Ok, so I’ve been doing a bit of looking around for my new server builds. As I’ve thought about this, I’ve firmed up my requirements to the following:
- Low-power, low-noise
- 2 x 3.5″ SATA2 hard drive bays (hot plug not required, I’m just going to use Linux’s built-in RAID1 again)
- All standard, replaceable components – no custom PSUs especially
- Small form factor (as much as possible given the other requirements)
- Cost-effective
- Performance almost irrelevant
The things I have decided on:
- CPU / Motherboard: Intel Atom 330 on D945GCLF2 motherboard. The Atom’s power usage is great (8W idle), the 945G chipset is not so great (25W!) but as a combo they’re still pretty damn good, and not expensive. VIA do the only other alternatives but I’ve had some issues with VIA in the past.
- HDD: 2 x Western Digital Caviar Greens, because they’re low-power and run cool
- 1GB miscellaneous RAM
- No optical or floppy drives, I don’t need them (boot from USB flash drive, OS and other software will be directly downloaded)
The main problem I have now is finding a case. It has to be relatively small, and preferably stackable so I can put two of them on top of each other. Most of the Mini-ITX cases have 2 problems: they either don’t take 2 HDDs, or they use a custom PSU (or both) – I’ve been burned with having a custom PSU on a Mini-ITX machine that failed before, with no replacement available, and have no intention of going down that route again; everything has to be stock, so I can whip it out and replace it easily even if the case model has been discontinued.
Some cases come with an external ‘power brick’ PSU which in itself is pretty standardised (60/80/120W usually), but I remain concerned about the DC circuitry that the brick connects to in the case; if that fails it could be a pain. At least a standard PSU is replaceable in its entirety very easily. And plus, those cases that externalise the PSU tend to be too small to take 2 HDs anyway – all except the Chenbro ES34069 but it’s stupidly expensive.If anyone knows of any others, and has experience of the resilience of external DC power systems, please let me know.
So in the absence of a better option, I’m leaning towards a standard ‘cube’ case like the ThermalTake Lanbox – I have one of these already for a test machine and it’s good, if a little heavier and larger than I actually need (and even the lowest power standard PSU will be overkill, even if I go for an 80 plus certified one). If I was a case designer, I’d take this case, slice about 4 inches off the side and a little off the top, and I’d have precisely what I want – a stackable compact mini-ITX box which uses all standard components and can fit 2 HDDs comfortably. Is that so much to ask?
June 11th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Hardware projects can be interesting now and again
No optical drive… so I guess you are doing backups some other way then burning dvds now and again?
June 11th, 2009 at 2:47 pm
I have several machines that just backup to each other over the network, with critical things backed up incrementally offsite to Amazon S3.
I used to archive stuff to DVD occasionally but these days it’s not worth it. S3 is more practical to do regularly, and if I want to archive more than I want to upload, flash drives are bigger than DVDs these days, and are much faster and reusable. Optical drives are dead to me
June 12th, 2009 at 4:17 am
I have bought 2 D945GCLF motherboards (not the D945GCLF2) and I have had mixed impressions. Now it seems they fixed a few things including the Realtek Ethernet which is good finally supporting 1000Mbps which I assume you do need! Linux and Windows now both have proper drivers and kernel support (Linux did not work so well in the very beginning with the early board/bios).
The ATOM processor is pretty darn good though and the dual core one must be even better. Good luck with it all!
June 12th, 2009 at 6:58 am
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June 18th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
I was speccing Atom Mini-ITX boards for a server recently and decided upon the Gigabyte GA-GC230D. Reviews say it has quite a bit better build quality, and it’s barely more expensive; otherwise, the ports are mostly the same
June 20th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
[...] just assembled a new server machine, for which in the end I chose to house in a shiny aluminium Thermaltake Lanbox, which is relatively [...]