\jeff{krimmel}

A Monster Purchase

Now that the file server for our lab’s cluster has been repaired and is running smoothly again, I have undertaken the task of building two new file servers for our lab’s use. The file servers should be designed to be identical (or nearly so), mirror each other (as far as the data storage is concerned), and have RAID-5 arrangements. Kristjan, Ariele, and I took off to Fry’s yesterday to see what we could come up with. The result: $5460.92 worth of file serving heaven. The only component that is different between the two servers is the processor. One has an Athlon 64 3800+; the other has an Athlon 64 3200+ (both socket 939).

I was told before I went to the store that I could have the cashier call campus, get a credit card number from authorized personnel, and the payment would be taken care of. Au contraire. The cashier at Fry’s told me that was not possible; I either had to have a credit card or a physical PO with me. The person on campus who was anticipating receiving the phone call and taking care of the payment offered to drive out to Burbank (where Fry’s is) and do the thing in person. I said that wasn’t necessary and handed the cashier my personal credit card. My limit is high enough that I could absorb the approximately $5500, but the cashier’s computer immediately comes up with a “must contact financial institution” or some such response. The guy tells me that if I was over my limit, he would be seeing “insufficient funds”, so it looked like something a phone call to the bank would solve. The cashier handed me a cordless phone, and as I was waiting for the automated routine to finish telling me my options, my cell phone rings. I pull it out, don’t recognize the number, but answer it anyway. Sure enough it is a lady from MBNA asking me if I was trying to make the purchase. I was, and she authorized it immediately. After I hung up, the cashier mentioned what great customer service that was, the fact that MBNA gave me a call to make sure someone hadn’t swiped my credit card. I hadn’t thought about it, but yes, it was quite good service. I’m glad to know if someone else gets a hold of my card and tries to make a purchase like that I will know within minutes.

As for the equipment, each machine has an Abit AV8 motherboard, 2 GB of PC 3200 Kingston RAM, a GeForce MX 4000 AGP video card, a Sony DVD +/- RW drive, an LSI Logic MegaRAID SATA 150-6 RAID controller, 6 300 GB Seagate SATA hard drives, and a 600 W power supply. Beautiful stuff, if I may so myself. We walked around Fry’s with an absolutely loaded shopping cart, getting some glances and some downright stares along the way. The cart was loaded with two of everything listed above plus two X-Dreamer II cases. One guy even turns around and says, “Man, I wish that was my stuff.” I must admit that I felt a bit proud walking around the store, feeling like a king for a day. A king of geeks, granted, but a king nonetheless.

Kristjan and I sat in the lab for a few hours yesterday afternoon building the systems, and it took a little while to get everything smoothed out enough to boot properly (a RAID controller not plugged in properly here, a flaky IDE cable there). I have spent most of the afternoon test driving the sytems. It turns out some of the RAM is flaky, and the Linux installation routine was dying with kernel panics. It took a little while for me to realize it was the RAM. Also, the RAM doesn’t seat quite as well as I would like in the DIMM slots, but that’s a small complaint. My biggest regret at this point is not getting a motherboard with 64-bit PCI slots. The RAID controller can work in either 32-bit or 64-bit PCI slots, but the Abit AV8 only has 32-bit slots. Something to keep in mind for next time.

The systems will be running Fedora Core 3 for the x86-64 architecture. One of the many things Linux has on Windows is that it (Linux) actually supports 64 bit processors and has for some time. Windows is behind the times here. Oh well, not a concern of mine. The next task is to find where these puppies go and get ITS to help me out with some static IP addresses and hot wall ports. Effort for another day.