Looking for build advice for SC836e16

A

anaxagoris

n00b
Joined
Jun 26, 2012
Messages
8
<functional requirements>
Here are some boxes or functions I want to compress:
Firewall/router running pfSense
File Server with cifs/nfs interface (i'll probably migrate to zfs or unraid): will have at least 2 arrays 1 with high fault tolerance for irreplaceable data, 1 with low fault tolerance for replaceable media such as movies.
Asterisk PBX (I run a home side business and do my own PBX, but if it's down I can get by with out it I mainly use it for call recording purposes)
torrent seed box
uPnP media server like ps3MediaServer or MediaTomb
a test environment that includes 4 linux servers minimum that I use for work.
I'll probably want to add or play with some more things as time goes on, those are just the things I do right now.
</functional requirements>

<goals>
Reduce power consumption
Reduce foot print
Enterprise reliability is not a major concern. i don't need five 9s.
I also don't want to break the bank, but since i like my fancy toys I know i'll be dropping some coin.
</goals>


<New Parts I have>
I got a SuperMicro 836 e16 chassis for a deal about 50% off open box, the chassis seems to be in great condition.
I also have about 50 gigs of ddr3 Registered ECC RAM that I got on the cheap from a computer recycling company. mostly 4 gb dimms, some 2 gb.
</New Parts I have>

<what i'm looking for>
I'm looking for a good motherboard and cpu to pair with my chassis.
I want to try and use a supermicro board so I won't have any compatibility issues with the chassis form factor or fan shroud
Possibly an array controller if i don't have an onboard one.
<what i'm looking for>

<what I think I need but is open for discussion>
Since I have the ecc ram i want a Xeon.
Since i want to "future proof" i'm looking at socket 2011 dual socket boards.
something with IPMI because i'm spoiled by playing with this stuff at my job
something with 4 nics because i'll also be using this as a router and supporting 2 internal networks (1 wired that i use for work and then 1 wifi, separate isolated networks)
</what I think I need but is open for discussion>

<what I've been looking at>
<motherboard>
http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C600/X9DR3-LN4F_.cfm
This is nice because of the form factor and the location of the ports seems to be ideal for my chassis, the extra dimm slots and the fact I have a ton of ram, seems to have better availability for fast delivery.
Negative - the onboard sas is not lsi based, supermicro confirmed that the bios will not be able to see any of the drives off the port expander on boot, however once in the OS it should be fine. This means i'll need to use 2 fixed internal 2.5" drives to boot off of, or get an M1015

http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C600/X9DR7-LN4F.cfm
This guy is not only more expensive, but also seems to be special order everywhere I look. LSI based sas controller means I could run my boot drives off backplane and thus the hotswap bays.
</motherboard>

<cpu>
E5 Xeon 2609 2.4ghz 4 core, no ht, no turbo
E5 Xeon 2620 2.0ghz, 6 core, yes ht, 2.5ghz turbo
</cpu>
</what I've been looking at>

<final thoughts>
If you're still reading thank you. I'm not sure if all of this is entirely overkill and my perceptions of reality are skewed thanks to working with high end servers all day long. I'd like to have the best performance/power ratio I could get as I want to cut down the electric bill substantially, yet still have enough power to run everything I want to run and not have performance issues. Maybe I could get by with a single socket ivy bridge e3? Or maybe something entirely different? I'm open to suggestions and discusstion.
</final thoughts>
 
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I understand you want to cut the power usage down, but from what? How many boxes do you have running at home now? How much power are you pulling? As to the RAM it will depend on your motherboard and how many DIMM slots but you'll probably want to not use the 2GB stuff. What are the model #'s of the 4GB stuff you have? As to "future proof" I think you will be happier with a single proc board with something new like an IB Xeon. For Asterisk, are you using net adapters, FXO/FXS or just straight sip in and out? You have a large chassis, how many drives are you planning on installing to start? What bare metal OS are you planning on running and what OS's in VMs? What is your real budget for this build?
 
i'm coming down from 4 and a half boxes.

File server which is an hp server, it's got 8x 750 gb sata drives. It draws about 350 watts according to my killawatt.
router: is a repurposed symantec firewall appliance ~100 watts
Asterisk runs on an old laptop, sip in, sip out I have some voip phones i got cheap. ~90 watts
seed box, upnp server runs on another old laptop. ~75 watts
VMs for test environment run on my old beast of a gaming desktop (i'm ready to retire it, i use my new laptop for everything else these days and never game anymore). That thing chews another 200 watts idle, although i no longer leave it on 24/7.

=615 watts 24/7
and 200 watts whenever i need the test stuff for work, maybe 15 hours a week.

bare metal os - i'd like to try proxmox (which is a debian based distro that does KVM and openVZ), although I plan on testing with esxi and xen as well. VMs will be linux, bsd, solaris and maybe 1 windows vm.

Drives to start for data store to be accessible by the file server 6 x 3 tb, plus a hot spare. I also have some old 2.5" laptop drives that I could mirror for the boot partition. And 2x300 gb 15k sas drives that I could use for my vm storage.

the 4gb dims are ddr 3, 10666, ecc, registered, cl9 hynix chips.

I don't want to spend more than $1,000 for the cpu/motherboard/array controller combo. since i'm going to be doing software raid i don't see any need for a high power array controller.
 
 
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