Could someone recommend hardware for 400 courses (30 users a class) and 1000 courses (30 users a class), the machines would obviously run linux with MySQL.
The courses would be spread amoungst multiple instances.
I have left the requirements vague as I am open to suggestions. Please advise.
I am thinking:
2x dual CPU dual core (2 machines with 4 cores each) with 4GB of RAM (8GB if we use VMWARE) hooking them up to a SAN (or cross mounting NFS)(for the storage) and master master replication for mySQL
Placing the two machines behind a load balancer and splitting the backup tasks between machines.
Im also interested to know peoples experience with running moodle on VMWARE for medium sized installations (100+ courses)!
Thanks in advance for your help.
Rahim,
do you know what the usage pattern will be? Will your users be using all of moodle, or only the more static things (resources). Server load is very dependant on the moodle module used and the number of concurrent users.
So basically you should think about the number of users, the number of courses is not of your primary concern database and apache/php wise (but it may be disk space wise). Do you have an idea of the number of concurrent users and the number of users in total? Knowing this figure can help us support you better.
Mysql replication, especially multi master, is a rather complex thing and you should really know what you are doing here, to avoid user (admin) errors. More info on : http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/replication.html
I would advise one big database server (lots of fast disks, loads of ram, fastest cpus you can pay) and multiple webservers sitting behind a loadbalancer or using some kind of balancing mechanism. One big fileserver for the data and you are set. Keep in mind that you only get higher performance doing this, not higher availability. If you need higher availabilit, you should think about making things redundant (drbd block devices, mysql master/slave failover).
This is my opinion on these kinds of setups, maybe others have differen ideas and I'd love to hear about them, too.
Might I suggest a quad-core Intel instead of two dual-core cpu's. You will save yourself some $$ on the motherboard costs. You also might want to check out a raid 1+0 array instead of the more conventional raid 5.
Cheers
Cheers
I'm not certain where your getting your processors/motherboards ... but why not just build two seperate dedicated machines and build in some redundancy?
Quadcore processor/motherboard = $879.00 + $107.99 = 986.89 + s&h
Two dual-core AMD AM2 processors/motherboard = 919.96 (with two 500Gig SATA drives (+539.98 times 3 for some redundancy) and 8gig of ram (+$1100)
... (or you could get a dual processor optron system ... still cheaper than the intel equivelent).
... but eh ... what do I know, I'm a small time user (I only have <60 endusers and antique 800MHz Intel box with 384mb of ram and an 80 gig hd over a 3MB down/384KB up ADSL line) with big time aspirations! The only certain piece of advice is to use either giga ethernet or fiber for your network connection (you'll never go back to 10/100 willingly).
He already has redundancy, I'm sure if one machine drops, his load balancer will compensate. He already specified that he was going to use 4 cores per machine, single-socket motherboards are much cheaper than dual, he could simply go with a quad-core and save some $ but I'm not sure that saving $ is even important to him.
Hi could anyone suggest how much load can i put on a SUN FIRE T1000 server
I am planning a new setup for 1000 users, mutimedia, Chat, Conferencing, 150 concurrent users. also will it be advisable to run moodle and have the database also on the same server
Additional Details are Here on the SUN FIRE T1000 server
Processor
Processor 6 or 8 core, 1.0 GHz UltraSPARC T1 processor
Architecture SPARC V9 architecture, ECC Protected
Cache per processor 16 KB instruction, 8 KB primary data cache, 3 MB integrated L2
Main Memory
Main Memory Eight DIMM slots, DDR2 with Chipkill and DRAM Sparing, ECC registered DIMMs, system maximum of 32 GB; support for 512 MB, 1 GB, 2 GB and 4 GB DIMMs
Standard/Integration Interfaces
Network Four 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet
Serial One DB-9 serial port
Expansion One PCI-Express (PCI-E) slot compliant with PCI-E specification Revision 1.0a (supports x1, x4, and x8 cards)
I am planning a new setup for 1000 users, mutimedia, Chat, Conferencing, 150 concurrent users. also will it be advisable to run moodle and have the database also on the same server
Additional Details are Here on the SUN FIRE T1000 server
Processor
Processor 6 or 8 core, 1.0 GHz UltraSPARC T1 processor
Architecture SPARC V9 architecture, ECC Protected
Cache per processor 16 KB instruction, 8 KB primary data cache, 3 MB integrated L2
Main Memory
Main Memory Eight DIMM slots, DDR2 with Chipkill and DRAM Sparing, ECC registered DIMMs, system maximum of 32 GB; support for 512 MB, 1 GB, 2 GB and 4 GB DIMMs
Standard/Integration Interfaces
Network Four 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet
Serial One DB-9 serial port
Expansion One PCI-Express (PCI-E) slot compliant with PCI-E specification Revision 1.0a (supports x1, x4, and x8 cards)