SAMPLE WEBSITE SERVER CONFIGURATIONS

Let’s examine some sample real life configurations that might be found running a robust website.

Simple Website

You can build a website around an inexpensive server configuration as discussed previously, but your website would be limited in the number of simultaneous visitors it could handle. A better choice would be a simple, relatively inexpensive web-server configuration that could reliably run a website that serves, on average, around 500,000 pages per month, such as:

• Silicon Graphics Inc. Challenge S with a 180 MHz IP22 MIPS R5000 CPU and 128 MB RAM, and file systems consisting of (1) 3GB SCSI (system) and (2) 4GB differential SCSI2 (web pages).
• The software might include the Unix IRIX 6.2 OS, Apache 1.3.1 web server software, and Perl 5.003 CGI Development Platform.
• Tape Backup 8mm DLT.
• ISP connection via either a symmetrical DSL line (i.e. a high-speed line that provides the same speed for both upstream and downstream data loads) or a fractional T-1/E-1 line.
• Everything would be plugged into a robust UPS.

Complex Website

Now, let’s look at a couple of configurations that might reliably be used to run a more complex website:

Example 1

• Dell Pentium III 500 MHz equipped with 256 MB PC100 RAM, Dual 9GB UltraWide SCSI drives, the necessary number of network cards, and Raid V Backup.
• The software might include Windows NT Server 4.0/ Windows 2000 Enterprise, Internet Information Server 4.0 (Service Pack 5.0), MDAC 2.1x, and a ColdFusion 4.0 Professional Server.
• ISP connection via a T-1/E-1 line.
• Everything plugged into a robust, long life UPS.

Example 2

• Dual Pentium III 450MHz processor equipped with 1024 MB of RAM, and running Linux, RedHat-6.2 install, Linux Kernel 2.2.20, Apache 1.3.9, and Perl 5.
• Backup would be handled by a 70GB RAID-5 array.
• ISP connection via dual fiber-optic T-1/E-1.
• Everything plugged into a robust, long life UPS.

Enterprise Website

Now let’s move up to a complex website running not only a web server but also other servers including a database server. This type of site might run a very expensive, but necessary, high-end configuration such as:

Example 1

• One Sun E450, 250 MB RAM, three 400 MHz UltraSPARC II processors with 4 MB cache, eight 9 GB (10,000 RPM) hard drives with backup plan, running Veritas’ Volume Manager RAID solution, Solaris operating system, Apache web server, F-Secure ssh 2.0, and WebTrends Enterprise Reporting Server for Solaris.
• One Sun E250, 128 MB RAM with one 400MHz UltraSPARC II Processor with 2 MB cache, five 9 GB (10,000 RPM) hard drives with backup plan, running Veritas’ Volume Manager RAID solution, Solaris operating system, Apache web server, F-Secure ssh 2.0, and WebTrends Enterprise Reporting Server for Solaris.
• One Sun E250, 128 MB RAM with two 400MHz UltraSPARC II Processors with 2 MB cache, five 9 GB (10,000 RPM) hard drives with backup plan, running Veritas Volume Manager RAID solution, Oracle Database Server Enterprise Server for 2x400 MHz CPUs.
• One Compaq ProLiant 1850R, 128 MB RAM, One 500 MHz Pentium III Processor with two 512 K caches, 4x1-inch Hot Plug Drive Cage and 2x1 Hot Plug Drive Cage, three 9 GB (10,000 RPM) Hard Drives with backup plan, SMART Array 3200 Controller running Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0, Microsoft IIS 4.0, Symantic PCAnywhere 8.0 Server.
• ISP connection via either a dual fiber-optic T-1/E-1 or a T-3 line.
• Everything must have a redundant power supply and be hooked up with multiple network cards.

Example 2

• Clustered Sun E450s with multiple processors and 1 GB RAM with the Solaris operating system and Apache web server.
• A database server with the same configuration except running Oracle 8.1 in place of Apache.
• An e-commerce server running two Dell 450s with 1 GB RAM and the Windows NT operating system and Microsoft IIS 4.0.
• A staging server running two Dell 450s with 1 GB RAM.
• A terabyte (TB) of external disk packs and a RAID 5 disk array.
• ISP connective via either a dual fiber-optic T-1/E-1 or a T-3 line.
• Everything should be powered by redundant power supplies and have multiple network cards to support High Availability.