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Let's say I want to host 100000 tiny image and video files between 50kb - 2mb

It's obvious that SSD would be better than HDD because of file access speed.

But how much does CPU and RAM matter?

What would handle the read only better/faster:

1 vServer with 300GB SSD, 16GB Ram and 8 CPU cores

or

Load-balancing between 2 vServers with 300GB SSD, 4GB Ram and 2 CPU cores

Another put: Which of those two options will shut down/giving 500 error faster when the i/o increases every minute?

Eduard Unruh
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  • There is no single answer for this. Will you use RAID? Is it software RAID or hardware RAID? Is there a working set size where cache would help, or are all the files read evenly? Is there a lot of metadata that needs to be cached in ram? Ideally, you'd just buy enough ram to hold all the data, but that's probably not practical. – user10489 Dec 27 '21 at 13:28
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    This also depends on the number of simultaneous connections to the server. – Hardoman Dec 27 '21 at 13:29
  • Those are vSeevers, not dedicated and hosters which I'm looking at don't specify if it's software or hardware RAID so I guess software I don't know. "Is there a lot of metadata that needs to be cached in ram?" I don't know, maybe none? I don't read the metadata, I just read the images and videos with PHP and send them to the user – Eduard Unruh Dec 27 '21 at 13:33
  • "This also depends on the number of simultaneous connections to the server" this is the main concern, there is really much i/o, around 10 millions per day right now for reading files only. I count it will be up to 10 times more next year so I will have to decide like 5 servers with fast hardware or 10 servers with moderate hardware @Hardoman – Eduard Unruh Dec 27 '21 at 13:35
  • Not really, the question there is very general without any examples and also the answers while I specify the hardware and also the workload, which is reading files only @GregAskew – Eduard Unruh Dec 27 '21 at 13:46
  • You say, "_ I just read the images and videos with PHP_". Just to clarify, your PHP, webserver etc. are _on a separate server_, and your file server does nothing else than serve out files? (How & using what?) Because if not, then all bets are off as to how much CPU/RAM you may require. – Markus AO Dec 27 '21 at 15:42
  • The server which serves the files runs on Windows Server 2016, has plesk installed (because of the free ssl which is required and comfort) and reads the files with PHP. Yes it is separate, the database/backend scripts are on another server. This question is plain about which option is better to serve files only @MarkusAO – Eduard Unruh Dec 27 '21 at 18:11
  • The duplicate question answer is the only reasonable one that anyone can give. Only you can run tests to determine the proper hardware for your workload. Others can only make guesses, which can be wrong in either direction. – Tero Kilkanen Dec 28 '21 at 10:22
  • If your "file server" only purely served out files, stripped of anything that isn't integral to file serving, with whatever software requiring the files running and making calls from a separate server, files accessed via Samba or whatever, you might have a shot at getting hardware estimates per request volume. Otherwise, the CPU/RAM requirements entirely depend on your software rig, and you will only have answers by load testing yourself. – Markus AO Dec 28 '21 at 18:09

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