[Beowulf] 32 nodes cluster price

[Bill Rankin]

On Oct 8, 2007, at 3:38 AM, Geoff Galitz wrote:

> I would argue that the situation you describe is a result of  that
> particular RAID adapter or that particular make and model is just
> inappropriate (no offense)

None taken.

I should have been clearer on the point I was trying to make.

First the clarifications:

I never meant to imply that RAID is a backup substitute.  Treating it  
as such is foolish in a production environment for many obvious  
reasons.  I mentioned the backup issue here (it was a failure of the  
existing backup system, not a standard policy) to explain why the  
group in question had to go to such lengths to restore the data that  
was on the disks.

The main point that I was trying to make was the the proprietary  
nature of the HW raid controller that they used made recovery from a  
double disk failure a much more lengthy and expensive process than it  
would have been with the software implementation (in this specific  
case).  For an inexpensive/small installation, I personally feel that  
software raid allows for better control and management of resources  
with a minimal (if any) performance hit.

That's all I really wanted to say.

-bill "Don't shoot me, I'm only the piano player" rankin