building epyc esxxi 7 build.

[Kirika]

Looking to build an quiet tower epyc esxi 7 or 8 host to replace my old 24 bay rack server since 6.7 is EOL and still have some server2012r2 vms which is also EOl soon. I am getting tired of the noise when playing ping pong or pooli in the basement with friends.

Current server is a supermicro x9dai 2 x 2680v2 256 gb ddr3, some random quadro for video card 2x 6.4 tb fusion IO for VMs 4x 8 tb, 4x 14 tb 4x 18 tb zfs z1 arrays for storage. 24 bay supermicro case 1000 watt p2 evga powr supply.
Running the folling
esxi 6.7
server 2012r2 domain controller
Server 2016 SQL 2016 server
Server 2012r2 team foundation
server 2019 web server
server 2022 test server
redhat linux web server
ubuntu for Git
Ubuntu for zfs
plex server
game servers
8v8 RVR (server 2016)
Ark Survival Evolved (Centos)
Battlefield 1942 (ubuntu)
Minecraft (ubuntu)
Quake 3 (ubuntu)
Renegade X (windows server 2012r2)
Team Fortress (ubuntu)
Terraria (ubuntu)
probably are a few more I haven't spun up recently or moved off the main drives other then the minecraft one I typically only spin them up when my friends want to play.


case Fratal Define XL
$224.99 on new egg
https://www.newegg.com/black-fracta...xyAm-VnuCBlDpPkEB5YaAr_WEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds


Epyc Rome 3402P or 7F72 24 core OR Eypic 3532 32 core
Friend said to get higher cock speed for the mindcraft server or is it worth the extra cash for 32 cores? Went with the 24 core with my threadripper and sometimes wish I had a 32 core since I'm running vms and using it as my workstation but for server are the extra cores worth it?

Motheboard
Supermicro H12SSL-i or H12SSL-NT (10gb ethernet)
This has PCI 4.0 so can add pci card to put nvme 4.0 drives in it and can take Eypic Rome and Milan if I want to upgrade to Epyc Milan later. is it worth the extra money to get the H12SSL-NT for the 10 GB ethernet for the future. Not looking to do the 10 GB upgrade right now since 10 GB switches are pricey and would have to rerun wiring through the house.

Ram likely just go for 256 I upgraded my pervious server to 256 since ddr 3 was so cheap and can ram disk the Minecraft server.

Epyc 7402p + H12SSL-i combo $1064 with 128 gb 2133 ddr4 ecc ram (32gb x x4_ 1216.00 with 256 gb 2133 ddr4 ecc ram (32 gb x 8) ramhttps://www.ebay.com/itm/175430838962?_trkparms=amclksrc%3DITM%26aid%3D777008%26algo%3DPERSONAL.TOPIC%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20221115143056%26meid%3D41085b2cdaef43049dccfc038cea64ec%26pid%3D101612%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D1%26itm%3D175430838962%26pmt%3D1%26noa%3D1%26pg%3D4375194%26algv%3DRecentlyViewedItemsV2%26brand%3DSupermicro&_trksid=p4375194.c101612.m4236&_trkparms=parentrq%3Ae2b882831890a56643cee2a6ffffddfe%7Cpageci%3A5b037918-37fa-11ee-9252-d25219f7b8c3%7Ciid%3A1%7Cvlpname%3Avlp_homepage

Epyc 7532 + H12SSL-i combo $997.50 with no ram
https://www.ebay.com/itm/1753864512...clzXXCr3IKvZI7U7ZFJk4FBUWw==|tkp:BFBMquKGq7xi



Cooler
Noctua NH-U14S-sp3
$99 on amazon This worked for my threadripper should work for epyc is fairly quite likely spend the $25 for an extra fan.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074DX2SX7?tag=pcpapi-20&linkCode=ogi&th=1&psc=1


Video cards
Random quadro or gtx 730 cheap card for vga for server for intitial set up when hooked to monitor.

Used 3090 not sure of brand or might get used 4090 and use the 3090 from my desktop as pass throughfor AI projects like Stable Defusion MiniGPT etc or is another card better bang for the buck for this seen used 3090s as cheap as $500.

Power supply
EVGA 1000P2 oor 1600P2?
Have an EVGA 1300G2 power supply in my current desktop. 1000P2 in the server since the original power supply died. Is it worth getting a bigger power supply like a 1600 watt to possibly have 2 video cards for ai projects? Or should I get different power supply since EVGA might not be around to honor warranty? how much power do you need for 2x 3090?

EVGA 1000P2 $169
https://www.amazon.com/EVGA-Supernova-Platinum-Crossfire-220-P2-1000-XR/dp/B00EKJQM5E?th=1

EVGA 1600G+ $233
https://www.amazon.com/EVGA-Superno...+supernova+1600+p2,electronics,83&sr=1-2&th=1


Solid state drives for virtual machines

previous machine had 2x fusion io 6.4 gb ssds which don't work on esxi 7.0 or later so looking for alternatives

I was thinking
Intel DC P3700 Series 2.0TB PCIe 3.0 NVMe SSD OR
SamSung enterprise sata 1.92tb $49 each.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/1959136922...Cj0iWR1rBuLRQJ5hrcJDD9yHrVU=|tkp:BFBM6vu1k8li
for the criticle VMS


samsung 2 tb 970 evo plus $89 each for the game servers

Have the 4 x nvem card that came with my gigabyte motherboard for my workstation I could put these in if that doesn't work could get a generic ph44 card
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B09CTZ8QJM?th=1

Hard drives

Thinking get like 6 drives run them raid z2 instead of raid z1 with 4 drive sets like I been doing and retire the 8 tb drive set. I bought some of the 18 tb sea gates on black friday from serer parts deals but are western digital less noisy about the same price.
Seems shucking is risky cause some of the new drives are not shuckable or have issues and prices aren't low for externals

$175 each
https://serverpartdeals.com/collect...2e-4kn-256mb-3-5-manufacturer-recertified-hdd

$179 each
https://serverpartdeals.com/collect...-2k-rpm-sata-6gb-s-3-5-recertified-hard-drive


looking to add another array and replace some of the old drives from the old server maybe retired the 8 tbs and maybe 12 tbs, the 14 tbs western digital shucks I put in black friday 2021 and 18 tbs are seagate xxos frp, server parts deals black Friday 2023.

External back up drives
maybe get a couple of these for now for the new array and more black friday.
https://www.newegg.com/seagate-expa...22-184-959&cm_sp=product-_-from-price-options
usually get western digitals doesn't seem to be any good deals on these. have like a whole shelf of back up drives.

Please let me know any thoughts. Thank you.

 

[TType85]

I recently put together a similar system; I am running Proxmox but ESXI 8 ran fine when I tried it.

Fractal Design R5, changed the front case fans for high static pressure ones.
Epyc 7402P
Generic 4u SP3 CPU cooler
ASRockRack Epycd8 motherboard (supports rome but not milan)
256GB DDR4-2666 ECC RDimm
2x 512GB Samsung 970 Evo NVME (Boot ZFS pool)
Nvidia Quadro P2000
4x 1TB NVME in a Hyper M.2 card (requires bifurcation; you need to set the slot to 4x4x4x4x)
2x 3.84TB Western Digital u.2 in on an 8x card (again bifurcation 4x4x)
Intel X540 10GB card
6x 16TB Seagate Exos SATA drives in a RaidZ2
NZXT 850W power supply

Machine is pretty silent and stays cool. It also only pulls about 140W-150W idle with all that hardware. It will be a decent step up from old v2 xeons. I would go with the 1600w if you are putting in dual 3090s.

 

[Kirika]

I recently put together a similar system; I am running Proxmox but ESXI 8 ran fine when I tried it.

Fractal Design R5, changed the front case fans for high static pressure ones.
Epyc 7402P
Generic 4u SP3 CPU cooler
ASRockRack Epycd8 motherboard (supports rome but not milan)
256GB DDR4-2666 ECC RDimm
2x 512GB Samsung 970 Evo NVME (Boot ZFS pool)
Nvidia Quadro P2000
4x 1TB NVME in a Hyper M.2 card (requires bifurcation; you need to set the slot to 4x4x4x4x)
2x 3.84TB Western Digital u.2 in on an 8x card (again bifurcation 4x4x)
Intel X540 10GB card
6x 16TB Seagate Exos SATA drives in a RaidZ2
NZXT 850W power supply

Machine is pretty silent and stays cool. It also only pulls about 140W-150W idle with all that hardware. It will be a decent step up from old v2 xeons. I would go with the 1600w if you are putting in dual 3090s.

Thank you. Looking to actually make the purchases soon with Black Friday coming up. What Hyper M.2 card and U.2 card did you get may get the same ones If I don't get the H12SSL-NT board since you said they work with ESXI 8.

 

[Vengance_01]

I recently put together a similar system; I am running Proxmox but ESXI 8 ran fine when I tried it.

Fractal Design R5, changed the front case fans for high static pressure ones.
Epyc 7402P
Generic 4u SP3 CPU cooler
ASRockRack Epycd8 motherboard (supports rome but not milan)
256GB DDR4-2666 ECC RDimm
2x 512GB Samsung 970 Evo NVME (Boot ZFS pool)
Nvidia Quadro P2000
4x 1TB NVME in a Hyper M.2 card (requires bifurcation; you need to set the slot to 4x4x4x4x)
2x 3.84TB Western Digital u.2 in on an 8x card (again bifurcation 4x4x)
Intel X540 10GB card
6x 16TB Seagate Exos SATA drives in a RaidZ2
NZXT 850W power supply

Machine is pretty silent and stays cool. It also only pulls about 140W-150W idle with all that hardware. It will be a decent step up from old v2 xeons. I would go with the 1600w if you are putting in dual 3090s.

that's a damn good idle draw!

 

[osrk]

Thank you. Looking to actually make the purchases soon with Black Friday coming up. What Hyper M.2 card and U.2 card did you get may get the same ones If I don't get the H12SSL-NT board since you said they work with ESXI 8.

I have good luck with the asus hyper x cards. I have three running in a H12SSL-i and have not had an issue. Setting bifurcation in the bios was dead simple. Any 4 port U.2 card will work from amazon. Less important for that card because you're not mounting the drives to the card like the nvme m.2 card. You do need to buy the cables as well.