Re: Designing RAC Storage For A Small University

Tim wrote:
> Hello, all.
>
> We are a small (1,500 enrollment) university running SCT Banner
> currently on Oracle 9i on an old HP Alpha.
> We are looking at upgrading to Oracle 10g on a two-node RAC of Windows
> or linux machines - windows because our admins here have the most
> experience administrating it.We would rather build a cluster of boxes
> rather than just one because we can buy multiple wintel boxes and thus
> ensure hopefully an even better availability than our old Alpha.
>
> I am discovering that RAC requires external shared storage. Can someone
> please explain to me what exact kind of hardware (with example
> make/model if possible) would be needed and can be used in a RAC? Our
> database is under 10GB in size and we have about 50 users. I am getting
> lost in the diference between NAS and SAN and which one will work, and
> I'm seeing dollar figures of $12-15,000, which, as a storage solution
> for two $3,000 servers, seems a little out of scope, especially since
> Oracle's big "grid" thing is supposed to be about /in/expensive
> hardware.
>
> Thanks for the help, Tim

Tim while one can cobble together a shared disk environment very inexpensively for testing purposes it's not at all suitable for a production environment.

For small RAC configurations the shared storage ( given how inexpensive server hardware is these days ) is still probably going to the most expensive part.

RAC is a high availability solution. Do you need that much availability?

One can configure a stand by database on a different server and fall over to that system pretty quickly if your primary server goes down.

That only requires 2 servers that each have their own storage not shared.

There's a bunch of vendors out there that should be able to quote you prices and features for a minimal RAC configuration if that's absolutely what you want.

Do you need it or do you just want it?

It's a business decision and an availability choice that you are looking at. If you need it then someone will find a way to pay for adequate hardware. Received on Fri Nov 04 2005 - 14:54:29 CST