CentOS 4 vs 5

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JakeS
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CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by JakeS » 2009/07/23 17:43:06

Hi!

DISCLAIMER: I'm not trying to start a "My version is better than your version" thread here.

Well folks, I've got a small "issue" here.

I'm getting a server arriving on Saturday 6am.. yes 6am -.-

This is indeed a second hand server. Though can handle both 5 & 4 of CentOS/RHEL and probably Fedora and what not.

I want to put CentOS on it. No doubt about that (CentOS has always been reliable for me with servers)

However, I'm not sure whether to put 4 or 5.

One of the reasons is, all drivers from manufacture website are for RHEL 2.1 3.x and 4.x but NOT 5.x :-(

I obviously don't want 2 & 3, as their um ancient :D

so I was wondering if the drivers from manufacture would be needed for the box?

box is a: ML530 G2.

Should I stick with 4 to be extra safe? or should I gamble and go with 5?

these are the drivers:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=3285467&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=316545&swLang=8&taskId=135&swEnvOID=2025

What's the chances of those drivers working on 5.x? not much?

Also read from release notes that 4.7 iso's have a dead kernel?! how am I supposed to install it, if I install and the kernel does not work?!

What's the chances of 4.8 hitting by Saturday 6am? I'd like to install 4.8 rather 4.6 then upgrade to 4.7 then later on 4.8.

Fired up Scientific Linux 4.8 yesterday for a bit of testing (in a virtual machine) I was quite surprised.. at how old it looked.

So um yeah. Should I go for 4.x or 5.x? Ideally I want 5.3. However, I also want everything to work.

Thanks!

PS: I know this post probably doesn't make any sense.. but my posts never do! plus I was in a bit of a hurry.

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toracat
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by toracat » 2009/07/23 18:36:53

I suggest you try a LiveCD for CentOS5.3 (or LiveDVD for Scientific Linux 5.3) just to see if your hardware is supported (or if the drivers for CentOS-4 work).

I would also ask a question -- what is it that I would miss if I install CentOS-4 instead of CentOS-5? One thing that comes to my mind is the EOL. CentOS-5 lives 2 years longer than -4. On the other hand, if all the applications you are planning to use run on CentOS-4, there is no strong reason to go for CentOS-5 and go through the trouble of finding the drivers.

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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by NedSlider » 2009/07/23 20:03:35

CentOS 5 should be fine for you - that's quite old hardware so it should be well supported out of the box. You're unlikely to need any 3rd party drivers from HP.

A quick search shows this guy appeared to have no trouble with a basic CentOS 5 install...

http://centos.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=21153&forum=37&post_id=80670

[quote]Hi i got an Compaq proliant ML530 server that i installed CentOS 5.3 on i tested the connectivity to the LAN and to the WAN and everything worked.[/quote]

I'd go with 5 unless you have a good reason to do otherwise.

I installed C5 on an HP ML330 G3 last week without issue.

JakeS
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by JakeS » 2009/07/23 20:21:51

Ok great :-)

In the quote was that a G2? or just the original PII based box's?

One I'm getting has 2 CPU's 2.80GHz each. Based on P4.

But I doubt the CPU of that age should be worried xD.

Anyhow, I think I'll install 5.3, see if it works. Though I probably won't be using much of it, the only main reasons I'll be using it are:

1) Build box, running Koji
2) internal web server (Testing websites basically)
3) PXE Server, basically, the box which holds the bits for a computer to boot pxe from.

may do other things also though, depends.

If it all works, great. If not I'll put 4.x on :-)

Thanks! :D

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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by NedSlider » 2009/07/23 21:22:58

[quote]
JakeS wrote:
Ok great :-)

In the quote was that a G2? or just the original PII based box's?

[/quote]

I don't know Jake - I just did a quick search on the ML530 and that was the first thread that jumped out. Given this hardware has supported RH for years, I doubt you'll have many issues.

These older servers sure are cheap on ebay these days - I just found an ML530 Dual Xeon 2.4GHz / 8GB RAM listed for £60 - that would certainly make a great build host :-D

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toracat
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by toracat » 2009/07/23 23:51:18

[quote]
JakeS wrote:

Anyhow, I think I'll install 5.3, see if it works. Though I probably won't be using much of it, the only main reasons I'll be using it are:

1) Build box, running Koji[/quote]
If this is for building, I would recommend CentOS-4. yum in CentOS-5 is still buggy and mock (which is called by koji) may have problems. At this moment, a CentOS-4 (and its yum 2.4) x86_64 box is the best choice for a build system.

You can see some "heated" discussion on yum/mock in today's centos-devel mailing list atarting around here:

http://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos-devel/2009-July/004778.html

JakeS
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by JakeS » 2009/07/24 09:19:46

[quote]
NedSlider wrote:
[quote]
JakeS wrote:
Ok great :-)

In the quote was that a G2? or just the original PII based box's?

[/quote]

I don't know Jake - I just did a quick search on the ML530 and that was the first thread that jumped out. Given this hardware has supported RH for years, I doubt you'll have many issues.

These older servers sure are cheap on ebay these days - I just found an ML530 Dual Xeon 2.4GHz / 8GB RAM listed for £60 - that would certainly make a great build host :-D[/quote]

Yeah prices are pretty good right now.. Which is why I picked up the box as it has:

2x Intel Xeon 2.8GHz (Max 3.0GHz)
6GB RAM (Max 16)
7x SCSI HDD's (Max 14)
1x CDROM (Max 1)
1x Floppy (Very important these days!)
2x PSU's

And various other bits, is in full working order, and fully tested, and has all bits (eg case parts etc) I think it also has a GFX card (Not sure why as it also has onboard) & extra Ethernet ports and is Rack Ready.. though I don't have any rack room or spare rack for that matter, but that's not the point as it can run without one :p

Listed price was £165. I know a guy who knew the seller were good friends, so I got it for £130 :-) Though I tend to prefer AMD's (Personal preference), I grabbed this because of the price.. And has enough "expandability". Though I'm still saving up to get a box with 4x Quad Opteron's installed, 128GB Ram (or 64GB) etc xD but for now.. this will do.

[quote]
toracat wrote:
[quote]
JakeS wrote:

Anyhow, I think I'll install 5.3, see if it works. Though I probably won't be using much of it, the only main reasons I'll be using it are:

1) Build box, running Koji[/quote]
If this is for building, I would recommend CentOS-4. yum in CentOS-5 is still buggy and mock (which is called by koji) may have problems. At this moment, a CentOS-4 (and its yum 2.4) x86_64 box is the best choice for a build system.

You can see some "heated" discussion on yum/mock in today's centos-devel mailing list atarting around here:

http://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos-devel/2009-July/004778.html[/quote] So for building it's better to stick to 4.x at this time? In release notes, it states that the installing kernel in 4.7 is dead... is this really true? and how did it pass QA? Surely someone would notice a dead kernel?

As for x86_64, not quite sure if the CPU is 64-bit. I doubt it is though.

Hmm considering I got 7x HDD's to play with, I might just install both :-) (4 and 5)

4 for building 5 for anything else.

Also, how does 4.x do with compiling.. Fedora 11 based packages?

Thanks (both of you)

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toracat
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by toracat » 2009/07/24 12:23:32

Regarding the building questions ...

If you use mock, you should be able to build Fedora packages on your CentOS. The only thing is that you cannot build 64-bit packages on a 32-bit box, which is why I suggested installing x86_64. So, if you don't need to build 64-bit, you will be fine with a 32-bit OS.

Kernel for CentOS4.7 [b]i586[/b] is broken. I don't think you are going to use it...

JakeS
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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by JakeS » 2009/07/24 20:29:10

It's a bit hard to install a 64-bit OS on a 32-bit cpu ;)

CPU simply does not support 64 bit. Will be using a i686-PAE kernel (I think it's in CentOS4 pretty sure it is, if not I'll build it my self.)

Just done a test install of 4.7 on a virtual machine (I love virtual machines by the way) installed fine, I wasn't sure if 4.x used i686 or i586 guess I know now.

I would love to install 64-bit by the way, but when a CPU doesn't support it, their is not much I can do about it without replacing the board and CPU(s)

And Fedora packages should build fine? great! :D, however would I need to use any other repos for build deps?

I'm presuming I would. (Never used mock before, I've normally just done the following:

rpmbuild -ba --clean --sign example.spec

So I decided to set up a build box)

I'll be adding "epel" repo regardless as always :) comes in handy for those "missing packages".. like ClamAV, phpMyAdmin etc

Thanks :D

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Re: CentOS 4 vs 5

Post by NedSlider » 2009/07/24 21:50:28

[quote]
JakeS wrote:
It's a bit hard to install a 64-bit OS on a 32-bit cpu ;)

CPU simply does not support 64 bit. [/quote]

Are you sure?

I thought all Xeon's were 64-bit - especially those running at 2.8GHz

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