hard disk – Internetblog.org.uk https://www.internetblog.org.uk Web hosting, Domain names, Dedicated servers Fri, 29 Jan 2016 11:05:52 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.5 https://www.internetblog.org.uk/files/2016/01/cropped-favico-32x32.png hard disk – Internetblog.org.uk https://www.internetblog.org.uk 32 32 Does my server need a high-speed hard drive? https://www.internetblog.org.uk/post/654/does-my-server-need-a-high-speed-hard-drive/ Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:58:47 +0000 http://www.internetblog.org.uk/post/654/does-my-server-need-a-high-speed-hard-drive/ hard disk drive
Dedicated servers generally come standard with a 7200 RPM hard drive, but many providers offer faster 10,000 RPM or even 15,000 RPM hard disks for an additional fee. Are these high-speed drives worth the money?

In most cases, no. While faster hard drives do translate to faster read and write times, they will not result in drastically faster performance. This is because the server’s Internet connection acts as a bottleneck.

It’s great if a server can access a file in a few milliseconds, but if it takes 5 seconds to send it across the web, the end user won’t notice the difference. In order to see benefits from a high-speed drive, a very fast uplink connection is needed. A 7200 RPM is fine for most applications.

]]> Prevent data disasters with a RAID array https://www.internetblog.org.uk/post/534/prevent-data-disasters-with-a-raid-array/ Thu, 01 Oct 2009 15:04:42 +0000 http://www.internetblog.org.uk/post/534/prevent-data-disasters-with-a-raid-array/ dedicated server
Do you make regular backups of your data? Even if you do, you will always experience significant downtime in the event of a hard disk failure on your dedicated server.

One solution to this problem is to upgrade from a single drive to a RAID array. Simply put, the technology involves running two hard drives in tandem. One is used by the server, while the other keeps a constant backup of everything. In the event the main drive fails, the backup takes over.

After experiencing two hard drive failures on my dedicated server, I paid my provider around £100 to have a second hard drive installed for RAID. While a bit pricey up front, the cost of downtime for me was much greater. I not only lost revenue when my sites were down, but also had to spend a significant chunk of time reconfiguring my server and uploading my data. A RAID array was a no-brainer.

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