Bad Cables Often Crash Computers
My last Linux dedicated server managed to die an ungraceful death. I was fortunate to repair it three times by replacing the motherboard twice and the power supply once extending the lifespan of the server well into six years of 24/7 99.99% up time. But I had to say goodbye to the server and go a different route.
Usually after 3 years, parts become obsolete and the only viable solution is to upgrade your server. A quick trip to Fry's confirmed this.
I didn't want to build a new server from scratch so I created a virtual Linux server on a workstation to keep things up and running until the new hardware was purchased and shipped from Dell.
But the thing is, the virtual server actually ran well enough -- and perhaps better -- than the old server that died. After all, the server was running in its own logical processor that had more memory and about 2x faster that the six year old server.
So I didn't have to go out and buy new hardware at the moment.
The wait paid off since I was able to get a half-dozen used servers for $50 each without the drive. A local University was selling the two year-old computers -- minus the disk drive -- to get a newer model.
Now with 6 servers, I had enough spare parts to keep the server running for at least 10 years.
I gotta admit that virtual servers are pretty convenient, but the extra memory and disk space needed to run on my workstation really puts a limitation on some of the video editing and other application resource hogs. So I was somewhat glad to move the server over to a dedicated system.
I put in a new 500GB WD SATA drive, installed Linux Ubuntu 8.04 server got everything configured, rebooted and started getting SMART drive errors on boot.
I opened up the box, checked connections, same thing. I was ready to return the drive to Western Digital since all it had on it was the OS. I pull the drive out and boxed it up and closed up the server but I noticed that the SATA cable was kinked.
I replace the SATA cable and put the drive back in and all is working good!
Usually after 3 years, parts become obsolete and the only viable solution is to upgrade your server. A quick trip to Fry's confirmed this.
I didn't want to build a new server from scratch so I created a virtual Linux server on a workstation to keep things up and running until the new hardware was purchased and shipped from Dell.
But the thing is, the virtual server actually ran well enough -- and perhaps better -- than the old server that died. After all, the server was running in its own logical processor that had more memory and about 2x faster that the six year old server.
So I didn't have to go out and buy new hardware at the moment.
The wait paid off since I was able to get a half-dozen used servers for $50 each without the drive. A local University was selling the two year-old computers -- minus the disk drive -- to get a newer model.
Now with 6 servers, I had enough spare parts to keep the server running for at least 10 years.
I gotta admit that virtual servers are pretty convenient, but the extra memory and disk space needed to run on my workstation really puts a limitation on some of the video editing and other application resource hogs. So I was somewhat glad to move the server over to a dedicated system.
I put in a new 500GB WD SATA drive, installed Linux Ubuntu 8.04 server got everything configured, rebooted and started getting SMART drive errors on boot.
I opened up the box, checked connections, same thing. I was ready to return the drive to Western Digital since all it had on it was the OS. I pull the drive out and boxed it up and closed up the server but I noticed that the SATA cable was kinked.
I replace the SATA cable and put the drive back in and all is working good!
Labels: bad cable, component failure, computer crash, disk crash
posted by Howard at
8:15 PM
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