bye bye Xen
Well it looks like it’s time to plan a replacement server. My trusty Ideq Biostar which I’ve had since 2004/2005 is still fine, however there are some bugs for which I need to upgrade the kernel and it’s stuck at 2.6.18 since Xen hasn’t been ported to a newer kernel. I’ve backported a few fixes, but really it’s getting a drag. Furthermore the fan in the PSU has been dodgy for ages and I’m sure it chews a fair amount of power.
New server will be small and support KVM virtualisation. Current contenders are:
* [http://www.tranquilpc-shop.co.uk/acatalog/Motherboards.html Atom CPU based machine] – 1.6GHz but not that fast
* [Intel Core 2 duo http://www.mini-itx.com/2008/03/06/intels-eaglelake-mini-itx-boards] DQ45EK or DG45FC with E8200 (£90)
The Atom is much lower power (4W), but also lower performance – the E8200 is about 40-50% faster than my current E6300 desktop. On PC Mark 2005 we have:
* current desktop: 4794
* E8200: 6833
* Atom230@1.5GHz: 1406
I think the Atom may well be too slow unfortunately. It’d be nice to have the laptop T9300/T9500 processor – 2.5/2.6GHz rather than the 2.67GHz of the E8200, but the TDP is 35W rather than 65W (although mostly it’ll be idle). In fact the T8100/T8300 would do nicely – not as quick, but cheaper. As usual [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Core_2_microprocessors wikipedia] is the best source of information.
There also seems to be confusion as to which Atom CPUs have VT (virtualisation extensions).
I’ll also need a new case for the current two IDE disks (and no doubt a slimline DVD drive).
Update: [http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=34 Jetway Mini-ITX] look tempting too. Case suggstions welcome.
Posted: June 24th, 2008 under My setup.
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