yet another request for hardware rec.

[Goodleaf, John M]

I know these questions come up all the time, but I think it's okay, since no
one ever tires of talking about good hardware. Also, hardware changes pretty
frequently.

I need backup/storage space. I know I could go tape or DVD RAM. But I want a
machine running a true RAID to serve as storage space for various databases
and so forth. Here's the trick: I want not to spend a ton of money. So I'm
looking at getting five or so SATA drives of maybe 80 or 120GB apiece. Then
I'd probably get the 8-port 3Ware SATA controller. SCSI would cost just too
damn much money. Besides, SCSI drives are really, really loud (I have a
machine with dual 15Krpm scsi drives and I can barely be in the same room
with it). 

What I'd like is to identify a solid motherboard. I'm comfortable with a
behind-the-curve processor, since the storage machine won't need much muscle
of its own, but I would like it to have a 64/66 PCI slot for the SATA card.
I know there's some performance drag with RAID5 and I want to crank out as
much disk speed as possible. 

I have no particular preference on the AMD/Intel question. It seems that AMD
generally gets you better bang for your buck, but it seems that an Intel
board is more likely to have the 64/66 slot I long for. I don't know, and
there's a bewildering array of MBs on the market. Any thoughts?

Also, feel free to criticize the whole plan. If you've heard of a RAID
appliance that doesn't cost $5K, I'm interested.

Thanks,
John


PS I just thought of this: What about network bandwidth? Since I don't want
to go to gigabit hardware on the network, is there a way I can install two
or so 100M cards and bind them to one IP, just to increase the throughput?