Question about best hardware

[Mike Cohen <mike () antropyinc com>]

Hi Folks, 

Im am beginning snort user, and I have been asked to spec a production snort
server to do the following:

Monitor all traffic in and out of a relatively busy Mail Server(300 users).
The mail server is on a gigabit link and is usually at about 300mbs average
usage, it rarely gets super saturated.

I will be storing the logs on the snort box itself and I have to use a
hardware raid solution.

I am told I must spec an HP brand server and I have the following questions.

1. I thought I remembered reading that Opterons have an advantage when
trying to sniff gigabit traffic , but I have never used an opteron, and as
an intermediate Linux User Im not entirely confident trying to force linux
to work on a new architecture, are there any problems with linux and snort
on an opteron.

2. How much memory do I need? I specd 1gb, is this sufficient for high
usage?

3. Which distro is best for an intermediate level Linux user? I know that
there is no cut and dry answer to this question, but if anyone has any
insight on using snort on a RAID 1 box , using an opteron on gigabit please
chime in.

If anyone has any other insights as to recommended hardware please let me
know.

Thanks.



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