Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Colocation and Data Centers : Any 1U Chassis capable of supporting this rih

[AndyJH]

So basically I want to build my custom server for it's datacentre colocation/ I'm limited to a 1U Chassis Design. I've mainly been considering Supermicro because I've heard Dells have a beastly AMP draw.

Anyway, I need a M/B & Chassis for this config if possible

- 2 x Quad Core LGA 771 (Harper / Clovertown most likely because of their TDP)
- 32GB or more 667MHZ RAM
- 2 x PSU (hot swap ideally)
- 3 Ideally 4 HDD bays
- Slimline DVD/CD Support

If it's not possible, whats the best config available to support a 1U Quad Core with as much RAM as poss with 4-5 HDD Bays (1 inside chassis) 3 for RAID5 with 1 for spare hot swap.

Something I've been curious on, with regards to PSUs. If you fit a 600-700w PSU will the system actually use the full amount, or only on full tilts ?

The datacentre has 0.5A for 1U and with a PSU calc at everything 100% it said recommended 650w PSU. I don't know if supermicro do them, could I fit a 1000w 80+ but would datacentre not support it because if it's maximum power draw?

[AndyJH]

To make it a bit more flexible I have seen chassis which support hot swap up to 8 x SAS setup using 2.5" 15k drives

I've thought about using the seagate savious (146gb) so this would give a lot more storage and flexibility with some drive redundancy as it would allow a RAID5 possibly RAID setup with 1 hot spare and 1 drive for backups....

I'm just doing a lot of research atm so not sure on budget

[Matt R]

Always remember -- amps is watts divided by voltage.

However, you'd need to contact the manufacturer of the PSU to see what it's true current draw at 120V would be assuming full load.

It's not too common to see dual redundant PSU's on 1U servers, although it's not unheard of. It will probably jack up the cost quite a bit as they need to be built much smaller.

If you need that kind of power and redundancy, you might want to go 2U as it may cost less overall. Plus, you can then comfortably fit 8 3.5" HDD's.

2.5" HDD's are good for saving power, but their life expectancy is no where near as high as a 3.5" Drive. But, that might be why you have RAID.

[AndyJH]

Originally Posted by ClubUptime

Always remember -- amps is watts divided by voltage. However, you'd need to contact the manufacturer of the PSU to see what it's true current draw at 120V would be assuming full load.

Hi Clubbed, I'm in UK so our power here is ~230v so we get a bump up in power availbility (still sucks though)

Originally Posted by ClubUptime

It's not too common to see dual redundant PSU's on 1U servers, although it's not unheard of. It will probably jack up the cost quite a bit as they need to be built much smaller.

This isn't an essential, it's mainly a preferance. I was going to have redundant PSUs on a seperate A+B power feed in the datacentre. Just so in the eventuality the datacentre breaker trips or a PSU fails. There is one seperate. I'll probably scrap this idea as they're EXTREMELY hard to find in the design I want and it would probably cost a bomb anyway. It's just I want to offer some good levels of redundancies to potential clients

Originally Posted by ClubUptime

If you need that kind of power and redundancy, you might want to go 2U as it may cost less overall. Plus, you can then comfortably fit 8 3.5" HDD's.

Definately worth considering for overall costs. Ideally the setup I'd like to have is RAID5 minimum, so I've got some decent level of redundancy. The disks I want to use will be 15k RPM. The original setup I was going to have was 2 x RAID 1 15K 3.5" Cheetahs with 1 hot swap spare and a 1 or 2 TB 3.5" 7.2k just for local backups then every now and then copy the data off onto an external drive for backups (yes I'm cheap, but you do what you can to save money when starting up)

Originally Posted by ClubUptime

2.5" HDD's are good for saving power, but their life expectancy is no where near as high as a 3.5" Drive. But, that might be why you have RAID.

Yeah power is going to be a bitch, I know it's the RAM / CPU what will hog the most. I thought more RAM / CPU power would be better overall as there would be more breathing room.

What would you say is better 2 CPU - 8GB RAM or 1 CPU 16GB RAM?

As I'll be starting up I'll want to save money but give a good offer for services / equipment to my clients.

These factors below are a definate regardless of the size or spec. I definately won't be changing this

- At least 1 x Quad Core Xeon CPU
- 8GB + RAM
- 15K RPM Disks (preferably cheetahs in 3.5" or savios in 2.5") in RAID1 or 5
- A 7.2k SATA for local server backups

(I plan on doing backups for my clients) incrementally and SQL databases. This wouldn't be hard if migrating data off site as I could have Terrabytes in offsite storage.

[linuxissues]

What would you say is better 2 CPU - 8GB RAM or 1 CPU 16GB RAM?

Cpu takes more power, but if the RAM is ECC Fully buffered, it takes more power as well.

[AndyJH]

Originally Posted by linuxissues

What would you say is better 2 CPU - 8GB RAM or 1 CPU 16GB RAM?

Cpu takes more power, but if the RAM is ECC Fully buffered, it takes more power as well.

Bugger, horrible trade off either way

The RAM will be fully buffered. I know that for a fact, all the boards I've seen use FB-DIMMs for the extra reliability but I did read that FB-DIMMS are power hoggs

I'm confused however, I saw another statement (think by crucial or kingston) that FB-DIMMs regardless of size, always use Maximum of 10w per module each (this was only a specific manufacturer however) and not in general

I'm working on the basis of decent RAM / CPU for headroom, decent disks for performance and reliability and maximum amount of high speed fans to lower the power consumption.... I hope

The maths confuses me so I assumed 0.5A is 500w of power. So I was working on this principal for example

2 x Quad Xeon Harpertown 3.2ghz (I think they're 65w TDP each) - 130w
8 x 2GB FB-DIMM - 80w
4 x HDDs 3.5" (3 x 15k, 1 x 7.2k) - 40w
Motherboard - 50w
High speed fans ?? ~ 50w draw?
Slimline DVD - 20w

Total Require - 370w?

I don't think this is right but I have nothing to base it off. I'm trying to get active in the forums more, I couldn't find any decent forums on the web for proper server talk and colocation is the only section I could find so I'd appreciate any help or advice offered. I am stubborn as a donkey however so you may need to repeat stuff a few times

[funkywizard]

Any reason you're looking at LGA 771 instead of the series 5500 xeons? The 5500 is a lot faster, not really more expensive, and uses cheaper / faster / less power hungry ddr3 ram. It's really a no brainer. If you're looking for dual socket, the 5520 is the cheapest 55xx that supports hyperthreading, which gives you a 30% performance boost over the lower clocked ones which don't have hyperthreading. Especially if you're considering 3.2ghz harpertowns, those are really really expensive, but still not appreciably faster than the 2.26ghz 5520 cpus. Save yourself $1500 and get the 5520. If you're really looking to blow what it takes to get 3.2ghz harpertowns, you can get the top of the line 55xx and it will blow away the harpertowns.

As to power supplies, you typically want to get a PSU that is rated for roughly double the power you intend to draw from the system, as PSU's tend to have their highest efficiency at 50% load. Having a 700w psu does not mean you'll be drawing 700w, it depends what hardware you're using.

My UPS tells me how much power my systems are drawing. In the bios (at idle), a xeon 3460 w/8gb ram and 1 hard drive using a supermicro high efficiency psu, runs about 50-60 watts. A similar x3460 but with 22 hard drives in a 4u case with plenty of fans and an 80+ gold rated PSU, runs around 250 watts in the bios (at idle). The cpu is supposed to add another 40-60w when running full tilt compared to idle, from what I've read, but I haven't tested my systems power use under load yet.

High speed fans and motherboard you seem to be overestimating their power draw. I would cut those estimates in half. Similarly, I don't see why the slimline dvd would be using 20w either at idle or during use. Those slimlines were originally designed for laptops. Heck, I have an external that connects with 2 usb plugs, which implies a max draw of 1a @ 5v (5 watts). If I'm not burning a disc it tends to work fine with only one usb plug connected, max of 2.5 watts. And if you're not using the drive, it really shouldn't use much of anything, with no motors spinning or lasers, uh, lasering.

3.5" 15k hard drives pull a bit more than 7k drives. I would budget 10-15w each on those, power wise. The 2.5" is probably half that, but I would have to test to be certain.

[AndyJH]

Originally Posted by funkywizard

.

Hi Funky,

I'm not familar but I'm guessing DDR3 ram they are newer more efficient models. Are they the Nehalem based ones or something different entirely. I can't particularly say I'm overly keen with "hyperthreading" CPUs. I prefer physical cores of speed-boosting technology, I'll have to do some research as if it's better overall regardless of cores I could look into these. I saw Dual-Cores with Higher Clock speeds, but assumed quads would be better for webhosting due to lots of multitakings

Do you have any reviews over these models that you have found, only place I know possibly Tomshardware

Thought as much regarding the PSU, it's basically maximum theoritcal wattage and your components determine the draw. I'm going to try and find a good 80+ PSU as it would work out better on power consumption and thus lower draw.

I dont' actually know the powe draw figures of any the equipment, I'm just using a power calculator for overclocks and entering the figures so some of them were already posted. Slimlines definately are low power, but the earlier post mentioned they're not as reliable. I'm definately a fan of seagate cheetahs and anything seagate based as they've always proved to be reliable in my eyes.

Even though I don't have a budget I'm still trying to give a decent build on server. I'm going to try and work to £4000 I think, so I think I'll stick to a RAID1 configuration with 1 spare hot swap which leaves a 4th bay for a 7.2k drive for backups.

Anything which saves power but gives good performance is always worth considering. My main focus is reliability, low power and performance. So multicores , raid and good technology most likely

I'll do some further research, this is partly why I'm not starting up any business yet, still got a lot to learn

EDIT - when I first looked I didn't consider because some of the TDP values looked high. I forgot newer technology was more energy efficient too

EDIT2 - wow, TYVM the suggestion. I've just seen the prices of the technology you could build a huge performance server with that. How come the W5590 CPU doesn't use QPI, is it better or worse. Has less cache ?

[aeris]

Uhm. 0.5 amp @ 230V is 115 watts.

[cwl@apaqdigital]

socket 771 (Xeon E54xx series) is really a thing in the past. going forward, you must opt for socket 1366 platforms.

these 2 supermicro superserver barebones should fit your need great:
http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...6016T-NTRF.cfm (4x 3.5" hot-swap SAS/SATA bays)
http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...-1026T-URF.cfm (8x 2.5" hot-swap SAS/SATA bays)

both models come with dual 650watt redundant PSU. "650w" doesn't mean server will draw 650watt power constantly! it simply means it's capable of supplying 650watt power maximally. each PSU supplies 50% of power that server actually demands. if one failed, the remaining one will kick itself up almost instantly to carry the 100% load.

at cold power on, this 2U server peeks at 3.0amp/120v (360-watt), actual reading from Kill-A-Watt:
dual Xeon E5520
24-Gig (6x 4G) ECC reg DDR3
supermicro X8DTI-F
8x Seagate 300G 15K SAS
Adaptec 5805
3x 8cm "SanAce 80" chassis fans
single 700watt PSU

[hhw]

Originally Posted by AndyJH

I'm not familar but I'm guessing DDR3 ram they are newer more efficient models. Are they the Nehalem based ones or something different entirely.

Nehalems will only accept DDR3, but DDR3 is an independent technology and can even be used with some Core 2 Duo CPU's (i.e. I have an old socket 775 Gigabyte motherboard that can take either DDR2 or DDR3).

Originally Posted by AndyJH

I can't particularly say I'm overly keen with "hyperthreading" CPUs. I prefer physical cores of speed-boosting technology, I'll have to do some research as if it's better overall regardless of cores I could look into these. I saw Dual-Cores with Higher Clock speeds, but assumed quads would be better for webhosting due to lots of multitakings

You're not trading one for the other going from 54xx to 55xx Xeon's. The 5520's are still quad cores, but also have hyperthreading in addition.

Originally Posted by AndyJH

Even though I don't have a budget I'm still trying to give a decent build on server. I'm going to try and work to £4000 I think, so I think I'll stick to a RAID1 configuration with 1 spare hot swap which leaves a 4th bay for a 7.2k drive for backups.

Your budget is pretty high, so you shouldn't have any trouble building a powerful server.

I would recommend using all 4 drive bays for RAID 10, and backing up to a remote/separate location. You should be backing up remotely either way. Otherwise, if your server goes kaput, your backups won't be remotely accessible. RAID 10 will give you significantly better performance, and unless your load is very much CPU oriented, you'd find that disk I/O is often the bottleneck on a server. It would be a waste to buy 2x powerful CPU's only to be restricted by your hard disks.

With your budget, I would definitely opt for a 8x 2.5" configuration so that you have more scalability. In fact, you could have a 6x disk RAID10, and still have the spare + backup drive if you were so inclined. You'd also have options to use SSD drives for caching to boost I/O.

With your power constraints so tight, you may also want to consider using L5520's (the lower power version).

Don't even bother with FB-DIMM's, as there is no way you'd be able to meet your power limitations with them. If by chance you'd still want socket 771, you can use a board with the 5100 chipset that will support regular ECC DDR2 which will save you quite a bit of power. However, as everyone else has mentioned, socket 1366 is definitely the way to go.

[AndyJH]

Originally Posted by aeris

Uhm. 0.5 amp @ 230V is 115 watts.

I know it was low, but I know servers don't read that high under load depending on technology too. I could easily buy a server like an Atom but screw that, it would be **** for a webserver imo which is why I wanted to look at dual cores.

Originally Posted by cwl@apaqdigital

socket 771 (Xeon E54xx series) is really a thing in the past. going forward, you must opt for socket 1366 platforms.

these 2 supermicro superserver barebones should fit your need great:
http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...6016T-NTRF.cfm (4x 3.5" hot-swap SAS/SATA bays)
http://www.supermicro.com/products/s...-1026T-URF.cfm (8x 2.5" hot-swap SAS/SATA bays)

both models come with dual 650watt redundant PSU. "650w" doesn't mean server will draw 650watt power constantly! it simply means it's capable of supplying 650watt power maximally. each PSU supplies 50% of power that server actually demands. if one failed, the remaining one will kick itself up almost instantly to carry the 100% load.

at cold power on, this 2U server peeks at 3.0amp/120v (360-watt), actual reading from Kill-A-Watt:
dual Xeon E5520
24-Gig (6x 4G) ECC reg DDR3
supermicro X8DTI-F
8x Seagate 300G 15K SAS
Adaptec 5805
3x 8cm "SanAce 80" chassis fans
single 700watt PSU

Thanks, that helps a lot. That equates to around 240-w draw with kill-a-watt on 230v doesn't it ?
Whats the average consumption. I'm definately liking the look of the Nehalem based CPUs, they look like real crunchers but they're pricey.

Any processor(s) which can give a comparable performance to 2 x 771 3.2ghz harpertowns is worth a look imo. No O/C and I definately wouldn't consider AMD, I know they're more efficient, but I've never liked them for some reason. I've heard bad stories about them catching fire

I'd definately consider a DDR3 option, I've seen 8GB for around £300, you'd be lucky to get a 4GB kit here in DDR2 format and DDR3 has the better BUS speed.

[AndyJH]

See my replies below

Originally Posted by hhw

You're not trading one for the other going from 54xx to 55xx Xeon's. The 5520's are still quad cores, but also have hyperthreading in addition.

Definately a plus, always better for good performance

Your budget is pretty high, so you shouldn't have any trouble building a powerful server.

Thanks, I plan on saving up so would prefer getting the best setup for startup of my hosting that I can afford

With your budget, I would definitely opt for a 8x 2.5" configuration so that you have more scalability. In fact, you could have a 6x disk RAID10, and still have the spare + backup drive if you were so inclined. You'd also have options to use SSD drives for caching to boost I/O.

I like this suggestion, I thought about RAID10 but don't know the specifics on how much storage space I'd get.
Does it work out at space of 6 disks -2 for the dual redundancy ? If I went the route of RAID10 I'd prefer having a 1 spare hot swap and the local backup. Please note, I would still be doing a remote offsite backup as such. It's just the reason I want to have the local drive is for faster restores as it's directly on a local disk so should mean faster restore, plus there's always 1 onsite backup and 1 offsite backup permanently

With your power constraints so tight, you may also want to consider using L5520's (the lower power version).

Is it only the Nehalems what support the hyperthreading and quad cores, or do the low power versions too ?

[AndyJH]

How about this for a config. Low power and decent performance... I think

Dual L5530 CPU - Do these have HT technology too ?
16GB or more DDR3 RAM (ECC ofc)
6 x 2.5" 146gb savios, 1 spare hot swap and 1 500gb 7.2k for local backups ?

Power consumption would be around 100+ TDP lower over the other specification with more performance. Id' be prepared to overspend on a build like this because it's better in the long run, and by the time I get round to building it parts will be cheaper

[funkywizard]

Originally Posted by AndyJH

Hi Funky,

I'm not familar but I'm guessing DDR3 ram they are newer more efficient models. Are they the Nehalem based ones or something different entirely.

The DDR3 ram is faster, but also, the 55xx platform does not require fully buffered dimms as they have a shared buffering chip on the motherboard, so you need fewer buffering chips. The buffering chips use a lot of power, so having fewer of them saves energy.

Yes, the 55xx is nehalem.

I can't particularly say I'm overly keen with "hyperthreading" CPUs. I prefer physical cores of speed-boosting technology, I'll have to do some research as if it's better overall regardless of cores I could look into these. I saw Dual-Cores with Higher Clock speeds, but assumed quads would be better for webhosting due to lots of multitakings

I would prefer real cores to hyperthreaded ones as well, but in a multi tasking environment, hyperthreading gives around a 30% speed boost. Considering the number of transistors they have to add to the cpu to get these is a lot less than 30%, I'll take that nearly free speed boost, thanks

Also, the nehalem core is a lot faster than the harpertown, even without hyperthreading, HT is just the icing on the cake.

Do you have any reviews over these models that you have found, only place I know possibly Tomshardware

I would check out anandtech. They've done some hard core tests on the 55xx versus the 54xx, and the 55xx just blows it away.

Thought as much regarding the PSU, it's basically maximum theoritcal wattage and your components determine the draw. I'm going to try and find a good 80+ PSU as it would work out better on power consumption and thus lower draw.

Yupp Check out 80plus.org, they have a list of all the 80+ certified psus, as well as their ratings (80+, 80+ bronze, silver, gold), as well as showing a chart of their efficiency at each % of load level. You should be able to find an 80+ silver psu in a 1u case for what you're trying to do.

I dont' actually know the powe draw figures of any the equipment, I'm just using a power calculator for overclocks and entering the figures so some of them were already posted. Slimlines definately are low power, but the earlier post mentioned they're not as reliable. I'm definately a fan of seagate cheetahs and anything seagate based as they've always proved to be reliable in my eyes.

Slimline CDRoms should be just as reliable.... or just don't install one at all, you only need it for initial OS install, or even then, you don't need it as you can mount an iso as a virtual cdrom using IPMI if you get an IPMI capable supermicro motherboard.

I have no experience with failure rates on 2.5" SAS drives, so I really can't comment there. I would assume that they're as reliable, since they use less power / heat, and heat tends to screw with drives, but again, no direct experience. The Seagate Cheetas may be reliable (their high end), but their desktop hard drives have been nothing but trouble for me. If you're looking at SATA, definitely go with western digital. The only product of theirs to ever give me unusual amounts of trouble has been their raptor line, everything else has been solid.

Even though I don't have a budget I'm still trying to give a decent build on server. I'm going to try and work to £4000 I think, so I think I'll stick to a RAID1 configuration with 1 spare hot swap which leaves a 4th bay for a 7.2k drive for backups.

You can definitely build a hell of a server for £4000. With only a raid 1, you're likely to run out of i/o speed well before cpu or ram, given the specs you're looking at. How much hard disk space do you need? The disk subsystem is a tricky part to get right, and can easily create a bottleneck on either speed or space if you're not careful. Depending on what is hosted, you may find that SATA, SAS, or even SSD are appropriate, but it's hard to tell just from what's been said so far.

If you go with dual E5520, those cpus are about $350 apiece, motherboard $400 or so, the 1u case I'm using from supermicro is around $350 and has 80+ and 4 hot swap bays, and should fit the dual socket. Ram for this machine is around $100 per 4gb, so at 32gb that's around $800. So far up to around $2300 before tax and shipping. Heck, you could put 4x intel 160gb SSD in there and still be under your budget if you do things that way, which would give you something like 20x the performance of a 2 disk raid 1 SAS @ 15k rpm. Or you could go well under your budget and do something else with the disk system.

EDIT2 - wow, TYVM the suggestion. I've just seen the prices of the technology you could build a huge performance server with that. How come the W5590 CPU doesn't use QPI, is it better or worse. Has less cache ?[/B]

You're welcome

If you want a complete comparison of all the xeons features etc, wikipedia has a great run down on all the features of all the lines, cache amounts, etc.