Advice for a debian server

[Tim Small]

On 06/09/10 13:57, Emmanuel Lesouef wrote:
> Reading this list, I sometimes see threads complaining about
> compatibility issue between recent Dell servers and Debian GNU/Linux.
>
> What is the most stable and compatible model in order to install Debian
> Stable (Lenny) ?
>    

Anything without a SASx controller (LSI 1068 / LSI 1068E etc.), in my 
experience (just spent the morning recovering a Lenny server following 
data corruptions with these crappy controllers).

I'm quite happy with the option of using software RAID along with the 
onboard SATA controllers on the R210, R310, R410.  Not sure if they do a 
hot-swap option with SATA-only (i.e. non-SAS) configurations, but if 
they don't and you need this, then I can recommend the Intel Server 
Systems instead (e.g. Intel SR1630HGPRX,  SR1695GPRX etc.) - they are 
engineered to a similar quality, and you don't end up paying through the 
nose for large hard disks.

Make sure you use a recent Lenny kernel for the bnx2 NICs in the R210 
etc. to work - you'll need to have the firmware-bnx2 package installed.  
The Lenny installer images probably have the kernel patch in by now, but 
if they don't, just install using a USB NIC, or similar and then update 
to the latest kernel post-install.

Tim.

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