My (hopefully) future virtual rig

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K0m0d0

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Jun 20, 2013
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Greetings,

I've been lurking the forums for quite some time (without registering, shame on me).

After all the reading about virtualization I wanted to go and build my own whitebox.

In my daily life I'm a sys admin at an energy corp in the netherlands, so introductions aside ill show what information I have gathered to build the box.

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1230V3 - 3.3 GHz ( Link )
Motherboard: Super Micro X10SLH-F ( Link )
SSD's: Samsung 840 Series MZ-7TD250 250GB x2 ( Link )
Memory: Kingston ValueRAM KVR16E11K4/32 32GB ECC DDR3 - 1600 ( Link )
Case: Fractal Design Define XL R2 ( Link )
Powersupply: Seasonic G-550 80 Plus Gold ( Link )

And some older sata HDD's which I will gather from the several old computers I have.

How I would like to set up the disks:
the 2 SSD's in a stripe setup, I have read that the Samsung 840 series is near indestructible ( NL Source (Dutch) ENG Source (Google Translate) )
I dont know what to do with the several old Sata drives but its just storage of information I dont mind losing.

I would like to use ESXi 5.1 (most recent version), but I dont know if the on board RAID controller will work though. It's the newest generation Intel Haswell processer with a just as new Supermicro motherboard, so i can just hope ESXi will support it.

Well thats about it, maybe anyone could have a small say on this? I would like to know some idea's anyone might have.

Thanks for your time!

Regards,

K0m0d0
 
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The onboard sata controller will not be seen as a raid device by ESXi. It will see individual drives, but not raids configured through the intel raid. X10SL7-F from the same product family does have a raid controller onboard, but is about $150-$200 more. If you decide at a later point that you need raid functionality you will need to burn a PCI-E slot.

What is your goal for striping the SSDs? Performance or capacity?
 
Hi geiger, thank you for the reply. I have looked up the other motherboard you recommended, it is only a 20 euro difference where I'm going to buy it. Only when I look at the supermicro website ( Link ), it says SW RAID 0, 1, 1E, 10 support (does SW mean software?).

But it does state having an LSI 2308 SAS2 controller. Does this mean the RAID is only hardware based for the SAS2 part or also for the SATA3/6 connectors? Also for the RAID reason on the solid states its performance, I'm going to run the VM's on them. Is it needed performance wise to do that?

I have neglected to tell what the server is for, it will be a media box with tvheadend and I'm going to put my digitalized movies on them so I can play those on the 2 media centers I have. I'm also most likely going to put in a digital devices satellite card, but I'm still not certain which one. Also I want to test around with Linux distro's and Win server 2012 ( IIS, terminal services ).

Thank you for your time!
 
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What you have proposed is basically my home ESXi box.

I only have 1 samsung 840, and performance is phenomenal with 8 low-to-modest use guests (5x Ubuntu, 2x 2012, 1x FreeBSD). Ubuntu installs in something silly like 5-6 minutes; rebooting windows the server is back up and running faster than RDP realizes what is going on.

I have the X9SCM-F motherboard and a 1230v2, fwiw, and like you my system is for home media storage and distribution.
 
Good catch on the SW raid, it might indicate that the controller is flashed to IT mode by default, not sure if it will be able to be flashed with the IR firmware afterwards. Might be a moot point if you eventually go the ZFS all in one route.

I'd also suggest using a USB drive for the ESXi install, that will leave whatever drives for datastores(where you place the VMs). The board has an onboard USB header to make this much easier.

I also have a X9SCM-F, but with a V1 1230 :)
 
Thank you for the reply's, im probably going to buy the box as it stands in my first post.

Though on your (Geiger) advice I have added Patriot Supersonic Xpress USB stick, does any of you maybe know if ESXi can work with USB 3.0 sticks?

Once I buy the box I will keep you updated with the unpackaging and installation and the like.

Thank you for your time again!
 
Hi,
Could you provide an update. :)

Looking at a setup very close to yours and just curious if you ended up buying a separate raid controller or if you got it to work with the onboard one.
 
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