[ale] What are the minimum requirements for a CentOS server to learn on?

[Greg Freemyer]

I'm not sure the RAM overhead of VMs was emphasized.

VMs use require dedicated RAM so it is a major driver.

Lets say you want to have a host and 4 simultaneously running VMs.

I would think 512MB minimum for each, so you need 2.5GB for that.

And if the host is really a desktop machine running
X/KDE/firefox/etc., I'd go with 2GB for the desktop use, and 512MB for
each server VM.

So that's 4GB at a minimum.

And each VM will want 50GB or so minimum of disk, so that's 250GB.

Fortunately RAM and disk are cheaper and cheaper every day.

Also, you did not say anything about RAID setups.  You can start
without it, but a real server should have at least raid1 imho.

You can easily do all of the above for less than $1K.

Greg

On Tue, May 4, 2010 at 5:16 PM, Robert Owen <robeowen at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks for all the suggestions. You all have confirmed what I
> suspected, but I just wanted some support.
>
>
> On Tue, May 4, 2010 at 1:32 PM, Damon L. Chesser <damon at damtek.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, 2010-05-04 at 11:45 -0400, Robert Owen wrote:
>>> Hi, All, I haven't posted to the list in several years, so please
>>> forgive my "lurking" most of the time. My son-in-law is studying at
>>> home for the RHCT exam and wants to know what motherboard and
>>> processor, and minimum amount of memory he needs to set up a server to
>>> learn with. Initially, it will be for a home network, but later, maybe
>>> on . . . ? It must be able to set up virtual servers, too.
>>
>> most any box that will load linux will work in general, now when you
>> talk of virtual machines, then you will need hardware virtualization in
>> the cpu.  Not all boxes sold support that (mfg turn it off in the bios).
>> I purchased a Dell low end tower server, a T105
>> ( http://www.dell.com/us/en/business/servers/pedge_t105/pd.aspx?refid=pedge_t105&s=bsd&cs=04 )
>> for about $250 on some sale.  It does work for centos/RHEL just fine and
>> will do virtualization (KVM) flawlessly.  I run Proxmox VE
>> ( http://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Main_Page ) on it.  This allows me to set
>> up virtual networks and various virtual machines to do what I want
>> (using KVM) with a minimal of configuration.  Proxmox is based off of
>> Debian stable and takes 10 min to install.  Keeps the focus on learning
>> what you want to learn rather then trying to figure out how to run a
>> virutualization product.  If you prefer you could also run VPSs on it as
>> well.
>>
>> HP would have a similar machine for a similar price, I am just not
>> familiar with HP.
>>
>> In short, you don't NEED a server box to run CentOS or RHEL to learn how
>> to be a RHCT, any box would work that will install CentOS.  IF you
>> wanted to run server hardware, the T105 or equivalent would work fine
>> for most any "home" use.  If you add "virtualization", then you can add
>> virtual disks at will and learn complex disk management, you can add
>> NICs and play "network" games at will, etc.  You would not be able to
>> play "games"on a T105 as the graphics are not designed to do that (if
>> that matters).
>>
>> HTH
>>
>>> Thanks for any help given.
>>>
>>> Bob
>>> --
>>> Bob Owen
>>> 770-540-4920
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> Ale at ale.org
>>> http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
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>>
>>
>> --
>> Damon
>> damon at damtek.com
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>
>
>
> --
> Bob Owen
> 770-540-4920
>
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Greg Freemyer
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