X-Original-To: pgsql-performance-postgresql.org@localhost.postgresql.org Received: from localhost (av.hub.org [200.46.204.144]) by postgresql.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E07069DC88A for ; Sun, 15 Jan 2006 00:05:02 -0400 (AST) Received: from postgresql.org ([200.46.204.71]) by localhost (av.hub.org [200.46.204.144]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 16022-09 for ; Sun, 15 Jan 2006 00:05:00 -0400 (AST) X-Greylist: from auto-whitelisted by SQLgrey- Received: from floppy.pyrenet.fr (news.pyrenet.fr [194.116.145.2]) by postgresql.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B19929DC89C for ; Sun, 15 Jan 2006 00:04:59 -0400 (AST) Received: by floppy.pyrenet.fr (Postfix, from userid 106) id D9B543093C; Sun, 15 Jan 2006 05:04:58 +0100 (MET) From: Christopher Browne X-Newsgroups: pgsql.performance Subject: Re: SAN/NAS options Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 23:04:52 -0500 Organization: cbbrowne Computing Inc Lines: 59 Message-ID: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: usenet@news.hub.org X-message-flag: Outlook is rather hackable, isn't it? X-Home-Page: http://www.cbbrowne.com/info/ X-Affero: http://svcs.affero.net/rm.php?r=cbbrowne User-Agent: Gnus/5.1006 (Gnus v5.10.6) XEmacs/21.4 (Jumbo Shrimp, berkeley-unix) Cancel-Lock: sha1:imHhvU6cfaVtk6TboJ95EU3V94g= To: pgsql-performance@postgresql.org X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new at hub.org X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.638 required=5 tests=[AWL=-0.175, INFO_TLD=0.813] X-Spam-Score: 0.638 X-Spam-Level: X-Archive-Number: 200601/195 X-Sequence-Number: 16673 > Following up to myself again... > > On Wed, 14 Dec 2005, Charles Sprickman wrote: > >> Hello all, >> >> Supermicro 1U w/SCA backplane and 4 bays >> 2x2.8 GHz Xeons >> Adaptec 2015S "zero channel" RAID card > > I don't want to throw away the four machines like that that we have. > I do want to throw away the ZCR cards... :) If I ditch those I still > have a 1U box with a U320 scsi plug on the back. > > I'm vaguely considering pairing these two devices: > http://www.areca.us/products/html/products.htm > http://www.chenbro.com.tw/Chenbro_Special/RM321.php > How can I turn that box down? Those people in the picture look very > excited about it? Seriously though, it looks like an interesting and > economical pairing that gives me most of what I'm looking for: The combination definitely looks attractive. I have only been hearing positive things about the Areca cards; the overall combination sounds pretty attractive. > Disadvantages: > > -only 1 or 2 hosts per box > -more difficult to move storage from host to host (compared to a SAN > or NAS system) > -no fancy NetApp features like snapshots > -I have no experience with Areca SATA->SCSI RAID controllers > > Any thoughts on this? The controller looks to be about $1500, the > enclosure about $400, and the drives are no great mystery, cost would > depend on what total capacity I'm looking for. Another "usage model" that could be appropriate would be ATA-over-Ethernet... > Our initial plan is to set one up for storage for a mail archive > project, and to also have a host use this storage to host replicated > copies of all Postgres databases. If things look good, we'd start > moving our main PG hosts to use a similar RAID box. We're thinking about some stuff like this to host things that require bulky amounts of disk that are otherwise "not high TPC" sorts of apps. This is definitely not a "gold plated" answer, compared to the NetApp and EMC boxes of the world, but can be useful in contexts where they are too expensive. -- let name="cbbrowne" and tld="gmail.com" in String.concat "@" [name;tld];; http://linuxdatabases.info/info/x.html It is usually a good idea to put a capacitor of a few microfarads across the output, as shown.