Hardware for a zimbra server?

[Dirk]

Well, the trial process with Zimbra rolls on and I'm happy so far, happy enough to be looking at buying a server to run it on (it's running on a high spec PC right now)

So, I'm after some suggestions from you all, I have two proposals to make, does anyone have any comments?

Option 1, the cheap system
A used server, possibly from ebay, suggest:

• Compaq Proliant 9500
• 8 x 700MHz Xeon Processors
• 2 GB Ram
• 4 x 18 GB Drives (or larger if desired)

Option 2, the expensive one
A new server

• Compaq DL380
• 1 x P4 2.4 GHz Processor (possibly 2 if budget can stretch)
• 2 GB Ram
• 4 36 GB drives (15000 rpm)

So, the question becomes, will zimbra support around 50 users on the cheap hardware and remain responsive? Does linux love running on 8 processors or will that make things worse?

The difference in price is a lot, something like 400quid for the cheap one and a few thousand for the expensive one.

Suggestions and comments appreciated.

[jholder]

Hi Dirk,
Linux in general can support as many processors as the distro itself can support.

The real question is what distro do you plan to use it on?

I would think that zimbra could run on your cheap system, but I don't think that you will have great speed.

I would reccomend nothing less than 1 ghz. . .but then again, it is strongly predicated on the distro you use.

Have you tried eBay? You can get some really good deals there.

Good luck
john

Well, the trial process with Zimbra rolls on and I'm happy so far, happy enough to be looking at buying a server to run it on (it's running on a high spec PC right now)

So, I'm after some suggestions from you all, I have two proposals to make, does anyone have any comments?

Option 1, the cheap system
A used server, possibly from ebay, suggest:

• Compaq Proliant 9500
• 8 x 700MHz Xeon Processors
• 2 GB Ram
• 4 x 18 GB Drives (or larger if desired)

Option 2, the expensive one
A new server

• Compaq DL380
• 1 x P4 2.4 GHz Processor (possibly 2 if budget can stretch)
• 2 GB Ram
• 4 36 GB drives (15000 rpm)

So, the question becomes, will zimbra support around 50 users on the cheap hardware and remain responsive? Does linux love running on 8 processors or will that make things worse?

The difference in price is a lot, something like 400quid for the cheap one and a few thousand for the expensive one.

Suggestions and comments appreciated.

[Dirk]

Looks like we'll be going with an 'older' server, so a recon unit with lots of slower chips rather than a new unit with one or two fast ones.

Personally, I thought this thread may have been quite busy, I envisaged lots of people chipping in with comments about the rig they run and how it performs, I'm going to take the silence to mean that zimbra just works great on almost anything

Once we select the server and get it running, I'll drop a short message in here stating what we ended up with and how it's working out.

[KevinH]

This one got a few more responses...

What hardware does your zimbra system runs on