What hardware to handle this

[Jules Agee]

Jim Bartus wrote:
> I'm looking to redo our companys mailserver setup, and I want to move 
> from our current system of POP3 to an IMAP based system.  I've done a 
> fair amount of reading and Cyrus looks like the right answer, so I was 
> hoping you guys could help me out with some final details.
> 
> I have approx 500 users.  Of which probably only about 300 will be 
> connected at peak times, but they will be consantly connected in the 
> "check for new mail every 5 minutes" sense.  Overall the system will 
> deliver about 25 - 40,000 messages a day.  There will be a seperate SMTP 
> server delivering to this via LMTP, and a seperate webmail server 
> connecting in through IMAP.  Quota's will be set around 250MB and the 
> use of sieve filters will be enabled.  All with authenticate against our 
> LDAP server (its not purchased yet, but it'll be novell edirectory).
> 
> My major question is what kind of hardware will cyrus require to handle 
> that level of load?  Currently we were planning on buying a dual 3.0GHz 
> Xeon system with 2GB of ram running RHEL 3.0.  For storage it'll connect 
> via HBA to our EMC CX500 storage array.  Will that do it?  Does anyone 
> have anything similar setup?

We have almost identical usage and a similar setup. We're using a Compaq 
ML-350 with dual 2.4Ghz Xeons and 2GB of RAM for the IMAP server. No 
external array, just the built-in SCSI controller, mirrored. Works 
great, might try RAID-5 next time though.

> One other question, is it possible to have the one IMAP server listen 
> for both encrypted and unencrypted connections?  We'll then use firewall 
> policies to make sure anything from outside the lan is SSL'd.

Yup, we're doing that too. It also listens for POP connections, both 
encrypted and unencrypted, for those who like POP, too. If I had my way, 
it would *only* allow the SSL connections, but that will probably have 
to wait for another few months...

Since you're authenticating from LDAP, you can't use CRAM-MD5 or other 
such goodies on the IMAP/POP connections, you hafta use plain 
authentication. So if you can, force the use of SSL *everywhere*.
---
Cyrus Home Page: http://asg.web.cmu.edu/cyrus
Cyrus Wiki/FAQ: http://cyruswiki.andrew.cmu.edu
List Archives/Info: http://asg.web.cmu.edu/cyrus/mailing-list.html