XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

hcgtv · 2006-09-05 23:56:44

Sencer, I hear you, failing drives are inevitable.

In my case, I just wanted another copy of my data. Now I have 2 copies of our data on hard drives, which adds up to over 250GB and growing. Of course, I also have copies scattered on tape, CD and DVD. The USB drive is just a clone of the server, restoring all of it from media would take a long time, so I opted for an external hard drive.

Eventually a 1TB NAS, like Marios has done is in the plans, I await hard drive prices to keep falling.

As for External drives, I’ve had my share of corruption with them, whether they were hooked up via USB or Firewire. That’s why I’m just using it for backup purposes, not hooked up all the time. Oh, and never defragment them under Windows, this can screw them up big time using NTFS, Fat32 seems to be more robust. I formatted my new 500GB drive as Ext3 under Debian, I’ve learned my lesson.

marios · 2006-09-06 00:48:30

hcgtv wrote:

I purchased a WDMybook 500GB external USB this weekend.

@hcgtv ,

did you as well observe, that the disk spins down after a while ?
Also, how much did you pay for it ?

Sencer wrote:

I find it pretty courageous to trust so much data to single harddisks.
I would go for something like a <a href=“http://www.buffalotech.com/products/product-detail.php?productid=127&categoryid=27”>Buffalo</a> or Infrant which offers Raid 1 or Raid 5 (though with current low costs of harddisks, I’d always choose Raid 1

As a comparison with US prices:

<a href=“http://buffalotech.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php?vcode=PGBFT&partnum=TS10TGLR5”>Buffalo Terrastation</a>

<a href=“http://smallbusinesscomputing.com/buyersguide/article.php/3628286”>Review</a>

pros:

Support many different Raid configurations, <del>hot swappable disks</del>, four extra external USB ports for additional external storage
Running Samba(no mention again how and what version, and if you can access the conf file and the like, same trouble as Lynksys to find out what is under the hood), compatible with OS-x as well (Not mentioned in the specs anywhere)

around 750 US $ cheapest from Dell
(Probably much more expensive on the European market, especially here in Greece, if available at all for retail purchase)

My solution

2 x <a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-Storage-Disk-Drives-NSLU2/dp/B0001FSCZO”>NSLU2 Slugs</a> = 2 × 83 $
4 x WBMyBook USB 2 250GB each = 4 × 120 $( estimated retail price on US market)
1 x DES 1005 Ethernet switch = 1 x 0 $ (was laying around unused)

Grand Total: = 646 $ (including VAT)

Sencer wrote:

Remember failing harddrives is not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. And that can mean 8 years, 2 years, but it can also mean 3 months.

That’s why my initial Idea was to schedule an additional Backup from one Slug to the other as well, in case one Slug fails,
Data is still available from the second one. (Without any Raid at all)

cons.:

no hot swappable disks.
Very bad firmware and sluggy admin interface, needs to be flashed in any case.
Difficult to set up.
Maximum 500gb per slug with any Firmware (Else trouble)
you loose one port if you want to unslug to an external filesystem and install other packages.

pros.:

backups from port one to port two don’t slow down network
Extremely low power consumption.
No heat.
Small.
Extremely configurable if Expertise and Time are present.
Can act as web server or svn server as well, if you know how to set this up
(Apache is probably a little too resource intensitive for this, but it would work)

So , considering the Time you loose with the latter, the Terratech could be worth spending the extra money.

<a href=“http://www.samspublishing.com/library/content.asp?b=Mac_OS_X_Unleashed&seqNum=232&rl=1”>Nice and simple rundown for SAMBA</a>
(Describing Access conf further down in section 30.4)

<a href=“http://www.cae.wisc.edu/site/public/?title=linpermissions-applications”>File and access permissions for shares</a>

(UPDATED)
regards, marios

Last edited by marios (2006-09-06 10:04:17)

Destry · 2006-09-06 10:58:41

Thanks again, Sencer.

Sencer spoketh: sshfs requires linux though

Ah yes, I meant to say sftpdrive (for Win), which was the site I was checking out.

Sencer decreed: On Windows there are only a few commercial (but worthwhile) tools to do that (like sftpdrive;webdrive etc.), however many editors have sftp built-in.

Hmmm. I suppose WinSCP3 is not one of those “editors” you speak of? It provides sftp and I can move things from drive to drive…and it’s free.

At any rate, that VM stuff is pretty interesting and seems like just the extent to which I, personally speaking, would go (and put to use). That other stuff you guys are going on about loses me, and frankly I don’t have that kind of time or ambition to mind it much. On the other hand, I am keenly concerned with doing local development/design and safeguard my work in a relatively easy manner.

At the moment I backup my whole system to an external Lacie drive (via USB) every couple of weeks, sometimes once per week if I’ve been especially productive. Generally I overwrite the previous backup. I also use the external drive for photo storage as well. When it’s not being written too (or pulled from) the external drive is off and unplugged.

This is all pretty straightfoward for me and seems to work fine.

Oh, one more thought about the VM gear, would that be a viable solution to installing IE6 and 7 without problems? Leave one on the main drive and one in the VM? I think I’ve read reports about that being the suggested way to go with multiple IEs when the new “seven” is concerned, but all the talk seemed bent on costly purchases of some sort.

Last edited by Destry (2006-09-06 11:00:51)

Sencer · 2006-09-06 11:31:57

Destry wrote:

Hmmm. I suppose WinSCP3 is not one of those “editors” you speak of? It provides sftp and I can move things from drive to drive…and it’s free.

WinSCP is great, I recommend it for moving files around when sftp/scp is offered (usually the case when you have an ssh account).

When I said editor, I meant actual text-/html-editors. For example ultra-edit. It allows you to access files directl from within the editor, without having to use a seperate program for transfer. Preferences are different, though. Some prefer an integrated solution, some prefer dedicated programms or mixed-use of both.

Oh, one more thought about the VM gear, would that be a viable solution to installing IE6 and 7 without problems? Leave one on the main drive and one in the VM?

Remember that you have install a complete perating system in the VM. So if you want to run IE7 in a VM, you have to first do a complete windows installation inside the VM, and then install IE7. Windows inside a VM is also more hungry for RAM. If your computer only has 512 MB RAM you’ll probably have to close all other applications, and dedicate enough RAM to the VM. If you have 1 GB or more, that’s less of an issue. That leaves only the necessary additional Windows licence as a potential hinderance.

I think I’ve read reports about that being the suggested way to go with multiple IEs when the new “seven” is concerned, but all the talk seemed bent on costly purchases of some sort.

Destry · 2006-09-06 12:10:05

Sencer clarified: When I said editor, I meant actual text-/html-editors. For example ultra-edit.

Gotcha. So let me backpeddle a sec. Does this mean I can use a free, combination solution (sftp/editor) like WinSCP3/Crimson Editor to work back and forth between the main drive and the VM…or do I have to go with an integrated tool like Ultraedit, SftpDrive, … at cost?

Sencer saged: if you want to run IE7 in a VM, you have to first do a complete windows installation inside the VM, and then install IE7.

Doh, of course. And therein lies the answer. /* <small>%{color:gray}No, fool, this is not how to handle IE7.%</small> */

marios · 2006-09-06 13:44:58

@destry

If just for Browsertesting , it would be easier may be just to use parallels instead of VMPlayer
(License at 49$, Evaluation 14days)
I am downloading it right now, to give it a try on top of XP, so I can have Linux as well.

regards, marios

Last edited by marios (2006-09-06 13:59:25)

hcgtv · 2006-09-06 14:09:59

Destry wrote:

Does this mean I can use a free, combination solution (sftp/editor) like WinSCP3/Crimson Editor to work back and forth between the main drive and the VM…or do I have to go with an integrated tool like Ultraedit, SftpDrive, … at cost?

I use WinSCP to manage the files on my VPS and I can’t recommend it enough. There are options to configure what editors to use for what files, so you can open up one editor for .php files and another one for .txt files let’s say.

Destry · 2006-09-06 14:22:09

@marios: Hmmm “parallels”. I’ve seen some articles about that lately. Interesting, but no, this is not just for browser testing….thread is (or rather was) about XAMPP (which I currently use to test/use many open source systems), Sencer mentioned an alternative situation to XAMPP (namely VM) so I’m just following up with that a bit. The browser thing was just an afterthought that I’ve seen come up before, so I thought I’d see if I could kill two birds with one slung marble.

@Bert: WinSCP3…I have it. Been using it for a couple of years or so. It’s great. I have my favorite editor, currently Crimson Editor, configured in. I was just trying to make sure that I could in fact use WinSCP/Crimson to work between the main drive and the VM, instead of something like SftpDrive. Yes? No?

Sencer · 2006-09-06 14:51:32

Destry wrote:

Gotcha. So let me backpeddle a sec. Does this mean I can use a free, combination solution (sftp/editor) like WinSCP3/Crimson Editor to work back and forth between the main drive and the VM…or do I have to go with an integrated tool like Ultraedit, SftpDrive, … at cost?

You can use the free solution. It’s your decision which client-software you use.

At the core, all decisions are up to you, since you have full control over what’s installed in the VM. So if you decided you do not like ssh/sftp, then you could install a regular ftp-server, or telnet-server, or a samba-server (which is the linux-way of offering windows-compatible “shared folders”) or ….

The “only” thing the Virtualization-Sotware gives you is a an emulated computer with an emulated network-card.

marios · 2006-09-06 18:03:12

@Sencer , bert

I am trying to find a suitable Linux distro iso image for x86 Athlon (32bit) processor on force-2 board.
Downloading <a href=“http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/3.1_r2/i386/iso-cd/this”>this</a> one.

(Hope that’s the right one)
Thought Debian might be suitable.
(Ubuntu is not reported to be campatible with Parrallels)
Poking around in windows Computer Managment Console, I realized that I
have now 5 network adapters showing up.
I ran allready VMPlayer Installer and then decided else towards Parallels.
VMplayer was a little better, since it found both of the physical adapters, while Parallels
only found the enabeled one. Therefore five.

@Destry, sorry for hitchhiking your post (not hijacking),
I just found it a nice opportunity to discuss some of this stuff in a little broader sense.

regards, marios

Last edited by marios (2006-09-06 18:27:21)

Destry · 2006-09-06 18:12:57

@marios: Hitch away! I pick up the best scraps from threads like this…VM case in point. I’ll be giving it a run when I have more time to focus on it.

Carry on.

hcgtv · 2006-09-06 19:08:55

marios wrote:

I am trying to find a suitable Linux distro iso image for x86 Athlon (32bit) processor on force-2 board. Downloading <a href=“http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/3.1_r2/i386/iso-cd/this”>this</a> one.

Debian should be fine, my home server has an AMD Athlon 3000+ processor on a Gigabyte 7N400 Pro II motherboard. I first loaded Debian Sarge, then upgraded to Etch and now it’s running Sid. I would of stuck with Sarge if it would of remained a server but I decided to turn it into a workstation.

The debian-31r2-i386-netinst.iso is what you should burn, it will install a base system and fetch what you need like Apache, MySQL, PHP, etc.

Last edited by hcgtv (2006-09-06 19:10:21)

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#25 2006-09-05 23:56:44

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#26 2006-09-06 00:48:30

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#27 2006-09-06 10:58:41

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#28 2006-09-06 11:31:57

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#29 2006-09-06 12:10:05

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#30 2006-09-06 13:44:58

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#31 2006-09-06 14:09:59

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#32 2006-09-06 14:22:09

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#33 2006-09-06 14:51:32

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#34 2006-09-06 18:03:12

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#35 2006-09-06 18:12:57

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

#36 2006-09-06 19:08:55

Re: XAMPP on external drive: mapping trouble?

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