HP DL120 + OCZ PCI express SSD as a RDS server

[MrWu]

Hi

 

Been thinking of replacing a single self built terminal server running Xeon E3 and 8 gb RAM, at most I see 12 teachers log in running SIMS , Office etc, peaks no more than 4GB RAM usage, its on 4 x 500gb SATA running RAID 10....so thinking of upgrading to a RDS farm for say upto 50 staff?

 

Thinking of buying 2 of these DL120 with 16gb RAM each:

 

HP 644706-425 ProLiant DL120 G7 Rack Server | ServersPlus

 

And add each with a 240gb SSD:

 

OCZ 240GB RevoDrive 3 X2 PCI-E SSD - Read 1500MB/s.. | Ebuyer.com

 

Anyone tried fitting PCI SSDs to HP servers?

 

I will MDT these so they pretty much treat them like a PC if they fail...

 

Cheers all

Edited September 12, 2012 by MrWu

[Arthur]

Anyone tried fitting PCIe SSDs to HP servers?

@jamesfed has... www.edugeek.net/forums/hardware/86672-ocz-revodrive-3-x2-hp-dl165-g7.html

 

Personally I would get a Samsung 830 SSD instead. Not only is it just as fast as (and in some cases faster) than the RevoDrive 3 X2, but it will be more reliable, cheaper and TRIM works too.

 

http://i.imgur.com/5i2mz.png http://i.imgur.com/68vJC.png

Edited September 12, 2012 by Arthur

[Guest Guest]

I'd say sata SSD too. If you really wanted to you could raid 1 / raid 10 a few of them but TBH I'd say 1 with be plenty.

[MrWu]

@jamesfed has... www.edugeek.net/forums/hardware/86672-ocz-revodrive-3-x2-hp-dl165-g7.html

 

Personally I would get a Samsung 830 SSD instead. Not only is it just as fast as (and in some cases faster) than the RevoDrive 3 X2, but it will be more reliable, cheaper and TRIM works too.

 

http://i.imgur.com/5i2mz.png http://i.imgur.com/68vJC.png

 

Cool, do you know whether I could fit a 3.5 inch adaptor to the Samsung 830 and fit it into the 3.5inch caddy on the HP? Have to find out where I can get HP caddies since ones supplied are just blanking plates....

[Arthur]

do you know whether I could fit a 3.5 inch adaptor to the Samsung 830

All of the 830 SSDs that have a 'D' in their model number include a 2.5" to 3.5" adapter in the box (MZ-7PC128D / MZ-7PC256D / MZ-7PC512D).

 

Have to find out where I can get HP caddies since ones supplied are just blanking plates....

I think @Millgate sell empty caddies for HP servers.

[jamesfed]

Cheers for the mentions guys

@MrWu you maybe intrested in my latest project - Series: Custom RemoteFX RDS Farm « my world of IT

 

We have custom built some RDS servers using 2U cases (2 in each case cookie sheet style!) and they run off.......SATA SSDs

 

Personaly though I will be sticking with PCI-E in things like my HP servers - at least I know 100% that the RAID array wont muck up on me.

[Millgate]

I think @Millgate sell empty caddies for HP servers.

 

I certainly do!

[3s-gtech]

If it's just an RDP server, a single SATA SSD should be fine, should mean that TRIM works happily that way. Many RAID controllers (if not all still) prevent the TRIM command from working.

[MrWu]

Cheers for the mentions guys

@MrWu you maybe intrested in my latest project - Series: Custom RemoteFX RDS Farm « my world of IT

 

We have custom built some RDS servers using 2U cases (2 in each case cookie sheet style!) and they run off.......SATA SSDs

 

Personaly though I will be sticking with PCI-E in things like my HP servers - at least I know 100% that the RAID array wont muck up on me.

 

I have been following the stufff you do, with the budget you have you are creating some damn amazing things, i have seen the stats on your VDI supporting 20 users on an SSD drives which what inspired me to use SSDs for my RDS servers, with 2 of them(DL120s) for redundancy, i could get away with single SSD and PSUs..i'm also hoping RDS is not write intensive so the SSDs should last a while.

 

So i could get a pair of DL120 G7 with 16gb RAM and 256gb SSD for less than £1400 hopefully...

 

Luke you up for the challange lol?

[Millgate]

I think that might be a bit of a stretch! Ha

[MrWu]

No worries mate, give it a go, i will PM you. :-)

[jamesfed]

Bearing in mind that the parts I used in the custom RDS farm were all desktop parts the 4 'servers' came in at just under £1,300 + licencing and that happily runs 30 sessions for me (looking at the stats from the servers I could probably push that to 60 easily as well).

[VeryPC]

If the HP comes way over budget and is a write off, I would recommend having a look at a supermicro,intel or tyan based custom server. You can probably shave quite a bit off of the HP price for the same performance and be much more flexible on specification / SSD etc .

 

Luke@Millgate you can quote these right ?

 

Andy

[Millgate]

Yes matey, i can supply pretty much anything. I know MrWu likes his HPs though so it'll be a tough choice!

[jamesfed]

Yes matey, i can supply pretty much anything. I know MrWu likes his HPs though so it'll be a tough choice!

 

If only I could've built the RDS servers out of HP SL series cookie sheets - would be even cooler than blades HP all the way for me all the same!

[MrWu]

Thanks guys

 

So sanity check:

 

Get a pair of DL 120 G7 with a single SATA Samsung 830 SSD each with a 3.5 adaptor and a HP 3.5 inch adaptor...Not use the in built RAID, TRIM should work on Windows 2008 r2..but risk HP firmware rejecting the drive

 

 

Get a pair of DL 120 G7 with a single Revodrive 3 x2 PCIe SSD each, Not use the in built RAID, TRIM should work on Windows 2008 r2..but need to find out whether it will fit the PCIe slot and any BIOS settings needed for intel Xeon specifically for it to boot up from the PCIe slot

[jamesfed]

Thanks guys

 

So sanity check:

 

Get a pair of DL 120 G7 with a single SATA Samsung 830 SSD each with a 3.5 adaptor and a HP 3.5 inch adaptor...Not use the in built RAID, TRIM should work on Windows 2008 r2..but risk HP firmware rejecting the drive

 

 

Get a pair of DL 120 G7 with a single Revodrive 3 x2 PCIe SSD each, Not use the in built RAID, TRIM should work on Windows 2008 r2..but need to find out whether it will fit the PCIe slot and any BIOS settings needed for intel Xeon specifically for it to boot up from the PCIe slot

 

Sounds about right although I haven't tried a boot from the PCI card before so you are on your own with that one

 

Just in case anyone is wondering about life time in a server please do the maths on the hours on and how many months that represents with 0 flash blocks reallocated -

 

 

Thats running our Lync, Exchange, UAG and RDS Load Balancer server

[MrWu]

Sounds about right although I haven't tried a boot from the PCI card before so you are on your own with that one

 

Just in case anyone is wondering about life time in a server please do the maths on the hours on and how many months that represents with 0 flash blocks reallocated -

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]15186[/ATTACH]

 

Thats running our Lync, Exchange, UAG and RDS Load Balancer server

 

ah, got it, so the Revo is not used as a boot drive, and you use standard HP brand HDDs in your DL165 for booting to OS?

 

In which case might try the Samsung options first, worst comes to worst I could test the Sammy SSD first in a ML110 G7 i have, as far as I know very similar Hardware wise to the DL120....then buy the rack server later, sounds like a safer bet...PS also heard you can under provision the SSD to extend its life.

Edited September 13, 2012 by MrWu

[VeryPC_Ed]

SSD's aren't my strong point but I've just done a quick bit of googling about the trim support as I know when I have looked into it in the past, LSI/3ware Raid controllers don't currently support trim commands and I think it's the same with the HP/Dell controllers.

 

The Revodrive3 apparantly appears as a storport device under windows7 (going to be same in Windows 2008 R2 I'm guessing) and apparently Trim commands won't be sent. I'm thinking that if you switch to Server 2012 the support for trim commands will be there for the Revodrive3 as Microsoft will support this under Windows 8.

 

So essentially I reckon you will have to rely on the drives internal garbage collection if using any SSD's that are in raid when not connected directly as a single disk.

 

Otherwise, single SSD on internal controller and depending on the chipset you should get trim support unless you go with the Revo and go for Server 2012.

 

If I'm wrong please correct me (someone/anyone!)

 

Ref: OCZ's RevoDrive 3 X2 240GB solid-state drive - The Tech Report - Page 1

Ref: New for Storage Drivers

[jamesfed]

Yep not booting direct off the drive - we do however have plenty of VMs booting off that drive which in theory would put more strain on the drive than a single RDS server.

@VeryPC_Ed - quite right about there being no TRIM under Windows 7 however over 9 months in now and 0 reallocated flash blocks...think that speaks for its self that the need for TRIM might be disappearing (at least in the relatively low usage environments you will find in a school (compared to a corp datacentre)).

Edited September 15, 2012 by jamesfed

[VeryPC_Ed]

Hey James, thanks for the reply, out of curiosity do you have your SSD's over provisioned ?

 

I think there's a lot of FUD about SSD's and people usually look at the extreme's (which they never end up experiencing), totally agree that under everyday operating conditions a decent consumer SSD will more than likely do fine, if it's in a DC then that extra spend for additional corp/ent features (like on Intel 320 (now EOL) with the power loss protection) can easily be justified if the workload requires it.

 

Edit: 320 not 520

Edited September 15, 2012 by VeryPC_Ed

[MrWu]

Thanks again everyone

 

Bit of googling and found some comments about DL120 G7s with 256gb Samsungs 256gb SSD installed and working,so quite encouraging:

 

HP ProLiant DL120 G7 E3-1220 Server rack-mountable | Ebuyer.com

[jamesfed]

No overprovisioning on the drive (at least no more than the standard for the card) - if you boot into the cards bios/firmware you can enable a extended life mode which cuts down on your useable space but I don't see much of a need for it at this stage.

[Arthur]

Bit of googling and found some comments about DL120 G7s with Samsung's 256GB SSD installed and working, so quite encouraging

This is quite encouraging too.

 

http://i.imgur.com/Wa1sI.png

 

Based on how much data James has written to his RevoDrive, I don't think you have much to worry about.

[Arthur]

By the way, should you ever decide to overprovision the drive, don't bother reducing capacity beyond 27%...

 

http://i.imgur.com/HKDQ4.png http://i.imgur.com/2HSSJ.png http://i.imgur.com/uuId4.png

 

Source: SNIA