The SAN Question

Do I ISCSI or Fiber Channel? What are you guys who are reading this who have SANs doing? I have worked with both technologies in my past. I am familiar with the challenges that come with Fiber Channel, but I love the speed. I have also worked with IScsi Sans... Seems easy, but the actual performance left something to be desired. However, this is a church and I want be running heavy transactional 500 GB databases (well until we grow some more)...

Please comment and leave your thoughts...

Infrastructure Series: Streaming Setup

At CCM we have two very different streaming systems right now. We have our regular Internet Streams, and we also have our Live Streaming Solution for our Multi-Site Church. Both work off many of the same systems, but operate very differently. Let's start with our Internet Streaming setup. Currently we have 3 encoders...2 in production, 1 in standby mode (manual, nothing fancy yet, just a spare). The encoders are all built with the following:

Hardware:
- homebuilt rackmount dual core computers
- Osprey 210 Cards
- 1 to 8 Analog Composite Video & RCA Stereo Distribution Amplifier

Software:
- Windows XP
- Osprey Drivers / Utilities
- Windows Media Encoder / Real Producer

Server Side we have an interesting mix. In the process of getting our distributed network for Multi-Site streaming in place, we ended up getting 75Mb of Internet as part of the deal. Long story with Time Warner, if anyone ever wants to know email me... On the servers we have, again a home built box with some redundancy for our Windows Media Distribution Point (Win 2k3, WMS, etc) and we have a leased server from the Planet where we run Real Server.

Currently we are running the following streams:

WMS:
- 282 Kbps (16:9 Video 360x240 Resolution)
- 30 Kbps (16:9 Video 180x120 Resolution)
- 14-20 Kbps Audio Only Stream
- 14-20 Kbps Spanish Audio Only Stream (translated on the fly)

Real:
- 250 Kbps (16:9 Video 360x240 Resolution)
- 30 Kbps (16:9 Video 180x120 Resolution)

Right now all of these streams are being done from 1 Encoder Computer. (Dell Optiplex with Core 2 Duo / 2 GB Ram) ViewCast offers a software called simulstream which allows you to fire up multiple encoders on a single computer using a single osprey card to create completely seperate streams.

Our Second Encoder computer is being used to test some higher bitrate streams. Right now I am testing the possibility of upgrading to using the Flash Media Encoder to provide a Real Time Flash Stream.

My other upgrade project is to get a Black Magic Capture board and offer a full resolution (720x480) stream.

Here is a look at our streaming setup. Our Live multisite is also diagrammed here, but I will cover that in a later article.

Infrastructure Series: Content Filtering

For content filtering we have standardized on WebSense http://www.websense.com . I have worked with Surf Control and Websense rather extensively over the last 6 months. Pound for pound Surf Control is less expensive and get’s “close” to filtering as well as WebSense, but in the end, WebSense is simply a much better product. There are obviously much less expensive solutions out there, but there aren’t too many that can keep up with our network. Websense has several little features that are really cool…

First things first – our Church environment might be a little different. We have a large atrium area where we have public internet access…Totally public. I am looking at putting a captive portal in place so we can at least splash something at folks as they come in. Additionally we have a K-8 school and those little guys need some supervision / blocking. Lastly we have a Youth Center Building where teens have free access to the Internet from 8 computers (thin clients, but that’s another story).

WebSense has been a great solution for us because:

1) It enforces Safe Search on Image Sites (images.google.com / images.yahoo.com)

2) Has a wonderfully selectable policy engine

a. Multiple policies

b. Multiple Category / List settings

3) Much faster update than Surf Control

All in all it is a fantastic product. I actually considered going with Surf Control and then I learned that they are in the process of being acquired by WebSense. So that sealed the deal, that and the fact that WebSense offered to match the Surf Control Pricing.

So that begs the question? What is everyone doing on Content Filtering?