[SOLVED] Choosing cheap 2nd hand server for office with lots of SAS storage

[dance621]

Hi all. Bit of a newbie. I'm looking to buy an oldish server on ebay to make a file server for my office. It will store a huge number of image files and a mysql database. It will need redundancy so was thinking raid1. Excluding drives budget is only about $400. My research suggests that the sas raid controller will limit the size of drives possible. I ultimately need up to 40 or even 80TB.

My question is would something like these G8 servers work if I upgraded controller to LSI MegaRAID MR SAS 9260-8i (assuming I could then use 8TB drives)

This (proliant DL360p G8) or Or this (proliant ML350p G8)

My other question can a 12 disk chassis like THIS be used as a file server also? I see them cheaply and wonder why they are not lore popular are they seem to take 12 drives.

 

[USAFRet]

How many people in this office?
What do you guys do?


Unless you are "the IT guy", don't build this or buy used stuff. There are multiple other paths to go down.


And for "redundancy" you also need actual backup procedures. RAID 1 is not nearly enough.

 

[dance621]

How many people in this office?
What do you guys do?


Unless you are "the IT guy", don't build this or buy used stuff. There are multiple other paths to go down.


And for "redundancy" you also need actual backup procedures. RAID 1 is not nearly enough.

Thanks for the reply. What other paths might those be? Cloud seems cheap per month but start multiplying per month and it would be prohibitive for me.

The server would only be used by one person in the office who will be managing the database. It would not be utilised by everyone.

Also, I have a guy who calls himself an IT guy, but why does second hand concern you so much?

Thanks

 

[USAFRet]

Second hand is not a major concern, but it brings no warranty. 6 months from now, if it dies....

That workload could easily be handled by a commercial NAS box, like a Qnap or Synology.
I have a 4 bay QNAP TS-453a, with 50TB drive space in or attached to it.
Small, stable, quiet, efficient on power, feature rich...a host of applications included, data segmentatrion and permissions by individual user or office.
Trivially expandable to add capacity.


I don't know what OS you were going to put on this, but a Windows Server license alone will double your cost.

 

[dance621]

Second hand is not a major concern, but it brings no warranty. 6 months from now, if it dies....

That workload could easily be handled by a commercial NAS box, like a Qnap or Synology.
I have a 4 bay QNAP TS-453a, with 50TB drive space in or attached to it.
Small, stable, quiet, efficient on power, feature rich...a host of applications included, data segmentatrion and permissions by individual user or office.
Trivially expandable to add capacity.


I don't know what OS you were going to put on this, but a Windows Server license alone will double your cost.

Thanks for the advice