These aren't my questions, per se, so much as they need to be YOUR questions. Jeff Steward also gave you a long list of questions, and you attempted to answer them. Here's the thing, this list is not a substitute for the work you need to do yourself. You need to identify your needs, you need to ask and answer your own questions.
We, the list members, have been pushing you in this direction since you started asking around. You're asking us to do your thinking for you, but we cannot do that, we are not in your position and, quite frankly, we have our own problems to solve. If you go back and look at the posts of frequent contributors to this list, you'll see requests from people who are in a jam and need some instant advice because they're stuck on something, or they may have gotten turned around in their research and need to trackback and confirm their understanding. These are the types of things a list is good at solving. Filling in gaps in your skill set or educating you on a broad technology segment is not. We are not in elementary school anymore. We're asking you questions, not because we need to know the answers, but because you need to ask and answer the questions. Note: if someone comes back with a recommendation on doing something you don't know how to do, it isn't really acceptible to say, I don't know how to do X, can you tell me? I would venture to say you should learn to use Google to help fill in your gaps. On Thu, Sep 23, 2010 at 10:58 AM, John Aldrich <jaldr...@blueridgecarpet.com > wrote: > To answer your questions in order: > 1) Failover capability would be very good to have. I need a minimum of two > controllers so that if one fails, at least we can run on the other until we > fix the first. That could also be handled by a dual-controller "head" unit. > So that brings single-node with dumb drive trays back equal with "smart" > trays. > 2) Scalability -- I firmly believe that your data WILL eventually grow to > match available disk space, so I'd like the ability to add space easily. > That being said, either method will work to add space. > > So far, my *MINIMUM* requirements are as follows: > 1) No single point of failure (Redundant power, redundant controllers, > RAID, > redundant Ethernet, etc.) > 2) Approximately 5 Tb of useable disk space (that should give us a little > breathing room once we start redirecting critical folders from users' > desktop machines and add in email) > 3) RAID 5 minimum to help prevent loss of data from drive failures. > 4) Under $30K > 5) Any replication needs to be done on the SAN and not involve software > (such as Backup Exec) on a server. > > Anything more than that is gravy. > > From: Jonathan Link [mailto:jonathan.l...@gmail.com] > Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:33 AM > To: NT System Admin Issues > Subject: Re: SAN question > > I think we have given you the benefit of our knowledge. > Several times even. > > What requirement do you have that would be met by additional controllers? > Failover capability? Scalability? Again, for like the third time, what > are > your requirements, that'll drive your analysis. > On Thu, Sep 23, 2010 at 10:16 AM, John Aldrich > <jaldr...@blueridgecarpet.com> wrote: > Ok, guys. I'm trying to narrow down my many choices with regards to our > on-going search for a SAN manufacturer. I'd like your thoughts on the whole > question of adding more intelligence vs just adding more disks. i.e. the EQ > vs LeftHand models. > > I can see arguments to be made for both models. I'll tell you that, > initially, the SAN is going to be a glorified file server, however, we plan > on hosting our email data store on the SAN when we bring email in-house > later on. I've already verified with the email vendor that I hope to use > that this is not a problem, so that's a non-issue. Other than that, the > only > database we would store on the SAN would possibly be the database from our > Vipre install, although initially that would stay on the local storage. > > So, I'd like to see some discussions of the benefits of just adding a tray > of "dumb drives" or adding a complete controller along with the drives (a > la > LeftHand.) > > I just don't know enough about the benefits of each model to know what > would > work best for us. I'm hoping that you guys who are more experienced would > give me the benefit of your knowledge. > > > > Thanks, > John Aldrich > IT Manager, > Blueridge Carpet > 706-276-2001, Ext. 2233 > > > > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ > ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ > > --- > To manage subscriptions click here: > http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ > or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com > with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ > ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ > > --- > To manage subscriptions click here: > http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ > or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com > with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin > > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ > ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ > > --- > To manage subscriptions click here: > http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ > or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com > with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
