Re: couple of things...

["Mike A. Harris" <mharris opensourceadvocate org>]

On Fri, 29 Jun 2001, Jason Montleon wrote:

(Your right margin is about 10 feet long.  ;o)

>Here is what I want to do: Add the two 8GB drives (so that all
>three [same model] 8GB hard drives are on one IDE controller)
>and create a software RAID.  The idea is to use this for
>everything but the data on the 28GB drive.  This would give me
>a form of redundancy for the rest of the system without having
>to necessarily back it up to tape.  At this point I would
>remove the 2.5 GB drive, but keep the 28 GB for data storage
>(this I would back up using the tape drive.)

Yep, RAID works well in Linux.  If you're using IDE though you
need to put one drive per cable.  IDE disks can only be accessed
one at a time, and since RAID accesses all drives simultaneously,
there are no speed gains achieved by putting 2 drives on one
cable.  In fact it would slow down access due to RAID overhead,
etc.  You really need one drive per channel.  IDE cards are dirt
cheap.

>Naturally if possible I would like to keep the IDE CD-ROM drive
>and add an IDE CD-R.  And don't forget the tape drive.

You'll need to put those CDROM's and other IDE devices on their
own separate controllers also.  Of course you can put 2 drives
per channel on those.

>So my questions are these:

>Does anyone have experience using two IDE devices in a Linux
>computer (and especially a RedHat 7.1) computer?

Yes.

>Are there any special problems that you run into trying to do
>this?

Yes.  The above one drive per cable for software RAID is a must.
Not doing so shouldn't break anything, but it wont give any
benefits either except ammassing all the space into one spot.

>What kind of power supply am I going to need for 7 devices (300
>watt? 400 watt?)

I would put a 400 watt supply in.  300 will run ok, but will be
much hotter and much more susceptible to failure.  You will
DEFINITELY want to put space between the drives and use a large
tower case, with extra cooling fans also.

>Regarding the CD-R this system is a P90-166 MHz (not even sure)
>with 48 MB RAM.  It runs great for what it does (sit there and
>act as a server with no GUI running) but I'm worried that this
>thing is going to burn more coasters than CD's... anyone have a
>guess?

You can burn CD's on a 486 no problem so a P90+ wont have
difficulty.  Do not use the machine for anything while burning
however, and make sure you do not run any screensaver.  Also make
sure cronjobs do not kick in while burning (ie: 4am).

Since this sounds like an older AT system, doing the above RAID
thing doesn't sound like it would be the best way of
price/performance.  You can get Duron 800's now for a song and a
dance, and memory is dirt cheap.

I recommend you treat yourself to a snazzy new
case/mobo/memory/cpu instead.  Go for software RAID for your
upgrade after that.

Hope this helps you with your decision.
Take care,
TTYL


----------------------------------------------------------------------
    Mike A. Harris  -  Linux advocate  -  Open Source advocate
       Opinions and viewpoints expressed are solely my own.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You know what would be cool?  Not having to press spacebar with your foot
while playing Rush'n'Attack on the Commodore 64.