Server upgrade

[Tweak]

Hi all,

Since this weeks problems (and the realisation we've been on the same server for over two years) I have been in direct discussions with my technicians in regards to a potential server upgrade. Although this will increase my own costs (which the donations will reflect) it has been decided to be the best method.

Please note that the costs will increase more as the VAT rate within the UK has also been increased.

The upgrade is not massively different to what we are currently running but will benefit from a slightly beefier processor. The server is being installing concurrently with the current one so downtime will be tiny, all data will be transferred over the next week with sites switching with no real noticeable changes, there may be some small offline periods whilst databases are transferred but once the new server is fully operational the current IPs will be transferred and the old server shut down.

I hope this renews your confidence in the service and hopefully sparks some donations - as this will be costing myself more out of pocket.

Thank you

[Ares the Ram]

once I get my commissions paid off, I will definatley contriubte.

[White Wolf Guardian]

I'll gladly help in the coming months 8D

[Tweak]

Server is currently being provisioned and should be operational by 23:00 GMT. Go-live is currently tentatively scheduled for 20th January.

[icy wolf]

ill be glade to help once i get a job and a paypale. what are the changes going to be like?

[Tweak]

What changes?

[icy wolf]

you said you where going to up grade the server, is it going to change tff ?

[Timmy Fox]

you said you where going to up grade the server, is it going to change tff ?

I may not be the right one to answer this, but as I understand it, the only real change be that the server should run faster and more reliably... however it may not be very noticable to the average user...


And I'm just slightly curious, do you have any brief technical specs for the new server to post?

[icy wolf]

ok so that what it just becomes more reliable

[Tweak]

I may not be the right one to answer this, but as I understand it, the only real change be that the server should run faster and more reliably... however it may not be very noticable to the average user...

And I'm just slightly curious, do you have any brief technical specs for the new server to post?

Pretty much.

New specs are:

Dual Core 2.8Ghz
2 GB RAM
2 x 80 GB HDD
100 mb/s transfer with no bandwidth cap

That's a change from:

Dual Core 2.0Ghz
2 GB RAM
2 x 80 GB HDD
100 mb/s transfer with 1000 GB bandwidth cap

ok so that what it just becomes more reliable

Most likely at this stage.


As I have full access to the network configuration the new server could be operational by the end of the day. There will be a downtime of about an hour whilst everything is transferred and then the IP addresses are switched. During the IP change the server may be inaccessible for 10 minutes. Will also be a brief downtime next week when the extra drive is fitted and it is a non-standard spec.

[Tweak]

Migration is complete and all systems are operational.

The additional hard drive will be installed next week.

We've also taken delivery of a 64 band of IPv6 addresses, although these are currently not active.

[Timmy Fox]

New specs are:

Dual Core 2.8Ghz
2 GB RAM
2 x 80 GB HDD
100 mb/s transfer with no bandwidth cap

That's a change from:

Dual Core 2.0Ghz
2 GB RAM
2 x 80 GB HDD
100 mb/s transfer with 1000 GB bandwidth cap

Sounds good, may I ask if slightly more specifically which processor? And possibly about the frequency and what kind of ram? I guess the HDD's are 7200 rpm and is using Sata 2 connections?

Sorry for the questions, I'm just rather curious bout those things..

[Tweak]

No idea, would have to check.

[Tweak]

As many of you will have noticed the forums have been offline for the last day, this was due to a further hardware failure.

Unfortunately the main disk failed in the new server and it's been a busy 24 hours piecing together the data to recover it from a dead disk.

The forums are currently running on a temporary server whilst we repair the old machine, the machine is going to be set up in a RAID 1 format to remove the risk of data loss and cut downtime from another event of this type. We are still verifying how quickly we can get the old machine online and everything transferred back to it.

[Tweak]

Hi all,

We've now migrated back to the old machine (with a new disk array) and all systems are online and functioning as expected.

No problems should occur but please report any issues in the Bugs Report board. Please note that our mod_security rules have been updated and due to the disk failure the previous whitelist has been lost, so some 403 errors may occur. Just report them and they will be dealt with.

Thank you for your patience through this trying time and lets hope all hardware issues are now behind us.