Need help with EV and SQL hardware spec for small office

[tg88]

I'm planning an EV7.5 implementation for Email Archiving, OWA functionality and PST migration only.

200 staff, 1.2TB Exchange store on a single Exchange 2003 server.  The plan is to archive approx. 50% of this which, based on a previous proof of concept, will mean all email older than 90 days is archived.  Indexes will be set to full and fast searching is a requirement.

Possible specs, any suggestions based on experience would be most welcome.

Option 1.

EV/SQL Server combined - 2 x QuadCore 2.4GHz CPU, 10GB RAM (W2003 Enterprise), 8 disks (RAID1 pairs) for System, MSMQ, SQL data, SQL logs, 3 disks (RAID 5) on a second controller for EV Indexes.  RAID5 SATA SCSI attached array for EV data.

Option 2.

EV Server - 1 x QuadCore 2.4GHz CPU, 4GB RAM, 4 disks (RAID1 pairs) for System, MSMQ, 3 disks (RAID 5) for EV Indexes.  RAID5 SATA SCSI attached array for EV data.

SQL Server - 1 x QuadCore 2.4GHz CPU, 4GB RAM, 6 disks (RAID1 pairs) for System, SQL data, SQL logs.

Option 2 is a little more costly, and requires more rack space, power, network, etc. so I would prefer to go with Option 1 if performance will not be an issue.

[MichelZ]

Hi From my view, we always recommend to have SQL on another Box (isn't there already one in your Org you could use?). The 3 disks for Index seems a litte bit small, I'd recommend 5 here for performance. How many disks are in your SCSI attached array? If you really want to save money and buy just 1 box, I think it would be enough (but not "best practice") Is there any reason why you implement 7.5 and no directly go to EV8? (e.g. because of the new storage model -> may save you some space) Cheers Michel

[Wayne_Humphrey]

Hi tg88,

Fist question:
Why install Enterprise Vault 2007, when you got v8 SP1 in a couple of weeks?
 

Obviously option 2 would be the best bet or so most people will say, however with the amount of users you got I would say option 1 would be more than sufficient.
 

This all comes down to the number of messages you need to archive each night, average message size and the archive window you have.

[Wayne_Humphrey]

Feel, free to contact me if you wish to discuss.

[tg88]

To answer the questions:

How many disks are in your SCSI attached array? Initially 6, expandable to 12.

Why install Enterprise Vault 2007, when you got v8 SP1 in a couple of weeks?  Testing in our environment (which has to be completed by our HQ) is only up to 7.5 (2007).

Further questions from me:

What kind of load can I expect to add to an existing SQL server when is this highest, during archiving (which will be outside core hours) or general activity?

Other than improved compression/SIS, are there any other improvements in EV8 that might make me want to push for this?

[MichelZ]

Hi Yes, main load will be during archiving hours, with some (minor) load during core. On EV8 features, Wayne certainly is better informed than me ;)

[Wayne_Humphrey]

double post

[Wayne_Humphrey]

As I said:

"This all comes down to the number of messages you need to archive each night, average message size and the archive window you have"
 

Work out how many messages per night will be archived, tell me the average message size and the archive window you have. We can then speak figures :)
 

I would strongly recommend that while you still in the testing phase to consider v8.
 

A) You will not need to upgrade, when 2007 becomes none supported
B) V8 is way more superior. OSIS, Age/Quota, updatable metta data, are just some of the features you could take advantage of.

[tg88]

After the initial archiving backlog is cleared, I would like to be able to archive 2GB or 18000 emails/day in a 1 hour window.  That would be an average size of approx. 120KB per email.

Like I said, moving to EV8 will be dictated by our HQ, but I will enquire again for their testing schedule.

[Wayne_Humphrey]

You should be getting a minimum of around 20,000 per hour.  If you know your stuff you can easily double that figure, if not treble that.

[tg88]

Is the above comment based on my Option 1 (combined servers) ?

[Rob_dos_Ramos · Accepted solution]

 Those figure for the first option would work. 

Just rememeber single point of failure, if that box goes down it takes a long time to rebuild and get it back up and running. 

I would always use two server but then again you could use one server for now and then later on bring in another SQL server.

If you do have another SQL server in the enviroment then the only time you need to worry about the SQL performance, the only time SQL server has issues is when yuou run big reports using EV reporting and during the Archiving it self other wise the server will work fine. 

One of the customers we have has a fairly good EV server for the bulk of the work load and a smaller server for the SQL and we stil manage good archiving rates. Similar to the rates that Wayne stated