Been outta the scene for years while I was getting a degree, bring me up to speed?

M

mindstormsguy

Gawd
Joined
Nov 4, 2002
Messages
654
Basically I'm looking to build a new server for myself. My current server is in my sig. The processor is starting to not really cut it. Most of the time this thing's just a file (and torrent) server, but it does web/application hosting, some audio transcoding for streaming, runs several VMs, etc.

Could someone make a processor family recommendation? I want processing power, but I don't want something that'll make a huge dent in my power bill. And of course, I don't wanna spend a boat load on the cpu+mobo.

Thanks :)

Edit: Aw man, they're really tightening up the rules here aren't they? ;) Doesn't 8.5 years count for anything? :p As requested:

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
answered above

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
I'm looking for a "best bang for the buck" type answer. Haven't exactly set a strict mobo+cpu budget.

3) Where do you live?
Canada. Therefore, yes, I have Newegg and ++++ :) Second edit: we can't speak of the "Canadian newegg"?

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
No specific budget, but I'm looking for cpu architecture type advice. The rest doesn't change that quickly

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
Not really relevant, I'll play it by ear. I'm not asking anyone to build me an entire system

6) Will you be overclocking?
It's a server.

7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
See 6

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
For sake of discussion, lets say next week.

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video? etc.
Looking more for a "family" type recommendation vs a specific board. But, I don't need onboard anything except video. Even then, I'm flexible.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
64 bit server 2k8 R2. Yes, it's legit. Thanks for asking :)
 
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Intel's Sandy Bridge with an H67 or Z68 chipset. Consider a dual core i3-2100 or a low end quad core. I'm on my phone but will check back later.
 
mindstormsguy said:
Edit: Aw man, they're really tightening up the rules here aren't they? ;) Doesn't 8.5 years count for anything? :p
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Nope :D. Those questions makes it easier for us to help you.

mindstormsguy said:
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
I'm looking for a "best bang for the buck" type answer. Haven't exactly set a strict mobo+cpu budget.
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What tonytnnt said is about right. Core i3 2100 CPU + H67 or Z68 motherboard chipset

mindstormsguy said:
Second edit: we can't speak of the "Canadian newegg"?
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Yeah they've been blacklisted from this forum for refusing to maintain relations with HardOCP.

mindstormsguy said:
The rest doesn't change that quickly
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Actually it kind of does in regards to very specific recommendations. I.e we may recommend a Corsair GS500 500W PSU one week but recommend Antec Neo Eco 520C 520W PSU for a similar build the next week due to changing availability and prices.
 
For a reasonable combination of good performance and low idle power an intel sandy bridge chip is the way to go.

I see you have a raid card which presumablly you will want to keep. I'm not sure if H67 boards can run a non-graphics card in the x16 slot while using the onboard graphics (has anyone here tried this?). You could put it in the x4 slot on a h67 board but that leaves you with very little expansion room for any future requirements.

An option worth considering is to go for a proper server board (and possiblly a server CPU though the server boards do seem to support some desktop CPUs). You pay more than for desktop parts but you get a board with an expansion slot configuration designed for server use, onboard graphics that is not going to interfere with any expansion slots (often with the option for remote kvm) and support for ECC ram (with a server CPU). Something like the supermicro x9scm (add -f if you fancy remote kvm).
 
mindstormsguy said:
Edit: Aw man, they're really tightening up the rules here aren't they? ;) Doesn't 8.5 years count for anything? :p
Click to expand...
Nope :D. Those questions makes it easier for us to help you.

mindstormsguy said:
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
I'm looking for a "best bang for the buck" type answer. Haven't exactly set a strict mobo+cpu budget.
Click to expand...
What tonytnnt said is about right. Core i3 2100 CPU + H67 or Z68 motherboard chipset

mindstormsguy said:
Second edit: we can't speak of the "Canadian newegg"?
Click to expand...
Yeah they've been blacklisted from this forum for refusing to maintain relations with HardOCP.

mindstormsguy said:
The rest doesn't change that quickly
Click to expand...
Actually it kind of does in regards to very specific recommendations. I.e we may recommend a Corsair GS500 500W PSU one week but recommend Antec Neo Eco 520C 520W PSU for a similar build the next week due to changing availability and prices.

mindstormsguy said:
Not really relevant, I'll play it by ear. I'm not asking anyone to build me an entire system
Click to expand...
Yeah trust me: we're gonna end setting up a build list for you anyway since a good majority of the time an OP's planned rig is pretty bad. Especially if it's made by a person who's been out of the scene for so long :D
 
I don't have time to make a complete build list, but I can elaborate on what tonytnnt mentioned earlier.

For the processor, any of the Sandy Bridge quad-cores will do. (For future reference, you should be looking at Socket/LGA 1155 for motherboards and processors.) There are currently four quad-core processors: the (Core) i5-2300, the i5-2400, the i5-2500, and the i7-2600. All of them run at 95W, but there is an i4-2400S model that runs at 65W (but costs about as much as the i5-2500). Only the i7-2600 has Hyper Threading, which could benefit you if you like to use a lot of VMs. Since you want to use the onboard GPU (which is now embedded within the processor, rather than the motherboard), avoid the "K" models as they have unlocked CPU multipliers (and, consequentially, cost more).

The two Sandy Bridge chipsets that tonytnnt mentioned -- H67 and Z68 -- allow you to use the processor's onboard GPU. The P67 chipset enables overclocking but disables the use of the onboard GPU.

For RAM, all you need is DDR3 1333 CL9 1.5V RAM. As long as it's from a reliable name brand, you should have no problems. Given the relatively low cost of DDR3 RAM, you should buy at least 8GB (though you can bump it up to 16GB if you plan on using multiple VMs simultaneously).

Performance-wise, there is no difference between SATA 3Gb/s and SATA 6Gb/s hard drives. SSDs can take advantage of the SATA 6Gb/s bus, but we often recommend Intel's 320 and 510 series SSDs and Crucial/Micron's C300, C400, and m4 series SSDs for performance and reliability. The benefits of using an SSD are faster performance, no moving parts, and lower energy usage, but they have lower storage capacity (compared to hard drives) and they cost far more per gigabyte than HDDs.

Why not AMD? Well, Sandy Bridge outperforms all of the current AMD lineup in many benchmarks. Bulldozer is expected to arrive soon, but there haven't been any significant previews that we could use to compare the platform to Sandy Bridge.
 
Thanks for all the input everyone. I guess it's a given that I'll be going with Sandy Bridge then, unless the Xeons and their associated mobos can tempt me. But from what I remember last time I looked at supermicro boards, they're expensive. (I have a supermicro SC743 chassis and powersupply currently). For curiosity sake tho, any cheap-ish server boards? What are the big advantages of the Xeons anyway (other than the obscene amount of cache)?

Also, yes, I do plan on reusing the RAID card. It's only sata2, but by the time 3 matters I'll probably be building the next server. I love this card too much anyway :p. Also, it's an x8 card, so I would prefer to avoid putting it in a x4 slot.

Danny Bui said:
Yeah trust me: we're gonna end setting up a build list for you anyway since a good majority of the time an OP's planned rig is pretty bad. Especially if it's made by a person who's been out of the scene for so long :D
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I don't mean to be an ass, but "for so long" are your words, not mine. I'm not incompetent (after all, I wasn't that far from computers. It's an Electrical Engineering degree I was getting). I used to know every little product that was on the market though, and I haven't had time to do that for the past few years. That's why I'm making this post, not because I'm clueless. By all means, make complete system suggestions; I'd look at the parts. But I'm looking for more of a casual discussion than a "lolz I haz $1000, build be a computorz!!!1!one".
 
mindstormsguy said:
Thanks for all the input everyone. I guess it's a given that I'll be going with Sandy Bridge then, unless the Xeons and their associated mobos can tempt me. But from what I remember last time I looked at supermicro boards, they're expensive. (I have a supermicro SC743 chassis and powersupply currently). For curiosity sake tho, any cheap-ish server boards? What are the big advantages of the Xeons anyway (other than the obscene amount of cache)?
Click to expand...
The CPUs themselves aren't anything special: Just designed with higher quality/tolerances in mind and guaranteed support for ECC RAM.

mindstormsguy said:
I don't mean to be an ass, but "for so long" are your words, not mine. I'm not incompetent (after all, I wasn't that far from computers. It's an Electrical Engineering degree I was getting). I used to know every little product that was on the market though, and I haven't had time to do that for the past few years. That's why I'm making this post, not because I'm clueless. By all means, make complete system suggestions; I'd look at the parts. But I'm looking for more of a casual discussion than a "lolz I haz $1000, build be a computorz!!!1!one".
Click to expand...

Will grant you that "for so long" were my words, not yours. But I would think that the :D would indicate that was just a friendly jibe, no insult meant at all.
 
mindstormsguy said:
By all means, make complete system suggestions; I'd look at the parts. But I'm looking for more of a casual discussion than a "lolz I haz $1000, build be a computorz!!!1!one".
Click to expand...

Realize that for the people making the product suggestions, it's a lot nicer when the guy on the other end knows their shit. Leads to better discussions of the pros/cons of various components.

You could look at a Sandy Bridge Xeon rig if you'd like. It'll cost more than consumer level parts, but it is an option. As far as I know, on H67 and Z68 chipsets you can use the x16 slot for whatever you want, so you would have a slot available for your x8 card.

So here's my recommended build based on what I know so far (feel free to comment/tear apart):

(All prices Canadian)
$253 - Intel Core i5-2400 and G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (there are alternative combos if you want 16GB of RAM for $334)
$100 - Intel BOXDH67CLB3 LGA 1155 Intel H67
$58 - Antec EarthWatts EA-500D Green 500W

Subtotal (don't have a postal code for shipping, but Newegg.ca is having a shipping sale): $411.46 CAD

Motherboard was chosen because it uses the Intel integrated NIC, which will be better than almost anything except an Intel expansion card NIC.
Quad core i5-2400 processor will help with your VMs over the dual core i3-2100.

Reuse your current harddrives (unless you want new ones) and case (again, unless you want something new.) You might be able to reuse your old power supply depending on its age and efficiency.

Anyways, not knowing what kind of budget you want, the above is a relatively inexpensive way to get a fairly solid server going. If you didn't have the VM requirement a dual core i3-2100 would shave about $70 off the above price.
 
Yeah, I was looking at probably an i5-2400 because that's the minimum where you get the VT-d.

I like that build, actually. You're right about the Intel NICs. I have a PCI and a PCI-E Intel gigabit NIC in the server right now.

As for the PSU...maybe they're better now, but I still refuse to buy another Antec PSU. :p
Honestly, since I've got a Supermicro PSU in there right now, I'll probably keep it. I'm not one to typically reuse a PSU in a new build, but I think this is different :p
 
/off topic

So canadian newegg is blacklisted but normal newegg isn't? Aren't they the same company?:confused:
 
munkle said:
/off topic

So canadian newegg is blacklisted but normal newegg isn't? Aren't they the same company?:confused:
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No, not literally Newegg Canada. There's another Canadian company (it's a four letter acronym) that, before Newegg expanded to Canada, was the only good option.

Edit: Actually I'm a little curious exactly what happened to make the [H] so mad.
 
I don't think he meant Newegg.ca but rather another company that is fairly popular up north. If I were to type the URL in this post it would just come out as plus signs.
 
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