Saturday, September 07, 2019

Question regarding server hardware

I recently purchased a Dell T-330 server that I had intended to
install OpenBSD on and use as a serious web server. My goal was to
have more control than would be (naturally) given with, say an AWS VM.
And by control, I mean what is *not* running on the box - security-wise.

Apparently, Dell ships these with an abundance of "security features"
already on the box. And not a lot of obvious opt-outs. And a proclivity
not not understand that "no means no" in regard to turning off these
features.
One of which used 60% of (one of 8) processors, all the time. Constantly
running
one of my processors at 60% - as long as it was powered up.

I understand that there are times when good security requires such measures.
I do. And if I trusted Dell with 100% of my security needs, I'd be ok if
it phoned
home a lot, or repeatedly powered up my external HD after a total power
down,
etc.

But I am under-educated and over-paranoid, and so I'm hoping that the
people on this list can offer some suggestions of machines that they use
as internet servers. I'm looking for *more* power and *less* stuff running
in the background when booting from a newly-installed OS (like obsd).
I can and will go with a 10-yr-old desktop model, if that's what it takes to
achieve "radio silence" when I'm not running anything.

Can you tell me what you like to use?
Thank you in advance.
-Jim Huddle

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