Game Server!!!!!!!!!

T

Tman

Gawd
Joined
Aug 10, 2004
Messages
945
Ok I know that some of you may be getting sick and tired of me always asking you which server would be a good one to get so that I can set it up at my house and use it to Run Game Servers and a small website for my self..

My budget is about $2,000 Grand give or take a little.


Like I said This will mainly be used for hosting a small website and hosting online games like Counter Strike, Call of Duty, and Halo with about 20 or less players. And Be on a T1 connection ;) hopefully... lol

I have a Copy Of Red Hat 9 too
 
What system would you get??

Could you please totally price one out for me and post it here thanks
 
Running linux would be preferable over windows for stability sakes but alot of games these days don't have linux based server clients so you might be forced into windows to host the games you'd like as well as your website :(

For the CPU: Get either opterons or xeons but my vote is opteron, probably around dual 246 level, but 248 if you can afford it.

For the motherboard: Try and get a high quality one, if you plan on stability. Tyan Thunders and supermicro(SM are more high-end) are good. For a more down to earth level board the MSI K8T-Master 2 FAR is a good entry level dual opty board.

For ram: Get 2 to 4 gig of ram. Tthe more games you plan on running at the same time the more ram would be advisable, probably about a gig a game(up to 4 gig) would make it run very nice, even if a little overkill.

Video card: Well... you shouldnt actually need a video card. If you plan on gaming with the machine to a small degree then something like a 9600xt with a heatpipe no-fan cooler would be nice, though i personally don't like using servers for anything but serving :p

Storage: You'd probably want to go with a Raid array, most likely Raid-1 for data integrity. Raid-0 might also be an idea to consider, though may not benifit you much in this situation.

To summarise:
CPU: Dual 246 or 248 opteron Skt940
MB: Tyan Thunder chipset board or Master K8T Master2 FAR
Ram: ECC Registered 2 to 4 gb, Corsair or Kingston
GFX: 9600xt level would make sure configuration of games would be smooth
PSU: Antec 550w True Power
Case: CM Stacker (if can afford, big case with lots of ventilation)
HDD: 2 or 3 sata drives, for either Raid1 or JBOD.

If you want more precise details on which motherboard just say so or if you have any other questions. I havent had time to price this, i just through it up outa my head. If you explain how much strain or what exactly the server is going to be doing(load and up-time, public or private etc) ill be able to give you more specific specs.
 
FunkStar said:
Running linux would be preferable over windows for stability sakes but alot of games these days don't have linux based server clients so you might be forced into windows to host the games you'd like as well as your website :(

For the CPU: Get either opterons or xeons but my vote is opteron, probably around dual 246 level, but 248 if you can afford it.

For the motherboard: Try and get a high quality one, if you plan on stability. Tyan Thunders and supermicro(SM are more high-end) are good. For a more down to earth level board the MSI K8T-Master 2 FAR is a good entry level dual opty board.

For ram: Get 2 to 4 gig of ram. Tthe more games you plan on running at the same time the more ram would be advisable, probably about a gig a game(up to 4 gig) would make it run very nice, even if a little overkill.

Video card: Well... you shouldnt actually need a video card. If you plan on gaming with the machine to a small degree then something like a 9600xt with a heatpipe no-fan cooler would be nice, though i personally don't like using servers for anything but serving :p

Storage: You'd probably want to go with a Raid array, most likely Raid-1 for data integrity. Raid-0 might also be an idea to consider, though may not benifit you much in this situation.

To summarise:
CPU: Dual 246 or 248 opteron Skt940
MB: Tyan Thunder chipset board or Master K8T Master2 FAR
Ram: ECC Registered 2 to 4 gb, Corsair or Kingston
GFX: 9600xt level would make sure configuration of games would be smooth
PSU: Antec 550w True Power
Case: CM Stacker (if can afford, big case with lots of ventilation)
HDD: 2 or 3 sata drives, for either Raid1 or JBOD.

If you want more precise details on which motherboard just say so or if you have any other questions. I havent had time to price this, i just through it up outa my head. If you explain how much strain or what exactly the server is going to be doing(load and up-time, public or private etc) ill be able to give you more specific specs.
Click to expand...
Nice work, I couldn't have said it any better myself! ;)
 
FunkStar said:
Running linux would be preferable over windows for stability sakes but alot of games these days don't have linux based server clients so you might be forced into windows to host the games you'd like as well as your website :(

For the CPU: Get either opterons or xeons but my vote is opteron, probably around dual 246 level, but 248 if you can afford it.

For the motherboard: Try and get a high quality one, if you plan on stability. Tyan Thunders and supermicro(SM are more high-end) are good. For a more down to earth level board the MSI K8T-Master 2 FAR is a good entry level dual opty board.

For ram: Get 2 to 4 gig of ram. Tthe more games you plan on running at the same time the more ram would be advisable, probably about a gig a game(up to 4 gig) would make it run very nice, even if a little overkill.

Video card: Well... you shouldnt actually need a video card. If you plan on gaming with the machine to a small degree then something like a 9600xt with a heatpipe no-fan cooler would be nice, though i personally don't like using servers for anything but serving :p

Storage: You'd probably want to go with a Raid array, most likely Raid-1 for data integrity. Raid-0 might also be an idea to consider, though may not benifit you much in this situation.

To summarise:
CPU: Dual 246 or 248 opteron Skt940
MB: Tyan Thunder chipset board or Master K8T Master2 FAR
Ram: ECC Registered 2 to 4 gb, Corsair or Kingston
GFX: 9600xt level would make sure configuration of games would be smooth
PSU: Antec 550w True Power
Case: CM Stacker (if can afford, big case with lots of ventilation)
HDD: 2 or 3 sata drives, for either Raid1 or JBOD.

If you want more precise details on which motherboard just say so or if you have any other questions. I havent had time to price this, i just through it up outa my head. If you explain how much strain or what exactly the server is going to be doing(load and up-time, public or private etc) ill be able to give you more specific specs.
Click to expand...


WOW thanks alot man!!!

I quess that you are the guy to ask these kinds of questions to me :)

The nice thing is that I have a old 9600 card laying around because the pc craped out on me and now its just collecting dust... sadly enough to say..

Some Questions I have for you-

1) Besides RedHat9 I also have a copy of Windows Server 2000 (i got it form on of my dads old office computers when he ugraded his dential offices computers) and was wonderng if that would even be a good thing to possible run??

2) How much would you say a system with
Duel 246 processors
2g
cheaper motherboard out of the two you suggested to me
cost me??

3) If I wanted to opperat my server from my moms house what would you suggest I go doing this?? what programs?? etc?? Suggestions?? Comments?? ETC Thanks


Thank you a bunch... as you can tell I am a noob to computers and would really like to start learning things like this and many more..
 
Everything on this list is priced from newegg unless otherwise stated

Retail Opteron 244 Skt940 x 2 = $660
MSI K8T Master2 FAR (For ZipZoomFly.com) = $214 (comes with CPU coolers)
Coolermaster Stacker Full Tower = $159.50
Antec TruePower 550w = $102.50. I'm pretty sure its standard ATX not EPS, correct if wrong
1gb Corsair Registered ECC DDR-PC2700 x 2 = $478.52
Western Digital S-ATA 160gb HDD x 2 = $192
Sony Black 52x32x52 CD-R Drive = $23.99
NEC Black Floppy OEM Drive = $7
D-Link 10/100/1000Mbps Copper-line PCI Card = $16.99

Total for that is $1854.50

Its most likely possible to pricegrab all these parts and save a good $100 or so, but i'll let you do that heh. You could also opt for a slightly cheaper case but the stacker is nice and roomy :p, but any case will do really, so theres like $75 saved there if you chose to get something dif. Something Antec would be nice, but generic cases are the devil so avoid that if you can. Any Antec Tower would be a good alternative, but once again, the stacker is the best case out there.

For a Dual 246 system with the same parts is $2132.50 so if you saved about $100 on parts, $75 on case and then got rid of the CD drive to save a bit extra you'd be able to get under $2000 quite easily.

On the topic of windows 2000 server i personally have never used it, only windows 2k professional. I'd check with the games your planning on playing to see if they're compatible with it and read up on reviews and opinions of the OS itself. Once again, Linux would be better but if any of the games your running have no linux server client then :( I'd check up on this cause Linux is ALOT better as a server.

For remote operation, if using Linux, you could use good ol' Telnet but there are alot of remote terminal emulation programs, PuTTY is one that i've seen used quite alot. Most of the linux ones have no GUI just simple text but thats all you need.

The two HDDs are for Raid-1. Raid-0 should only be used for mass data-storage of large files, not quick access of game config files. The motherboard can handle the array im pretty sure. Raid-1 is mirroring, if you didnt know, so if one drives takes a dive the other has the data on it so nothing is lost.

Once again, if you have any more questions or would like more specifics on setting the server up, just ask. I'm more of a hardware guy but yhere are alot of Linux proficient people on here anyway heh. Remember, don't be afraid to ask any questions, even if you think they're a little simple.

-Funk*
 
Tman said:
3) If I wanted to opperat my server from my moms house what would you suggest I go doing this?? what programs?? etc?? Suggestions?? Comments?? ETC Thanks
Click to expand...
With Linux it's quite easy to set up an SSH server, rather than telnet. This will work quite nicely with PuTTY (google it, it's your new best friend) to let you remotely connect.

Even if your motherboard doesn't allow for "hardware" raid1, there is still a way to do raid1 in software with Linux. Works rather nicely.


edit: even with win2k you can do sw raid. There's a piece of software called VNC you'll want to look into for remote access to windows. Real easy.
 
Are you looking at 20 players total or a few 20 player servers?

Cause 1x20 Player CS:S server can use 1Mbit.
 
Though you have a copy of red hat 9, I would suggest if you are going with Opterons to take the leap to Suse Linux Interprise 9

Man is it easy and just as well done or better than red hat 9.

Also if you don't have your heart set on building the server, you can get a dell pretty cheap. If you are set on Opterons, try XIComputer
 
If it's 20 or under you aren't going to need all that powerful of a system. Since you aren't hosting tons of servers I doubt you will need dual opterons unless you plan later on to really add a ton of stuff to it. You would probably be fine with like a 2ghz processor and a gig of ram. Most game servers run out of bandwidth at lot sooner than hardware slowing them down.
 
ya your right with what you say-

I just really want to spend about $2000 for a server
 
Tman said:
ya your right with what you say-

I just really want to spend about $2000 for a server
Click to expand...

You still have a bandwidth problem no matter how much you spend on a server, as determined in your other thread in the networking section. I'd consider finding some more bandwidth first or scrap this idea all together. It seems more logical to use the money towards building a kickass system and connect to one of the other 1000's of game servers with the bandwidth you will have.
 
Tman said:
so a T1 will not be good enough??
Click to expand...


Per this thread: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=853230 you say all those (seven) people want to be on at the same time, you would really be pushing the bandwidth available whenever you're using a large chunk of it with a game server. Those other users would most likely feel ripped off if they can only download at 56k speeds(with less lag though) because a game server is using most of the bandwidth.
 
i messed up that other thread..

basically everyone would have their own T1..
and that thread is really really messed up and I must say sorry for that.. (like is said I am a freaken nOob)

but to add to the fasct that everyone would have their own T1, I really think that the Ebay guy, me, Aunt, and other neighbor would go through with it.

I am jsut really really desperate for any kindof High Speed Connnection and really want to do anything to get it and set up a home net work together with hopefully a server for only me and my friends, and for hosting some very small personal sites
 
Some ISPs won't run a T1 to a personal residence, unless its for a business or something. Also, the cost of having 4x T1's (probably better off getting partial T3) is a lot of money just so surf the internet and play games online. A rough guess would be at the least 1,500 a month if it isn't too far.
 
If you feel up to the build challenge, do a 1U or 2U server, put it in a good datacenter and then you won't be looking at $1000 US a month for a T-1 connection, which is terrible for gamehosting, because you need at least a 2Mbit for that. A full T-3 will run you about ten thousand a month. You're much better off paying a datacenter for a 2Mbit chunk of their backbone connection than hosting it in your house. Not to mention your power bill will shoot up unless you already keep your room cold and use low voltage Xeons or buy an Apple G5 server.

In any case, to put together a good server will cost probably more than 2k because the case alone is about 700 or so. It also depends on how many game servers you want to run off the single machine. My friend used to have 12 game servers on a Dual Xeon setup with a few GB of RAM and a 2Mbit connection in the EDeltacom datacenter. You could host a single UT server with a Celeron or a P3 though. He owned a business that hosted gameservers so he had a good setup, but if you're hosting you and ten of your friends playing CS or something a single P4 or A64FX should be plenty with 2GB of RAM. Reliability will be your biggest concern because you won't want to go to the datacenter every time something breaks.

Supermicro and Tyan make good server components.
 
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