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Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2012 09:20:51 +0100 (BST)
From: Glyn Astill <glynastill@yahoo.co.uk>
Reply-To: Glyn Astill <glynastill@yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: Re: hardware advice
To: "M. D." <lists@turnkey.bz>,
	"pgsql-performance@postgresql.org" <pgsql-performance@postgresql.org>
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>________________________________=0A=0A> From: M. D. <lists@turnkey.bz>=0A>=
To: pgsql-performance@postgresql.org =0A>Sent: Friday, 28 September 2012, 1=
8:33=0A>Subject: Re: [PERFORM] hardware advice=0A> =0A>On 09/28/2012 09:57 =
AM, David Boreham wrote:=0A>> On 9/28/2012 9:46 AM, Craig James wrote:=0A>>=
> Your best warranty would be to have the confidence to do your own=0A>>> r=
epairs, and to have the parts on hand.=A0 I'd seriously consider=0A>>> putt=
ing your own system together.=A0 Maybe go to a few sites with=0A>>> pre-con=
figured machines and see what parts they use.=A0 Order those,=0A>>> screw t=
he thing together yourself, and put a spare of each critical=0A>>> part on =
your shelf.=0A>>> =0A>> This is what I did for years, but after taking my o=
ld parts collection to the landfill a few times, realized I may as well jus=
t buy N+1 machines and keep zero spares on the shelf. That way I get a spar=
e machine available for use immediately, and I know the parts are working (=
parts on the shelf may be defective). If something breaks, I use the spare =
machine until the replacement parts arrive.=0A>> =0A>> Note in addition tha=
t a warranty can be extremely useful in certain organizations as a vehicle =
of blame avoidance (this may be its primary purpose in fact). If I buy a bu=
nch of machines that turn out to have buggy NICs, well that's my fault and =
I can kick myself since I own the company, stay up late into the night read=
ing kernel code, and buy new NICs. If I have an evil Dilbertian boss, then =
well...I'd be seriously thinking about buying Dell boxes in order to blame =
Dell rather than myself, and be able to say "everything is warrantied" if b=
adness goes down. Just saying...=0A>> =0A>I'm kinda in the latter shoes.=A0=
 Dell is the only thing that is trusted in my organisation.=A0 If I would b=
uild my own, I would be fully blamed for anything going wrong in the next 3=
 years. Thanks everyone for your input.=A0 Now my final choice will be if m=
y budget allows for the latest and fastest, else I'm going for the x5690.=
=A0 I don't have hundreds of users, so I think the x5690 should do a pretty=
 good job handling the load.=0A>=0A>=0A=0AHaving=0Aplenty experience with D=
ell I'd urge you reconsider.=A0 All the Dell servers=0Awe've had have arriv=
ed hideously misconfigured, and tech support gets you=0Anowhere.=A0 Once we=
've rejigged the hardware ourselves, maybe replacing a=0Apart or two they'v=
e performed okay.=0A=A0=0AReliability has been okay, however one of our=0An=
ewer R910s recently all of a sudden went dead to the world; no prior sympto=
ms=0Ashowing in our hardware and software monitoring, no errors in the os l=
ogs,=0Anothing in the dell drac logs.=A0 After a hard reset it's back up as=
 if=0Anothing happened, and it's an issue I'm none the wiser to the cause.=
=A0 Not=0Agood piece of mind.=0A=A0=0ALook around and find another vendor, =
even if=0Ayour company has to pay more for you to have that blame avoidance=
.