Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

Zetsumei · 2009-07-13 12:37:01

Well, it's that time again to buy some new hardware. I've already got a decent server that should do the trick, but it's lacking the hard drive space. Now, I've got a few SATA drives but my server system on has IDE controllers. Time to buy some SATA PCI Cards, woot. If you're a hardware junkie, then here are the things I'm planning on buying for the server system. Hopefully now I can give it a new job again.

SATA II 4 port PCI Controller – http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6816124008
This thing is only $38.99. I know it's cheap and probably isn't the best out there, but it looks like it'll work fine for my low budget needs. After all, I won't be using the RAID on it until I get 4 matching drives on the card. So, for now it'll do the job.
WD Black 640gb Drives x2 – http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6822136319
These are only $74.99 each. A few days ago they were $69.99 and I hate I didn't grab them then, but still pretty cheap for being some of the fastest 7200rpm drives out there.
OCZ Vertex 30gb SSD – http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6820227393
Sooner or later I do plan to upgrade all my OS drives to SSD as all the main storage will be transferred over to my server. This should speed up my systems consideribly as their already fast with Arch64 on them.

Later on I plan to upgrade to either two more 640gb drives and add another PCI Controller card or upgrade to 4 new WD Black 1tb drives. My server has two free PCI slots so I'd be able to get a total storage space of around 8tb or something like that.

That's enough for the server hardware and file system setup, here's how I'm planning to roll the network out. Of course, re-designing it from what it is now.

Internet ISP > Modem > Server > Switch and Router > Wired PCs and Wireless PCs

Here are the systems that will be benefiting from the server just for pleasure purposes.

My desktop machine and laptop will have their /home paritions mounted onto the server.
My work machines (iMac and eMac) will have a small /work-data partition mounted onto the server.
My family's machine (XP Pro, wireless) will have a small /family-data partition mounted onto the server with just Read Access to the other partitions just in case. I don't trust them enough not to fuck something over on my machines.
My brother's laptop (Vista Home Premium) will have access to the /data partition for the family.

I believe that should do it for the machines that would need a constant access to it. I'll post any new updates when it happens. Enjoy.

fukawi2 · 2009-07-13 12:55:30

Sounds like a good server, but a couple of points about the network
1) Why is there a router between the server and the rest of your internal network?
2) It's bad practise to put a server holding all your data directly in the path of the interwebs IMHO. Put a separate device between the modem and the switch to act as a firewall / gateway if you can.

Zetsumei · 2009-07-13 13:25:52

Well, my family's PC is a desktop but on wifi so they still need access to the server. I could turn an older rig into a firewall perhaps then or get a cheap firewall to put up there.

fukawi2 · 2009-07-13 22:46:00

Zetsumei wrote:

Well, my family's PC is a desktop but on wifi so they still need access to the server.

That shouldn't need to be routed, it should just require a Wireless Access Point which acts as a bridge...

Last edited by fukawi2 (2009-07-13 22:46:11)

zenlord · 2009-07-15 09:56:24

My thoughts exactly. Install a dhcp-server (and maybe bind9) and all you need is a WAP - works here. You could also configure iptables so you don't need an extra machine as firewall.

My concern is that you are planning on putting all data of you and your family (more than 1 TB at the moment) on a machine and that you don't use a hardware RAID-controller. IMHO data is THE most valuable thing (pictures, holiday movies etc.), so I would prefer spending money on a RAID-controller instead of putting it in an SSD. What is you're server going to do that it needs an SSD for its OS? If it's going to serve files and mail, then you won't notice much of a difference with a normal IDE / SATA disk.

I have bought a new pc for my mediaserver, and it's doing practically nothing 90% of the time, but I need it's CPU cycles to transcode 1080p-files to my DLNA-clients on the network. And did you think of a backup-system? I strongly recommend bacula for automated backups - it might be overkill for a home network, but it is not that hard to learn and very, very flexible!

Zl.
BTW: I am still learning a lot about networking, but I do think I know the basics...

Arch Linux

#1 2009-07-13 12:37:01

Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

#2 2009-07-13 12:55:30

Re: Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

#3 2009-07-13 13:25:52

Re: Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

#4 2009-07-13 22:46:00

Re: Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

#5 2009-07-15 09:56:24

Re: Server and Network Setup Plan - Does this plan sound good and decent??

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