MailScanner & Solaris (Sparc)

[Didier Belhomme]

Hi Ignacio,

At 23:52 27/10/2003 -0300, you wrote:
>Thanks for your quick answers, Matt & Randy.
>
>We didn't install yet MailScanner over Solaris, because i just realize is
>possible (sorry, i'm some kind of newbie in the MailScanner world).
>
>We have 5 boxes running Solaris, with the following configuration:
>
>* OS: Solaris 8.0
>* CPU: 2*UltraSparcII 400 Mhz w/ 1GB RAM
>* Email system: SunOne Messaging Server 5.2

Our mail server is running on the same platform (I think dual-CPU 
Enterprise 250), but without the Sun Product (we're stuck to sendmail).

I was quite reluctant to run Mailscanner on this system, thus we added two 
small (and rather cheap) SunFire V100 (550 UltraSparc IIi, 1GB RAM, dual 
IDE disk) before the main mail server. These systems running Solaris 8 are 
running very fine since we put them in production in may 2002. During the 
Sobig storm last August, I saw load average up to 6 or 7, but the systems 
were standing well. We have currently about 24000 messages a day, which is 
much less than your system of course, but we are running Spamassassin also. 
I didn't do much tuning of these systems, but I dont need it for now.

Hope this helps,

>Every hour, this platform process 100,000 messages, with an average size of
>60 KB. We was thinking about adding some Linux boxes with MailScanner+AV,
>but if we can install MailScanner over this servers, will be better.
>
>The idea is to install MailScanner + F-PROT for Linux File Servers to
>analyze the email messages for virus and content potentially dangerous.
>We'll not use RBL neither SpamAssassin at the moment.
>
>Do you think is possible to install MS over this configuration without any
>problem of performance? The servers are working fine now, with only a 60/70%
>loading during the rush hours.
>
>Thanks a lot for your help.
>
>Ignacio
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Matt Kettler" <mkettler at EVI-INC.COM>
>To: <MAILSCANNER at JISCMAIL.AC.UK>
>Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 11:35 PM
>Subject: Re: MailScanner & Solaris (Sparc)
>
>
> > At 09:21 PM 10/27/2003, you wrote:
> > >Friends,
> > >
> > >i just realize that MailScanner is capable of running over a Solaris
>server
> > >(with a Sparc processor). Does anybody have some expertise about that? My
> > >main question is about the performance of the server and the load that
> > >MailScanner will add over this kind of equipment and what we'll have to
> > >upgrade in order of having MS working fine over a Solaris box.
> >
> > The load presented is going to depend on a lot of factors:
> >          1) What's the rate of message arrival, and average size..
> >          2) What tools are you going to use with it? spamassassin? are you
> > going to use SA's AWL or bayes? razor/dcc/pyzor? DNS blacklists? A virus
> > scanner?
> >
> > And well, it's also going to depend on what kind of sparc you've got in
> > that solaris server.. Some models of Sun computers with sparc CPU are
> > _really_ slow, and others are quite fast multi-cpu systems.
> >
> > In general mailscanner itself adds very little load, it's all the add-ons
> > that load you down..
> >
> > However, as a rough-order of magnitude, a minimalist no-dnsbl, no
> > razor/dcc/pyzor, no AWL, no bayes mailscanner/spamassassin/virus scanning
> > shouldn't do much more than double your current loads unless your messages
> > are quite large.
> >
> > Others with more careful measurements from high load systems may have
> > better insight than I do however..
> >

Didier Belhomme
FUNDP - Service informatique universitaire - Support systèmes UNIX
Rue Grandgagnage, 21 B-5000 Namur
Tel : +32 81 725025
Fax: +32 81 725023
E-mail : didier.belhomme at fundp.ac.be