I've been building 32bit servers like this for years... In fact I also deliver SOHO servers built along theese lines. to answer your question: No there is no reason to buy a 64bit system for the purpose you describe. Remeber also that a 64 bit system as almost double the memory requirements, since it needs 2 the space to store it's data! Here some tips... I use Software raid 1 (mirrowed) drives. to protect my data against the inevitable disk crash. I use storebackup to protect my data against the inevitable user error. The storebackup backups to a 3rd disk. In win/Samba, I avoid "Hot seating" unless I can get all workstations ot be the same (usually not the case for home networks). I use the Yast configuration for email fetchmail, which lets the server constantly poll my "local" users email accounts for new mail (24/7). and Use squirrelmail for "backup" mail access... I use SSH and VNC (via xinetd) heavily, for example I only run my email client (evolution) remote on the server either via "SSH -X", or on a vnc so that all my emails are in a single client... Don't forget to look into a "Fax-server", (I use hylafax) as this will give you faxes to email interface, and save (for all eternity) all inconing faxes to a directory... I use fwbuilder to build my firewalls, but I do have additional (and complicated) firewall needs. maybe the new SuSE firewall 2 is enough for you... And last (but not least): I have several servers that have been running like this for many years... (for example my mother 'n law, whoose Celeron 400 has been doing service for 4 years now, or is it 5?) Jerry Westrick. On Mon, 2004-05-03 at 09:10, Lenz Grimmer wrote:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

Hi,

On Mon, 3 May 2004, Koenraad Lelong wrote:

...

I would like to build my own machine, which is going to serve mail (Postfix, Courier-Imap), web (maybe), files (Samba), proxy (Squid), for my home-network. I hope to have it running for the next 4 to 5 years, if the hardware allows. Since SuSE 9.1 will include 64bit software I'm considering to make the new machine 64bit. Any reason to go (or not) to AMD Athlon64 (or Opteron) ? Comments invited.

A system with a 64bit address space comes in handy, if you need to access very large amounts of memory or need to create extremely big files. So far, I have not hit any of these limits on my current home workstation (Athlon 1.3 GHz, 512MB RAM), and it too is running 7x24, performing as a web and mail server as well as my KDE desktop system. Actually, the desktop applications are much more demanding than the server parts in the background.

Performance-wise, a program running on a 64bit CPU can sometimes actually be slower than on a 32bit CPU (running on the same frequency), as the overhead involved in dealing with 64bit data types and addresses can require more CPU cycles. Your mileage may vary - this depends on the software.

So, for a home network, a 64bit machine will most likely be quite an overkill. For the above mentioned tasks, a current 32bit system (e.g. some fast Athlon XP) should be more than sufficient. Better invest the money that you would need to spend extra for the 64bit CPU into more memory/disk space and high-quality components (better cooling, extra-silent fans, etc).

Bye, LenZ - -- - ------------------------------------------------------------------ Lenz Grimmer <lenz@grimmer.com> -o) [ICQ: 160767607 | Jabber: LenZGr@jabber.org] /\\ http://www.lenzg.org/ V_V -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.3 (GNU/Linux) Comment: For info see http://quantumlab.net/pine_privacy_guard/

iD8DBQFAlfBNSVDhKrJykfIRAqYIAJ9Bv7rz5Ojmun+8jY7pe4GMxKWDuQCfYSKE Zc60lZhWPvrqZXI9/j2SlX4= =ML9J -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Jerry, All great points, except your first. 64bit systems do not use twice as much memory as 32bit systems. Their internal registers are twice as large, and they pull from RAM 64bits at a time instead of 32 bits. That does not make them use twice as much memory. I run Opteron Java application servers. Our memory heap sizes are approximately the same as on our 32bit machines. - Richard -----Original Message----- From: Jerome R. Westrick [mailto:jerry@westrick.com] Sent: Monday, May 03, 2004 1:18 AM To: Suse mailing list Subject: Re: [SLE] Why should I buy 64bit hardware ? I've been building 32bit servers like this for years... In fact I also deliver SOHO servers built along theese lines. to answer your question: No there is no reason to buy a 64bit system for the purpose you describe. Remeber also that a 64 bit system as almost double the memory requirements, since it needs 2 the space to store it's data! Here some tips... I use Software raid 1 (mirrowed) drives. to protect my data against the inevitable disk crash. I use storebackup to protect my data against the inevitable user error. The storebackup backups to a 3rd disk. In win/Samba, I avoid "Hot seating" unless I can get all workstations ot be the same (usually not the case for home networks). I use the Yast configuration for email fetchmail, which lets the server constantly poll my "local" users email accounts for new mail (24/7). and Use squirrelmail for "backup" mail access... I use SSH and VNC (via xinetd) heavily, for example I only run my email client (evolution) remote on the server either via "SSH -X", or on a vnc so that all my emails are in a single client... Don't forget to look into a "Fax-server", (I use hylafax) as this will give you faxes to email interface, and save (for all eternity) all inconing faxes to a directory... I use fwbuilder to build my firewalls, but I do have additional (and complicated) firewall needs. maybe the new SuSE firewall 2 is enough for you... And last (but not least): I have several servers that have been running like this for many years... (for example my mother 'n law, whoose Celeron 400 has been doing service for 4 years now, or is it 5?) Jerry Westrick. On Mon, 2004-05-03 at 09:10, Lenz Grimmer wrote:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

Hi,

On Mon, 3 May 2004, Koenraad Lelong wrote:

...

I would like to build my own machine, which is going to serve mail (Postfix, Courier-Imap), web (maybe), files (Samba), proxy (Squid), for my home-network. I hope to have it running for the next 4 to 5 years, if the hardware allows. Since SuSE 9.1 will include 64bit software I'm considering to make the new machine 64bit. Any reason to go (or not) to AMD Athlon64 (or Opteron) ? Comments invited.

A system with a 64bit address space comes in handy, if you need to access very large amounts of memory or need to create extremely big files. So far, I have not hit any of these limits on my current home workstation (Athlon 1.3 GHz, 512MB RAM), and it too is running 7x24, performing as a web and mail server as well as my KDE desktop system. Actually, the desktop applications are much more demanding than the server parts in the background.

Performance-wise, a program running on a 64bit CPU can sometimes actually be slower than on a 32bit CPU (running on the same frequency), as the overhead involved in dealing with 64bit data types and addresses can require more CPU cycles. Your mileage may vary - this depends on the software.

So, for a home network, a 64bit machine will most likely be quite an overkill. For the above mentioned tasks, a current 32bit system (e.g. some fast Athlon XP) should be more than sufficient. Better invest the money that you would need to spend extra for the 64bit CPU into more memory/disk space and high-quality components (better cooling, extra-silent fans, etc).

Bye, LenZ - -- - ------------------------------------------------------------------ Lenz Grimmer <lenz@grimmer.com> -o) [ICQ: 160767607 | Jabber: LenZGr@jabber.org] /\\ http://www.lenzg.org/ V_V -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.3 (GNU/Linux) Comment: For info see http://quantumlab.net/pine_privacy_guard/

iD8DBQFAlfBNSVDhKrJykfIRAqYIAJ9Bv7rz5Ojmun+8jY7pe4GMxKWDuQCfYSKE Zc60lZhWPvrqZXI9/j2SlX4= =ML9J -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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måndag 03 maj 2004 09:10 skrev Lenz Grimmer:

Performance-wise, a program running on a 64bit CPU can sometimes actually be slower than on a 32bit CPU (running on the same frequency), as the overhead involved in dealing with 64bit data types and addresses can require more CPU cycles. Your mileage may vary - this depends on the software.

A lot of programs, have no use of the enormous bits they use ... take a look at this one here. main() { int i; for(i=0;i<255;i++) printf("number is %d",i); } Even 32-bit is too much overhead for the above ... it's an 8 bit program, that uses 8 bit code data, and everything above it is an overhead. When it initializes the i variable, it's done in 32bits while only 8 bits are used, and all math on that variable is 32bit wide, yet only 8 bits are used. A lot of programs are like the above. Even those programs, that are created for multimedia, an area that would tremendously benefit from 64bit programming, are still using 32bit program technology. They may be using MMX or some extensions, that may or may not benefit from being on a 64bit Athlon. However, I suspect that we'll be seeing true 64bit programming soon ... and we'll even be seeing compilers that will produce code that will make use of both 32bit and 64bit, depending on need/desire. Until then, we'll just have to get used to all the overhead that we live with daily ... like, most of our user needs, are character oriented and that's only 8 bits, 16 bits for wide characters. Everything above that, is an overhead for average use.