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Establing a Workstation Cluster

Establing a Workstation Cluster

Basic hardware components

• Workstation specification

• Network specification

Workstation specification

System Components

• Processor: reasonably powerful (shipped in last 3 years)

• Memory
  • 32 Mb minimum (possible on as little as 16Mb but performance will be poor)

  • 64 Mb preferable

  • leave empty slots for expansion (eg if there are 8 memory slots get 2x16 Simms not 8x4)

• Disks
  • 512 Mb minimum for each to have a full version of Unix but 1Gb preferable

  • 512 Mb at least for applications

  • 1 Gb for user's files

Workstation Peripherals

• Tape: a vital and often forgotten aspect is backup
  • DAT: low cost and moderately reliable

  • Exabyte: low cost (less reliable??)

  • QIC (Quarter Inch Cartridge): too many expensive tapes but very reliable

• Care should be taken to how many times a DAT or Exabyte tape is read (5 is a safe maximum for Exabyte) between writes

• CDROM: vital for loading software packages, access can be across the network

• Printer: many public domain packages come with extensive manuals in postscript

Workstation Configurations

• Diskless - no disks attached to machine, all files are accessed across the network. These are ok as interactive stations but inappropriate for a cluster node. They should also not be on the same network segment as a cluster - heavy network load.

• Dataless - local disk for booting, swap space and temporary files. Most of the operating system is loaded across the network. Can be effective as a cluster processing node but with a network overhead.

• Standalone workstation - a complete system on a local disk, ideal for inclusion in a cluster. Check the disk space allocated to /usr and /tmp.

• Server - complete workstation with substantial disk space which is available to other machines for applications and user's files. Must run some form of network filesystem such as NFS or AFS. Most cluster configurations would have a server for user's files.