System config suggestions

We are migrating from Sybase ASE to Oracle with new hardware and win2000 server. The new hardware will have between 512mb and 1gb, be dual processor, and will also serve as our main web server (IIS) on which we get about 50k hits daily. The database is moderately sized, probably about 1 gb in Sybase. We'll have about 20-30 active users with more sporadic usage from others. Our users do more reading than editing and more editing than creating. Web accesses would be more much more reading than read-write transactions.

I need advice about RAID configuration.

We can't do as much segmentation as many might like. I expect to have 3 18gb 15k drives and two 9gb 10k drives, although I can reconfigure that somewhat. My initial thought is one raid 5 array with 3x18gb 15k drives and a raid 1 array with the 2x9gb drives mirrored. I could also add a third 9gb drive to the raid 1 and make it raid 5; I figure by now the penalty for write calcs on raid 5 over raid 1 have got to be a lot less than it used to be on $1400 controllers. ;-)

Then comes the question: where to put the web files, Oracle's data files and Oracle's redo logs. My initial thought would be to place the web files and data files on separate channels with the redo logs going where the web files go (since we don't do nearly as much writing as reading). Question is, who can better take advantage of the 15k access speed, Oracle or the web server (we have about 20k html files)?

Another approach might be to ditch the two channel approach, add a fourth 15k 18gb drive and let the web site cuddle into all that memory and let raid 5 do its magic on read speed in combination with the rapid access speeds that 15k drives seem to offer.

What about cluster size? It seems web servers would prefer a smaller cluster size as html files tend to be small. What about Oracle?

I should also say I believe we can backup the full database each night, unless we start to do multimedia of any sort.

Please share your thoughts on this probably-oft-discussed topic.

Thanks.

-- 
Frank Burleigh
Indiana University School of Law
burleigh_at_indiana.edu