> I plan to set up a big file server, something like motherboard with 4 ide > ports and an additional 4 ide daughter card, a PIV proc and 512 or 1024 MB > ram, a 100 or 1000 MB NIC, with 6 or 7 200 GB ide HDDs in a sigle box. I > don't need lightning performance, just disk space. Of course this would be > served by some linux os and sambaI would strongly recommend using a 3ware Escalade hardware RAID card rather than software RAID for putting the drives together.> - is there a better fs type (ext2, 3, xfs...) for this ?I have been happy with ext3; it has acceptable performance, high compatibility (can use ext2 rescue tools, etc.), and solid journalling. Many folks have reported better performance with XFS.> - what about such space (1 TB at least), can i have only one fs for the > whole ?You can set it up as one filesystem or partition it into many.> - what about huge files (over 2 GB)Should be fine server-side; client-side you may have issues.
On Thu, 2003-05-15 at 10:34, Thierry ITTY wrote:> I plan to set up a big file server > Of course this would be served by some linux os and samba > > questions (relative to samba configuration and behaviour) : > - is there a better fs type (ext2, 3, xfs...) for this ? > - what about such space (1 TB at least), can i have only one fs for the > whole ? > - what about huge files (over 2 GB) > - any suggestions (kernel releases and patches, samba performance tips...)I am about to do the same thing (3x = 3 independent GigE-connected servers, each with their own 1TB disk-arrays and attached LTO tape-bacukup units.). We have talked over the same issue, and have chosen to use Reiserfs. The debate continues about which is faster, more robust, lower CPU usage, etc. but I think either XFS or ReiserFS is an excellent choice. For me, ReiserFS won out for two practical reasons: -we're using a lot of RedHat, and ReiserFS is basically included 'out of the box'. During a fresh install, I use the GUI tool 'anaconda', then Ctrl-Shift-F2 to a shell at the disk-partitioning point. Then I use the miniroot tools included with RH to create the Reiser partitions, and format them. Ctrl-Shift-F7 back to the GUI, and Disk Druid recognizes the Reiser-partitions. Continue installation per normal. You cannot use the GUI anaconda to create Reiser partitions, although it will happily recognize them. -our servers will be backed up by 'amanda'. You need special XFS tools (xfsdump is one) that you have to Google for... It's just a slightly higher hassle-factor, which I feel will complicate upgrades or bare-metal disaster recovery. Both are reputed to be very quick, support ACL's, handle large files, etc. Our servers will have these arrays configured to be one single file-system (/home), with the Operating System to be held on RAID 1 (mirrored) smaller drives (this is purely to help cope with 1 drive dying :-( ). That's my $0.02 ;-) There may be all sorts of glitches along the way, because I haven't yet actually done this installation yet. But I have used the various components (including Samba 3.0alpha) for 8 - 20 months. -Gord -- Gordon Pritchard, P.Eng. | Institute of Electrical and Research Labs Manager | Electronics Engineers Simon Fraser University, Surrey | Quarter Century Wireless Ass'n gordonp@sfu.ca | Telephone Pioneers of America phone: 604.268.7509 | Amateur Radio: VA7SFU, VA7GP
Hi I plan to set up a big file server, something like motherboard with 4 ide ports and an additional 4 ide daughter card, a PIV proc and 512 or 1024 MB ram, a 100 or 1000 MB NIC, with 6 or 7 200 GB ide HDDs in a sigle box. I don't need lightning performance, just disk space. Of course this would be served by some linux os and samba questions (relative to samba configuration and behaviour) : - is there a better fs type (ext2, 3, xfs...) for this ? - what about such space (1 TB at least), can i have only one fs for the whole ? - what about huge files (over 2 GB) - any suggestions (kernel releases and patches, samba performance tips...) tia - * - * - * - * - * - * - Bien s?r que je suis perfectionniste ! Mais ne pourrais-je pas l'?tre mieux ? Thierry ITTY eMail : Thierry.Itty@Besancon.org FRANCE
> I plan to set up a big file server > Of course this would be served by some Linux os and samba > > questions (relative to samba configuration and behaviour) : > - is there a better fs type (ext2, 3, xfs...) for this ? > - what about such space (1 TB at least), can i have only one fs for the > whole ? > - what about huge files (over 2 GB) > - any suggestions (kernel releases and patches, samba performance tips...)I second the notion of using a 3ware card - much cleaner (though pricy!) I use reiserfs at home for a dir of 16000 files, works nice. We use XFS at work for the filesystem, and have had no issues with it. It nicely goes to the 2 terabytes that linux supports for a single disk/volume. Definitly don't use ext2 (notice the 2), because fscking a 1.2TB drive will result in you taking a fireman's ax to the computer...... If you use a 3ware card, in say, raid5, then 7 200 gig disks would look like a 1.2TB disk, which would be /dev/sda. Both reiser and xfs should work fine with that. Files over 2 gigs work as long as you have the newer kernel and glibc libraries (Redhat 7.3+ has these, I'd assume any similarly dated distro has them, too.) I think that xfs may require kernel patches, at least, it did in the past. (Also remember that reiser4 is coming soon.) -Tom
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Le Jeudi 15 Mai 2003 19:34, Thierry ITTY a ?crit :> Hi > I plan to set up a big file server, something like motherboard with 4 ide > ports and an additional 4 ide daughter card, a PIV proc and 512 or 1024 MB > ram, a 100 or 1000 MB NIC, with 6 or 7 200 GB ide HDDs in a sigle box. I > don't need lightning performance, just disk space. Of course this would be > served by some linux os and sambaJohn T gave a great piece of advice this week about how much processors and ram are needed for big servers ( serving 500+ clients ). You should look at the archive, he suggest that your configuration might be a bit light. But it all depends on how many clients you'll be serving. Still i guess if you plan on Gigabit, there might be a few...> questions (relative to samba configuration and behaviour) : > - is there a better fs type (ext2, 3, xfs...) for this ?my advice would be xfs. Never had anything but trouble ( severe fs corruption beyond repair, every time, on all machines. Am i the only one ???) with reiser. Ext3 is fine but probably slower. Avoid ext2 unless you don't mind spending hours fscking 1,4 Tb of storage in case of power failure or whatever.> - what about such space (1 TB at least), can i have only one fs for the > whole ?You definitely can, using LVM or better yet EVMS (logical volume managers, which are an absraction layer between the physical discs and the file system). You can then use these volumes in any fashion you like, even in software raid and so on. But hardware raid5 wouldn't hurt also, so why not use both?> - what about huge files (over 2 GB)samba is compiled with large file support most of the time. XFS has support for it also, as well as recent kernels for ext2 & 3 IIRC> - any suggestions (kernel releases and patches, samba performance tips...)dunno, 2.4.20 is fine with us. David - -- *********************************** david.morel@amakuru.net OpenPGP public key: http://www.amakuru.net/dmorel.asc 28192ef126bc871757cb7d97f4a44536 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQE+w9rLqr7QF98duCMRAnaPAKCW8KKaugsZLEdviYf0tkPZXzTboACfUQrb CFmo8j7azpZrJoxAeQM1cUU=rVHw -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> why you would recommend hardware raid over md/lvm?Hardware RAID is faster. -Mike MacIsaac, IBM mikemac at us.ibm.com (845) 433-7061
Am Freitag, 16. Mai 2003 16:06 schrieb Michael MacIsaac:> > why you would recommend hardware raid over md/lvm? > > Hardware RAID is faster.Michael, I Guess you are right with the 3ware cards. It has real good performance. My question was motivated by the fact that many SCSI and ATA RAID controllers perform really bad compared with software RAID. Thanks Uli
> > Hardware RAID is faster. > > Michael, > I Guess you are right with the 3ware cards. It has real good performance. My > question was motivated by the fact that many SCSI and ATA RAID controllers > perform really bad compared with software RAID.There is a BIG difference between pseudo-raid cards (IDE cards with RAID function, but without own processor etc.) and real RAID controllers. The latter really are faster than SW RAID. -- Honza Houstek
Through a time-warp on my mail provider I only received your mail of 2003-05-15@13:12:48+0200(CEST) today, but I won't miss the chance to respond to your flame-bait.>> my advice would be xfs. Never had anything but >> trouble ( severe fs corruption beyond repair, >> every time, on all machines. Am i the only one ???) >> with reiser. Ext3 is fine but probably slower. >> Avoid ext2 unless you don't mind spending hours >> fscking 1,4 Tb of storage in case of power failure >> or whatever. > > I must agree. Reiserfs is quite fast but not very > reliable. It doesn't support ACLs (AFAIK), > reiserfsck is completely broken (unlike other fs > with reiser you have almost no chance to save data > after fs corruption). If you know Hans Reiser, you > understand ...What a bunch of FUD crap, Honza and Thierry. Every file-system can develop pathological non-recoverable corruption, especially if it is used by some seriously experience-challenged users. To generalize your sad case with such words and to attack the creator of reiserfsck with such innuendo as you do, only gives a bad impression of yourself. I'm using reiserfsck exclusively and must say that one thing alone in your mail is true - the fact that reiserfs is really fast, in fact orders of magnitude faster than any other fs when it comes to directory browsing and manipulation, which is very important for the clumsy SMB protocol. Everything else you write about it is BS! reiserfs complies fully with APIs for ACLs and EAs. Unfortunately, samba team would rather start writing non-POSIX samba from scratch than use the elegant transparency of reiserfs's streams. samba can and does use quite nicely reiserfs's ACLs though. If you don't know how to set the mount options to enable these features, tough, you're out of luck, pal. But if you ask nicely, I'm sure someone will let you know. I've had some severe corruptions on a striped JBOD under thermal strain, I mean real physical corruption and reiserfsck just repaired it like nothing. Sure, it warns you quite verbosely that by typing in exactly "Yes", case-sensitive and all, you may eventually kiss your fs good-by, but any serious fsck does the same. If you're scared shitless of the more articulate manner of stating it in reierfsck, then tough luck again. But the question ist, have you yourself suffered? Tell us your story. Don't just spread the hear-say. People like you should stay away from reiserfs, for their own good. Stick to what you know and feel comfortable with. I'm sure xfs is a decent system but it didn't work for me quite as well as reiserfs. But that wouldn't justify me to say that its authors thereof are arseholes or hobos or pinkos or whatever you meant by those ominous three dots in a row, just slightly slower-witted and I can put figures where my mouth is, as I did in several postings before. Cheers Dragan ____________________________________________________________ Get advanced SPAM filtering on Webmail or POP Mail ... Get Lycos Mail! http://login.mail.lycos.com/r/referral?aid=27005
>> reiserfs complies fully with APIs for ACLs >> and EAs. Unfortunately, samba team would rather >> start writing non-POSIX samba from scratch than >> use the elegant transparency of reiserfs's streams..............................> >Errr. What brought this on ? What gave you the idea >that we're (a) writing a non-POSIX Samba or (b) >rewriting Samba from scratch ?Duuuh, you must have had to go to the bathroom just as Tridge was passionately pitching his "Beyond POSIX" plea for Samba 4.0 :-) But seriously, Jeremy, if you read my quote again, you should note that it neither says nor purports to say that you are either (a) writing a non-POSIX Samba, or (b) rewriting Samba from scratch. It is a not so uncommon figure of speech where the absurdity of one sentence enhances the sillines of the other - I forgot the Greek word for it. To put it in Usian, my letter says that the so- called "multi-dimensional" files, as Tridge put it, or simply multiple file streams, should be within reach of Samba, if Samba wizzards cared and/or had enough manmonths to pull 'em out of their white hats. Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't streams merely files in ars (as in ar(1)) with fancy marketing name? If it sells WinDoze, it can't hurt Samba.>The problem is there is no POSIX API for streams. I'm >willing to abstract any reasonable API so we can have >streams on systems that support them. We will probably >add extended attributes now Linux supports them.Sure, there is no POSIX API for ACLs and EAs either, that couple of proposals will forever be discussed by the hair splicers on the 1003.1e. That doesn't mean we'll wait until they have decided. The ACLs and EAs from bestbits.at is de facto standard because it's there and people can use them. Not quite as extensive as M$ ACLs, but quite a workable start in right direction - the only limit is our imagination. I guess it's only the lack of said imagination that prevents us from using them 1:1 against SMB. Say, for example, why don't we put the system, archive, hidden and read-only bits in EAs and sweep a lot of ambuguity out of Samba source? Who cares if those bits mean nothing to Posix-compliant apps if they're as well as exclusively used in samba shares and Samba is aware of them? Those utilities that need to be aware of them will grow to accept them after the fact. It's the chicken and egg dilemma all over again. If Posix stands in the way, by all means we should make it better, even if we have to consciously ignore it until it catches up. Precisely this kind of rebellious civil disobedience brought us the possibility to approximate winfs's state of mind with those seemingly superfluos bits. Now it's time to move on and use what's as good as approved POSIX. Few of the things that M$ does are POSIX compliant. That doesn't keep Gates from coralling almost all the sheep in his backyard, to say nothing about the greenbacks. But by doing so, M$ established a number of de-facto standards with more normative power than the Posix cabal. Witness Samba. I'm not an expert on reiserfs, only an extremely satisfed user, but from what little I've read about the concept behind that endevour, you should be able to just put another slash behind a "unidimensional" file name and access whatever you fancy, call it extended attributes, streams or whatever. Why is it not used in Samba? Cheers Dragan ____________________________________________________________ Get advanced SPAM filtering on Webmail or POP Mail ... Get Lycos Mail! http://login.mail.lycos.com/r/referral?aid=27005