Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Dedicated Server : [Ask] The Best Harddisk Configuration for Web Server?

[Echizen]

Hi there,

I have stupid question about hard disk configuration, which of this configs that is powerful in term of I/Os?

a. 4 x 500GB SATA (7.2K rpm) II with Hw Raid-10 (cost $110/mo)
b. 2 x 450GB SAS (15K rpm) with Hw Raid-1 (cost $300/mo)

I know for the price and space the first option is better than the 2nd. But, how about the i/o performance, which is the best possible for shared hosting server for dynamic web content (CMS) ?

Many thanks for your advices,
-sorry for my english -

[Showfom]

of course 2X450GB SAS

[leckley]

We run 4 x 500GB SATA (7.2K rpm) II with Hw Raid-10 + BBU on our machines and they run like champs.

We have used SAS 15K drives in the past and never really saw much improvement, though we never come close to maxing out the drives.

[SparkNode]

Can you tell us more about what you plan on hosting on this machine? Also, how important is having more storage available for future growth? It really depends on your specific requirements and how best to meet those requirements within your budget.

[Echizen]

Originally Posted by Showfom

of course 2X450GB SAS

thanks Showfom, for your advice, I'll consider it

Originally Posted by leckley

We run 4 x 500GB SATA (7.2K rpm) II with Hw Raid-10 + BBU on our machines and they run like champs.

We have used SAS 15K drives in the past and never really saw much improvement, though we never come close to maxing out the drives.

woow, yes this configs will also use Hardware Raid-10 with BBU.
thanks Leckley, for sharing your experiences.

Originally Posted by HivelocityDA

Can you tell us more about what you plan on hosting on this machine? Also, how important is having more storage available for future growth? It really depends on your specific requirements and how best to meet those requirements within your budget.

Hi HivelocityDA thanks for the input.
This server will be used for shared hosting most of the sites will use WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal. off course it is very important to have more space on this server, b'cos my client is increasing day by day right now.
I'm looking for provider that give me an affordable price, my budget is no more than $400usd/mo, for 4x1TB SATA II or 4x500GB SATA II + Raid-10 hardware.

Any suggestions?

[cedivad]

You should be able to handle the same kind of traffic with both the solutions, giving the iops as the only parameter, the only difference would be in latency, maybe a 30/40% better, using the 15k disks.
You will have 2*150 iops vs 4*70 iops, divide by 2 since that you are using raid 1/10.
Given the price difference I would go with the 4*sata option, no doubt!

[HSN-Saman]

Hello,

I would also recommend you using the 2x SAS drive Raid 1, as this configuration will give you more speed and a better I/O.

[RRWH]

Originally Posted by cedivad

You should be able to handle the same kind of traffic with both the solutions, giving the iops as the only parameter, the only difference would be in latency, maybe a 30/40% better, using the 15k disks.
You will have 2*150 iops vs 4*70 iops, divide by 2 since that you are using raid 1/10.
Given the price difference I would go with the 4*sata option, no doubt!

This is 1/2 of the answer.

Read Performance:

a. 4*75 = 300 IOPS
b. 2*180 = 360 IOPS

Write Performance

a. 2*75 = 150 IOPS
b. 1x180 = 180 IPS

As you can see, the IOPS is prety comparable between the 2 choices. It comes down to price, so that is a no brainer!

If we look at typical requirements for Web Hosting, it is typically over 80% read.

Think of it another way, use the 4-disk RAID 10, then chuck in an SSD and use it for the Databases.

You would get amazing performance and still come out less than the $300!

[QuickWeb-Roel]

might consider 4x120G SSD if storage space is not main issue, with the prices of SATA drives at the roof and SSD going down might be the better alternative if you want performance the iops will simply blow them out of the water.

[cyberhouse]

you could always do 2 500 gig sata and 1 120 gig ssd and do zfs

[cedivad]

Originally Posted by RRWH

This is 1/2 of the answer.

Read Performance:

a. 4*75 = 300 IOPS
b. 2*180 = 360 IOPS

Write Performance

a. 2*75 = 150 IOPS
b. 1x180 = 180 IPS

As you can see, the IOPS is prety comparable between the 2 choices. It comes down to price, so that is a no brainer!

If we look at typical requirements for Web Hosting, it is typically over 80% read.

Think of it another way, use the 4-disk RAID 10, then chuck in an SSD and use it for the Databases.

You would get amazing performance and still come out less than the $300!

Standing to my experience on hardware raid controllers, they don't double the read performance on raid 1. Mdadm does it with, but only with a plugin.

[RRWH]

Originally Posted by cedivad

Standing to my experience on hardware raid controllers, they don't double the read performance on raid 1. Mdadm does it with, but only with a plugin.

True, but it is certainly more than the Write penalty. What we are doing is providing a comparison - which does vary by up to 20% (plus and minus) in the real world, but without benchmarking everything, it is all we have.

[Ramon - i3D]

You might see a slight speed increase with SAS drives. It'll be minimal and not worth the price difference though. If your indicated pricing is your full server price you can get nearly 3 servers of your config 1. Giving you a truckload of extra performance over the sas drives, would be a no brainer really.

If you are looking at spending in the area of $400 per server I would sooner invest in some good SSD drives as they'll give a bigger performance increase than the SAS drives will.

[cedivad]

I don't even see a 10% better performance on read on raid 1 the controllers I tested just read the data from the 2 disk at the same time, to make sure that it's not corrupted. That's all

[Echizen]

Originally Posted by cedivad

You should be able to handle the same kind of traffic with both the solutions, giving the iops as the only parameter, the only difference would be in latency, maybe a 30/40% better, using the 15k disks.
You will have 2*150 iops vs 4*70 iops, divide by 2 since that you are using raid 1/10.
Given the price difference I would go with the 4*sata option, no doubt!

Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

Originally Posted by S4m4N

Hello,

I would also recommend you using the 2x SAS drive Raid 1, as this configuration will give you more speed and a better I/O.

Hi, thank you for your advice,

Originally Posted by RRWH

... Think of it another way, use the 4-disk RAID 10, then chuck in an SSD and use it for the Databases.

You would get amazing performance and still come out less than the $300!

Originally Posted by QuickWeb-Roel

might consider 4x120G SSD if storage space is not main issue, with the prices of SATA drives at the roof and SSD going down might be the better alternative if you want performance the iops will simply blow them out of the water.

Originally Posted by cyberhouse

you could always do 2 500 gig sata and 1 120 gig ssd and do zfs

@RRWH, QuickWeb-Roel, cyberhouse
The problem is, it seems that my provider do not offer any SSD drives

btw, is Memcache can help me reduce the IOPS cons of SATA drive?
cuz the server that I will buy has a huge RAM (32 or 48GB)