2003 SBS configuration?

Question

I will be running 2003 SBS for mail, web, ftp, etc.

Should the server have SCSI instead of IDE? Should they be hot swappable? How many total hard drives would be good for the server? I know RAID5 requires at least 3- is this good enough?

They say you should separate the data drives from the OS, etc. Does this mean RAID would actually need more than 3? What would be the best backup for someone that's not too experienced (raid, mirror, etc)?

Answer 1

SCSI or SATA are faster than IDE. If you want true server-class performance and reliability, stick with SCSI. SATA is a consideration if cost management is a significant concern. Hot-swappable is the ONLY way to go. This is generally not an option with IDE, cutting it out of consideration completely.

I strongly recommend a minimum of 5 drives for any production server. 2 36GB or larger drives in a RAID-1 (mirror set) array for the operating system and 3 or more drives of equal size in a RAID-5 (striping with parity) array for the data.

This configuration provides two major benefits. First, it separates your data and OS onto separate physical and logical partitions. Just as importantly, by putting the OS on a mirrored set you avoid a MAJOR performance hit that you would encounter if the OS's swapfile was on a RAID-5 array. I've measured drive system performance reductions as high as 50% when the swapfile is on a RAID-5 array and the controller has to spend extensive time keeping up with the parity set in the constantly changing swapfile.

Using a RAID hard drive system is NOT a substitute for a good backup plan! You'll need a tape backup unit if you want to keep any kind of history available. For reliability reasons, stay away from DAT drives. First off, the tapes need to be replaced every 6 months. And the max capacity of DAT tapes is 72GB. Only the most anemic server will have less total space than that today. Honestly, LTO is the only sensible way to go today. The life-cycle cost is comparable to DAT since a set of tapes will last you 5 years or longer and a LTO-2 drive will hold 6 times as much data.

If price is a severe constraint, you could go with TWO external USB hard drives and swap them out each night. Then move up to tape when your budget permits.

Whatever backup regimen you go with, make sure that you keep the most current set off-site to protect against physical disasters such as fire or flood. You could use a fire retardant safe but you MUST get one rated for storage of magnetic media. The normal fireproof safes are designed to protect paper documents and will get way to hot internally for magnetic tapes. A decent one will cost you about $1,000.00 and will have storage space about equivalent to a shoebox although it will be about the size of a dormitory refrigerator.

Answer 2

Wow that is a lot. You maybe need to consider hiring a consultant to set this up. You are asking some basic questions and you probably won't be able to get all that going yourself.

The SCSI drives are a little faster. I usually get the SATA or IDE ones because the SCSI drives are so expensive.

The two RAIDs you are looking at are RAID-1 and RAID-5. Raid one makes an exact mirror. You have two drives and you lose the storage space for one but you have a full disk if one fails. RAID-5 you have three or more drives and you lose the storage of one. You can have one drive go down and still rebuild all the data. The more drives you put into the set, the more storage you get and you still only lose one drives worth of space. But you increase the chance that two will go at the same time. What you want depends on how much data you have now and are going to have in the next five years or so.

You absolutely should separate the data from the system, but you do that with partitions on the RAID, not with the RAID itself. If you order SBS pre-installed you will also want to move the Exchange data stores to the data partition. They always leave it in the defaut location and that isn't right. What you are trying to avoid is anything that may fill up the system drive and shut it down. So you don't want any shares or growing databases that your users can get to on the system partition.

That is far from everything you need to know. Like I said you probably want help. Look for someone with MCSE certs and they will be able to set this all up for you and help you order what you really need.

Answer 3

This is what i have done on my server. Put your OS on one HDD, and you Apps load onto another HDD then make shortcuts of the apps and paste them to your workstations. Using a third for your Users, assigning full control to their folder alone. SCSI drive are faster than IDE and no they don't need to be hotswap.
As for how many it depends what you are using your server for, you can load it up with 1200Gb if you have the money for the drives, but that is overkill.
As for backup i have a separate computer that is connected to the server alone that has 2 X 20GB HDD 32 MB ram and a Pentium 2, that i backup EVERYTHING to once a week, and that's all it does.