🚀 go-pugleaf

On 29 Jan 1997 17:14:33 GMT, jpquinn@cyberramp.net (Jay Quinn) wrote:

Some advice...

Anyone can build almost anything these days.  I could built a server
for a lot less money than Compaq, but no matter how hard I try, I'd
always be missing something...Experience.  

If you've never built a CD server before you probaly don't know what
to look out for and what can go wrong.  It's not like putting together
a model airplane...

Some things to look out for:

--Today's industry standard is the 8X CD ROM drive.  For a 150 User
network get a good drive, NEC, Toshiba etc... 12X drives are
available, but I'd wait till the cream rises to the top.
-- Go with SCSI only.  IDE/EIDE only supports 2 Devices per channel
and the bandwidth is a lot less than with SCSI.  Multi user
environments eat up the bandwidth rapidly.  Also, EIDE depends on the
CPU for processing while SCSI takes the load off the BUS.
-- Fast Processor is important (P100 or better)
-- PCI, 32Bit bus is a must.
-- lots of RAM (1-2 MB per CD)
-- PCI SCSI and NIC cards
-- A GOOD CD MGMT PACKAGE!!!  The best I've found for the price is CD
NOW from Microtest.  It's got all the bells and whistles of the
standard CD Packages, and it includes a CD version of Netware 4.1 (100
User)

If you do things right, you'll have a system that efficiently serve
out data to all of your users with a minimum of down time.  If you
don't then you'll have a great hobby for the next year or so.

By the way...The company's name is PROCOM with one "M" not to be
confused with the communications software.

Carl


>I am trying to build a inexpensive CD Rom Server for a 150 person LAN.
>
>I have looked at CD ROM servers like Procomm and other high end 
>equipment vendors.  They are all very nice and also very expensive.  I 
>also don't see how they are any better than what I can build.
>
>you decide!
>
>Now days there is 8x, 12x and even 16x CD ROM players.
>
>I am currently having my hardware vendor search and find out who makes 
>what speed in both IDE and SCSI.
>
>Heres the specs on what I've come up with as an effective inexpensive 
>solution:
>
>1.)  1 Pentium 166/32MB RAM/1GB HDD/Scsi Card for 6-CD ROMS/NIC
>
>2.)  6-16x SCSI CD-ROMs (Or E/IDE if they don't make em in SCSI)
>
>2.)  Windows 95 SP1 and share out all CD ROM Volumes
>
>3.)  Cacheing Software for the CD ROMS's
>
>4.)  Put on LAN and serve out!
>
>Well, what do you think?  Please take a stab at it to see if you feel 
>that there is anything better I can do.
>
>At this time I don't have prices but I will within a couple of days.
>
>I think that my solution is still as good or better and a lot cheaper 
>than what a place like Procomm will charge for the same basic thing.
>
>Q
>
>--
>Jay Quinn
>jpquinn@cyberramp.net
>