Howdy all,

It's been a while since I made a blog post, so here is a small update.

Today I received a package I ordered for some server upgrades and improvements. Since I now have my own flat I wanted to setup my server the way I originally intended - in a proper rack. Given that racks are so expensive however I made my own rack out of wood and attached it to the side of my desk. It doesn't look quite as professional but it does the job great. It is unfinished, but I hope to complete it in the next few days.

To get a server into this rack, I of course needed a rack case, so I found a nice 4U rack case on eBuyer. it just so happened to be their cheapest model too, so I checked out the reviews and they persuaded me to buy it. 4U is pretty huge and this case houses enough space for 7 hard drives and 3 DVD drives, plus a huge motherboard should you need it. It also takes a standard ATX PSU which is a bonus.




Next I was running out of space for the BA backups - the betas that is - so I needed another larger drive. Since 2TB drives are so cheap now (twice the price of a 1TB drive) I decided to get one. This means I can keep all files on one drive making syncronising easier. The current 1.5TB drive will be formatted after copying and used for something else.



My next part of the order was memory. About a year ago the memory in the server started playing up, so I swapped it with 1GB from my desktop PC. Over time I forgot to replace the memory and it went out of warranty, so now I'm stuck with 2 dead sticks of RAM. I wanted the 1GB back in my desktop PC to make the 4GB again so I ordered the cheapest stick of 2GB Corsair DDR2 800MHz memory I could. This has lifetime warranty so should it fail, I can easily get it replaced.



My final order was more of an impulse buy. Since wireless G is considered slow these days, I decided to upgrade to wireless N. For £15 I got a Tendra router which can be used as a wireless N access point. It's only single channel 150Mbps (not dual channel 300Mbps) but it's still 3x faster than wireless G, which does the job for me. And for £15, you can't complain.



So the end result of the server is now this...



And here are the stats...



Lots of work still to be done regarding cooling, noise and mounting of the server, but it's up and running albeit without an internet connection until 2 weeks from now when the broadband line is put in.

Comments, questions, etc welcome as usual...

Cant you plug in any extra? I know there's plenty of storage on the servers already, but it wouldn't hurt. Also, it may also be a good idea to upgrade the RAM, because depending on how it will be used, a good amount of RAM would help (especially if it will be used for hosting betas or some of BA itself) For server mounting, just put it on a sturdy desk somewhere, or buy a rack. I've heard that some big businesses (like Apple or MS) use that to host a big website. Also for cooling, you might wanna put it behind a fan near the window, so you dont end up heating the house (in winter time that would be useful! (free heating))

DarkerJ, it is his backup server for home.
He doesn't run any websites from it, it only contains an backup from the main BA server and FTP.

Hey Andy, what are you doing?
2 TB drives are still way more expensive than 1 TB drives per GB. (although IIRC there was a Newegg sale: US$ 55 for a 2TB drive)

Not to mention the slight performance losses.

Good choice with the wireless-N though, as after trying to copy my whole 60+ GB TV shows folder across wireless-G, I replaced my router immediately.

(BTW, try to get 5.25" to 3.5" drive bay brackets if you need more storage in it)

I can get a 2TB drive for £78, or a 1TB drive for £45, thus the 2TB drive makes more sense on a cost per GB basis.

Even though its wireless N, its only single channel (150Mbps) so it maxes out at about 6MB/s.

I have 1 HDD slot spare and 3 CD slots so there is no shortage of room yet. I will probably start swapping out the 1TB drives with 2TB's in the future as they become cheaper.

Just out of interest, how much was the case?

£49.99 from eBuyer.

Nice, that's not bad, I was thinking of building a [proper] server one day, and I wanted a proper 'server' case.

I wish I'dve known you were after a case! I have that exact same one (550mm deep, and all the extra fans) just sat doing nothing after I got rid of the parts within. Ah well, I can always put it in the loft ready for when I get a house and get a new rig.

Nice case wish i'd had one of these when I was running my server before my broadband stopped being unlimited. The case it was in was crap and a rack could have probably been mounted under my desk simular to what Andy's doing if I put wood in to support it. Ah well if I get another server I will do it.

I really wish I could convert pounds to dollars

Google's waiting.

Type "50gbp to usd" into Google.

Maybe he was referring to physically exchanging currency.

I know that, but with such high specs that it has, I know it could be used for many more things too. (more storage space for the betas, shall we?)

Remember this is my home server we're talking about here. I don't even have a broadband connection yet, and even when I do it's upload bandwidth is going to be far too poor to host anything. It is purely a storage server for personal use and a backup server for BA, nothing more. Until the days where I can have 100Mbps symmetrical connection in my home, nothing like that can or will be hosted from it.

You're looking for that to happen in 20 years the way BT keep going. By then South Korea will be into triple digit giabits.

^ Very true.

The rackmount case looks nice. What size fan mounts are in? My guess is 120mm, or 80mm. What processor is in there? If I ever get the money I'm gonna build another server and maybe one of those rackmount cases. 4U is pretty roomy for a case. If you need to sort out any cooling issues, I highly recommend the Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro, since my guess is that is an LGA 775 board. A fan controller might be a good investment, considering there are 3 5.25" drive bays.

120mm front fan and 60mm rear fans, with 80mm top fans. Cooling the CPU is not the issue, the case however is. A heatsink will make no difference to that.

The CPU is a Pentium Dual Core E5200.

if you get bored during the middle of the night, you can get about 4GHz out of a Pentium Dual Core. But I guess you are having airflow problems? Well, remember, heat rises. From what I can see in the pictures, I would make the front and top of the case draw air in and make the rear pull it out. It's how I usually do things regarding PC airflow. Sometimes I draw air in from the front and back and bring it through the top. However, front to back is usually the most effective cooling method. You should also think about positive and negative airflow. Positive where there is more air going into the case than coming out, which can sometimes create pockets of heat, or negative balance, where there is more air going out of the case than going in. Negative is the best from my experience, but I've never worked with a server rackmount case, only theatre audio equipment that uses a rackmount.

Hope that helped with something

I know exactly how to create the correct airflow, the problem is the fan I'm using is too large and no air is being pushed into the case from the front. I'm waiting for the correct size fan to arrive.

Oh, you're using Abyss Web Server X1. Finally someone, who likes Abyss, too.
IIS is such hard to configure. MBL said, I need to turn off exec() PHP command and a lot of things.
But I didn't think you like Abyss, because BA is on IIS - now I understand - BA is not located on your home server.

Anyway, good job. It works fast enough for me and I see you have very many space (HD space is important. DVDs are outdated, because we can't put all our data on it. There is a need of larger and larger drives).

I only use Abyss at home for ease. It's not capable of handling the traffic BA gets. IIS is easy enough to configure but Abyss is even easier if you just want PHP support.

You should turn off many PHP functions, including exec(), shell_exec() and system(). There are many others you should disable as well.

To be honest, I like WAMPServer. Apache, PHP5 and mySQL in one quick package. Great for quick web pages and set ups, but not as good as IIS for traffic handling as Andy said.