32GB SATA SSD - is it big enough

[sapphiron]

Hi All

I have a 20 user site that I am looking to replace their 7 year old Smoothwall with a nice Untangle 7.2 box. Internet connection is currently 4Mbit to be upgraded to 10Mbit later in the year.

I am planning a custom built whitebox with the following spec
Core i3 530 2.93Ghz
4GB RAM (dont need that much, but RAM is cheap)
Intel H55HC Hunter Cove (will check if its compatible first)
onboard NIC for LAN (Intel Gigabit)
2x Intel Pro 1000 PCI (one for internet and another for redundent internet or spare)
30GB Kingston SATA SSD (http://www.kingston.com/ukroot/ssd/v_series.asp?id=2)

Based on the 2 other site I currently manage running untangle, I came to the following conclusions that I would like to get input on.

Now the theory with the SSD is that the 30GB Kingston SSD is nearly the same cost of a standard 3.5" drive, but has the following theoretical advantages
1. Has no moving parts. So it should last much longer in low activity uses than a normal HDD that spins all the time.
2. saves power - every bit helps
3. fast read performance - booting up quickly is a plus and most people tend to recommend high spindle speeds on other forum posts

my questions
1. Untangle seems to require very little disk space in my other deployments, is 30GB enough?
2. does the Debian Kernel used in Untangle 7.2 support TRIM functionality found in the Kingston. Point me to the Debian version untangle 7.2 uses and I might be able to find out.

Should their be a problem, my plan is to get a 7200RPM WD black hard drive (smallest version is 500GB). I used them in the past because of the excellent performance and the 5 year warranty.

[dbunyard]

Depending on how much you are logging 30GB should be enough. Our system here at work with 80 users is currently only using about 8GB of it's 80GB. I don't have a lot of stuff being logged though really. I have the "Reports Retention days" and "Limit Data Retention" both at 30 days and I have daily, weekly, and monthly reports enabled. As for the Debian kernel support TRIM, I do not know the answer to this question. Someone else will have to address that.

[proactivens]

30Gb should be gravy. I have yet to see an untangle install go over 20GB and thats at a large site with a ton of spam quarantine going on. With the new reports, I dont think it will let data sit around for years on end, so he should be just fine with regular settings.

[proactivens]

That Kingston SSD is a nice drive BTW, I have used that model with great success. Untangle will fly through the install and startup will be fast too. SSD's are fast.

[sapphiron]

Thank for the input guys. Thanks for confirming my suspicions

Any world on the kernel version currently in use in Untangle 7.2 ?

[proactivens]

Debian Lenny not sure what build though

[sapphiron]

ok, I did some digging. Debian Lenny stock uses kernel 2.6.26

According to Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIM
TRIM is supported in Linux From 2.6.33, but as with other OS's will require a program to execute it.

But you know what they say about Wikipedia:

"Wikipedia is accurate"
(Citation needed)

[sky-knight]

I just did a uname -r on my box here that is current 7.2

2.6.26-1-untangle-686

So we're on 2.6.26-1 kernel

As for the 32gb drive, it should be enough. My largest installation that I manage every day has a 30gb utilization. That unit has 6 racks, defends an active Exchange server, and has 30 users behind it that like to torrent at random intervals.

My Untangle server here is a dual core unit, it defends a moderately busy mail server, my bench, virtual hosting rack, and my office network. Untangle is burning a whopping 6gb of the drive...

[hescominsoon]

The problem with the low end SSD"S is that without trim the drive is going to slow down after a certain amount of small writes. The slowness can get so bad it's slower than a laptop disk. I would not deploy any ssd's in a small write environment without TRIM support.

[sapphiron]

Thanks for the info everyone

I came to the same conclusion as Hescomingsoon. Without TRIM , SSDs dont provide reliable performance, will steer clear of SSDs for untangle until it (or rather debian) goes to a newer kernel.

WD black it is then.