SuperMicro H8SSL-i (ServerWorks HT1000) -- providing technical information

[Bryan J. Smith]

"Vladimir G. Ivanovic" <vladimir at acm.org> wrote:
> My impression is that Bryan has been quite polite in the
> face of some unnecessarily pointed comments.
> And, BTW, ad hominem attacks like the manners comment about
> are always unappreciated.

I don't have a problem with anyone's demeanor here.  So don't
worry about that.

I provide a _lot_ of technical information to various groups,
and really try to "do my homework."  That includes providing
references as best as I can, when I can find them, and trying
to explain why you may never find exactly what you want with
some details.  I don't say things lightly, and if I'm saying
something, it's from experience.  Yours _may_ vary, and I'll
willing to accept that -- especially if the
context/application is quite different (e.g., web servers
using software RAID v. file servers using hardware RAID).

I'm more than ready and willing to be proven wrong.  The
_only_ problem I have is when I get berrated for providing
information, but no one else provides anything that
contradicts.  We're all here to help each other as we're all
looking for information.  I don't know why Peter insists on
picking apart anything I say, but for people like him, I have
my standard disclaimer -- please find out so we _all_ can
benefit.

You won't see my asking for anyone else to "prove" their
viewpoint.  I leave it up to others to challenge themselves,
just as I challenge myself.  So ... please don't ask me for
"proof" when you don't have any either -- let alone continue
to not accept the references I provide, then nit-pick apart
little details outside the context I give them.

E.g., vendors are marketing these commodity disk capacities
that have been tested to exceptional tolerances as
"enterprise," but they are very much not enterprise
capacities and quality.

I've shown specification sheets of drives with commodity
capacities (100-400GB) at 1.0M hours MTBF like the Seagate
NL35 and Western Digital Caviar RE, which match the exact
capacity/performance specifications as the Seagate Barracuda
7200.8 and Western Digital Caviar SE, respectively.  Anyone
can do further research on the enterprise capacities
(18-146GB) and find 1.4M hours MTBF.

But what you won't find is OEM/desktop grade MTBF anymore,
and some vendors like Hitachi have cut out MTBF ratings
altogether.  But if the "enterprise" versions of commodity
capacity (100-400GB) drives are only 1.0M hours MTBF, you can
be rest assured the OEM/desktop grades are well below that. 
Going back to the 50,000 restarts and 8 hours/day, maybe 14
hours/day (0.7M hours MTBF), maximum.

Lastly, getting away from end-users, but more to "service
level agreements" (SLA) with integrators (hey, most of here
support RHEL and sell some with SLAs, right? ;-), I know _no_
HD manufacturer/vendor that will warranty such OEM/desktop
grade drives when they know they will go in a 24x7 system. 
That's the reason for these 1.0M hour MTBF "enterprise"
versions like the Seagate NL35 and WD Caviar RE.

Please take this information as I have provided it.  If you
wish not to, again, I have no problem leaving you with the
belief that I acquire everything from my rectum.  I know it
takes years to trust what comes from someone, and I'm willing
to spend years earning that trust.  ;->


-- 
Bryan J. Smith                | Sent from Yahoo Mail
mailto:b.j.smith at ieee.org     |  (please excuse any
http://thebs413.blogspot.com/ |   missing headers)