Building a Web Server - what to buy, how much to buy?

[Superwormy]

We're looking at getting a dedicated server for a few websites we will be posting very shortly, none are up at the moment, but all 5 are e-commerce websites, driven by Linux, PHP, MySQL and Apache.

Basically we'd be looking at around 20,000 visitors per month PER WEBSITE, so maybe 100,000 or so visitors ( many more actual hits ) per month. It would be easier for us to get a dedicated server for all this, but we don't know what or how much to get. The PHP scripts are pretty efficient, and most queries are selects, right now running on a Pentium Pro 200mhz computer, pages take 0.10 seconds to build and spit out.


To clarify a few things, not sure on exact number of hits, because that depends on how many images are on website / javascript files / god knows what else that each html page is pulling up.

I think BingBongWongFooey made a good guess, maybe say AVERAGE a visitor per 20 seconds or so, BUT realize that there'll be many more visitors during the day than at night.

And RAID 5... doesn't seem like I should need a RAID 5 array to serve a page every 20 seconds... any other opionions on that?



And, to reiterate what I already said once, APACHE, LINUX, PHP, MYSQL!!!


Any suggestions on how good of a computer to get!?!

 

[mcveigh]

pornservers.com
😉

actually I dont't know. what kind of software are you going to run on it? apache? IIS? it makes a difference.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: mcveigh
pornservers.com
😉

actually I dont't know. what kind of software are you going to run on it? apache? IIS? it makes a difference.

Can't you f-ing read? I quote now from his original post:

...but all 5 are e-commerce websites, driven by Linux, PHP, MySQL and Apache...

And, I'm sorry Superwormy, but I'm not skilled in specing out servers; we'll have to wait for the forum UNIX gurus to come around and give you some recommendations. 🙂

FWIW, I think you'll be better off going with a maybe-not-quite-the-absolute-fastest CPU, and spending extra on redundant HDs and plenty of RAM. Some RAID 5 would be nice, since that provides extra speed (if used with a decent controller) and redundancy, but I don't know if your budget would allow that. Let the amount of RAM be determined by how much RAM your applications take up when they're all running at the same time, and then add a bit for some future expansion.

 

[mcveigh]

Originally posted by: jliechty

Originally posted by: mcveigh
pornservers.com
😉

actually I dont't know. what kind of software are you going to run on it? apache? IIS? it makes a difference.

Can't you f-ing read? I quote now from his original post:

...but all 5 are e-commerce websites, driven by Linux, PHP, MySQL and Apache...

.

OK mr fluffy bunny

will every server be running identical software? identical loads? will one do the transactions while another servers the pages? etc..


if your sites are getting that many hits you at least need raid 5 scsi. I don' t know how well multiple processors scale in that environment.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

right now running on a Pentium Pro 200mhz computer, pages take 0.10 seconds to build and spit out.

so you can do 10 per second, and say, 5 per second comfortably.

the 100,000 visitors per month - do you mean page views? if not, an idea of how many page views will be happening would be helpful.

so say (for now) 100,000 page views per month. that's ~3300 per day, thats one page view per 26 second, which wouldnt require that fast of a machine. i'm thinking a higher end pIII would work great, but then again, i am no sysadmin..

 

[Superwormy]

To clarify a few things, not sure on exact number of hits, because that depends on how many images are on website / javascript files / god knows what else that each html page is pulling up.

I think BingBongWongFooey made a good guess, maybe say AVERAGE a visitor per 20 seconds or so, BUT realize that there'll be many more visitors during the day than at night.

And RAID 5... doesn't seem like I should need a RAID 5 array to serve a page every 20 seconds... any other opionions on that?



And, to reiterate what I already said once, APACHE, LINUX, PHP, MYSQL!!!

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Superwormy
To clarify a few things, not sure on exact number of hits, because that depends on how many images are on website / javascript files / god knows what else that each html page is pulling up.

I think BingBongWongFooey made a good guess, maybe say AVERAGE a visitor per 20 seconds or so, BUT realize that there'll be many more visitors during the day than at night.

And RAID 5... doesn't seem like I should need a RAID 5 array to serve a page every 20 seconds... any other opionions on that?

And, to reiterate what I already said once, APACHE, LINUX, PHP, MYSQL!!!

I pulled RAID 5 out of the air without taking the time to calculate things. If you want to save costs, a simple two drive mirrored setup would probably work fine. IDE or SCSI depends on how much reliability and speed you want - go with IDE for cheaper / slightly slower, but SCSI for hotswappability (if you need perfect uptime) and speed.

If you have enough RAM, static things like some of the images in your sites will simply be cached, so realistically, unless the DB is large and / or updated frequently, SCSI is not needed for speed (though you may still want it for reliability).

 

[Sunner]

Well, I've said it many times before, but it's good, so Ill say it again 🙂

Buy a server from HPaq, IBM, or whoever you like, me I think Compaq(HPaq) makes the best x86 servers.
Unless the sites are gonna do lots of disk IO(heavially dependant on a database?), you should be fine with a couple of mirrored fast disks, say two 72 GB 15K RPM disks, that will be plenty of throughput for most sites.

How important it reliability?
Of course, being a server it's important, but what I mean is, will you lose lots of $$$ if it's down for a few hours?
Im guessing no since you're considdering building the server yourself, if so, you could go for something like Compaq's ProLiant DL360 G3, they come with 2.4 GHz P4 Xeon's, and up to 8 GB of RAM(depends on availability of 2 GB DIMM's, it's got 4 DIMM slots), can take 2 hotplugable HD's, and it's got a 32 MB RAID controller, as well as GigE.
Should be fine for what you want, get 2 GB of RAM for it, should give you headroom, unless you think you need more.