KWestos Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Just received this for our new sims server, Capita are charging £2450, what do you guys think: Dell PowerEdge 2950 Rack Server 2 x Quad Core Intel® Xeon® E5410, 2X6MB Cache, 2.33GHz, 1333MHz FSB Processors 16GB Memory, 667MHz (4x4GB Quad Ranked FB DIMMs) 4 x 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug) DVD+/-RW Drive, SATA C4 Integrated SAS / SATA, RAID 5 using add in internal PERC controller, min3/max6or8 Hard Drives PERC 5/i, x4 Backplane, Integrated RAID Controller Card Rack Chassis with Sliding Rapid/Versa Rails, Universal 3Yr Warranty - Next Business Day Many thanks
steveg Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 How big is the school? How many pupils, how many users of sims? Is this going to be just for sims? Does that price included any setup, or is it just the hardware? Steve
KWestos Posted July 9, 2009 Author Posted July 9, 2009 How big is the school? How many pupils, how many users of sims? Is this going to be just for sims? Does that price included any setup, or is it just the hardware? Steve Hi Steve This is just for SIMS application delivery, nothing else. Currently there are 700 pupils, set to rise to 900 over the next 3 years There are currently about 60 SIMS users
FN-GM Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Lots of Ram for 900 Kids. we have 1200 in ours and it happly runs on 4GB ram. I would get better warrenty, get the 4 hour gold one.
steveg Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Seems almost a little over specced to me, (unusual for me, i'm great at over spec'ing servers!) I don't think you'll notice much of a benefit from the second cpu, or from at least 8gig of that ram. - Also check the sql licencing, i'm not an expert but I know some versions are licenced per cpu, so it may not even use the second one. Steve
FN-GM Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Another note, the Dell 2950 are a good server they just go and go.
jdibsdale Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Just received this for our new sims server, Capita are charging £2450, what do you guys think: Dell PowerEdge 2950 Rack Server 2 x Quad Core Intel® Xeon® E5410, 2X6MB Cache, 2.33GHz, 1333MHz FSB Processors 16GB Memory, 667MHz (4x4GB Quad Ranked FB DIMMs) 4 x 146GB, SAS, 3.5-inch, 15K RPM Hard Drive (Hot Plug) DVD+/-RW Drive, SATA C4 Integrated SAS / SATA, RAID 5 using add in internal PERC controller, min3/max6or8 Hard Drives PERC 5/i, x4 Backplane, Integrated RAID Controller Card Rack Chassis with Sliding Rapid/Versa Rails, Universal 3Yr Warranty - Next Business Day Many thanks That's pretty cheap, I got this a couple of weeks ago (from our LEA ICT dept) : Dell Poweredge 2950 3 Year ProSupport for IT and 4Hour Mission Critical Rack Mount Chassis with redundant power supply 2 x Intel Quad Core Xeon E5405 2.0GHz/2x6MB 1333 FSB Processor 4GB FB 667MHz Memory 4 x 3.5” 300GB SAS Hard Disk Drives PERC 6l Integrated Controller 16x SATA DVD-ROM Drive 2 x integrated 10/100/1000 Network Card DRAC5 Controller C4 – RAID 5 PERC6i Cntlr 3-8 HDD MS Windows 2008 Standard Server Licence (Downgraded to a supported Sever 2003 install) Symantec Backup Exec Quick Start Edition Software £ 3,309.88 Installation/ configuration £ 398.00
Mcshammer_dj Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Thats not a bad price for the kit. I agree with what others are saying about the spec. For a school with 60 users and 900 pupils this is a very high spec server With Server 2008 64bit installed this would quite easily run terminal server application delivery for all the staff and then some.
MYK-IT Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Spooky, just been pricing up a replacement SIMS server myself.. Been offered the following, for approx £2700.00 PE 2950 III Quad Core Xeon E5420 (2.5GHz, 2x6MB, 1333MHz FSB) 4GB (2x2GB Dual Rank DIMMs) 667MHz PE2950 III Additional Quad-Core Xeon E5420 (2.5GHz, 2x6MB, 1333MHz FSB) 2x 146GB SAS 15k 3.5" HD Hot Plug 2 (RAID 1) 2x 450GB SAS 15k 3.5" Additional HD Hot Plug (RAID 1) PE2950 III - Chassis 3.5HDD x6 Backplane 1 PERC 5/i, Integrated Controller Card (8 ports, 256MB cache, battery backup) x6 backplane DVD+/-RW Drive SATA with SATA Cable PE2950 III Redundant Power Supply No Power Cord TCP/IP Offload Engine Rapid/Versa Rack Rails PE2950 III C7 MSS R1/R1 Add-in PERC 5/i / 6/i 5Yr Basic Warranty - Next Business Day May well drop the second CPU (as initially will go for SQL 2005/2008 Express edition, but may keep if upgrade to full version in future). Only 4GB RAM, compared to your 16GB, but our LEA SIMS Team have advised there has been reported problems with Windows 2008 64bit edition, although they said it runs ok on Windows 2003 R2 64Bit.
matt40k Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 SQL will only use 1 processor per database, so might want to look at faster CPUs. 16GB ram might be a bit much now, but it really helps in 3 yrs time. Are you going to run terminal services on it? SLG2? Lesson monitor?
steveg Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 For the same spec server you have mentioned we pay about £2131. Speak to a few of the resellers on here, they normally get very similar pricing so can probably beat what you've been quoted. Removing the second cpu takes about £189 off the price. Personally i'd add a second redundant power supply @ aprox £90. Is next day warranty going to be adequate? You might want to consider 4 hour instead? Steve
localzuk Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 I would not use RAID 5 for SQL, as it adds more overhead. Instead have a raid 1+0 array, which will increase speed, and provide a nice amount of redundancy.
matt40k Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 I would not use RAID 5 for SQL, as it adds more overhead. Instead have a raid 1+0 array, which will increase speed, and provide a nice amount of redundancy. Really? I though you would make more reads then writes, so RAID-5 would be better. I do like RAID-10 (RAID 1+0) tho, still a split backplate with a RAID-1 (OS) and a RAID-5\10 (DATA) would be best. How much extra overhead is Lesson Monitor? Nothing really, it's just more concurrent connections and a larger DB size (eg. 7 marks a day per student x 1000 students 7,000 marks a day... rather then the 2,000.)
Heebeejeebee Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 I'm pricing up a new SIMS server now as well. Where are you guys going for quotes? HBJB
localzuk Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Really? I though you would make more reads then writes, so RAID-5 would be better. I do like RAID-10 (RAID 1+0) tho, still a split backplate with a RAID-1 (OS) and a RAID-5\10 (DATA) would be best. Not really, as most reads are actually handled in memory for an SQL database - especially ones the size we're talking about. So, write performance is the main issue. True, in a full enterprise database you may have your main DB file on a RAID 5 array, and your SQL transaction logs on a RAID 1 array, but as we're not quite that rich, a RAID 1 is the better all round choice for SIMS.net. (Ideally a log file should have it's own dedicated 1 array, the data on a 1 or 5 array and the system on it's own 1 array too).
matt40k Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Not really, as most reads are actually handled in memory for an SQL database - especially ones the size we're talking about. So, write performance is the main issue. True, in a full enterprise database you may have your main DB file on a RAID 5 array, and your SQL transaction logs on a RAID 1 array, but as we're not quite that rich, a RAID 1 is the better all round choice for SIMS.net. (Ideally a log file should have it's own dedicated 1 array, the data on a 1 or 5 array and the system on it's own 1 array too). Assuming you have enough RAM! You'll need full SQL (ie standard\enterprise ed) and x64 bit OS (and MSSQL) with AWE enabled and shed loads of RAM. I didn't think Dell charged that much for a split RAID, you just need RAID-1 for the Windows, then install MSSQL\SIMS to the RAID-10
localzuk Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Assuming you have enough RAM! You'll need full SQL (ie standard\enterprise ed) and x64 bit OS (and MSSQL) with AWE enabled and shed loads of RAM. I didn't think Dell charged that much for a split RAID, you just need RAID-1 for the Windows, then install MSSQL\SIMS to the RAID-10 Shed loads of RAM? Huh? SIMS databases only reach a few GB in size from what I've seen. So, say, a maximum of 4GB in size. If you're running 32bit enterprise with full SQL server that will easily sit in memory on 8GB. But anyway, whatever the case, you're not going to end up going down the route which RAID 5 would suit with SQL server in a school, so RAID 10 is the best solution all round.
matt40k Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 IMO typical secondary schools is 2.5GB, most lesson monitor schools are starting to reach 4-5GB now. I've see [myself] about 3 so far. 32bit Enterprise is just a lie IMO, it's such a hack job. The 32bit architure addresses 4GB ram, fact. Plus you get a nice performance increase over the 32bit. I would still say RAID-5 for secondarys with ~4GB ram, look at RAID-10 for 8GB ram. Still I would say a R200 with 8GB would be the min for secondarys.
Theblacksheep Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 (edited) The amount SQL is used for SIMS is really minimal... We have 1700 students and 250 staff. 3.5 GB DB with SIMS and FMS 32bit Windows Server 2008 DataCenter 2vCpu (2.66) 4GB ram VM disks on ISCSI SAN Raid5. No queuing, no waiting or performance issues. Edited July 9, 2009 by Theblacksheep
Butuz Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Will be setting up a new sims virtual machine here later on in the year. Planned spec will be: Win2003 Std 4GB vRAM 2 vCPU 3.16ghz iSCSI SAN storage Though in light of above I may well swap to Win2003 Enterprise with 8GB vRAM instead. Reason I am saying 2003 is LEA dont support 2008 yet. My upgrade may end up co-enciding with the LEA upgrading to 2008 though. Have to wait and see. Whatever I end up doing - it's gonna be a hell of a lot better than the 5 year old Single Xeon 2.4, 4GB Ram IBM thing thats running it at the mo! Butuz
FN-GM Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 32bit Enterprise is just a lie IMO, it's such a hack job. The 32bit architure addresses 4GB ram, fact. Plus you get a nice performance increase over the 32bit. I thinl that is aload of rubbish to be hoenst. They wouldn't get away with selling the enterprise version like that if it was true.
IanT Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Looks like a great specced server, but a little overkill imo
matt40k Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 I thinl that is aload of rubbish to be hoenst. They wouldn't get away with selling the enterprise version like that if it was true. Why do you think everyone is moving to 64bit if 32bit could truely support more then 4GB ram?! People got enterprise because there hasn't been any good* 64bit cpu until just a few years ago. Read: 32-bit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Then read about PAE (the work around to get more then 4GB ram): [ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension]Physical Address Extension - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame] * I use good as is loose term to describe AMD64 (not the CPU but the techology, Intel's rip of it is EM64T), which supports Virtual address space, which allows 32bit software to run on a 64bit CPU. There have been 64bit CPU before AMD64's, look up Intel Itanium (IA-64) and\or Sun UltraSPARC.
localzuk Posted July 9, 2009 Posted July 9, 2009 Why do you think everyone is moving to 64bit if 32bit could truely support more then 4GB ram?! People got enterprise because there hasn't been any good* 64bit cpu until just a few years ago. Read: 32-bit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Then read about PAE (the work around to get more then 4GB ram): Physical Address Extension - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia * I use good as is loose term to describe AMD64 (not the CPU but the techology, Intel's rip of it is EM64T), which supports Virtual address space, which allows 32bit software to run on a 64bit CPU. There have been 64bit CPU before AMD64's, look up Intel Itanium (IA-64) and\or Sun UltraSPARC. Your argument doesn't show how PAE/AWE is terrible though, or doesn't work...
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