Re: [WinMac] Re: Using NT for a MacFile server [WAS :Re: Film Bureau and Platforms]
mark.maytum@pompy.com
Tue, 21 Sep 1999 16:49:04 -0400
Dan,
OK, I'll bite. Let's get geeky! :-)
My raid controller is LVD-LVD straight through - I purchased this
particular controller mainly for cable length, not speed. You of course
have to stick LVD-PCI controllers in your macs (adding some expense, but
definitely *not* a hack). We get very speedy performance out of our RAID
tower. Certainly enough to pretty much fill up the 100mb pipes on the two
servers simultaneously. When I say *pretty much* I mean around 8-9mb/sec.
I've never benched the RAID disk I/O but, well...it's gotta be at least
20mb/sec. And before you yell "Cache!", both these servers run 96mb and
they have FMP server and Retrospect running too. ASIP doesn't get too much
memory to play with. I hammer mac servers with LanTest and/or Pounder and
if they fill the pipes I don't worry about it too much more.
OK granted, if I had the ability to run multi-port ethernet or gig cards in
the Mac servers, I might pay more attention to disk I/O. But we're not
nearly there yet.
I'm not sure what you mean about NT server and workstation RAID's being
transportable - I mean, yeah that's true. AFAIK, you can take a SoftRaid
(included with ASIP BTW) RAID and move it to any mac you want, server or
workstation too. Matter of fact, my two 9650's are nothing more than power
supplies with memory, an Asante 100mb card, an Adaptec card and a fan.
They boot and operate *entirely* off the RAID (again, from separate
partitions of course). I can run my ASIP servers from *any* PCI mac with
two empty slots.
Just a side note about newer: we have about 40 of their 6100 G3 cards.
Never a problem. Got my last three of them last week. These three were
all DOA. Little cap pak was busted off the board on all of them! My
MicroWarehouse salesdude tells me they're having quite the little cash
crunch. He also said they've been seeing lots of returns of their boards
lately. Hmm. I finally fixed my 9650 server problems with much tweaking,
removing of extensions, etc.
"Daniel L. Schwartz"
<expresso@snip.net> To: "The Windows-MacOS cooperation list"
Sent by: <winmac@xerxes.frit.utexas.edu>
<winmac@xerxes.frit.u cc:
texas.edu> Subject: [WinMac] Re: Using NT for a MacFile
server [WAS :Re: Film Bureau and Platforms]
09/21/99 03:18 PM
Please respond to
"The Windows-MacOS
cooperation list"
Dear Mark,
No flames here... Just vigorous opinions!
Yes, there are SCSI-to-SCSI RAID controllers, but that is a hack
of the
first order: You lose the bandwidth that can only be achieved with a
connection to a PCI bus - Especially the newer 64 bit &/or 66 mHz PCI
buses.
Software (driver level) RAID is OK, but it's a third-party
add-on for the
Mac while it's included in NT. Oh, and by the way the NTFS drivers between
NT/S & NT/W are the same, so if you want a RAID Level 5 on an
NT/Workstation, just create & format the array on an NT server and then
move it across to the NT workstation.
-----
SIDEBAR:
I've had poor experience with Newer Technology, specifically on
both their
G3 cards as well as honoring their lifetime warranty on RAM. I much prefer
Sonnet <http://www.sonnettech.com> because their 68040 AND G3 accelerators
have proven themselves in a number of installations I support... Plus, they
are less expensive!
-----
As for the third party AFP (and correctly, SFM) software, it's
only $295
for a 5 user license. Plus, you can add SFM using either ExtremeZ-IP or
MacServer IP to a machine running NT/Workstation as well as NT/Server. This
cuts down the licensing cost quite a bit, since NT/W is $179 (while MacOS
8.x is $99).
Cheers!
Dan
At 02:38 PM 9/21/99 -0400, Mark Maytum wrote:
>
>Rod,
>
>Well, I'm running two Compaq 1600's w/2SL RAID controllers and two Mac
>9650's. Both the Macs are connected to a RAID tower with a 4 host SCSI
>bridge in it (each have their own volume partitions of course). So the
>part about Macs not supporting hardware raid doesn't hold up. *Everything*
>supports hardware raid. Your host computer doesn't have to carry the RAID
>controller. And as far as software RAID goes, an NT mirrored partition is
>one step above useless and NT striped partitions are...well...fine. To be
>fair, SoftRaid and HDT on the mac side are about equal to their NT
software
>RAID counterparts. If you're going to mirror your boot partition, chances
>are, it's not going to be a *painless* recovery.
>
>If you don't count my attempt to hack the 9650's with Newer G3 cards
>recently (which was an experience), all four of our servers have similar
>uptimes. We have both AtEase for Workgroups users and NT roaming users to
>think about here. I really wouldn't want to have to do without *either*
>server platform.
>
>However, in your case, assuming that you don't want to do any domain level
>type authentication, I'd stick with ASIP. The lack of parity RAM and more
>PCI slots than you'll likely ever fill probably won't be a showstopper. A
>properly configured ASIP server is very stable. It's also....easy to
>configure.
>
>Considering that you need to add some extra (and not cheap) software to an
>NT server to get acceptable SFM performance out of it, I don't think price
>is really going to be a consideration.
>
>As always, your mileage may vary.
>
>HTH,
>Mark Maytum
>Pompanoosuc Mills Corporation
>
>P.S. *Not* covering my head. Flame at will everybody.
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