What's the Best Server for Home Use? 84
vrmlguy writes "I've seen recent posts about low-power, off-grid computing and about small systems, but neither quite captures the object of my desire. I'm looking for the ideal LAMP-based server for home use. Cost of ownership (though not TCO!) is one of my primary concerns, followed closely by reliability. Here's my idea of the perfect server. The software requirements are easy. I want to run Slash, WIKI and/or blogging software that I and my family can access worldwide. The system should be able to keep up with requests coming in via DSL or cable-modem, but doesn't need to withstand slashdotting. There are Linux-based systems available for under $200, which appeal to me as a low-cost base. I would want to add at least one additional disk for OS-level RAID. Also, since this is a server, it will need to be available 24x7, which could run up my electric bill. Therefore, I'm willing to spend a bit more for something that supports a 'napping' mode that can, say, spin down the disks and slow down the CPU, but still respond to web-page requests. Are there systems available that do what I need at a price I can afford?"
Server for home use? (Score:2)
Re:Server for home use? (Score:2)
Kind of funny really, the machines run Windows like crap, but they make good webservers and mail servers.
eBay (Score:1)
Re:eBay (Score:1)
Mini ITX (Score:5, Informative)
Two choices as I see it. (Score:1)
Easy to configure/expensive: Win2000 Pro, Pentium 300, Raid, two harddisks, a graffix card, an external card for sending movies over the air to your telly and mp3s through your home-cinema audio. (I watch divx'es like this). I recommend F-Secure for servers for antivirus. Use Apache or IIS for web.
Harder to configure/cheaper: FreeBSD, same system. FreeBSD also have some power management. I recommend F-Prot for FreeBSD. I takes approx 2 weekends before the system is 100%. Use Apache or tomcat for web.
Spinning down disks - bad (Score:2)
Re:Spinning down disks - bad (Score:2)
Explain why we lose a disk or two (out of several hundred) every time we have a scheduled power shutdown, then.
Stopping and starting hard disks more often than "never" shortens their lifespan. If you replace your disks often, this is not important.
- A.P.
Re:Spinning down disks - bad (Score:2, Informative)
Actually, no. If a hard-drive is going to fail, it's most likely going to fail in a power-down/power-up cycle. Just like lights are most likely to burn out when you turn them on.
Hard drives that are on 24/7 wear down, the bearings get warm, etc. You shut them off, everything cools, and in some cases, seize. Basically, before any scheduled power-cycle on a machine that's 'always on', back up its drives. Plan on at least a few pct of your drives dying in a site-wide 'reboot' like that. (We see that here whenever they do a site-wide power down.)
--Joe"HD capacity is measured in GB" ? (Score:1)
If you're trying to imply "use fewer, larger disks," then how do you expect to store a database in the double digit terabytes without using a storage cluster with several hundred hard disks? If that wasn't your point, then what did you mean?
This is easy. (Score:5, Insightful)
Save energy how you can, if it's important to you. Toss the CPU fan, and keep the heatsink. GlobalWin makes some huge Socket7 heatsinks which are suitable for this, all of which come with easily-removed fans screwed to them.
I've got a P133 which has been running various incarnations of Windows (now 2k) for years, with only a quiet PSU fan and a modest 6.5gig Seagate drive which spends most of its life spun down. It's nearly silent, doesn't make much heat, and I don't even think about its power consumption.
Configuring hdparm/apmd/kernel/BIOS to put the system to sleep would be good. As long as you don't let it drop into suspend mode, it'll come right back to life as needed.
Avoid hardware that you don't need. Don't use a sound card, find a slow/old/efficient video card. Keep things simple.
If you're worried about the reliability of a used machine, don't be. Remember, only the moving parts are subject to wearing out in normal use. Of these moving parts, you'll be completely eliminating the CPU fan. You can buy a nice new Sunon or Panaflow fan to replace whatever comes with the PSU, either of which should last a long, long time (the last dead fan I replaced was a Sunon that I've had spinning for 8 years).
All that's left is the hard drive, and you'll probably want to buy a couple of new ones no matter what you do, anyway, so that you've got two of them that match for your RAID.
That all said, I'm not exactly sure how this is Ask Slashdot material -- even if it's not something Google easily spits out answers for. Since specifications are so decisively absent, and cost is a factor, there's no way in hell you're going to listen to any of our suggestions, as none of them will be nifty enough or cheap enough for whatever purposes you actually end up using the thing for.
I strongly suspecct that you're either lost trying to figure out what kind of horsepower you need for the software you haven't picked yet, or that you already have a good idea of what you want and are looking for some sort of devine Slashdot Affirmation of your unspoken decisions. But you didn't ask us for software advice, or moral support - you asked us about hardware.
Running a glorified bulletin board for a small household is not a difficult task for a computer -- I had hundreds of users dialing into my 10MHz XT a decade ago, and things were plenty fast. WWIV under DOS, FWIW. In other words, the slowest computer capable of running Linux is more than fast enough for your purposes.
Find yourself a nice 386SL notebook, and be happy. The one I have here draws less than 12 Watts at full tilt, and the hard drive spins up in less than 2 seconds. Powersaving features are built-in, and the box supports killing the power to unneeded accessories. I just put Slackware 8.1 on it tonight, and things are looking good with a $2 PCMCIA network card. I bet an old Tandy/Northgate/AST/Blue Dolphin/Honeywell/AT&T/whatever 386 would work just as well, with a slight power-efficiency disadvantage.
And if you think you need anything faster than a 7-year-old Pentium desktop with RAID or a 10-year-old notebook for your family to write notes to eachother not more than several times a day, call Dell and buy yourself a new Optiplex or Dimension or whatever it is that they're hawking these days.
Or, stop complicating life by making things so simple, and invest in a corkboard and some scrap paper, plus a few moments to consider a proper location in which to put them.
Re:This is easy. (Score:3, Informative)
indead (Score:2)
Re:This is easy. (Score:1)
Re:This is easy. (Score:2)
That depends on what quality of electrolytic capacitors the motherboard manufacturer used. There's a guy who specializes in resuscitating Abit boards by gang-replacing all the caps.
Re:This is easy. (Score:2)
I do have an idea of how much horsepower I need, and it isn't much. Besides the Walmart box, I've been looking at DIY mini-ITX systems (the 533 MHz Eden, not the 800 MHz C3) and recycling a 1995-vintage CTX laptop. That's three ways to go, and I though that instead of rolling a die, I'd ask /.
And I do listen to the aswers. I'd been leaning toward the macho-ness of rolling my own mini-ITX, but as I think about the time investment, the laptop is looking better and better.
Re:This is easy. (Score:2)
They really shouldn't require much time to set up - there won't be anything involved other than selection, ordering, and assembling of parts.
The laptop may actually represent a larger time-sink, unless it's got a vanilla CD-ROM drive built-in and fairly standard PCMCIA hardware, which would make it easy.
If you've got no removable mass storage for the CTX box, invest a couple of dollars in a 2.5" -> 3.5" IDE kit. This will let you use a desktop machine to do the base install of software.
Since storage is cheap and demands are few, you'll probably want to leave a copy of your Linux distro on the hard drive in its own partition, so you can get back to a bootable state without pulling the drive, in case Bad Things happen. Slackware still fits on one CD, FWIW - you won't give up too much space for it.
Good luck.
You don't want a server... (Score:4, Informative)
You want a laptop!
- Get something a couple years old
- Load the OS and software
- Pull the optical drive and replace it with your mirror HD
- set up software RAID
A laptop sounds almost ideal for your use -- low power (the powerbricks usually draw 70 to 100 watts), and they include a sleep mode for the CPU / disks / screen / etc. As an added bonus, they're quite compact and include their own keyboard, mouse, screen, and speakers! A nice little 3Com 10-base ethernet card (if the unit doesn't come with ethernet built-in), and you're all set.I'm a big fan of IBM ThinkPads. A nice, small (5 pounds or so) ThinkPad 600X (P-III/500, 256 MB, 20 GB, 1024x768 (XGA?), DVD reader) should sell on Ebay for about $600. Also, it's quiet! (That's important if this thing is going to live in an apartment.)
If that price is a bit high, step a little further back. The P-IIs get REALLY cheap ($200 range, though you give up memory and HD size too), and if you find something with an 800x600 screen it will be a lot less. (Unless it's a 'palmtop'.)
If you're in New England, check out Kaplan Computers [kaplancomputers.com] in Manchester, CT. If you're in the Pacific Northwest, check out Boeing Surplus [boeing.com] or RePC [repc.com] -- both have stores (in | near) Kent. If you aren't near any of these, sorry, I can't suggest anything other than (shudder) eBay.
Re:You don't want a server... (Score:1)
They must have changed the harddisk from the 600 to the 600X because MINE MAKES A FUCKING RACKET.
I was going to mention something like this, but I wouldn't recommend using something as fragile as a laptop powered on 24/7.
Also, you couldn't count on the built in UPS (ie laptop battery) as they in general, and IBM's in particular, stop working within 6 months if you leave the laptop powered on mains for most of the time.
Re: Noisy ThinkPad hard drives (Score:2)
Do you, by any chance, have a 13 GB (or so) drive? I have a 770Z with a drive that's so loud that I hate being in the same room with it! My wife's P-III/450 (18 GB drive) 600X is so quiet that I have to look at it to know whether it's on or not.
My email file is on that 770Z, shared on my LAN. So I leave it in the den and read mail on my workstation (which has speed-adjusted fans and a Barracuda IV drive -- nice-n-quiet!) I haven't had any problems with leaving it on all the time -- it's been one of my home systems for almost three years now, no problems.
I've used several laptop brands -- the ThinkPads with metal housings I would not really call "fragile." Yes, it'll break if you drop it, but most laptops will. If you're worried about that, buy a Panasonic ToughBook.
You're right about the batteries dying, they sure do degrade... can't speak to your 6-month figure, though. I'm still on my original 770Z battery, and it still lasts about an hour at full-tilt. I'm not going to buy a new one anytime soon, mainly because Pricewatch showed figures in the $270 range!!! There's a place near me that'll rebuild laptop batteries (Pacific Power Battery), so I'll patronize them if I can't buy a fuel cell by the time the thing fully dies.
Re: Noisy ThinkPad hard drives and dead batteries (Score:1)
What I meant by fragile wasn't that it is easy to damage the Thinkpad, which does seem to be a tough little blighter, but more in the leaving it powered on constantly, wearing out the CPU, fan and drives. Mind you, if you have experience of doing that, and I have never tried, you win!
This machine was half-inched from work, so the battery was already dead. I have found a place in the UK [clonesuk.com] which has replacements for £52.87 (what's that, $80?) which has to be a bargain. They label them genuine IBM too!
Re: Noisy ThinkPad hard drives and dead batteries (Score:2)
As for the battery, I wouldn't even consider using a laptop battery for anything other than portable use. A UPS that can handle the power draw of a laptop is dirt cheap, and would probably have longer battery life under that kind of load than the laptop battery would.
Also, laptop hard drives are actually more durable than their desktop bretheren. Part of the reason they're so much more expensive is that they are designed to endure far more mechanical stress, so leaving a laptop drive spinning all the time is much less of an issue than leaving a desktop drive spinning all the time. Additionally, the vast majority of hard drive mechanical stress occurs during spin-up, so never spinning down the drive actually increases life expectancy.
As for wearing out non-mechanical parts by leaving them powered, as long as they have adequate ventilation that's a non-issue. Non-mechanical part die because of excessive heat or freak power spikes (which should be eliminated by the UPS), they don't "wear out".
Re: Kaplan Computers (Score:2)
Kaplan computers is a custom builder (your infamous 'white box' computers), a parts seller, but most of all a recycler. You'll find much of the cast-off computers from Aetna, Cigna, Travelers, The Hartford, etc., littering their sales floor.
I stopped through when I was visiting family back in August, and they had Dell OptiPlex desktops -- P-III/450s and 500s -- for a couple hundred dollars. If you can load the iPix thing on their homepage, look at that center aisle (frequently stacked five-plus feet tall!) That's a LOT of computers!
The store itself is pretty big, their warehouse/refurb site is bigger -- an old supermarket. You wouldn't BELIEVE some of the crap they have on pallets there... (okay, maybe you would.) That site isn't "open to the public," but if you ask for something that's not in the store, and they have it, that's probably where it is.
There are a lot of laptops, someone had just offloaded a bunch of Dell units when I was there. Not too many ThinkPads -- probably because those go fast.
Used printers are available -- they had a couple HP 5si/MXs, perhaps a half-dozen color laser printers of various parentage, some wide-format (11x17) HP inkjets. (And a couple dozen 'regular' laser printers.)
They have all manner of cards (PCI and PCMCIA), dongles, cables, monitors (I'm looking at this on a 21" Digital from them), and whatever other corporate hardware could possibly be re-sold.
Their prices on new parts aren't great, so know the market of what you're looking for before you go there.
The Kaplan brothers can be a bit mercenary about their pricing. I think they follow the adage of "you'll never get it if you don't ask." This leads to:
- Rule #1: Don't forget to haggle!
The place has grown so much that you won't actually deal with one of the brothers, so your experience will vary based on which employee you get and what kind of mood they're in. I had decent luck -- walked away with a handful of 3Com 100 Mbit PCMCIA ethernet cards (among other things) for less than $100.The same axiom they live by also applies to you -- they only paid a tiny fraction of what they're asking, so there's plenty of wiggle room. (In some cases, they were paid to remove the hardware they're selling! What a beautiful racket!)
So yes, I think it's a decent place. It can be a fun place to blow an hour or two just picking through the old hardware. I wish we had a place like that out here on the west coast, but there isn't the industry to support it (read: insurance and financial-services companies). We do have used-computer stores, they just don't have the kind of stock that Kaplan does.
One more thing, if it's closer... there's a little hole-in-the-wall shop in East Granby called (IIRC) Corporate Computer Salvage. Yellow sign in a strip mall, right off the intersection of Rt. 20 and 187. Decent place if you want a $15 Pentium for an OpenBSD firewall. Not worth much of a trip, though.
Re: Kaplan Computers (Score:1)
At last, an alternative to the wasteland of Buckland hills mall....
get a notebook with a dead screen/keyboard (Score:2, Informative)
Use VNC or a temporary external monitor/keyboard to configure the machine then tuck it away in a closet or under your desk or somewhere else you can forget about it.
Can we do better? (Score:1, Insightful)
How about a GBA? (Score:1)
But seriously, folks, pretty much any computer made in the past 4 years would be sufficient for your purposes, even if it takes a little extra RAM and a new HD, which it probably will. If you ask around, you could probably get somebody's old reject computer for 20 bucks or less. If you're not very familiar with GNU/Linux, BSD, etc., I'd recommend Mandrake as a good first distro, but LindowsOS looks pretty nice, as well.
Re:How about a GBA? (Score:1)
This guy talks to you about a server and you suggest a distro that runs as root by default?
A used Compaq iPaq Desktop (Score:1)
The machine doesn't spin down it's hard drive or throttle the processor speed, but it's power draw while idle is probably within the 50-65W range as the power supply can provide a max of 90W. You can probably find quite a few of the first or second gen machines on eBay or other used hardware sites.
I also have an older Gateway 2000 machine (P5-200 MMX) with 160MB of RAM and a 10GB hard drive running FreeBSD as my firewall at home. It's a bit overkill, but hey... it was given to me... the only thing I had to do was to clean it up, pull out the floppy drive (with the drive in, there was only a 2mm gap between the drive and the CPU's fan... not good!). Doing a make world on the machine is slow, but I'm able to pump around 40Mbps through the machine without any problems.
Another option is to check out some of the older IBM desktops that IBM is selling [ibm.com]as refurbished machines. The specs on some of them are P2-300/350, 64MB of RAM and a basic hard drive. In most cases, you can slap in at least another hard drive, more SDRAM, and keep the processor as-is and have a fairly decent, small and fairly low power machine.
Other options include looking at the Mini-ITX machines or the VIA Eden platform as other have mentioned. Check out the Seagate ATA hard drives if you are looking for quiet hard drives. I have two Seagate Barracuda IV 40GB hard drives in a machine at work... all I have to say is that the power supply fan is louder than the drive. I can barely hear the drive seeking. I wish I could say the same for this 10K RPM SCSI hard drive I have at home :)
Powell (Score:1)
I have the same motherboad and had no problems getting Linux installed on it. Right now I have a P3-800 running and it works fine. The great part is the power supply is an external brick, so you could probably put in a Via C3 to make it completely fanless. I think the PSU is something like 70W, with a Celeron and 2 drives the consumption would probably be less than half that.
So... What you need is motivation? (Score:2)
Let me see if I can distill what you want. You want a cheap, low-power, stable, Open Source home web server, and you don't want to pay much for it.
From a system architecture standpoint, the low-power, low-cost Via C3 is the chip you are looking for, and wallmart's C3-based systems sound perfect.
Really, with the needs you describe, ANY computer from a P2 on will suffice. Unless you have symetrical DSL, your server won't be processing a lot of requests at once. Unless you have metal shavings in the case, or have removed all of the fans, any computer will be as stable as its operating system from a home web server standpoint. And given the right configuration, any system can spin down your hard drive.
My girlfriend and I keep three computers on all of the time, and have noticed no significant increase in our utility bill. The power to keep RAM alive, CPU cycling blanks, and fans blowing is negligable compared to the power it takes to microwave dinner. Just keep your moniter turned off and you won't notice the bill.
Go forth young man, install Debian on the computer you are using RIGHT NOW, and make a dual server / surfer. Whatever it is, I'm sure it is strong enough.
-Chris
Re:So... What you need is motivation? (Score:1)
Re: raid and backup - not the same. (Score:3, Insightful)
RAID != backup.
Raid == fault tolerance. When one drive goes bad, your data is still ok.
Backup is for allowing you to get a system up and running again in the face of total catastrophy. Like a meteor hitting the house.
So use raid setups, but don't think you are off the hook for doing backups. Not unless you really could do without the data.
Re: raid and backup - not the same. (Score:1)
Losing non critical data is annoying, losing a house (or a part of it) is disastrous.
Re: raid and backup - not the same. (Score:2)
Re:So... What you need is motivation? (Score:2)
skip the RAID (Score:4, Informative)
Re:skip the RAID (Score:3, Informative)
This has the added advantage of being able to simply cp files back over if need be.
-Peter
Re:skip the RAID (Score:2)
I didn't bother to post my monthly script, I do a monthly backup too. The smaller the tarballs are, the more monthly backups I can keep before I have to burn 'em off to CD.
This is speedy enough for my purposes, i.e. it runs after midnight.
I tried BZIP2 but took too long for my poor 486DX25 to complete overnight
As far as restoring, I've never had to do that, other then to test my scripts. Of course if I stopped backing up, the primary HD would probably fail the next day.
Re:skip the RAID (Score:2)
You can still tar+compression.
Also consider that rsync is network aware, and works great over ssh, so you can trivially do your backups to a faster system with more storage. Even over 10base ethernet nightly backups will probably only take a few minutes with rsync, since it only copies the changes.
-Peter
Re:skip the RAID (Score:2)
Don´t play with dump (Score:1)
Re:Don´t play with dump (Score:2)
Ideally all backups would be to failure-proof media from a LVM disk snapshot, giving a 100% successful restore rate of 100% consistant, moment-in-time data.
Here on Earth, however, you have to weigh all the variables when doing backups. This advice ignores some pretty important stuff.
Does he contend that you are better off with a cpio/tar backup once a week (that's "100%" reliable (except that tape is SUCH shitty media)) than with a 99.9% (by his own numbers) reliable weekly plus daily incrementals?
Most people can't/won't do a full nightly, but dump can do incrementals pretty painlessly.
I think that either he didn't really think this through or he never meant for his advice to be so broadly applied.
-Peter
Why skip the RAID? (Score:2)
The tar kludge is more trouble than it's worth; why reinstall and re-customize your entire OS when you could've been mirroring the disk the whole time?
- A.P.
Re:Why skip the RAID? (Score:2)
>why not just spend the 5 minutes required to create
>a mirror of the first disk?
When I set this up I was unemployed and broke. I used a couple of drives I had laying around, I didn't have 2 spare HDs of the same size.
If you're willing to spend money, a mirrored drive makes sense, but I'm sure most people have a wee HD gathering dust somewhere, might as well make use of it.
Server for home use? (Score:1)
Low power server: look at Via mini-ITX (Score:4, Informative)
My current DNS, mail, and web server is 11.5" x 2.5" x 10.75" [caseoutlet.com] and draws about 20 watts. It's based on the VIA C3 EPIA motherboard [viavpsd.com]. The only downside for your use is that there's only room for one hard drive inside this tiny case. But it's cheap (less than $200) and as the power input is 12V, I use two paralleled gel-cells for a UPS. (That way I can swap out one battery for maintenance without interrupting anything.) My DSL router also runs off 12V. Linux installed very easily.
There's a similar VIA-CPU based low power motherboard for a little less money that draws so little power that there's no CPU fan. For reliability this may be a good choice as it reduces the number of moving parts.
If you insist on room for two hard drives, see these cases [servercase.com].
Try a HPC (Score:2)
I've never tried this, but I've thought about it on more than one occasion. Maybe you should try putting NetBSD/hpcMIPS on a handheld PC device. Compile Apache, PERL, whatever. Buy a 256MB flashcard and serve off of there. If you're weary of flashcards, try a microdrive (more space, less price). In any case, these devices should use less wattage than a laptop, and they are available on eBay for cheap (check out the IBM z50 -- its what most people seem to use with NetBSD/hpcMIPS). Just don't go serving any heavy traffic :)
Hope this helps.
Sun Ultra1 (Score:1)
If you have a bit more to spare, some of the older Netras are incredibly nice for low amounts of cash.
Server on DSL or Cable? (Score:2, Funny)
Then again, if the reason that you're looking to do this on the cheap is because you're plowing all your cash into a higher-end pipe that permits servers, never mind!
Re:Server on DSL or Cable? (Score:1)
Like i have a webserver running with very low traffic, have done for many months without Pipex or BT having a go.
Re:Server on DSL or Cable? (Score:2, Informative)
I chose SPEAKEASY as my ISP specifically because their TOS explicitly allows the operation of servers, provided the bandwidth consumption isn't excessive and you aren't running child-porn servers or other illegal activities.
Re:Server on DSL or Cable? (Score:1)
get a Mac (Score:2)
The early model G3's shouldn't have any problem with the kind of network loads required (the cable/DSL bandwidth is going to top out before the CPU, disk or memory bandwidth becomes a problem) and should only cost about $400. Add in some extra RAM and a copy of OS X [apple.com], and you're looking at no more than $650. If you go with Darwin [apple.com], NetBSD [netbsd.org], or one of the PowerPC [mandrakelinux.com] Linux [suse.com] distro's, and you can get by with just the base system price.
If you really want a deal, and feel up to a bit of hardware hacking, you could look for a dead iMac. So long as the logic board is Ok, you should be able to hack together a power supply (if/when you need a monitor you can use any VGA style monitor with a Mac/VGA converter). The only real issue with an iMac would be support for a second hard-drive, but you might be able to make due with an external drive on a USB or Firewire port.
I don't know what a dead iMac goes for these days, but I can't believe you'd have to spend more than $300.
Get hardware raid (Score:1)
Shuttle SV24 + Via C3 CPU (Score:1)
Check your broadband TOS first (Score:1)
They don't want you to have a home server, even if it's just for family or personal use. I'm almost mad enough to cancel the service, but then I'd be back to dial-up and we all know what fun that is.
So I'd advise you to check your Terms of Service carefully before you invest any money in this scheme. It's been said before here, but what the broadband people want you to do is what they show in the commercials: Send video e-mail (as if), and download streaming "content" (or is that steaming?) from their "partners."
Re:Check your broadband TOS first (Score:1)
I would recommend... (Score:2)
This one is $179 [newegg.com] without memory/hd/processor, which you could probaby scrounge (or buy for probably $100).
I have had two of these systems (not this exact model) for quite some time and they do really well with Linux.
Actual power consumption (Score:2)
Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
Let your providor worry about uptime, security, the power bill, and all the other the other headaches that come along with hanging your info out on the WWW. It's not like you aren't already paying for the service!
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:1)
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
Good experience, sure, I'm all for that. But if you can't even figure out what hardware you need for a simple family server without asking
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
It seems like cost is an important issue for you, both for the hardware and the power to keep it running 24/7. You'll need DSL with a static IP address to host it yourself, which is a fairly expensive prospect. It's certainly more expensive than paying a providor for the space, plus even if you have a static IP that doesn't mean that your AUP allows for self-hosting.
Do you need to have all your pictures on the web? Is there really any significant advantage to that? How does that advantage weigh against the significant price difference for static DSL with hosting priveleges?
Personally, I would have a server in my home to store all that stuff. Leave it on all the time in some back room where it won't bother anyone and let it do it's thing. Linux or BSD are excellent for that. Leave the web hosting to someone else, and set your server to make nightly mirrors of the site if your really concerned about the providor suddenly going away (there are utilities in most Linux distros specifically for that purpose).
Check how much web space you have with your DSL, and if thisis for the whole family ask other families to donate their unused space to the cause. There's no reason the whole site has to be at the same IP address, and between a few accounts you could have a significant amount of space, and back it all up regularly if you're really concerned about losing it.
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
I am quite interested in creating a useful LAMP-based server that other families could use as well. For example, my oldest son spent the summer hiking in Greece, and in recent years I've hiked the Appalacian and Ozark Trails. Both of us would like to stop off an an internet cafe, upload pix, and have an automagically generated item on a front page with a link to the photos and a spot for others to comment. And maybe I'm being an uber-geek here, but I'm also like to easily generate CD-ROMs containing the past year's contents as an Xmas "letter" or something.
Re:Why internal hosting? (Score:2)
Speaking of that small engineering company, the server I built for them was based on a 350MHz K6-2 with 256MB RAM that they had sitting unused in the back storeroom. I put in a cheap network card (check pricewatch.com, you can find PCI 10/100 cards for as little as $2 each, and yes, they are supported in Linux because they all use the RealTek 8139 chip), a 20GB IDE hard drive, and a basic (no GUI) install of SuSE (7.3) and Samba. The whole thing cost about $200, half of which was the hard drive and the other half was to pay me to set it up. It has sat under the desk that holds their printers, happily serving massive 3D CAD files to 5-10 workstations without a hitch, since I brought it online in february. I removed the keyboard, monitor, and mouse so no one would be tempted to use it, and did administration over ssh.
This is exactly what I recomend for you. It's cheap, easy, and has plenty of power for what you want to do. IIRC you wanted software RAID1, so I would estimate you could do it for under $200 in hardware, maybe $300 if you don't have an old system laying around taking up closet space. The Promise IDE controllers are now allegedly supported under Linux (and the cheap IDE controllers can be easily changed to a RAID controller with a resistor and a PROM flash), so you may want to invest in one of those to improve drive performance, but I don't know how much that would really matter in your case.
The important parts are: hard drive speed, network card speed, RAM. Any Pentium 2 or K6-2 CPU should be more than fast enough. Your DSL modem only has a 10-base Ethernet connection on your end, so your server only has to be capable of sustaining about 1MByte per second to keep it full, and the WAN side is likely much slower than that. This is a trivial task for the hardware setup I've described, so don't worry about the hardware end.
If you want to use a setup like the one I've described and need any help getting it running the email address above is good (after you remove slashdot's anti-spam stuff, of course). Feel free to email me with any questions, I'll be glad to help if I can (note that I know nothing about web servers, but I'll be doing exactly what you are doing as soon as I can put a server together, so I should learn soon enough).
Re: (Score:2)
Mitel Networks SME Server 5.5 (was: eSmith) (Score:2, Informative)
This puppy works and, for those who need it,
is very easy to install, configure & operate
It's just that simple...
Pentium class (Score:2)
What I need... (Score:2)
Re:What I need... (Score:1)
best server for home use (Score:1)