Re: Opinion: Dell PwrEdge/Xeon/RH 8.0 server

[rhema <rhema tampabay rr com>]

I have two similar systems (they are 4400s).  I'm running both systems
with the following setup on my PERC card.

All drives are hot swap and hardware RAID configured.  My PERC has 2
internal channels and 1 external.

Both have two drives configured as hardware RAID 1(these are the two
drives that are located behind the drop down door where you access the
floppy and cdrom drives).  These are located on channel 0.  These drives
have just what is needed to boot the box, no apps or data.  I also keep
a second install here, just in case.

Both have the remaining 8 drives located in the lower hot swap section
configured as hardware RAID 5 using a 1 of the drives as a hot spare. 
These are located on channel 1.  These drives are where I install apps
and store data.

The PERC cards are Dell versions of the AMI MegaRAID cards (at least I
think thats what were last time I checked).

Both boxes work fine, and this June they will be getting upgraded from
NT 4.0 to Red Hat Advanced Server.  Dell indicated that I could get Red
Hat when I purchased them, so my upgrade should go well.

The rest of the box is dual PIII Xeon w/ 2GB Ram and dual 10/100 NICs.
Can't complain about the hardware, OS maybe, but not the hardware.

John