Server Design

Yahoo Archive
1
You really think you are going to get an answer?

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Monday, June 10, 2002 9:09 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


Sorry about that Gary !

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Saturday, June 08, 2002 12:49 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


Someone mentioned something about a jinx. Let me correct the answer I sent
yesterday. Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr - HD failed last night.
Not total failure, but enought to be hanging when I came in this am. Worked
OK when I rebooted. But with Dell tech support on phone, ran HD diagnostic
and found one of 3 HD's failed on one of the tests. Still works OK, but
they're sending me a new HD on Mon. Starting a little survey of my own...
how many people's servers failed after Todd asked the question?

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 12:10 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


server1
Dell PowerEdge 2300 RAID1 - oper 3 yr no probs

server2
Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr no probs.

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages>
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links>

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
<http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>





Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages>
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links>

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
<http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/>




Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages>
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links>

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service
<http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> .




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have already linked your
email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and Crystal Reports and
other 'goodies', please goto: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
2
8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson
3
Basic risk analysis says to multiply the chance of failure by the cost of
the failure and factor in the cost of reducing the risk. We are SO
dependant on the systems and 100% availability that a little over
engineering at a small (relative) cost is OK by me. Although the risk is
low nowdays the cost is really high. Enough to justify the extra hardware
in my mind.
-Todd C.

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 10:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson

Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages>
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links>

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service
<http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> .




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
4
My primary server started dying with seemingly unrelated errors about 6
months ago. System would crash about once a day - I allowed to continue for
about 4 days and decided the problem must be RAM. I replace that and
haven't had a problem since. This server has been in place 4 years now. Only
other issue was 1 failed drive out of 4 drive raid 10 about 2 years ago.

Jim Stetter
-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail
every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun
... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating
of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5
arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail.
Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson

Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
5
Sever 1 , HP E50 twin 9 gig drive "seagate", no raid, scsi, 5 years old no
fails.

Server 2, Shirley Special, 6 18 gig Western Digital, raid 1 for 3 drives,
scsi, 1 year old no fails.
Shirley

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail
every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun
... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating
of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5
arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail.
Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson

Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
6
server1
Dell PowerEdge 2300 RAID1 - oper 3 yr no probs

server2
Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr no probs.

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
7
1 - HPLCii email/print server - 9GB SCSI RAID1 - 4+ years no problems
1 - Dell 1300 Vantage server- 9GB SCSI RAID 1 - 2 years no problems
1 - Darren Special Phone System Server - 4GB SCSI RAID1 - 1 year no problems

I hope we aren't Jinxing ourselves with the release of this information.
KNOCK ON WOOD!!!

Darren Mann
Miller Products Co.
8
Don't even get me going on what has or has not failed
We purchased a HP LH3000 Net Server about a year and a half ago
(I am only 3 months on the job newbie SYS ADMIN)
Anyway it worked fine up until March
One of the mirrored 9gb hd's failed (Just before I got here) replaced
by HP - A month later it started failing again - Replaced by HP
Make a long story short - HP Replaced EVERYTHING IN the server
Backplane, hard drives, SCSI Controller, Motherboard
The machine is now in the hands of Micron (Who we bought it from)
And it is being diagnosed as we speak
So yes there are failures out there and they do happen on occasion

James Piper
Meco Inc
Paris, IL 61944
admin@...
9
I do have a server (white box manufacturer) that had a HD fail (IDE drive).
The drive was nearly 5 years old. The other hardware problem I have had is
a power supply that overheated due to a fan failure. I replaced the entire
power supply just because it was easier and later replaced the fan and used
that PS in a workstation. Fan failures are rather common in my shop, some
cause failures (or noticeable performance issues) others I find while doing
routine maintenance.

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:47 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
10
Someone mentioned something about a jinx. Let me correct the answer I sent
yesterday. Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr - HD failed last night.
Not total failure, but enought to be hanging when I came in this am. Worked
OK when I rebooted. But with Dell tech support on phone, ran HD diagnostic
and found one of 3 HD's failed on one of the tests. Still works OK, but
they're sending me a new HD on Mon. Starting a little survey of my own...
how many people's servers failed after Todd asked the question?

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 12:10 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


server1
Dell PowerEdge 2300 RAID1 - oper 3 yr no probs

server2
Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr no probs.

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/





Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
11
The "jinx" factor is the whole reason I didn't respond to the post. Not
very superstitious but not worth the risk. You just never know,

--
Gary Wassing
Systems Administrator
SteelCraft Industries
519-271-4750 x227


-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Saturday, June 08, 2002 1:49 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


Someone mentioned something about a jinx. Let me correct the answer I sent
yesterday. Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr - HD failed last night.
Not total failure, but enought to be hanging when I came in this am. Worked
OK when I rebooted. But with Dell tech support on phone, ran HD diagnostic
and found one of 3 HD's failed on one of the tests. Still works OK, but
they're sending me a new HD on Mon. Starting a little survey of my own...
how many people's servers failed after Todd asked the question?

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 12:10 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


server1
Dell PowerEdge 2300 RAID1 - oper 3 yr no probs

server2
Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr no probs.

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/





Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/





Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
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12
Sorry about that Gary !

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Saturday, June 08, 2002 12:49 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


Someone mentioned something about a jinx. Let me correct the answer I sent
yesterday. Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr - HD failed last night.
Not total failure, but enought to be hanging when I came in this am. Worked
OK when I rebooted. But with Dell tech support on phone, ran HD diagnostic
and found one of 3 HD's failed on one of the tests. Still works OK, but
they're sending me a new HD on Mon. Starting a little survey of my own...
how many people's servers failed after Todd asked the question?

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Polvinale [mailto:garyp@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 12:10 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Server Design


server1
Dell PowerEdge 2300 RAID1 - oper 3 yr no probs

server2
Dell Poweredge 2450 RAID5 - oper 2 yr no probs.

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Anderson [mailto:tanderson@...]
Sent: Friday, June 07, 2002 11:33 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: [Vantage] Server Design


8 years ago I managed a IBM-System-38 with 8 hard drives using 14" HDA's.
Mean time between failures for these hard drives were about 20,000 hrs, or
about 2 years. With 8 drives the odds were that one drive would fail every
3 months and low and behold ... one did die every 3 months for 3 years
straight. ( I particularly LOVED this job ... it was just so much fun ... )

Soooo, when RAID controllers came along and I could design a server with
either a RAID-1 or RAID-5 configuration where I could loose a drive and
still get a good night's sleep I thought life was very good.

Of late, however, I've noticed an odd thing ... I can't remember the last
time a hard drive "Failed".

I think the last bunch of SCSI server drives I purchased had a MTF rating of
ONE-MILLION hrs or something like 114 years.

Are we over-designing servers these days by using mirrored or raid-5 arrays
???

I'm curious ... when was the last time you had a drive "Failure" ???

Or maybe a better question - in the last 12 months who has had "Hardware"
troubles with their servers and what was the root cause. Let's skip the
lemon boxes that we all occasionally get and never do work. I'm talking
about production servers in place for at least 30 days that then fail. Was
the cause - Hard drive, RAM, motherboard, power supply .... ?

Todd Anderson


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Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
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Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
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<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
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