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You don't need much of a machine to be a Linux backup server. I built mine from a salvage box (a discarded PIII machine) and a couple of EIDE HDDs. The OS went on a 80 Gbyte drive and the data is stored on a 500 Gbyte drive. The machine is located in another building on campus. My master server keeps the backup drive mounted and runs mirrordir several times a week to keep all data and key application dirs mirrored. The automated mirroring can be invoked as a cron job. If you care to be clever with your backup script you could keep several mirrors on the backup server in case things go south during a mirror job. There is probably no reason you couldn't run the mirror process from the backup server. The main pitfall is to write the script to determine if the remote dirs are in fact mounted. I have the script check for a hidden file placed on the remote server for that purpose. My total cost was jut for the HDDs, about $300. Works great. Cheers, Roger Rowlett Professor Colgate University Dept of Chemistry -----Original Message----- From: "Green, Todd" <[log in to unmask]> Subj: [ccp4bb] off topic - back-up servers Date: Mon Dec 10, 2007 5:26 pm Size: 3K To: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]> Hello All, Sorry for the non-crystallography post, but I thought this was a good place to ask my question since some discussion regarding archiving a few months back skirted my topic, albeit barely. I have a question about back-up servers. I want to spend between 2-4 grand(could be a little more if necessary or less if possible) for something that will do back-ups of the machines in our lab(currently 4 linux machines and a couple of pcs). I'd like for it to run linux and perform a backup weekly or possibly more often if necessary. I was thinking of something with mirrored drives(2 to 4 up to 750 GB each). Does anyone have any suggestions and/or pitfalls to watch out for in purchasing/setting up this type of thing? While I feel that I'm savy enough to set up a machine software-wise to perform this function, I must admit that "PERC this and Raid that" is a bit foreign to me. I just configured an example(rather blindly) on the Dell site. Any input would be appreciated? Feel free to tell me that th configuration is more than i'll need and/or is a load of crap. I just want something that will efficiently save the data on our computers. Feel free to email me directly unless you feel others would befit from the discussion. All the best and thanks in advance. Todd Green University of Alabama at Birmingham This configuration was around 2300 bucks: PowerEdge 840: Dual Core Intel® Pentium®E2160, 1.8GHz, 1MB Cache, 800MHz FSB 84E18 [223-1499] 1 Operating System: No Operating System NOOS [420-6320] 11 Memory: 2GB DDR2,667MHz, 2x1GB Dual Ranked DIMMs 2G2D6D [311-5313] 3 Drive Cage Configuration: Chassis with Hot Swap Drives for PE 840 CHHS [341-3900] 28 Hard Drive Configuration: Hot Plug Add-in PERC5i (SATA/SAS Contrl) supports 3-4 Hard Drives - RAID 5 HASR5 [341-3899] 27 Primary Hard Drive Controller: PERC 5i SAS internal Raid adapter, PCI -Express PERC5I [341-3902] 9 Primary Hard drive: 750GB 7.2K RPM Universal SATA 3Gbps 3.5-in HotPlug Hard Drive 750S2HP [341-4429] 8 2nd Hard Drive: 750GB 7.2K RPM Universal SATA 3Gbps 3.5-in HotPlug Hard Drive 750S2HP [341-4429] 23 3rd Hard Drive: 750GB 7.2K RPM Universal SATA 3Gbps 3.5-in HotPlug Hard Drive 750S2HP [341-4429] 54 4th Hard Drive: 750GB 7.2K RPM Universal SATA 3Gbps 3.5-in HotPlug Hard Drive 750S2HP [341-4429] 51 Network Adapter: Onboard Single Gigabit Network Adapter, No TOE OBNIC [430-2017] 13 TCP/IP Offload Engine Enablement: Broadcom® Dual Port TCP/IP Offload Engine Not Enabled NTOEKEY [430-1765] 6 System Documentation: No Hard Copy Documentation, E-Docs only and OpenManage CD kit EDOCS [310-8209] 21 CD/DVD Drive: 48x CDRW/DVD IDE Combo Drive, Half-Height CDRWDVD [313-4451] 16 Floppy Drive: No Floppy Drive NOFD [341-2489] 10 Mouse: Optical Two-Button Mouse, USB, Black USBOPT [310-8172] 12 Keyboard: Keyboard, USB USBK4 [310-8170] 4 Monitor: Dell E177FP, Flat Panel, 17.0 Inch Viewable Image Size 17LCD [320-5576] 5