If desktop computers serve as an organization’s brain, then a business-critical server functions as its backbone.
Acting as a lifeline to a trove of data,
servers play a crucial role in today’s
technologically driven society.
There are two key components to business-critical servers, says Hormazd
Dalal, president of Castellan Inc. “The
most critical component is the hard
drive, because that is where your data is
stored,” he says. “The next most vulnerable is the power supply, because those
tend to fail.”
Should either key component fail, having server redundancy is an astute
investment. This safeguard allows for
continual operations in the event that a
hard drive or power supply goes on the
blink.
Smart Business spoke with Dalal
about server redundancy, how often new
servers should be purchased and the
importance of warranties.
What is server redundancy?
Redundancy is making sure that if a
key component in the server fails, a
redundant piece of hardware ensures it
will keep running. In the case that a
drive fails, your data is still intact
because the server will continue running
on one drive. In the case of power supplies, if one power supply fails, the server continues to run and your network
stays up.
Why is it so important to have server redundancy in place?
Your mission-critical server will typically affect several people if it goes
down, so a server needs redundancy,
while a desktop computer doesn’t. If a
desktop component fails, then one user
will be out of business. If a server component fails, then access to data is lost in
its entirety, which will affect the entire
company. For example, if an e-mail server does not have redundancy and one of
those components fails, then the entire
company is without e-mail.
What aspects of a server are most important when creating redundancy?
You should mirror your drive. This can
be done either RAID 1, which is two
drives mirrored, or RAID 5, which is
three drives mirrored. This way, if one
drive fails, the server continues to run
and your data is still intact. The big manufacturers all offer dual power supplies,
so that if the power to one supply fails,
the server continues running. In most
cases, the server will give you a warning
saying that the component has failed,
but will continue to run, which gives you
enough time to call the manufacturer
and arrange for a replacement part.
How does a business know when it’s time to
buy a new server?
Typically, the life of a server is three
years. Most manufacturers only sell a
three-year warranty, which is an indication of when they think the items will
start failing. After that, if you try and
extend the warranty, it’s extremely
expensive. It’s much like a car warranty:
they don’t offer it after 50,000 miles
because around that time, the components start to fail. The time frame for
buying a new server depends on the critical nature of the server. If it’s a server
that isn’t doing a mission-critical application, like e-mail, for example, it’s not
as important. The servers that a business
relies on should be changed every three
to four years.
How important is it to have a warranty in
place for servers?
It is essential to have a three-year warranty for parts and labor. When you purchase a parts-and-labor warranty for
your server, you can have the manufacturer ship a part out or have a tech bring
a part out within four hours or the next
business day, depending on what you
purchased.
We recommend a four-hour response
time for mission-critical servers. The
redundancy is useful, but the warranty is
the icing on the cake because it allows
you to replace a part in a timely manner.
What are some additional considerations
for purchasing a server?
It depends on what you need. Today’s
applications are all memory-intensive,
memory being random access memory
(RAM), not storage. We recommend at
least four gigabytes of RAM and more if
it’s a database server or if it’s running
multiple applications.
The speed of the processor is important, although today’s processors are
fast enough to run many server-based
applications. SCSI hard drives are faster
than SATA RAID hard drives. Your
fastest SATA RAID drive today is 7,200
rpm. SCSI hard drives are 10,000 rpm to
15,000 rpm. This means that the ability
to retrieve and write information back to
the server is much faster.
HORMAZD DALAL is president of Castellan Inc. Reach him at
(818) 789-0088, ext. 202, or [email protected].