Server for File Storage & Sharing

[MasonV]

Alright, so essentially imagine a note sharing database with up to 2000 students using it any given time. I don't imagine all would use it, my guess is that once it reaches full utilization you may see it get up to 300-500 people using it any given year. And yes, this is a long term plan. However, when people do use it I imagine they'll be downloading tonnes and tonnes of notes. 

 

Does anyone have any experience with building/renting a setup for this type of purpose as  I can't even think of the possible speks required for it. Obviously bandwidth speed will be a huge issue, and it'd probably require a good chunk of bandwidth. However beyond that and perhaps stating that the storage probably wouldn't exceed a couple TB (I have ~800 pdfs, word documents, excel files which are about 1 GB, and I doubt people will upload millions of files) of storage for everything I really have no idea what the CPU or ram requirements would be for this sort of thing. 

 

Any insight you could provide will be great.

[gylmir]

What is your budget?

 

if you have the right connection speed and bandwidth you can go with this setup.

it will handle 500 to 2K people easy normaly

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2620 V3 2.4GHz 6-Core Processor  ($519.99 @ Memory Express)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($26.79 @ DirectCanada)
Motherboard: MSI X99S SLI Plus ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($246.61 @ DirectCanada)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($259.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($259.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)
Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)
Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)
Case: Thermaltake VL80001W2Z ATX Mid Tower Case  ($34.99 @ NCIX)
Power Supply: Thermaltake 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($69.50 @ Vuugo)
Wired Network Adapter: Intel EXPI9404PTL 10/100/1000 Mbps PCI-Express x4 Network Adapter  ($181.98 @ Amazon Canada)
Total: $2202.67
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-03 19:06 EDT-0400

 

website ask around 400$ each month for things like this so you will benefit from it in les then a year.

[MasonV]

What is your budget?

 

if you have the right connection speed and bandwidth you can go with this setup.

it will handle 500 to 2K people easy normaly

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2620 V3 2.4GHz 6-Core Processor  ($519.99 @ Memory Express)

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($26.79 @ DirectCanada)

Motherboard: MSI X99S SLI Plus ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($246.61 @ DirectCanada)

Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($259.98 @ Newegg Canada)

Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($259.98 @ Newegg Canada)

Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)

Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)

Storage: Western Digital Red Pro 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($200.95 @ Vuugo)

Case: Thermaltake VL80001W2Z ATX Mid Tower Case  ($34.99 @ NCIX)

Power Supply: Thermaltake 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($69.50 @ Vuugo)

Wired Network Adapter: Intel EXPI9404PTL 10/100/1000 Mbps PCI-Express x4 Network Adapter  ($181.98 @ Amazon Canada)

Total: $2202.67

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-03 19:06 EDT-0400

 

website ask around 400$ each month for things like this so you will benefit from it in les then a year.

Thanks, can you explain the reasoning for the parts?

[gylmir]

@MasonV yes i can tell you the reason.

 

CPU: every cpu can be used for servers but the xeon are specially made for that purpose and will handle it much better also it has more features for server to.

RAM: it all comes to handling traffic and process the packages it gets most will run from 32 up to 512GB ram depends on the needs. ddr4 is new but increase the performance a lot so 32gb will handle the needs easy. you don't want to slow down the server when 50 people are trying to get the same file (same Principe for the cpu).

 

i went with 3 hard drives don't know how much file size you have in total but this is will do the trick if you have the  money to expand then i would go for a raid 5 config and an ssd of 60gb to cache the raid 5 then you will get high performance from the server with the good security of not losing data when a drive fails or crashes.

 

i added 4 extra ethernet ports for getting higher connection speeds to your server. because it will not help to get the uber parts and not be able to transfer the files quick enough over the wire so with the 4 ports extra you will be able to get easy around 300 to 500mb/s transfer.

 

hope this info will help you you can also search google for more info about the parts with terms like "e5 good for server" and "best hdd config for server"

[MasonV]

Alright thanks for your help, although I think you're overestimating the usage a bit more than needed  

[gylmir]

Alright thanks for your help, although I think you're overestimating the usage a bit more than needed

you can always back them a few tiers if you want or start with 16gb ram since you can always add more or less hdd drives if you don't need that much or just a raid 1 for security.

 

the options are endless and always pick parts where you can upgrade easy with not much money thats the best option if you need more.