 Putting the new server together |
thechronic 
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I've been checking out a lot of info about putting a server together the past week, and done a lot of calculations.
It would be cheaper in the long run to build my own server and have it colocated. I have done some research and came up with a configuration for a cheap but good and stable server. Mind, I mean "cheap" as in "cheap for a rack mounted webserver", unfortunately the cases and motherboards etc are rather expensive compared to normal desktop PC's.
I was thinking about the following minimum system:
Tyan Transport GT20 B2865 (link)
AMD Opteron 144 (1,8GHz, 1Mb cache) (link)
Kingston 512MB PC3200 ECC DDR-RAM
2x Western Digital Caviar RE WD2500SD, 250GB HD (link)
It would cost just over 1000€. It only has a small amount of RAM and a slow processor, but judging the responsiveness of the current PIII server, it will be more than sufficient 
Additional cost is the control panel, which is $450 (375€) for a one year license and colocation hosting which is between 600 - 1200€ a year depending on the bandwidth and connection quality.
Current average yearly income from the google ads is 413€ (calculated on the income of January 2006, which has been the top month so far
)
So the cost would be:
1st year: 1020€ (server) + 375€ Cpanel + 959€ hosting - 413€ google ads = 1941€
2nd year: 375 + 959 - 413 = 921€
3rd year: 375 + 959 - 413 = 921€
That gives a total cost of 3783 € coming out of my pockets, about 100€ a month over a period of three years.
The cost for renting a server including hosting and control panel is 150€ a month. That is 1800€ a year - 413€ google ads = 1387€ / year. Over a period of 3 years this is 4161€.
So basically switching to a new server would save me 378€ over a period of three years, and I have the benefit of owning the server so I make it a mean dual core system with 4GB ram and 4 drive RAID if I like to 
And the biggest bonus is that the monthly payments drop from 150€ to 111€, which means a hell of a lot to my financial wellbeing 
The only problem is that I don't have the cash 
It's a whole different case to pay up 150€ a month or pay 1500€ at once...
Edit by thechronic: this offtopic thread has been split off from the following thread:
can't connect to the forum
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03-02-2006 19:19 |
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Surya
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Can't you do without the expensive and not so secure Cpanel? It's handy, but you should be able to do without, no?
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03-02-2006 20:14 |
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thechronic
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Not without, that's too much bollocksing around. Just checking if everything works fine takes 2 seconds in cpanel but 10 minutes in SSH. Updating all RPM's is just one click a day. If I didn't run it I would have to check the websites of 50+ packages daily and downloading and compiling all updates manually, that would drive me nuts in a two week time span i think 
DirectAdmin would perhaps be a better option, but I haven't tried it yet. It's cheaper for sure but a lot less powerful I heard.
What else? Plesk? Ensim?
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03-02-2006 20:41 |
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thechronic
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Since cashflow is really the driving factor here I should really go with DirectAdmin instead of cpanel. It would bring down the price to 1816€ the first year and 546€ the following years, saving a whopping 1253€ in three years 
Monthly payments would be only 80€ 
That's half of what I'm paying now 
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03-02-2006 21:17 |
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thechronic
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| quote: |
Originally posted by zzero
I honestly dont understand how u calculated the amount of money u need but isnt 1800 euro a bit much and maybe misscalculated? 
why do u wanna buy the server yourself and even buy licences for the hosting software ??
Renting a dedicated server is much cheaper and usualy backups are included in the service package or cost a few euro's more
eg: http://www.hetzner.de/rootserver.html
regarding the hosting software , there are even free opensource alternatives that are decent enough to use |
Well that exactly proves my point why dedicated servers are more expensive 
Those hetzner servers are bandwidth capped, old (the cheap ones are probably 3 years old already judging the processor type), have no control panel, only one IP address (so that means you can't run your own DNS), no raid, no backup drives, not even a reboot switch to restart the thing if it goes down. And they probably use a low budget connection in a data center (which means 5% packet loss and lag spikes when the router is overloaded). Get all the options you need and uncapped bandwidth and you will be paying 150€ a month too.
The worst thing about dedicated servers is that you'll be paying exactly the same price forever, so you'll be stuck with a very expensive and very ancient server in 3 years time. Been there, done that, I still paid €150 a month for the Pentium III
If you colocate your own server you can upgrade the server whenever you want to, put more RAM or an extra drive in, put an extra CPU in even... it's your own machine after all
If you get your own server colocated, you only pay for the connection once the server has been put together. Those prices are from 20€/month for a 95% quality 150GB capped connection up to 1600€/month for an uncapped premium 5gbit connection (Holland is cheapest in europe I think, check this site for prices).
A good price for an uncapped 1mbit connection is around 80 euro/month. That gives a max total bandwidth of 316GB/month, and a total cost of less than 1000€ a year which is bearable. 1mbit will be more than sufficient for the site atm.
For the server, I'd ofcourse go for components that are specifically designed for server applications since it will have to fit in a 1U or 2U server case. That means a Tyan motherboard, an Opteron processor for good database speeds and drives that are made to run 24/7 (western digital caviar RE series for example) so the crap doesn't break down after a couple of months. I get my prices at a site that compares the prices of different shops to find the best deals. Check it out here.
If I had money to spare the site would benefit most from a 2gbit connection and a quad opteron server with a huge raid system ofcourse
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14-02-2006 13:55 |
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thechronic
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You need 1 IP address for the primary DNS and 1 for the secondary, so you'd need 2 at minimum to run your own name server
Most colocation give you 5 IP addresses minimum, and extra needed ones are usually free.
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14-02-2006 16:20 |
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thechronic
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| quote: |
Originally posted by KoFFiE
| quote: |
Originally posted by thechronic
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And we're not going to buy a fast server at all, we're going to buy the slowest and cheapest opteron server currently available. A fast opteron server costs like 8000 euro
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You don't need a "fast" server - it's better to have a solid reliable "slower" server anyway
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Exactly my thoughts, rather a slow opteron with server grade hardware than a fast pentium with desktop hardware
| quote: |
Originally posted by KoFFiE
PS: Sun has Opterons starting from about $800 already... You just need to make sure you have enough and reliable (raid1 or even raid5?) storage... |
I'm going for a Tyan barebone, very reliable stuff too. Depending on how long it takes i'm going to go for either:
- main drive + backup drive (2 HDs needed)
- RAID1 + backup drive (3 HDs)
- RAID5 + backup drive (4 HDs)
I'm still deciding on the distro, I'm now in favour of CentOS but am looking into a few others too.
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20-02-2006 12:02 |
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Surya
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Also, for a server the amount of ram is much more important than the speed of the processor, since more webpages can be stored in the memory, thus they can be accessed faster.
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20-02-2006 13:57 |
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thechronic
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| quote: |
Originally posted by Surya
Also, for a server the amount of ram is much more important than the speed of the processor, since more webpages can be stored in the memory, thus they can be accessed faster. |
Doesn't count for dynamic pages, they are generated on the fly for each page request.
The old server had 512MB and it was plenty to run the site. The new one will have a 64-bit processor so it will probably eat up a lot more RAM though. Ofcourse if it is needed I will be able to put some more RAM in later.
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20-02-2006 14:28 |
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Surya
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| quote: |
Originally posted by thechronic
| quote: |
Originally posted by Surya
Also, for a server the amount of ram is much more important than the speed of the processor, since more webpages can be stored in the memory, thus they can be accessed faster. |
Doesn't count for dynamic pages, they are generated on the fly for each page request. |
Oh yeah, offcourse
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"In dnb you should make people jump not swim"
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20-02-2006 14:51 |
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thechronic
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I have ordered the barebone today, which is the first and most important component of the new server!!
A barebone is a servercase including motherboard, power supply, fans etc.
Model: Tyan GT20 B2865
- 19" 1U rackmounted server case
- Socket 939 (for an AMD Opteron or Athlon 64 processor)
- room for 4 SATA hard disks
- supports up to 4GB RAM
- 350W PSU
more info here
I paid 630€ for it, including delivery. It will be delivered sometime next week. I'll keep you informed when it arrives!!
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12-04-2006 18:09 |
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Muad'Dib
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Nice. I see the progress.
Respekt!
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12-04-2006 18:11 |
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Muad'Dib
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BTW is that power unit an UPS or normal one?
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12-04-2006 18:13 |
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thechronic
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Just a normal one, I will make sure to pick a data center that has a decent UPS running.
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12-04-2006 18:23 |
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Surya
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13-04-2006 08:49 |
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thechronic
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03-05-2006 09:44 |
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thechronic
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03-05-2006 09:45 |
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thechronic
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03-05-2006 09:54 |
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Surya
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Nice. Hope you manage to get the rest together fast
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"In dnb you should make people jump not swim"
- Pieter Frenssen 2004
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03-05-2006 10:15 |
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