nekon

Well I've finally decided to take the jump! I recently had a major RAID0 drive failure on my main pc and I'm still feeling the pain. Long story short it is time to add a WHS box to my arsenal!


CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 5050e Brisbane 2.6GHz - 45W, Dual Cores
MOBO: GIGABYTE GA-MA74GM-S2 740G Micro ATX - GigE, 6x SATA 3.0GB, Integrated GPU
RAM: mushkin 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 PC2 6400 - 4-5-4-11
PSU: Corsair CMPSU-400CX 400W V2.2 80 PLUS Certified

HDD1: WD VelociRaptor WD3000HLFS 300GB 10000 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s - Own Already
HDD2: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s
HDD3: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s
HDD4: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s
HDD5: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s

CASE: COOLER MASTER Centurion 590

Build Total: $ 519.92

There will be some other misc items but these are the meat of my purchases to come. So what do you honestly think?


04/19/09 - Revision I: We just knocked $100 off the build. Thanks!
04/21/09 - Placed Order: I placed my order today, everything should be here before the weekend!
04/28/09 - Build Begins: It's late but I put everything together to begin testing my hardware. I'll rough everything into the case tomorrow, begin making cuts, and get started on my cabling.

DuckieHo

The CPU is a bit overkill. Get a cheaper single core or a cheaper dual core.

It isn't worth using a VelociRaptor for a WHS build.

There are no features on the 790GX that you need. Get the cheaper 740G.

__________________
To answer most of your questions: (1) a fridge cannot cool a PC (2) 64-bit OS for over 3.4GB (3) If a PCIe card fits, it should work (4) Resolution, not screen size (5) If you have a question, it is not news (6) Report, not respond to Spam (7) Single-Rail/Non-Modular PSUs are not always better than Multi-Rail/Modular

graphicsman

if its a file server, it would be good, but if you get more drives, get more ram

DuckieHo

Why? 2GB is plenty fine for a file server. More hard drives has nothing to do with needing more RAM. It depends on concurrent applications.

__________________
To answer most of your questions: (1) a fridge cannot cool a PC (2) 64-bit OS for over 3.4GB (3) If a PCIe card fits, it should work (4) Resolution, not screen size (5) If you have a question, it is not news (6) Report, not respond to Spam (7) Single-Rail/Non-Modular PSUs are not always better than Multi-Rail/Modular

richardshewfelt

DEFIANTLY a bigger psu, your going to be expanding drives you need a bigger psu, i think it would be better to get the more powerful psu from the start rather then upgrading it in the future.

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Bonz™

Since you won't be RAIDing, I don't see a point for the RE3 drives. I would save a few bucks and get the Blacks. Hell, even the Greens for a few less.

I really like and prefer the WD Blacks. IMO they are probably ranked right up there in reliability with the RE drives, but lacking TLER. But from what I understand, you can enable TLER on them anyway.

I would go with the 740G and the CM 590. No sense in spending too much money looking fancy when you are only serving. CPU is good IMO, though I love as much CPU as possible

Edit: Almost forgot. Sell or use the VRaptor in your main build. No need for it. The server will only be booting up once every now and then, and not loading any large apps constantly.

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Bonz::Asmodian Templar of Zikel

Total Available Storage
Currently: 8,377 GB (useable)

DuckieHo

The Corsair 400w is plenty fine. I have one of those running the following:

ECS A740GM-M
AMD Athlon 64 LE-1620
2x1GB Micron DDR2-667
9600GSO
Seagate 7200.11 750GB
Samsung Spinpoint T1 1TB
Seagate 7200.10 500GB
MSI Fuzzy 945GME2
Celeron M 430
1GB Corsair DDR2-677
Seagate LD25 20GB
3x Yate Loon fans at 5v
D-Link DGS-2205 Switch 2.5A@5v
2x LEDs

__________________
To answer most of your questions: (1) a fridge cannot cool a PC (2) 64-bit OS for over 3.4GB (3) If a PCIe card fits, it should work (4) Resolution, not screen size (5) If you have a question, it is not news (6) Report, not respond to Spam (7) Single-Rail/Non-Modular PSUs are not always better than Multi-Rail/Modular

e_dogg

Listen to DuckieHo and Bonz. I almost got that Gigabyte mobo you're looking at and it's really nice. I wound up going with a similar Asus board with eSata. But you don't need a dual core CPU, lots of ram, or a fancy mobo for a WHS box.

I think that the RE2/RE3 drives are better for 24x7 use. If you're looking for low power and cool temps, check out the Western Digital RE2 Green drives. They're hard to find, but there are a couple of regular sellers on eBay that are reasonable. And they're plenty fast since you're just serving up files - your network will be the slowest part of file transfers even at gigabit speeds.

Your PSU should be fine for 3-4 drives at least. I'm running my WHS box with a 400w Ultra PSU and it's doing great. You won't have a huge video card or beastly CPU sucking up the juice. Plus, if you get those Green drives, they use even less power.

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graphicsman

this is why i posted a thread tryin to get someone to help me build a server, lol

Bonz™

Agreeing with DuckieHo and e_dogg about the PSU.

I am running the following with a 400w noname brand PSU that came with my $40 case for my server.

Q6600 @ 3GHz (Folding 24/7)
Gigabyte G31 mATX board
1x500GB WD AAKS
8x1TB WD Black

Couple o' fans.

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Bonz::Asmodian Templar of Zikel

Total Available Storage
Currently: 8,377 GB (useable)