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Crazy server idea?

N

night_2004

2[H]4U
Joined
May 31, 2007
Messages
2,229
I've been reading more and more about the server systems that all of you have set up, but I've come to realize that (1) having recently lost a major contract on freelance work money just is not there, (2) I do not have a need for 10TB of backup space yet, and (3) I do not need the most advanced hardware on the planet.

To that end, I was curious what your thoughts might be on using an Intel Atom ITX board as a server platform?

Maybe...
Intel Atom 330, GigE, Integrated Video
Corsair 2GB RAM
Corsair 400W PSU

Still would be hunting down a case and hard drives, but would this kind of computing power actually work for a backup server? I wouldn't think too much about using RAID on any of this, maybe RAID5 in software using USB hard drives. It doesn't need to be super fast, just maybe enough for 20-30MB/s on a network connection.

Given my current situation, I may do this next month or next year or never. But I'm curious.
 
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For a file and backup server, that setup would be enough. However for software RAID 5 using USB hard drives will probably be very slow, even lesser than 20MB/s
 
Danny Bui said:
For a file and backup server, that setup would be enough. However for software RAID 5 using USB hard drives will probably be very slow, even lesser than 20MB/s
Click to expand...

The only advantage I can see with RAID5 on a backup server is that it is all presented as one drive to the outside world. This is a freaking backup server, if a drive does so what...the original files ought to be somewhere else on another computer anyway!

Mark Larson said:
What are you going to be doing specifically with this "server"?
Click to expand...

"Like he said..."

I would imagine, at first, a file server just for backing up my computer, my wife's computer, and my grandmother's computer. My grandmother's computer would need a VPN tunnel since she is about 150 miles away, if I backed hers up at all. A USB hard drive would easily work for her.

Later on, I might expand on the server to store TV recordings from my PC's TV tuner and use that as a file share to a media center expander connected to the TV.

Just out of curiosity, does anyone have solid numbers how the old 2.8GHz P4 stacks up to the Atom 330? My grandmother kind of wants a new computer, I can build her an ITX Atom system for a lot less.
 
I hope its not too crazy as I ordered one of those SuperMicro Atom 330 boards to replace the dual Woodcrest board in my file server. The box has an Areca RAID card, so the Atom will just have to push data out onto the network.

IIRC, the Atom 330 is the equivalent of a midrange dual PIII from back in the day - that used to be a pretty high end server. So it should be fine for file server duties.
 
It is possible to get an AM2+ Regor and motherboard for about $100, just wanted you to be aware of that. Once you decide what you want to do with it, you can decide whether to go with the Atom or something else :)
 
I'm already fairly certain about what the "server" would do. I was just curious if a similar build would work for a basic home setting, since the build can be pretty cheap. I also do not want to increase the power bill by much.

I think I found a better PSU, lowered the RAM to 1GB (its a fileserver!), and added a good looking case that fits a standard ATX supply. I've got a 320GB hard drive I'd use as a main drive (otherwise I'd find the cheapest possible), and a 1TB drive that would be used as a share to start with.

Total: $230
 
I've always wanted to build an Atom system for my FreeNAS, but they just seem to have too many issues to beat out the old Celeron PCs (drive failures) I can get from work for free.

  • Despite being an Intel product, they still use a Realtek NIC. Bleh.
  • One memory slot. Not that I need a ton of RAM, but it would be handy to have dual-channel and the ability to use two smaller, cheaper DIMMs.
  • Only 2 SATA ports. Only a single PCI slot for adding a controller card. At least PCIe would've been better.
  • The CPU is very efficient, but the chipset still uses quite a bit of power. I don't mind lowering my system's capabilities some (which will probably still be more than enough horsepower) to cut my electric bill, but if 90% of the board is still sucking up just as much juice, it's not nearly as attractive.
 
But if you didn't get those for free...$220-230 isn't that bad is it? I'm not sure if you could get a lower wattage build, even if the chipset uses a lot of power compared to the processor. We're talking near 24/7 up time, or perhaps scheduled up time to coincide with backup times.

What little 24/7 work I do I can migrate to the server, meaning I can turn off my Core i7 system during the night. I might be able to even get the Core i7 system to listen for the magic packet or something, so that I can remotely wake the system up.

Alright, so I suppose this would be the wish list:
  • File server for backups
  • Use networked drive over VPN to access my files remotely
  • Store recorded TV shows from the Core i7 system
  • Connect with media extender and/or HDTV
  • Be able to wake up Core i7 system if I'm away and I need that computer online
 
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That is a bad idea....that board blows goats. 2 SATA ports? Come on.
Also get 2gb of ram...you will glad you did....Theres a reason that all those miniITX WHS mfgr upgaded units to 2gb;)

If you want small and LP get the supermicro Atom330 board. It has PCIexpress 4 SATA ports and Dual GigE Nics. Although I think its uATX or mATX.
 
night_2004 - have you looked at some of the threads here about Atom/WHS builds?

Dumping RAID5 for WHS seems like it might be a better all-around option.
 
[LYL]Homer;1034509875 said:
night_2004 - have you looked at some of the threads here about Atom/WHS builds?

Dumping RAID5 for WHS seems like it might be a better all-around option.
Click to expand...

I haven't looked too much into threads that are not stickies, I'll take a look. Any links I should really look at?

Yeah, I don't have to have RAID5.
 
yeah atom and WHS is a good fit, but you could (like i do) run WHS w/ RAID 5
 
night_2004 said:
But if you didn't get those for free...$220-230 isn't that bad is it? I'm not sure if you could get a lower wattage build, even if the chipset uses a lot of power compared to the processor. We're talking near 24/7 up time, or perhaps scheduled up time to coincide with backup times.

What little 24/7 work I do I can migrate to the server, meaning I can turn off my Core i7 system during the night. I might be able to even get the Core i7 system to listen for the magic packet or something, so that I can remotely wake the system up.

Alright, so I suppose this would be the wish list:
  • File server for backups
  • Use networked drive over VPN to access my files remotely
  • Store recorded TV shows from the Core i7 system
  • Connect with media extender and/or HDTV
  • Be able to wake up Core i7 system if I'm away and I need that computer online
Click to expand...

Yes, it would be a very different situation if I couldn't get the old PCs for free. However, I think I'd have to end up getting something like the Super Micro X7SLA-H that nitrobass24 recommended. It's $130+ from what I can see, but it's got two DDR2 slots, PCIe x8/PCIe x4/PCI, dual GbE (still Realtek though), and 4x SATA. The Intel board just seems so crippled compared to this one.

I'd imagine that it should handle your tasks just fine. Your list seems like basically just file storage and WOL, so it shouldn't take much horsepower to run it. If you really can't afford it* though, don't get it. As others have stated, it's a lot of non-necessary expense. Everything will only get cheaper and/or better if you wait.

* Others seem to have inferred that you're broke now, but your original statement is a bit ambiguous about whether you're living in a cardboard box or just don't have as much cash in the toy fund anymore.
 
Any idea if there is another mini-ITX case available that can hold 2-4 standard 3.5" drives?

The Lian Li case is definitely nice, holds 1x 2.5" and 1x 3.5". Could also set up a 3rd drive by converting the 5.25" bay to 3.5", maybe I'd make that a removable SATA drive at some point.

But I'm curious is there is something out there that is better. Would still prefer something that holds an ATX power supply.
 
night_2004 said:
Any idea if there is another mini-ITX case available that can hold 2-4 standard 3.5" drives?

The Lian Li case is definitely nice, holds 1x 2.5" and 1x 3.5". Could also set up a 3rd drive by converting the 5.25" bay to 3.5", maybe I'd make that a removable SATA drive at some point.

But I'm curious is there is something out there that is better. Would still prefer something that holds an ATX power supply.
Click to expand...

I'm building a Mini-ITX WHS with the Jetway NC92 mobo, 4xSATA daughtercard, and the Chenbro ES34069 case. I finally got all the parts and got it assembled last night only to find that the RAM I bought was PC5300 rather than 533MHz. A trip to Fry's today at lunch fixed that. So far I'm rather impressed with the Chenbro case. The fit of the hotswap bays leave a little to be desired - I have to wiggle 2 of them to get the drives to power up. I think there might be some adjustment I can to to fix that. I have the same issues with my Norco rackmount that I managed to adjust the way I wanted it. The Chenbro case with the Jetway mobo has been suprisingly quiet thus far. I figured with 70mm fans on the case and the 40mm fan on the mobo chipset it would be much louder than it is.
 
Alright, what about this idea?

CPU: Celeron 430 (supposedly 10W power consumption at idle)
Motherboard: uATX Intel w/o RAID for $60 or Intel w/ RAID for $100.
RAM: 2x 1GB DDR2
PSU: 370W PSU
Case: For now, but maybe find something with support for mini-ITX and a few more hard drives but around the same price. This showed up as well, maybe it would be okay.

Total is about $260. Would the Celeron maybe have enough juice to do software RAID 0/1/5 without too much trouble? Just asking...probably not going to RAID these.
 
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epimetheus said:
I'm building a Mini-ITX WHS with the Jetway NC92 mobo, 4xSATA daughtercard, and the Chenbro ES34069 case. I finally got all the parts and got it assembled last night only to find that the RAM I bought was PC5300 rather than 533MHz. A trip to Fry's today at lunch fixed that. So far I'm rather impressed with the Chenbro case. The fit of the hotswap bays leave a little to be desired - I have to wiggle 2 of them to get the drives to power up. I think there might be some adjustment I can to to fix that. I have the same issues with my Norco rackmount that I managed to adjust the way I wanted it. The Chenbro case with the Jetway mobo has been suprisingly quiet thus far. I figured with 70mm fans on the case and the 40mm fan on the mobo chipset it would be much louder than it is.
Click to expand...

Just to update, the Jetway 4xSATA daughtercard, as nitrobass put it, blows goats. It detects the drives and WHS installed fine with it, but I get nothing but "Delayed Write Failures" when I try to fill up the drives attached to it. And that's with write behind caching disabled. The daughtercard uses the Marvell 88SE6145 and Jetway does not provide drivers for it, neither does Marvell, at least not directly to consumers. I've tried every other driver I can find online for this chipset with the same results. My case will theoretically fit a Supermicro SAT2-MV8 card running in the mobo's PCI slot, so I've that and a PCI riser card on the way. I know the SAT2-MV8 works with WHS. Screw Marvell, although I believe the SAT2-MV8 uses a Marvell chipset as well. At least it's not a shitty Marvell consumer one.
 
night_2004 said:
Alright, what about this idea?

CPU: Celeron 430 (supposedly 10W power consumption at idle)
Motherboard: uATX Intel w/o RAID for $60 or Intel w/ RAID for $100.
RAM: 2x 1GB DDR2
PSU: 370W PSU
Case: For now, but maybe find something with support for mini-ITX and a few more hard drives but around the same price. This showed up as well, maybe it would be okay.

Total is about $260. Would the Celeron maybe have enough juice to do software RAID 0/1/5 without too much trouble? Just asking...probably not going to RAID these.
Click to expand...

1) dont do Onboard Raid5....ever...it sucks. especially with ICH7...I tried it on a ICH10r with an i7 and it still sucked. So dont waste your time.
2) RAID 0 or 1 will work fine.
3) IIRC that CPU is not 64bit compatible which you will definately want because the next version of WHS is x64 only.
 
Alright, forget RAID5. It wasn't ideal anyway. As for 64bit support, (1) NewEgg lists 64bit compatible but I'll check Intel's site shortly and (2) once I put an OS on this baby I intend to leave it alone.

Maybe I should approach this a little differently....what would you guys do with a roughly $250 budget? Don't worry about drives.
 
I'd do an AMD Sempron or Athlon II X2 with 2GB of RAM at least, with an mATX mobo that has at least 6 SATA ports and a couple of PCI/PCIe slots to add network cards/RAID. Most AMD mATX come with IGPs.

The advantage of this will be that if you can use the PC when you want and have it be a server when you want. With a dual-core CPU, it won't slow down if you're farting about on the net or torrenting and backing up at the same time.
 
Mark Larson said:
I'd do an AMD Sempron or Athlon II X2 with 2GB of RAM at least, with an mATX mobo that has at least 6 SATA ports and a couple of PCI/PCIe slots to add network cards/RAID. Most AMD mATX come with IGPs.

The advantage of this will be that if you can use the PC when you want and have it be a server when you want. With a dual-core CPU, it won't slow down if you're farting about on the net or torrenting and backing up at the same time.
Click to expand...

I had not thought about the AMD route for this, any idea how it does in the power consumption area?
 
How's this for a 5TB teaser...I'll explain tomorrow.

IMG00026-20090826-2133.jpg


IMG00027-20090826-2133.jpg


IMG00028-20090826-2134.jpg
 
Now here I staring at those pictures, trying to figure out what parts you have in there...

BTW, found out the Dell Outlet has Atom 330 Optiplex systems for $219 and Atom 230 Optiplex systems for $139. Sure, drives would have to be USB drives...but that $139 price point is attractive.
 
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Software RAID would work fine on such a rig, and you should get your desired performance no problem, if you wanted to go for it. Personally I think I'd go the Atom route with that Supermicro board and a cheap uATX case (thanks for pointing that board out BTW, I didn't know any Atom boards with PCIe existed). Run FreeNAS or WHS, your choice, either will work well for your goals. I don't think using USB drives is a worthwhile idea, especially if you go RAID - not only are they slow and CPU hungry, if you trip on the cables or they fall offline randomly or whatever, you've potentially lost the whole array. I'd sacrifice your desire for Mini-ITX and just go with a uATX solution instead (though that Lian-Li sure is a pretty little box for a storage server, of only it fit more disks). Boot from a USB stick if you run FreeNAS and you can fit more storage disks, or use a flash DOM if you run Windows (how much space does a WHS install require?). Either way I'd definitely drop an Intel NIC in and forget the Realtek crap.

My own rig I built a while ago is an Intel DG43NB (chosen for the Intel NICs) and Celeron E1400, and though power consumption is going to be higher, it was really inexpensive too, you can build a similar rig without disks for well under $200. My 1500VA/1000W UPS reports 8% load, with a 24 port managed GigE switch and my Atom-based router and cable modems running on it as well. I'd estimate the storage server with 4 drives is probably in the 50W arena at idle.
 
So my above system started out as a Jetway NC92-330-LF mobo with the 4xSATA daughterboard in a Chenbro ES34069 case. It turns out the 4xSATA daughterboard blows. Jetway doesn't provide drivers for the Marvell 88SE6145 chipset on the daughterboard and Marvell wouldn't even give me a datasheet on the chipset, the bastards. So it hit me that I might be able to throw a SM SAT2-MV8 in the case. Turns out it fits amazingly well. The last picture shows the slim DVD drive slid all the way back in. I'm using Samsung 1.5TB drives in the hot swat bays and a 500GB 2.5" Samsung for the OS drive. Once I switched to the SAT2 board, everything went swimmingly. The drives do seem to be limited to 70MB/s. Not sure if that's the Jetway's PCI implementation of the effects of the SAT2 in a PCI slot verses a PCI-X slot. Now that I know I don't need the daughterboard, which was the whole reason I bought the Jetway board in the first place, I might try to find a board that has an Intel NIC. The Jetway has a Realtek NIC that of course sucks.
 
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