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Give me a "Guestimate"


Jocka

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I'm doing this site right now and they request the ability to upload files with max sizes of 4mb. They are estimating a number of 1,000,000 members by this time next year.

This would require a GREAT sized harddrive on our dedicated server. A terabyte or 5 lol. I just want to make sure I'm guessing that right.

How would I go about adding a terabyte of space? I mean the max harddrive is a terabyte right now isn't it? And can you use more than on harddrive on a dedicated server? I've never dealt with so much space being needed so this is new to me.

I was thinking in the long run it might be better for my "boss" to just buy his own computer and install the harddrives he needs from his building. I'm not sure though. What would you (all of you) suggest?
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For an application such as this one, you're definitely going to want a server that you can have physical access to, and one that you control completely. (where you == the people owning this site) No, 1TB is certainly not the maximum you can have in a server - it's only once you get above 2TB that you need to enable options in the Linux kernel for it all to work. Maybe a server with hot-pluggable hard drives is in order?

And, quite honestly, they're probably going to have trouble getting 1,000,000 members in a year, unless they have some plan for requiring 1,000,000 people to join...
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Yea they have a plan. The site isn't even up  yet and they have about 300,000 members. (hard to explain but trust me on this).

So your saying we should skip the middle man and take this thing over ourselves? How much would it cost exactly to get and maintain a server that size?
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[quote author=jcombs_31 link=topic=114350.msg465416#msg465416 date=1163074527]
RAID
[/quote]

I'm with jcombs on this one. If you're looking at that type of bandwidth and server load, I'd definitely recommend going with a RAID setup. If you do have one go down, you won't have to shut down until it's replaced. You'll have to really manage your resources, though. That's quite an undertaking you're referring to ;)
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Ok. Would it be too much to spring on the boss RIGHT NOW? I mean, should I wait. I JUST talked him into getting a dedicated server and didn't even consider the amount of space he'll actually need. He already signed up for a year. I'm sure he'll be a little pissed.

I'm thinking of recommending he get someone else to run his servers overall. I mean, it's obvious I don't know where to go after so much. They asked if I knew anyone they could hire to help me temporarily so it might not be a bad idea. I just don't want the burden of the server, the software, and the security all on me.
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To be honest, if you're looking at a million active users [b]and[/b] looking at storing over a terrabyte of user data, you want to be looking at distributing the load over several servers. Also, say each of your one million users uploads at least one file, with a size of 4MB, you're looking at about 4TB without even considering the capacity you'll need to mirror/stripe that data with a RAID solution.

If I were your boss, I'd prefer to know about this sooner rather than later.
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Alright. The server host we use now is in the same city where we are located so I'm going to see if maybe we can work something out. I'll talk with him and if he's fine with it, we'll talk to our host and just let them handle it lol. Maybe pay a little extra for THEM to keep an eye on it. Since I don't know what I'm doing. Is that a better idea? lol. I have less than 1 month to build them an entire site with all-too-much on it lol. So I don't want to concern [i]myself[/i] with this. Maybe after I'm done I can start messing with it.
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If you looking to host files and it will be alot of files and have the budget I'd look into a SAN array.  :)

Its my dream to get my company to purchase a SAN.  You'll also need the bandwidth to support the transfers to and from the server too.  Seems like an expensive project.
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yea, very expensive. We're looking into all our possiblities right now. I'm not sure what SAN is so i'm going to look that up in just a second.

We were thinking that it'd be easier if the servers were in our office building so that if there are problems it can be fixed without having to call a host and waiting on them.
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