SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors
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The SAM-SD storage approach requires the use of enterprise, commodity hardware. Only a handful of vendors are well suited for this while also meeting the enterprise requirements. Of all of the potential vendors on the market, three stand out as particularly well suited, on a regular basis to the building of a SAM-SD. These vendors are Dell, HPE and SuperMicro.
There are other options, such as Fujitsu but their lineup and availability is limited. IBM and Oracle make excellent hardware but none well suited to large storage and low cost compute needs. These three vendors nearly always are the only ones that we need to consider. Cisco is, of course, an option but their lineup is mostly designed around external storage and their hardware is rarely well suited to storage serving needs but rather storage consuming needs.
Of recent interest is Chinese server maker Huawei who has a very cost effective lineup that is not very well known in the US and Western Europe. They are well worth keeping an eye on for sure.
Nearly all SAM-SD projects will involve these vendors.
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Updated for 2017. Original list had HP who is not HPE. And Huawei has been added as well. For 2017, it is certainly Dell and SuperMicro who show the most promise and HPE has backed away from the general purpose use market in this manner and increased costs while becoming locked more and more behind closed doors.
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I had chance to see Huawei gear at local telco ... I can tell you that is some serious iron. Performant, robust, looks really reliable. Don't know for pricing, but looks very good indeed.
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@triple9 said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
I had chance to see Huawei gear at local telco ... I can tell you that is some serious iron. Performant, robust, looks really reliable. Don't know for pricing, but looks very good indeed.
I don't have solid pricing but the rumour is that it's jaw dropping awesome. I'm trying to get more info on it while I'm in one of their better markets.
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@scottalanmiller telecoms in Eastern Europe are mostly on Huawei equipment. Our local telco has almost everything running on Huawei (pppoe, firewalls, storage, Openstack cloud, VoIP services like IMS/SBC. Their VoIP platform fits in 10U space of rack, and that is for 2 million subscribers, in HA conf).
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@triple9 said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@scottalanmiller telecoms in Eastern Europe are mostly on Huawei equipment. Our local telco has almost everything running on Huawei (pppoe, firewalls, storage, Openstack cloud, VoIP services like IMS/SBC. Their VoIP platform fits in 10U space of rack, and that is for 2 million subscribers, in HA conf).
Yeah, I'm in Ukraine right now so hoping to check them out before going to the US where they are impossible to find.
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a concern about supermicro in Italy is the lack of onsite support.
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@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
a concern about supermicro in Italy is the lack of onsite support.
In Italy that might be an issue. In the US they have onsite support.
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@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
a concern about supermicro in Italy is the lack of onsite support.
In Italy that might be an issue. In the US they have onsite support.
so they seem great, considering the gear/price ratio!
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@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@triple9 said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
I had chance to see Huawei gear at local telco ... I can tell you that is some serious iron. Performant, robust, looks really reliable. Don't know for pricing, but looks very good indeed.
I don't have solid pricing but the rumour is that it's jaw dropping awesome. I'm trying to get more info on it while I'm in one of their better markets.
Yeah, but what about replacement parts?
With Dell, if a drive or backplane goes bad, it can be replaced within 4 hours.
Seems like with a vendor like Huawei, you'd need to basically buy two servers so you have spare parts, because I doubt you can get replacements in a timely fashion.... unless they are generic and you can pick them up at a local Disctech.com because they are used in other vendor servers. I don't know, haven't looked in to Huawei yet, just my initial $0.02 of ignorance.
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@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
a concern about supermicro in Italy is the lack of onsite support.
In Italy that might be an issue. In the US they have onsite support.
so they seem great, considering the gear/price ratio!
And the range of products. They have more flexibility in their offerings than most server vendors.
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@Tim_G said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@triple9 said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
I had chance to see Huawei gear at local telco ... I can tell you that is some serious iron. Performant, robust, looks really reliable. Don't know for pricing, but looks very good indeed.
I don't have solid pricing but the rumour is that it's jaw dropping awesome. I'm trying to get more info on it while I'm in one of their better markets.
Yeah, but what about replacement parts?
With Dell, if a drive or backplane goes bad, it can be replaced within 4 hours.
Seems like with a vendor like Huawei, you'd need to basically buy two servers so you have spare parts, because I doubt you can get replacements in a timely fashion.... unless they are generic and you can pick them up at a local Disctech.com because they are used in other vendor servers. I don't know, haven't looked in to Huawei yet, just my initial $0.02 of ignorance.
I think this is the opposite of SuperMicro. SM in the US competes with Dell and HPE. Huawei outside of the US does the same, I think. This is one of the BIG enterprise players, just not in the US market.
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@Tim_G Newegg is pretty good at getting things out fast. I had to replace a SuperMicro mobo in my server last year for 1 XS host, i ordered it one morning got it the next. Their cases are great and can come with redundant power supplies. They definitely dont have the support network of Dell, but getting parts next day is not impossible. And their stuff rarely goes bad in my experience.
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@momurda said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@Tim_G Newegg is pretty good at getting things out fast. I had to replace a SuperMicro mobo in my server last year for 1 XS host, i ordered it one morning got it the next. Their cases are great and can come with redundant power supplies. They definitely dont have the support network of Dell, but getting parts next day is not impossible. And their stuff rarely goes bad in my experience.
If you get parts from places like Ingram Micro, we can often get parts in around two hours!
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just discovered this reseller they provide NBD support on selected EU countries for supermicro.
they also suggest you to buy spare parts for replacement like fans, power suppliers, hdd, in the while NBD passes... basically they replace your backup NBD, with the exception that if you lose the mobo or the raid controller you need to wait NBD. -
@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
just discovered this reseller they provide NBD support on selected EU countries for supermicro.
they also suggest you to buy spare parts for replacement like fans, power suppliers, hdd, in the while NBD passes... basically they replace your backup NBD, with the exception that if you lose the mobo or the raid controller you need to wait NBD.So you didn't hear this from me, but if you want SAM-SD officially gear built by Dell, it's officially available in the EU as of tomorrow. It's not available with SuperMicro (yet?) but on Dell, it is. I can hook you up with the people to talk to if you want one
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@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
just discovered this reseller they provide NBD support on selected EU countries for supermicro.
they also suggest you to buy spare parts for replacement like fans, power suppliers, hdd, in the while NBD passes... basically they replace your backup NBD, with the exception that if you lose the mobo or the raid controller you need to wait NBD.So you didn't hear this from me, but if you want SAM-SD officially gear built by Dell, it's officially available in the EU as of tomorrow. It's not available with SuperMicro (yet?) but on Dell, it is. I can hook you up with the people to talk to if you want one
What would that be?
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@Tim_G said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@scottalanmiller said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@matteo-nunziati said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
just discovered this reseller they provide NBD support on selected EU countries for supermicro.
they also suggest you to buy spare parts for replacement like fans, power suppliers, hdd, in the while NBD passes... basically they replace your backup NBD, with the exception that if you lose the mobo or the raid controller you need to wait NBD.So you didn't hear this from me, but if you want SAM-SD officially gear built by Dell, it's officially available in the EU as of tomorrow. It's not available with SuperMicro (yet?) but on Dell, it is. I can hook you up with the people to talk to if you want one
What would that be?
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@travisdh1 I mean what is the hardware Dell is selling as SAM-SD?
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@Tim_G said in SAM-SD Hardware Server Vendors:
@travisdh1 I mean what is the hardware Dell is selling as SAM-SD?
Well, dagnabit, I don't have a link I can give you for that in 2 seconds!
