* Jim McCloskey ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) spake thusly: ...> > I've never had to buy a server before. I'd really appreciate some > advice from you wise ones about what kind of hardware you would advise > for a task like this, and where you would go to get it.
Web/mail server will be i/o bound, so you don't care that much about CPU. I'd go for a Pentium & a decent (Asus, Tyan, Gigabyte) mobo with Intel chipset -- I've seen quite a few complaints about non-Intel chipsets and CPUs on kernel mailing list. Preferrably one without AGP and on-board video/sound/anything. You want to speed up i/o, so go for SCSI (check hardware-howto and kernel docs, or maybe ask on c.o.l.hardware which card to buy) discs and a lot of RAM (ECC, if they still make it). Vortex (3c905) NICs work fine here. A decent case with 400-450W PSU and fans in front of disc bays. Oh, and a cheap video card. As for where to get it, I dunno. We usually order hardware through uni's computer shop, otherwise our purchasing dept. would fsck up the order (you write "Do not change vendors" all over the purchase order, and they go ahead and buy something entirely different because it's .2 bucks cheaper anyway). Dima -- Surely there is a polite way to say FOAD. -- Shmuel Metz "Fornicate Off And Decease". -- Rik Steenwinkel
