Build server recommendations

[Ughmahedhurtz]

Hi, folks. Since inheriting the engineering IT manager slot (in addition to being the entire QA team.../grumble), I'm the default go-to for just about anything PC related. It's been a while since I've looked at full-up RAID-5 capable systems and figured I would check with you guys for hardware recommendations. It'll be a linux server (probably Mint 15 or 16) running a pretty basic distributed build script for a linux-based embedded app, so no fancy graphics or SSDs or anything strange going on with regards to package support. I'm mainly interested in the choices of enclosure, RAID controller/drives and motherboard/processor that are more geared toward high reliability rather than outright performance.

If nothing else, a good basic list of Stupid Shit To Avoid(tm) would be extremely helpful. I know some of you have pretty broad experience with current PC hardware and y'all are about the most honest bunch on the interwebz.

Thanks,
John

[Starbuck_Jones]

Need more information honestly. Budget for one, and what kind of workload this server is going to provide. If you're just looking for storage and redundancy options there are a lot of newer options. The old RAID 5, 50, 5+1 types of setups are outdated.

Ive heard nothing but good things about Synology NAS products.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

A build is running right now.

Tasks: 418 total,   8 running, 410 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu0  : 79.8%us,  5.3%sy,  0.0%ni, 14.9%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu1  : 89.4%us,  7.0%sy,  0.0%ni,  3.7%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu2  : 79.7%us,  3.7%sy,  0.0%ni, 16.6%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu3  : 67.3%us,  6.6%sy,  0.0%ni, 26.1%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu4  : 93.7%us,  4.6%sy,  0.0%ni,  1.7%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu5  : 92.7%us,  4.6%sy,  0.0%ni,  2.6%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu6  : 87.8%us,  5.3%sy,  0.0%ni,  6.9%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Cpu7  : 87.8%us,  7.3%sy,  0.0%ni,  5.0%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Mem:  12392320k total,  6367416k used,  6024904k free,   365332k buffers
Swap:  6385796k total,     5832k used,  6379964k free,  4937640k cached

[MiRai]

This stuff is definitely out of my league.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

It's running a pretty basic multi-process gcc compile (typically about 10-20 concurrent build processes) that builds a bunch of MIPS-based linux utilities (busybox, curl, opera, webkit, various linux libraries). Also builds an embedded linux OS+kernels. Then copies/compresses all that into an install file for each of about 8 platforms.

Budget is probably $5-7k.

As an example, we're currently running a 12GB tower with a quad core Intel i7-975 X58/ICH10R and a 3ware 9650SE-4LPML 256MB controller, and that takes about 4.5 hours to build everything.

Current thoughts are:
Intel Xeon E5-2687W 8-core
Intel PCI-E 2.0x8 RAID (RT3WB080)
Intel DBS2600CP2 motherboard
4GBx8 1600 (or 8GBx4, will have to find some on the MB's compat list)

[RSM72]

I'd probably go for a dual SSD build and have the SSDs Raid-1 mirrored for reliability. Probably 2x SSD for system and 2x HDD for your sourcecode depending on the size. Move most stuff to a rack mounted 12-bay NAS (even if you dont use all bays in the beginning) for archival. If you can afford and your network supports it go 10G instead of 1G.

8-core Xeon and 32GB of memory is good to go.

Go with a customized build by a vendor (eg. Dell or HP) instead of building the server on your own, put a care pack on it for 3 years just for 24x7 protection and replacement of failed hardware.

[Bradster]

sinology with a 4 network link aggregation is freaking amazing. Wish I had one for archives!