HP/Dell HD's versus WD/Seagate in Dell/HP server

[poke44]

I am starting a company up and need a server with a large amount of storage( will have 2 duplicate servers as 24/7 uptime)... hopefully a whole lot. Tomcat/Postgresql/Data storage based.

Problem is that when i ask Dell or CDW they tell me i cant use the 3rd part HD's with their servers as they use a proprietary interface or it will void the warranty. I just really think its kinda stupid to pay 4-5 times as much for a HP or Dell HD.

So is there any truth to their statements or are they blowing smoke... I was going to use 2 hp/dell small hard drives for the database and OS in raid 1 since they always come with one in the dell/cdw deals anyhow and then add my own large enterprise WD/seagate in a raid 5 or 10 setup, adding in a controller card from highpoint/3ware/adaptec for hardware raid if needed...again alot depends on if the HD's will fit in hotswap slots or not and if i need to get an external HD raid array.

Any help appreciated

 

[tomt4535]

Dell and HP buy hard drives from Seagate, WD, fujitsu, whoever is giving them a good price at the time. They then rebrand them, load custom firmware etc to ensure compatibility with all their equipment. A 3rd party hard drive would probably work in your servers, there isnt much difference between any old drive you get from CDW and the HP branded ones. Dont expect them to support your server when there are issues though. As for fitting in the hot swap bays, look on ebay for them, theres probably a ton for your server. What model servers are you talking about here?

 

[poke44]

from cdw was looking at getting 2 of these as they seem like a really good deal
http://www.cdw.com/shop/produc...fault.aspx?EDC=1723398

Dell updated their lines so dont know what the new one is called...

So basically they make you buy their overpriced hardrives to stay in compliance with the warranty. So would an external HD array with a controller mess with their warranty? It probably does as they sell those options now...

Also looked at getting a SAN for it, but wasnt sure i could pull it off reliably for a front line system.... DAS i have done for a pc.

thanks for the input, may just be stuck

Not sure if i mentioned to it but will be having daily tape backup and weekly images. stored in safty deposit box...

 

[specialk90]

First off, Legally speaking, they cannot Void your warranty just because you added hardware to the computer. They must PROVE that the hardware you added caused a problem. Its just like when they put that stupid F'ing sticker on PC cases saying if you open the case, your warranty is voided. Sorry, but this crap companies pull really pisses me off. I used to be into drag racing and modding regular cars. People who modify regular cars have to deal with this warranty crap all the time. When I had a Subaru WRX, which used a transmission designed for their 130HP cars but put it into the 230HP WRX. Subaru fought with WRX owners who had their transmission break, including mine which had the 5th gear go out. I quickly learned about the US laws regarding a warranty and being able to void them.

With HP & Dell, they can chose not to provide telephone support but they cannot refuse warranty support. They might say this now, before the sale, but if they did this after the sale, they would lose their business customers; so, I wouldn't worry. HP & Dell are in a fierce battle for business customers; so, they tend to bend for their customers after the sale in order to keep them.

For the HP Proliant you selected, I would not get that one because the CPU "5504" does not have Hyper-Threading. You need the 5520 for H-T support, and starting at 5520, Intel has added a "Turbo" feature for a single core as well as all 4 cores during heavy use. With the 1366(Nehalem) Xeon's, the faster the chip, the more Turbo it has. If you only need 4 cores, what about the desktop version i7, which also has Hyper-Threading.

For Dell or HP business class PCs, look for coupons to buy directly from them. I had received coupons left and right after buying a Dell for a former boss.

For Raid and redundancy: do you know how to clone data between 2 servers-is this included in the software you will be using? There are Raid controllers capable of doing this, FYI. Now that I think of this, FC or Fiber-Channel Raid controllers might be in your future in addition to a SAN.

So, how do you plan on 2 servers with the same data being able to switch automatically if one goes down?

To be honest, if you must have 24/7 availability and also backing up data, you might just need to spend the money with Dell or HP and have them configure the servers for the 24/7 auto switching in case of failure and also having one of the servers used to do the backup so the other server is not affected/slowed down. Both Dell/HP value their business customers more and they should be willing to bend on the price, especially during these hard economic times. You just need to buy and talk to them directly. I should mention that CDW is a HUGE ripoff. I can't believe their prices. FYI, Dell's prices for individual drives aren't that bad if buying separately.

 

[specialk90]

Look into 64kb partition offset for optimal Raid 5 performance. Here is a great article.

http://kendalvandyke.blogspot....-on-part-3-raid-5.html

 

[poke44]

Yeah i knew about the hyperthreading and have considered getting a frontline and a backline server....

the 24/7 service is more of a goal rather than being an actual fact, I dont know how to have them auto switch over...but can do it remotly... still working on it really. I had an IT partner who flaked on me, Thats where the SAN idea came from, but i have never messed with iscsi and while understanding the concept dont feel that it would be a good move, perhaps at a later date after a few classes and books. I have continued on with the project and I have arranged for support from someone else but he isnt cheap and probably need to look for someone else.

The price on that HP i linked seemed like a really good deal, i am not sure i could buy all the parts and get much below that price for a new 5500 series, even buying the parts from newegg.

As far as spending the cash to do it right, well my other partner is the marketing guru that could sell the bad of turds to someone and they thought they cheated him, my brother. He is kinda of the mindset that servers and backend should not be that much and this or that will get us by till later down the road, where I am more of lets do it right to start so we dont have problems or have the infrastructure in place to build upon.

Right now i have the system set up and running on a gaming rig i built with a Kuma and 6 gig of ram on a gigabyte motherboard running 2 500 seagates in raid 1 with a trial 2008 standard windows.... I also going to run windows 2008 as I just know windows a whole lot better than any linux, though open SUSE was alot easier than other to get going just took way to much time for me to trouble shoot problems.

So in ending, they are just gonna screw me over or try to... but there should not be a problem adding a controller card and an external hd array... with WD/Seagate hd's

Now if only those guys would answer back on which raid card would work best.

edit:
Looking at the raid controller for the server it seems it has a good raid control card
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/prod...rtarrayp410/index.html

 

[specialk90]

I can't find any testing or reviews on the P410 or what processor it uses. However, on the Performance page, it states that you would need to upgrade to the 512MB w/ BBWC in order to do online capacity expansion and online migration to another Raid level. If you can't do these functions with the regular P410, that is some crap HP is pulling. This means if you wanted to add a drive to the Raid array, you would need to take the entire array offline to do it, which means no access to the data. This is something any decent Raid controller can do. For the price of the Proliant at CDW, it is a steal. The P410 sells for over $400 by itself. Just don't add anything from CDW. Get it all from Newegg if you can. Adding Ram, fans, drives, hot-swap cages and setting up Raid arrays is rather simple. Definitely something you won't need to pay someone else to do. Just follow the guidelines in the article I posted for the various settings when setting up the Raid arrays.

Try to find what XOR processor that P410 uses as this will help determine how capable it is running Raid 5(or 50).

Take a look at this. On sale for $390; has the Intel IOP348 1.2GHz, 8 ports SAS/SATA, PCI-Express x8
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16816115056

Do you know what the % of Reads & Writes are for your type of database? The site I linked to in my prior comment has some great info on Raid 10 vs Raid 5 and how to get the most performance from a database. Basically, he said that Raid 10 is better if writes consist of 20% or more of all transactions.

DON'T forget a powerful UPS.

 

[poke44]

The data files should be pretty set and it will be mostly read once things get going. I am not so concerned at this time with overall performance as just working will be good enough for time being and if i throw enough ram and CPU power at the app it should power through some of the slower spots... My bottleneck more than likely will be my upload speed anyhow as I am just going with a business class cable modem.... at the moment its working a business DSL... I asked the DSL person how many phone lines the could set me up with in the office and she said like some huge number and i said i would like to have that many DSL's she didnt think that was funny though... was going to get a load balancer router from cisco, figured it was alot cheaper than a T1 or cable fibre.

I saw that at newegg today as well. Hence alot of my consternation about server pricing and HD's

Thanks for time and comments.... and that website you linked has very useful info

 

[RebateMonger]

I've dealt a lot with Dell. Not that their servers give a lot of trouble, but I call them if my client's server is still under warranty and the failed item is something that Dell provided.

Dell doesn't care where you got your hard drives from. I've never had them ask. If you need a replacement hard drive, they'll ask if you got the broken hard drive from Dell.