Server for office - totally lost

[LagMonkey]

Budget (including currency): ~$10,000 - $20,000

Country: USA

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: eClinicalWorks (EMR), and as a NAS

Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc): 

 

Currently have a Dell system, a Server PET320 with a Xeon E5-2430 0 @ 2.2GHz, but performance has been slow and we're running out of our slow, hard drive ROM storage. I went to look at pricing to add more and make is solid-state, and it's $6000 to replace our four 600GB drives with Dell's SAS 2Tb SSD drives.  This pricing seemed extortionate considering current NVME SSD pricing (2Tb Samsung 980 Pro is $360 USD), especially since we'll likely need more space in the future.  Now, 100% of my server experience comes from LTT videos so it's definitely limited, but those server-related episodes don't show anything like this magnitude of price difference. With the rise of 10GB networking, modern EPYC processors, and the fact that our current server sits as a tower on the floor surrounded by various tech boxes and wires, I wanted to price out a capable modern server rack that can be more easily upgraded in the future with more storage and RAM and anything else as needed. I just don't know where to even begin to start in terms of looking for these kinds of server things.

[Dedayog]

For that budget, I'd call a dedicated IT Service.  I am sure some here do that as well, so no harm.  But you may get a lot of mish mash answers and suggestions vs a cohesive build.

[LagMonkey]

5 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

For that budget, I'd call a dedicated IT Service.  I am sure some here do that as well, so no harm.  But you may get a lot of mish mash answers and suggestions vs a cohesive build.

Thanks. It may be a bit weird to think this way, but I kind of want a mish mash of answers and suggestions. I know that I don't know a lot of things, and I want to learn about what's normal/expected before I talk to anyone who'd be taking my money.

[Sprawlie]

Entirely doable I believe at that price range

 

Are you looking more for a NAS that will have an “easy” web GUI and is mostly hands off, or are you looking to have a server itself that you manage everything yourself including the base OS?

 

I also want to add: IF you want enterprise grade hardware, you cannot compare it to consumer class prices. Enterprise sales and devices tend to be very different overall, and there are reasons why they are more expensive.

 

 

[LagMonkey]

11 minutes ago, Sprawlie said:

Entirely doable I believe at that price range

 

Are you looking more for a NAS that will have an “easy” web GUI and is mostly hands off, or are you looking to have a server itself that you manage everything yourself including the base OS?

 

I also want to add: IF you want enterprise grade hardware, you cannot compare it to consumer class prices. Enterprise sales and devices tend to be very different overall, and there are reasons why they are more expensive.

 

 

Mostly as a NAS. I have 16 other computers throughout the office with their own OS, but I want all data stored on the server.  The PCs also have local versions of the software they use: email client, Microsoft Office, ect. The two main server software are eClinical and Olympus, which deal with medical records. The records are kept on the server computer, and accessed by the user computers when needed. I have Cat6 running to all the computers, and a network switch that connects all those to my current server.

 

In terms of the software on the server itself, currently I have Windows Server 2016 which works well enough.

[Sprawlie]

1 minute ago, LagMonkey said:

Mostly as a NAS. I have 16 other computers throughout the office with their own OS, but I want all data stored on the server.  The PCs also have local versions of the software they use: email client, Microsoft Office, ect. The two main server software are eClinical and Olympus, which deal with medical records. The records are kept on the server computer, and accessed by the user computers when needed. I have Cat6 running to all the computers, and a network switch that connects all those to my current server.

 

In terms of the software on the server itself, currently I have Windows Server 2016 which works well enough.

Sorry, wasn’t clear in my quesiton.

 

are you looking for

 

Something without an OS, so you have to install whatever OS, hypervisor, and manage sharing yourself (Similar to windows server you have)

 

or something you can just sign into a web UI, create a share and have your users drop files onto. 

 

I believe both are doable for your budget, however, there may be limitations. 10gb networking might not be in the cards, nor NVME based storage (depending on how much you really want, server grade NVME is ridiculously pricey)

 

if you’re looking for the second option, you can go for a QNAP rack mount unit. Many are x86 based (Intel) that can add RAM and Network cards later though so you have options. With a good drive setup, you should have more than enough drive space and bandwidth for a small office.

 

I have a couple QNAP’s (about 5 years old so newer ones would be faster). they’re outfitted with 8x 10TB Seagate IronWolf NAS Drives in RAID 5.

 

Nightly replication of my backups between the two QNAPs run at about 350 to 400 MB/s on my 10gbps network.

[LagMonkey]

32 minutes ago, Sprawlie said:

Sorry, wasn’t clear in my quesiton.

 

are you looking for

 

Something without an OS, so you have to install whatever OS, hypervisor, and manage sharing yourself (Similar to windows server you have)

 

or something you can just sign into a web UI, create a share and have your users drop files onto. 

 

I believe both are doable for your budget, however, there may be limitations. 10gb networking might not be in the cards, nor NVME based storage (depending on how much you really want, server grade NVME is ridiculously pricey)

 

if you’re looking for the second option, you can go for a QNAP rack mount unit. Many are x86 based (Intel) that can add RAM and Network cards later though so you have options. With a good drive setup, you should have more than enough drive space and bandwidth for a small office.

 

I have a couple QNAP’s (about 5 years old so newer ones would be faster). they’re outfitted with 8x 10TB Seagate IronWolf NAS Drives in RAID 5.

 

Nightly replication of my backups between the two QNAPs run at about 350 to 400 MB/s on my 10gbps network.

I really appreciate your help.

 

The only limitation is that files on the server need a file path (e.g. "H:\Test Folder\Inbox"), since the EMR software will be looking for one. I'm not sure if a web GUI would have any impact on that part, but to the user computers it needs to show up just like another drive.  I'm looking for an end usable capacity of ~4 to 8tb.  The only files that use a lot of space are the Olympus ones, and that amounts to 600 GB in 5 years.  The only reason I'm having storage issues is that the starting capacity was so low, at just 1 tb (4 x 600GB in I think RAID 5). In terms of prioritization, after security, snappy storage is way more important than excessively plentiful storage for my use case.

[Sprawlie]

I've come back and re-thought this based on what you've said. I don't think the NAS is what you're looking for. As you've said now you are looking to run the EMR  database on the share, plus capacity isn't your goal (8tb would be cheap to build today)

 

Let me rethink what I've recommended. As you've said here, you don't need a lot, you just need FAST.

 

A couple things to keep in mind: Almost all your endpoints are likely only going to be connected via 1gbps. this is going to be your primary bottleneck for accessing the files. not your hard drives. Even spinning hard drives in an array will saturate 1gbps fairly easily. if you're going to be running a database for example, you'll want to run it locally on the server itself. 

 

A NAS like a QNAP can still do this, but if you're looking fro a lot more controls over whats running, and shares, than a server with your own OS is probably best (I'm a linux person myself and would recommend that)

 

Since you're looking mostly for fast storage and running some lower power DB's, there are decent server options that'll probably fit whtin your budget. 

 

Just did a quick build that maybe you'll find useful. 

 

For this build, I went with a 2u rack case for you for more drive space in the main chassis instead of needing to buy an additional storage chassis or SAN.

 

A PowerEdge R7515 Rack Server with a single CPU socket is a good starting platform. This chassis lets you choose either 8 or 12 3.5" drive option, or a 24 x 2.5" drive option. 

 

Add TPM2.0 option. since this is your fileserver, you'll probably want to encrypt it with the best encryption available. TPM2 is the latest and required for WIn11 (if thats in the roadmap for you)

 

The default option here includes the EPYC 7313P @ 3.0Ghz (16c/32t 155w). which is likely more than enough for your use.

 

I upgraded the RAM to 16gb RDIM, dual rank, ECC.

 

Added the C23 RAID 5 option. HOWEVER, we can discuss this after, I'm curious what kind of database you think is running your stuff. because you don't want to run databases on Raid 5. But if it's just file store, it's fine.

 

I opted for 6 x 1.92TB  SATA (SAS drives increase price dramatically, and you don't really need it for your described use) read focused. My recommended configuration would be 6 of those drives in a RAID5. You've have 9.6GB of fast SATA based SSD. No real write gains, but read speed performance will be faster than your endpoints networking. But this could easily be setup as RAID10 as well. better performance, but less space. You can also buy 2 more of these drives now and setup them as "hot spares" in case of failures.

 

Added a Dual 10gbe SFP+ network card.

 

Dual Hotplug redundant powersupply 750w for this build.

 

Dell Price Including Warranty and support: 16,105.67 CAD$

 

 

there are a few thing that could also be upgraded if you have more budget. For example, this chassis is SATA only for the drives. There are other more expensive chassis that will support SAS drives, but SAS and it's drives will dramatically drive up the price point here. And I don't think the load you're describing warrants going for such a full blown performance crown. (For example, I paid about $100,000 for 70TB of mixed Tiered SAS drives in a SAN controller for VM performance. Not what I believe you are looking for)

 

 

Sorry I can't save the build I did. Dell's website is really bad and broken. It was complaining that doing a build with 9 of the same drives doesn't meet the requirements of RAID5's "minimum 3 of the same drive"... so, Dell needs to hire better programmers who know what a computer is.

 

Either way, I think a build LIKE this will meet your requirements. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[LagMonkey]

23 hours ago, Sprawlie said:

Almost all your endpoints are likely only going to be connected via 1gbps. this is going to be your primary bottleneck for accessing the files. not your hard drives. Even spinning hard drives in an array will saturate 1gbps fairly easily.

You're right, I didn't really think of this. And we probably won't be changing this anytime soon.

 

23 hours ago, Sprawlie said:

For this build, I went with a 2u rack case for you for more drive space in the main chassis instead of needing to buy an additional storage chassis or SAN.

A PowerEdge R7515 Rack Server with a single CPU socket is a good starting platform. This chassis lets you choose either 8 or 12 3.5" drive option, or a 24 x 2.5" drive option.

Add TPM2.0 option. since this is your fileserver, you'll probably want to encrypt it with the best encryption available. TPM2 is the latest and required for WIn11 (if thats in the roadmap for you)

The default option here includes the EPYC 7313P @ 3.0Ghz (16c/32t 155w). which is likely more than enough for your use.

I upgraded the RAM to 16gb RDIM, dual rank, ECC.

This all seems great, thanks for really thinking about it.

Is that 16GB RAM total for the system?  We're running 80GB DDR3 1600mHz right now, but I don't know if we have anything that relies on having that much or not. Also is there any benefit to the slower LRDIMMs, or am I better off with the faster RDIMMs?

 

On 8/18/2021 at 8:55 AM, Sprawlie said:

Added the C23 RAID 5 option. HOWEVER, we can discuss this after, I'm curious what kind of database you think is running your stuff. because you don't want to run databases on Raid 5. But if it's just file store, it's fine.

I'll confess I don't know much about RAID, other than striped vs mirrored. I know right now we can handle a single drive failure, and we have four drives.  If RAID 10 is better, that's perfect. Also if there's no realized benefit to SAS vs SATA, cost savings are always welcome. That would be then the 24x2.5", right?

 

On 8/18/2021 at 8:55 AM, Sprawlie said:

Added a Dual 10gbe SFP+ network card.

Dual Hotplug redundant powersupply 750w for this build.

This would connect with our network switch, which would split it towards the 1GB Ethernet lines going to the user computers, right? The network switch we have currently is a Netgear 24-port, and it doesn't have a SFP+ connector. Should we upgrade the switch as well?

The redundant hot-plug power supply is absolutely essential, glad you included that.

On 8/18/2021 at 8:55 AM, Sprawlie said:

a server with your own OS is probably best (I'm a linux person myself and would recommend that)

I'm seeing Is there a way to transfer our current Windows 2016 Server license from the old server to this one? I'm seeing a lot of options regarding Windows Server 2019 at $0 with reassign; I assume this is related?  With a Linux-based server OS, would I still be able to run Windows RDP to connect to the server remotely? This latter feature is essential as I use it all the time.

 

This is how I have it configured so far. I haven't done anything with the software parts yet.

 

https://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop/pdr/poweredge-r7515/pe_r7515_13734a_vi_vp?selectionState=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%3D%3D&cartItemId=e5b4af5d-8847-4635-8b19-0c97e76608de

 

Really appreciate your help here.

[Sprawlie]

No Problem, I actually do this stuff for a living and still enjoy system building and design. With my current budget of 0 at work, I don't have the opportunity to do it anymore that much.

 

Going to put some answers below

 

Quote

Is that 16GB RAM total for the system?  We're running 80GB DDR3 1600mHz right now, but I don't know if we have anything that relies on having that much or not. 

the build I did was just 16gb total. If you have the requirements for more, than it'll have to be adjusted. While your current system has 80gb, I think its important to go look at the actual utilization. if your capacity planning only requires a little, than over-doing RAM is someplace you can save some money. However I don't believe RAM upgrades are going to be the biggest cost addition.

 

Quote

 Also is there any benefit to the slower LRDIMMs, or am I better off with the faster RDIMMs?

Goign to depend what you're doing really and what sort of power / RAM utilization is actually going on. My recommendations when using Server RAM, is that unless you're going for the absolute highest in performance, where performance equals profit/dollars. Get the most stable, ECC Supported memory as data safety and avoiding corruption is likely more important than a few ms of performance.

 

Quote

I'll confess I don't know much about RAID, other than striped vs mirrored. I know right now we can handle a single drive failure, and we have four drives.  If RAID 10 is better, that's perfect. Also if there's no realized benefit to SAS vs SATA, cost savings are always welcome. That would be then the 24x2.5", right?

If you understand the basics of data mirroring/striping than you have enough information to understand the differences honestly. 

 

Just a little simple summary of the most common:

 

Raid 1: Mirroring of drives. you can lose one side of the mirror without data loss. However, there is no space savings as you only get the capacity of half the drives.

 

RAID 0: Striping only. Spreads the load accross the drives. No redundancy. You get the total capacity of all the drives. There is performance gains that are dependant on number of drives.

 

RAID 10: Combinations of RAID0 and RAID1. eg, 4 drives in two pairs. each pair is a raid 0 array for performance, but it's mirrored to another RAID0 aray for redundancy.

 

RAID 5: Striping accross 3+ drives with redundancy. example, in a 3 drive setup, you get the space capacity of 2 of the drives, and the parity information is written accross all 3 but balanced out. you can lose one drive wihtout data loss.

 

Each has slightly different caveats in use. For example, RAID5 is horrible for database use due to the extra time required to write the parity to numerous parity drives. Where in the RAID1, 0, or 10, it's not done the same.

 

Quote

This would connect with our network switch, which would split it towards the 1GB Ethernet lines going to the user computers, right? The network switch we have currently is a Netgear 24-port, and it doesn't have a SFP+ connector. Should we upgrade the switch as well?

 

Yes, you'll need a new switch that has a compatible port setup, and in this case at least 1 SFP+ port that supports 10gbps+ (there are also variants that support 25gb or 40gb. And while many will support all, i have ran into some problems with some switches that need special modules to work).

 

Given your users are still 1gbps though, you don't need a switch that's all SFP+. you can get a pretty standard set of switches that'll feature numerous 1gbps Ethernet, but have 2,4 or 6 SFP+ ports as well (for misc things like this, or trunking between other network equip)

 

Another thing to keep in mind is uptime. if you're looking to maintain a high level of uptime, than redundancy in the server alone isn't enough. You'll probably want 2 x switches that support MPIO and HA fail over (thats why a lot of the 10gbps enterprise server cards are 2 x ports instead of just 1)

 

 

Quote

I'm seeing Is there a way to transfer our current Windows 2016 Server license from the old server to this one? I'm seeing a lot of options regarding Windows Server 2019 at $0 with reassign; I assume this is related?

Can't answer this unfortunately. I hate microsoft licensing and i leave that to one of my consultants to figure out for me lol

 

Quote

With a Linux-based server OS, would I still be able to run Windows RDP to connect to the server remotely? This latter feature is essential as I use it all the time.

Yes, 100% absolutely with numerous different options. if you install a GUI on linux, you can install a few different 'host' protocols to allow remote access. The typical/popular one for linux admins is some sort of VNC based connectivity. However, XRDP protocol can also be installed to leverage microsoft RDP clients and services as well.

 

I personally don't install a GUI on my servers as I feel it's a waste of resources. With Linux, you can also have direct SSH based CLI access. Which most system admins will tell yo is really all they use.