[ale] Source for Inexpensive, Quiet, Low-Power, rackmount server?

[Derek Atkins]

On Tue, October 16, 2012 6:25 pm, mike at trausch.us wrote:
> On 10/16/2012 11:52 AM, Derek Atkins wrote:
>> I'm looking to offload my MySQL server off my MythTV hardware and onto
>> its own server box.  This instance of MySQL handles not only MythTV data
>> but also my Maia Mailguard, Zarafa, Gallery, and possibly other
>> services.
>>
>> I was considering an Atom-based 1U or 2U server.  Do you think this
>> would be "powerful enough" for this application?  I'm not really sure
>> how much CPU I would need, nor how well MySQL would run in this
>> environment.
>
> I think that even an older system (or a smaller one, like an RPi) might
> actually work for you here.  As long as you have sufficient storage for
> the database, that is.

The new 512M RPi might be interesting, except Fedora is still
experimental.  But yes, I am defnitely thinking of ARM boxes for some of
my other services down the road.

And sure, an older system would probably work, but I am having trouble
finding one.  Also, many older systems are more power hungry, so I'd
rather get a more modern, less-wattage system, even if it's "overkill". 
Moreover, I suspect many of those older systems scream like a banshee,
whereas I'm looking for something relatively quiet.

> MySQL doesn't require a lot of CPU to do most of its things, unless
> you're doing very complex queries (and if you're doing that, then you
> shouldn't be using MySQL in the first place, IMHO).

# du -skh /var/lib/mysql
665M	/var/lib/mysql

I don't know how complicated the MythTV queries are.  I do know that some
of the scheduling queries can take multiple seconds to run.

>> I'd like something relatively quiet because it's living in my house, not
>> in some rackspace machine room. I'd prefer to have 8GB of ram but all
>> the Atom boxes I've found seem to max out at 4 (although I can aquire
>> one for about $450 with an D2500HN Atom Dual Core 1.86GHz/4GB/160GB
>> 5400RPM).
>
> I don't have a single MySQL database server with that much RAM.  Most of
> the systems I have deployed are for legacy systems, but I don't even
> need to give PostgreSQL that much in the way of resources to get the
> performance that I want out of my applications, which pleases me a
> decent amount.  For something like a TV database I'd expect that 256M or
> 512M would work just fine.  All the production databases that I manage
> take up < 2 GB on disk, and work nicely in 512M and 768M Xen DomU
> instances.

I do have another MySQL DB instance that's using 3.2GB of disk space, and
I might migrate that database over to my dedicated server once I build it.
 The new RPi only has 512M of RAM so clearly it wouldn't suffice for the
larger database(s).

Part of the goal is to separate it from the MythTV spinning disks and
remove the load from that system.

>> Has anyone found any good sources for inexpensive servers?
>>
>> I was also considering an SSD for this application.  Do you experts feel
>> that would help my application speeds?
>
> BSD vs. Linux is more about footprint than raw speed.  Applications run
> very similarly on both, IME.  I tend to use BSD when I have very small
> things, or very old hardware, because it really shines there.

Note I said SSD, not BSD.  Thinking about a Solid State Disk (versus
spinning disk).  Any comments?

Thanks!

> 	--- Mike

-derek
-- 
       Derek Atkins                 617-623-3745
       derek at ihtfp.com             www.ihtfp.com
       Computer and Internet Security Consultant