islaw Posted June 27, 2004 Share Posted June 27, 2004 Hi! I hope you could give light to my problem. I'm planning to buy a P4 2+GHz computer and make it as a file server for our 10-16 PC(with Autocad 2000 running on a Windows 2K/XP). The autocad 2000 are installed on respective local machines while working on their CAD files on the proposed file server. What should I worried about if I pushed for the plan? Our network is connected on a 3com Baseline 10/100 Switch. I appreciate any response. Thank you. Ethan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Nichols Posted June 27, 2004 Share Posted June 27, 2004 first make sure you are running windows XP server. you will need to connect several computers. make sure your HD are as fast as posible serial ATA RAID or something. Make sure you have 1 to 2 gigs of ram. The only thing to go cheap on is the cdrom and video card. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
K-Mike Posted June 27, 2004 Share Posted June 27, 2004 if u really want to use it as a file server, U may consider replacing ur switch whith a gigabit switch... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckytohaveher Posted June 27, 2004 Share Posted June 27, 2004 Go Gigabit All The Way. It makes a tremendous difference is overall system performance. I just setup a small network with bridged (WinXP) 2port gigabit cards with full-duplex. I used $200 gigabit switches from 'buy.com'. It is about 500MB/second in burst mode. It is SUPER-FAST... Definitely get Raid-5 with 4 serial drives. Also use Supercache for XP. I have been using this for Window2000Pro since '00 with great success. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
islaw Posted June 28, 2004 Author Share Posted June 28, 2004 So, its okay to use a P4 2+GHz? Does anyone has a similar setup? Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Nichols Posted June 28, 2004 Share Posted June 28, 2004 that may be ok... I would use a dual proc if you can. If not, try to use one with at least hyperthreading. As a file server it has to do a lot of little tasks all the time, sometimes at the same time, so the extra proc can help you out here, a lot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad Warner Posted June 28, 2004 Share Posted June 28, 2004 I just setup a small network with bridged (WinXP) 2port gigabit cards with full-duplex. How do you set it up to use both network cards? -Chad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigcahunak Posted June 29, 2004 Share Posted June 29, 2004 The P4 is definitely 100% OK for the job and even more. Dont think you'll need lots of memory. Gigabit would be nice, but about $500 extra in expences for switch and cards. Not so sure about raids. I Use a similar setup for ACAD 2000 with 2 differences: 1. We only have 6 workstation (even though the switch is 16...) 2. The file server is a P2 350mhz, 128Mb and regular ATA33mhz hard drives. Guess what, it works flawlessly for years alrweady, and does backup as well. I do plan to replace it pretty soon, though. Its just that its a fuss replacing a server, so I keep postponing it... 16 users is still relatively small. I'd take the P4 and also push for a gigabit network. Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
islaw Posted June 29, 2004 Author Share Posted June 29, 2004 guys, thanks for all of your response. So, I guess i would go for a P4 Hyper Treading System and purchase a SATA. I'm really concern on the speed of the network once all the 10 to 20 Autocad users simultaneously access the file server and work on their autocad files. What do you think guys? iel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckytohaveher Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 Sorry Chad, I didn't finish the thread. You need two gig nics, or a dual-port gig card on both ends of the connection. You also need enough cables and switch space. Don't use a plain router (it must be a switching router). Then go into new network connections in XP. Select bridged and select both of the single port gigabit connections. That's it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xgarcia Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 In the office we're running a Dell Server (yeah I know, the boss bought it online about 4 years ago without consulting anyone remotely knowledgable about computers) P3 800, 512 MB ram, 0+1 Raid (mirrored and striped) 73 gig SCSI drives. For autocad work you don't need blazing fast CPU and high memory (1 gig at most). Remember, your server isn't folding proteins or running weather simulations - it just serves files to autocad stations. The most important two things are the hard drives (access times, reliability, size) and data backup. We're doing nightly DVD backups (carried off site) to one huge RAR file (via WinRAR command line / batch file, only amended files get added). In addition the RAR gets dumped to a stand alone drive. We're going to a tape backup soon because DVD will only hold 4.7GB per disk and our compressed backup master file is at 4.1GB or so. You could go dual CPU's but I don't see the real need if you're running only AutoCAD (for 16 users max). We're at 8 users now - everything runs well on 10/100Mbit 16 port switch. Good luck and keep asking questions if you run into anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xgarcia Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 Forgot to mention we're using Windows2000 Server, but we're soon switching to Debian based Linux file server (complete user permission and file structure). We're also going to build a small form-factor Linux firewall box along with another identical box running our own email server on site (we're at the mercy of our web hosting provider now). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 Go Gigabit All The Way. It makes a tremendous difference is overall system performance. I just setup a small network with bridged (WinXP) 2port gigabit cards with full-duplex. I used $200 gigabit switches from 'buy.com'. It is about 500MB/second in burst mode. It is SUPER-FAST... Definitely get Raid-5 with 4 serial drives. Also use Supercache for XP. I have been using this for Window2000Pro since '00 with great success. Good luck! I agree with all of this except the Supercache thing - only because I dont know what it is. Can you explain? When it comes to your server OS, I think I would choose linux over Windows. Although my server runs XP, it does so only because it needs to run Cinema 4D Net render server. I'd be using Linux otherwise. If you are a little tech savy it isnt that hard to set up. Its fast and super stable. I also opted for a four X 120G SATA RAID5. I'm not too satisfied with the speed, but the redundancy makes me sleep better Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad Warner Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 Seems easy enough. I will have to try that. -Chad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckytohaveher Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 http://www.superspeed.com/supercache.html I have used this in the past, under Win2K. It speeds up rendering about 20%-30% overall because it uses some of the system ram as a cache for the harddrive. Basically it greases the skids. It is most important for your rendering server which houses all of the source rendering files, process the network job requests, etc. I have seen similar number in my test at the station level. If you notice in the rendering dialogue for MAX/Viz there is always the active ram and swap numbers. Typically the swap is 1/3 of the physical. Because ram is approximately 1000x faster than a physical disk it optimizes that sub-system by around 200%. As a result overall performance is 30% or so. Don't forget at each job, map, RPC, etc. the data must be loaded from disk so it actually does make a difference. Also, BRIDGING the network works for 100baseT in addition to Gigabit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckytohaveher Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 I talked with Superspeed software. The XP Version of Supercache will be out early to mid September. That's +/- 3 weeks. Definitely check it out. It helps the entire system, not just Max/Viz. They usually have a free evaluation period and download on their web site. Nothing like a free test drive aye! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xgarcia Posted September 1, 2004 Share Posted September 1, 2004 Don't overkill it for just a autocad dwg file server. You really don't need that much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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