIT: I looked into three phase but the price for just this rack seemed like it would be astronomical. 

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

Here is work, because I have no other picture at this time and you can't see everything in this. I'll try to take a in-person one tomorrow

 

<snip>

 

I just saw this, Xendrome, how do you like the wireless temp monitoring? I thought about picking that up for the MC cabinet (I have magnetic temperature probes everywhere like pictured on the Sikh's startech rack  :woot:)

[Haggis Veteran]

^{Mine :)}

 

HP MicroServer N54L

 

Not done much to it yet

 

Has 2Gb RAM, 1*500Gb, 1*1Tb and the standard 160gb which has the os

 

[+John Teacake MVC]

I always get massive envy and ideas when I read these threads but I keep coming back because I love them haha.  

[+LogicalApex MVC]

^{Mine :)}

HP MicroServer N54L

Not done much to it yet

Has 2Gb RAM, 1*500Gb, 1*1Tb and the standard 160gb which has the os

What OS are you running on it?

[Haggis Veteran]

Debian 7.4  :)

[stromo]

Snap.

Tho mines running FreeNas

^{Mine :)}

 

HP MicroServer N54L

 

Not done much to it yet

 

Has 2Gb RAM, 1*500Gb, 1*1Tb and the standard 160gb which has the os

 

[xendrome]

I just saw this, Xendrome, how do you like the wireless temp monitoring? I thought about picking that up for the MC cabinet (I have magnetic temperature probes everywhere like pictured on the Sikh's startech rack  :woot:)

 

It works great, the interface isn't anything to write home about, but I have it send an e-mail to 2 cell phone txt message e-mail addresses and an e-mail address in case it goes above the set point. No problems so far, a bit expensive for what it does, but they appear to be the only ones that do this specific function at around the $300 price point

Snap.

Tho mines running FreeNas

IMG_2014032650959.jpg

 

 

Hope that speaker is shielded well.

[stromo]

[snipped]

Hope that speaker is shielded well.

Yeah I did wonder about that, but seems to be running ok..

[+Thayios Subscriber²]

It works great, the interface isn't anything to write home about, but I have it send an e-mail to 2 cell phone txt message e-mail addresses and an e-mail address in case it goes above the set point. No problems so far, a bit expensive for what it does, but they appear to be the only ones that do this specific function at around the $300 price point

 

Hope that speaker is shielded well.

 

Beat me to it on the speaker! :D

 

I've looked high and low for remote monitoring without investing in the APC netbotz system for this cabinet and haven't found anything.

[Bigkaye]

I am confused.  I dont have a server, nor do I even have a RAID array.  I have a 2TB Caviar Black that has about 200 1080p movies on it - I strem wirelessly to my TV.... And I can never decide what to watch.  And so many of them can be removed because I will never watch them again.  And everything is backed up on an external and on cloud.

 

So I ask, why a server ?  Is it a case of "well I want to tinker with it, I dont need it in the slightest sense, just feel cool having one ?" 

What does it do faster than mine ?  Because whatever I do on my main desktop - I never have to wait... for anything.

 

I am not saying I dont approve, I am saying, "why ?"  because maybe I want to do something like this in the future...well...no I wont.

 

Bitrot was my main reason. 200 movies on a HDD, after 6 months and a few power issues 75 of those movies are corrupted and unwatchable. I don't have the time to move around 2TB of movies every month to ensure the drive don't corrupt itself. Server does that automatically.

Expandability is another. I throw another drive into the box, or take out a small drive and put a bigger one in. Now I have more space. no moving files about, it just adds the space to the data pool without much of any legwork, extra power bricks or taking up more space.

redundancy. I buy different drives made at different times, if one fails theres a hotswappable right in place that'll rebuild it automatically. I just get an email saying <drive> failed. I know to seek out a replacement and do a swap with <drive>

Speed. Its hard to stream 4 different bluray rips to 4 different clients off a single 2TB wireless drive (I'm talking 15GB MKVs here). Someones gonna have a stuttery video. Its nice buying 60GB SSDs for everyone and nobody worrying about running out of space as most things will run/store/play from the network. In addition client computers don't need to be on all the time, and servers are easier to replace fans in than laptops.

Backups. The computers backup to the server automatically on a bi-weekly basis. Makes recovering a failed client HDD seamless.

Server stuff. it runs plex, web servers, web services, torrent clients, mycloud, all in the background. I can always access my data from anywhere in the world, upload data to it from anywhere, or tell my server to download something while away from my LAN.

reliability. I count uptime in years.

[T3X4S]

OK - well so far the only thing Ive seen mentioned that my system would struggle with is streaming 4 blu-ray simultaneously

I understand if someone wants to tinker with stuff - but all this power backup, for backups, and running Exchange for 3 people.... just seams kinda... I dont know.. a little crazy :D

[Recall1982]

Mine HP N40L. :)

4,5TB, 2GB of RAM

Runing Synology DSM 5.0-4493.

 

Sorry for poor picture quality. ;)

[TPreston]

Suppose its time to post my rig, Runs 80 or so VMs 24x7.

 

2xHP Dl380 G5 = Xeon X5450, 64GB,  500GB SSD for VMS and os, 1TB 7200RPM for bulk vm data like wsus content.

HP MSA 60 8TB RAID 6 4TB RAID 6 (Backups)

Edge Core ES4626_50 48 port switch

HP IP Console

Cisco 891W

Dust and lots of it datavac to the rescue!