[ale] Recommendation for off-line storage?

[Dow_Hurst]

Your idea of large IDE or SATA drives sounds good, but why not set up a system with lots of storage capacity in Linux software RAID 5?  Use decent 5yr warranty server drives and let it run.  If you really don't want to run them continuously then put the data there and unplug the drives.  I would not remove them from the chassis either.  Just label the slot carefully and keep a notebook for the machine.

I'm building up a backup server with a 3ware 8 port card right now.  I have 7x400Gb WD drives for the data.  I'll use all 7 and monitor the drives with smartd via the 3ware daemon.  I believe I'll run SUSE 9.3 for now.  Not sure of any reason to go to the cutting edge on this machine.  That will give us ~3Tb.  We spent about $2600 so far.
Dow


-----Original Message-----
>From: Allan Metts <ametts2 at mindspring.com>
>Sent: May 10, 2006 3:31 PM
>To: ale at ale.org
>Subject: [ale] Recommendation for off-line storage?
>
>Hi everyone,
>
>I have several hundred Gigabytes of data that's in my way.  I need to keep it, but I don't need regular access to it.  More data is coming in now that will eventually need the same treatment.
>
>So I'm looking for a good solution for off-line data storage.  Here's what I'm looking for:
>
>--*-- Rack-mountable
>
>--*-- Non-proprietary hardware, no special "backup" software
>
>--*-- Supports Linux distributions.  I choose which one.
>
>--*-- Uses readily-available and inexpensive IDE drives.
>
>--*-- Easy to set up and administer.  We have no time to fiddle with this -- I'm thinking 1) mount the drive, 2) copy the files, 3) unmount the drive, 4) remove and replace the drive.  The machine still needs to work when I pop in an unformatted or unrecognized drive.
>
>--*-- Hot-pluggable drives would be nice if it doesn't make things complicated.  I'm willing to power down the machine to swap the drives if need be.
>
>
>I think what I'm looking for is a bare-bones rackable server, with an internal IDE drive to boot Linux, a CD-ROM drive to install Linux, and two removable drive bays that I can dump the data to.
>
>Suggestions?  Recommendations?
>
>
>Best Regards,
>
>Allan Metts, VP -- Technology & Operations
>AirSage, Inc.
>ametts at airsage.com
>(404) 861-3404
>
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