Which Server?

[button_ripple]

Hi,

 

Just a quick poll - which server would you choose if you were in a primary school with about 250 kids, 75 staff, SIMS admin network. 15 computers in 1 ICT Suite, 30 Curriculum Laptops, 25 staff laptops?

[SYNACK]

Depends on your server room setup. If you have a rack avalible I would go with that option as there is not that much of a price premium on the low to mid range rack stuff. It will also put another door with a lock and key in between it and anyone wanting to mess with it.

 

If you don't have a full rack at the moment you could probably save a little cash by going with the tower versions, some of these can be converted to rack mount later with optional kits if you need to.

 

Blade servers really don't make a huge amount of economical sense unless you are getting four or more servers as the backplane enclosure is quite expensive to support just one or two blade servers.

[torledo]

Depends on your server room setup. If you have a rack avalible I would go with that option as there is not that much of a price premium on the low to mid range rack stuff. It will also put another door with a lock and key in between it and anyone wanting to mess with it.

 

If you don't have a full rack at the moment you could probably save a little cash by going with the tower versions, some of these can be converted to rack mount later with optional kits if you need to.

 

Blade servers really don't make a huge amount of economical sense unless you are getting four or more servers as the backplane enclosure is quite expensive to support just one or two blade servers.

 

Agree with your comment about blade servers.

 

My advice is to get one or more Dell Poweredge 2950 or HP DL380 G5 (rackmount of course) with two processors.

[kestrel1]

My advice would be to have a look at the IBM kit. Much more reliable than Dell.

[laserblazer]

250 kids and 75 staff. Must be a tough school

[nicholab]

HP racks and possible HP C3000 bladecentre as it take 8 blades. HP server come with the best remote management as standard.

[dhicks]

I'm guessing that, as a primary school, you don't have masses of money to spend or space to put in an entire dedicated server room. Your best option might be to buy a tower machine that will sit in one of those lockable PC desks. You might also want to aim for an ultra-quite machine if there's nowhere else to place it but in a classroom.

 

--

David Hicks

[m25man]

HP ML350's

Pedestal or in a 5U Rack version.

They are big, beautifully built and take Hotswap SAS or SATA.

 

Why ML350's?

 

They run cool and are almost silent!

Ideal for a small school or part of a larger one where you don't want the drone of jumbo in taxi mode all day long!

[john]

HP Proliants for me as well

[localzuk]

For that sort of size, I'd be going for a couple of HP pedestal servers. A rack would not be a good investment really as there is not enough call for space saving.

[torledo]

HP ML350's

Pedestal or in a 5U Rack version.

They are big, beautifully built and take Hotswap SAS or SATA.

 

Why ML350's?

 

They run cool and are almost silent!

Ideal for a small school or part of a larger one where you don't want the drone of jumbo in taxi mode all day long!

 

haha, jumbo in taxi mode, that's a very apt description of our PE2950.

But nothing compared to the noise on startup,...you'd be forgiven for thinking Dell fitted mini Rolls-Royce engines where there should have been fans.

 

Same goes for our xserve G5 when you tell it to boot from CD.

[richard.thomas]

I've just had an ML310 for one of my primary schools, had absolutely no issues with it. Would recommend