NEED EXPERTS - DIY Lifetime PC; 10 years unattended

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dseeley

Junior Member
Oct 23, 2002
17
0
0
Hello Anandtech experts, here's an interesting problem for you:

We are creating a large-scale interactive art work with a projected 10 year lifespan. The master controller runs on a windows pc. I want to install it and walk away forever and hope that technology and redundancy can help with this. I will be able to remotely login and I can have local staff reboot the machine, but nothing more. The requirements for this box are:

Must be fast
Must be rackmounted
1 GB memory
1 free PCI slot
doesn't need accelerated graphics
disk(s) can be slow, everything is loaded in memory
software is only 200 MB total + OS

Things I know already:

The box will have a UPS
The room/rack is cooled.

The tough parts:

Can one create a system with redundant memory?
How often to drives fail?
How many drives should a RAID 5 array have so that 2 can fail.
Can a mirrored RAID system have more than 1 mirror (eg: 4 drives with the same data)?
Can I create a persistent RAM disk?

Any other suggestions? Any help is much appreciated!

More about the artwork here: It's called "EnterActive"

Damon Seeley
 
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dseeley

Junior Member
Oct 23, 2002
17
0
0
That doesn't matter... in fact one of the tough parts is that I can't replace this box with the latest-greatest in 2010 - it's unpredictable how the artwork would run at the time.. I am going to leave a shrinkwrapped duplicate of this box in case of emergencies.
 
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DaveSimmons

Elite Member
Aug 12, 2001
40,730
670
126
Odds of any OS still running properly after 10 years are extremely close to zero. Odds of a Windows OS running that long are negative infinity. You need to plan for a way to reboot the PC.


Get rid of every fan that you can. Fans die screaming and then the part they're protecting dies too.

One of those special Thermaltake? fanless cases with fanless power supply, fanless CPU cooler, fanless video card. Cost will be over $1K for just the case if I recall correctly, but fanless is your only hope of it lasting 10 years. See www.SilentPCReview.com

That violates "must be rackmounted," but that's life. Redesign your installation.

If you didn't also say "Must be fast" you could use a dog-slow via cyrix or transmeta CPU. You might be able to run a Pentium M fanless in a case other than the ?Thermaltake with a fanless PSU from them or Antec, but I doubt it will fit in a 1u-2u rack case. maybe in a 4u case, I think that's full ATX size (but with that much room you could use the Thermaltake).


For drives, RAID 5 normally only keeps running after 1 drive failue not 2, so you might as well just use 2 drives in RAID 1. With some flavors of embedded linux you might be able to run with flash memory drives so there are no moving parts. Otherwise SCSI drives are your best chance.


For memory, ECC RAM will make the box a little more reliable if you keep it runnng for months at a time without rebooting.


Frankly you really should think about a locked maintenance panel with access to the PC for repairs. But running fanless and if possible solid-state will give you some hope of a PC lasting that long.
 
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dseeley

Junior Member
Oct 23, 2002
17
0
0
Thanks Dave! I will be able to VNC to the box and reboot it, with the onsite security guard as the backup. He'll be able to push a big red button and that's about it.

Unfortunately I think I need P4 or Athlon speed levels but it's possible that I could do without the rack. Wonder if I could create an external CPU blower and give it redundant fans. Hmm......
 
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Zepper

Elite Member
May 1, 2001
18,998
0
0
Yes, I was going to say it might have to be 100% solid state and fanless to have a chance of going 10yrs w/o repairs. Also UPS batteries wear out and need replacing at best every 5 years and 3 yrs. is better. It will take considerable thought and knowledge to come up with something for that.
. Perhaps it would be better to have a series of volunteers to maintain it say in 6 month stints and each is to recruit his own successor. Or there might be a computer club or such that would take it on as a project.
.bh.

:moon:
 
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heartsurgeon

Diamond Member
Aug 18, 2001
4,260
0
0
get a service contract with a large stable corporation that will sign a ten year contract...

you can't build a machine with any moving parts that will be stable for ten years...

fans will die, UPS batteries will die..hard drives will die

lightening hits may fry your machine, or may fry the powergrid the building runs off....

water may leak into the area your machine is housed (this is a real threat)

earthquake damage

random component failure

rodents

DUST in your cpu, powersupply or northbridge fan (fanless was a great suggestion by the way)

voltage surge over your network connection.

fire

if you could build a completely fanless box with excellent heat dissipation (don't forget someone could plug up you computer room and cause the machine to overheat.), and no hard drives...you might get it to work.

get a service contract

 
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dseeley

Junior Member
Oct 23, 2002
17
0
0
Thanks for the excellent replies. I wonder if I could create a persistent ram disk that would allow the machine to startup, load the os and software and then spin down the drives for long, long periods. That setup in a fanless machine with dual PSUs could go a while I bet.
 
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Gerbil333

Diamond Member
Jan 28, 2002
3,072
0
76
Even without moving parts, silicon transistors wear out after 10 years, and with today's hot chips, I doubt they'll even last that long. I'd go with this:

get a service contract with a large stable corporation that will sign a ten year contract...

you can't build a machine with any moving parts that will be stable for ten years...
Click to expand...
 
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MadMan2k

Member
Sep 30, 2004
92
0
0
You could probably run a p4 (maybe a 2.4c.. those are supposed to run really cool), with one of the big Zalman heatsinks without a fan, and it'd stay fairly cool at stock speeds.

You can set an option to power down the hard drives after x amount of time, but I don't know about enhancing the life of the drives with that method.

I'm pretty sure there are IDE CF/microdrive adapters... if so, you can run the whole system on a CF I/II card. I think they have 8gb CF type II's .

It wouldn't be unheard of for a high quality fan to last maybe 6-7 years, but that's kind of pushing it.


EDIT:
Here's an IDE-CF adapter:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISA...em=5155076681&rd=1

And here's a card you might use with it:
http://www.newegg.com/app/View...=20-160-033&depa=1

2GB *might* be enough... I don't know. The 8gb model is $1,200 :/
 
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sfgtwsac

Member
Nov 30, 2004
46
0
0
One thing I don't understand. You said you would provide a shrink wrapped replacement just in case. If so, why are you trying so hard for the 10 year life. Just hook up the other box (possibly in a different part of the building). When the first one goes bad (which isn't a given--there are plenty of 5+ year old computer out there), power on the second one. With two machines you should easily make it to ten years.
 
J

jose

Platinum Member
Oct 11, 1999
2,079
2
81
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
get a service contract with a large stable corporation that will sign a ten year contract...

you can't build a machine with any moving parts that will be stable for ten years...

fans will die, UPS batteries will die..hard drives will die

lightening hits may fry your machine, or may fry the powergrid the building runs off....

water may leak into the area your machine is housed (this is a real threat)

earthquake damage

random component failure

rodents

DUST in your cpu, powersupply or northbridge fan (fanless was a great suggestion by the way)

voltage surge over your network connection.

fire

if you could build a completely fanless box with excellent heat dissipation (don't forget someone could plug up you computer room and cause the machine to overheat.), and no hard drives...you might get it to work.

get a service contract

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It won't last ten years...., just get a service contract..

Regards,
Jose
 
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dseeley

Junior Member
Oct 23, 2002
17
0
0
Thank you for the excellent responses. I am now looking at a Dell 2U rackmount server with redundant PSUs and a RAID 1 array, with a live hot spare. I think that esoteric hardware like CF arrays might present more headache than is necessary, having read about the relatively long reliability of RAID 1 +hot spare solutions.

The shrinkwrapped box is really an emergency option, one that will require swapping a custom controller card into the new machine so it's not as simple as "turn it on." Good point, however.
 
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