> If I was to go with a 3ware setup $~1000 for a 4 port controller and 4 drive > cage, do you have any recommendations on servers to put it in?
For 6 client machines, a 3ware would be in the "nice to have" but not in the "necessary" basket, IMHO. Is there a specific reason why a Linux software raid 1 isn't good enough? Modern mobos have 4 SATA connectors. If you wanted to show a Linux price advantage, this would really give you points. RAID protects you against disk failures, but it's not a backup or protection against the filesystem getting damaged because of faulty software or a beserk box after a medium-distance lightning strike (yes I've seen the latter on a Linux server with RAID 1). Btw if you're thinking of carting the backup USB disks around, you might want to think about encrypting them. Personally I'd forget about tape backups, unless you're getting closer to a TB of backup volume. Volker -- Volker Kuhlmann is list0570 with the domain in header http://volker.dnsalias.net/ Please do not CC list postings to me.
