[NTLUG:Discuss] NTLUG workshops

[Burton Strauss III]

Oddly, I meant what I said.  I kicked the box @ 1st Saturday and asked the
vendor what it - 7U rack mount - was.  He said "A server".  Well, d'oh.  So
I asked what he wanted for it, he asked what I would pay, I said $20 and he
took it.

Until I got it's 75lbs self home, no clue if it would even power up or what
was inside.

Imagine MY surprise when it had dual unlocked 3.2GHz P4s, 2GB of RAM and
dual 73GB SCSI drives. The only problem is that I can't update the BIOS as
it's not a normal platform.


The other box is a Q6600 (2.4GHz quad core) with 8GB of ram. That's not a
$20 CPU, but quad core is a really nice combo for an ESXi box as you can
setup a LOT of 2GB/2CPU VMs and run them as needed/desired.  You can also
setup little tiny service machines throttle back to almost no CPU.  I run a
ntp server I used to have throttled back to 125MHz.  It's not supposed to
work (virtualized ntp), but as long as there is available CPU when it's
slice comes up, it does work great.  I just have to remember to unthrottle
it for OS updates - or it will take 4 days... I used to run my firewall in
about 250Mhz.




But, to bring it back full circle, neither of those are really normal boxes
for playing with ESXi. Your other point is a good one - you don't HAVE to
spend $700+ for playing @ home.  But our point is that it's not like normal
Linux, where we all assume any old piece of kit lying around will work. You
may have better luck with that older MB and dual core CPU than with the
latest & greatest.  Stuff that's a generation behind as of the release of
ESXi v4 is good - because while they may not have tested your particular
off-brand thingy, they probably did test the Dell/HP version with the same
chip...

But we often think of our Linux box as 'free' because we repurpose older
hardware.  That's not - necessarily - going to work here.  Depending on what
you want to do with it - that's the caution on drives.  If you are going to
play for a couple of weekends and then move on to some other project - by
all means any drive will do.  If you are going to install a home server for
backups and sharing media around the house, something that will run 24x7,
then enterprise class RAID drives are a better choice.  Doesn't have to be a
LOT of $ - MicroCenter often has the Samsung 105s both RAID and non-RAID
versions under $100. But not the used $5 1st Saturday special either.

The reason I'm carping is that that "generation behind" concept was true for
v3 and v3.5 but not for v4.  I had the same unpleasant surprise as many,
many people, when I upgraded my box and it finished the upgrade and then
refused to start because I had only a 10/100 NIC.  My fault for not reading
the HCL, but ... <whine>it's a play box</whine>.  Luckily I was able to fix
it for $30 mail order (but only after fruitless visits to WorstLie, 3 Office
supply stores and 2 Fry's)

So the caution: Be willing to spend a few $ or be willing to walk away.

That said, it's a great toy.  Especially for people who can't pass up
installing the newest distro to "see what it looks like".

-----Burton









-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces at ntlug.org [mailto:discuss-bounces at ntlug.org] On Behalf
Of Ralph Green
Sent: Sunday, March 27, 2011 3:03 AM
To: NTLUG Discussion List
Subject: Re: [NTLUG:Discuss] NTLUG workshops

On Sat, 2011-03-26 at 12:13 -0700, Burton Strauss III wrote:
> I've built two - one is a Intel Engineering Sample with dual 3.2GHz procs
I
> bought for $20 at 1st Saturday. The other is an ordinary quad-core. Both
> have been really stable (except for the disk drive failure, which I can't
> blame on VMware).

I think you mean you bought a CPU for $20 and used it in a system you
used for ESXi.  There are a bunch of other components that matter, too.
Is that right, or did you get a used server really cheap?



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