Server Recommendation

[Curlyp]

Hello Community,

I apologize in advance if I am not in the right sub section; if not mods please move to the correct section.

I am interested in building a couple of servers for home use. One is a storage server for backing up my home PC's. The other is a PLEX media server. I have pretty much gathered that they will have to be separate servers (hardware). I was told not to combine the two, which I am fine with.

Not sure which server I will create first. I am looking at a couple different servers to purchase from eBay. HP Proliant DL380 G6, HP Proliant DL180 G6, and Dell Poweredge 2950 III.

I have read several reviews about the 2950 III. Most of the review complain that it uses a ton of power and is loud (especially for home use).

I couldn't find any power usage on the DL380 G6 or DL180 G6. I do like that both of them use DDR3. Does anyone know what is the max HDD space per bay (I couldn't find concrete information on it)?

DL380 G6 - http://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-PROLIANT-DL380-G6-2x-2-26GHz-6-CORE-L5640-12GB-RAM-2x-2-5-73GB-HD-/380908822782?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item58afef60fe
DL180 G6 - http://www.ebay.com/itm/301513869324?_trksid=p2060778.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Please feel free to comment as I welcome your opinion and recommendations.

Thanks!

 

[peanuthead]

Are you looking for rack mount systems or it doesn't matter? What else are you planning on doing with the system? Those servers are certainly overkill for a plex media server and backups.

 

[Curlyp]

Are you looking for rack mount systems or it doesn't matter? What else are you planning on doing with the system? Those servers are certainly overkill for a plex media server and backups.

It really doesn't matter. I thought about making an Mini-ITX, but the HDD space is not there. I don't want a huge full tower either! That is why I was looking at a rack mount system (smaller with HDD bays). I plan on purchasing a half rack server case down the road for my switches and was going to add this to it.

I was also looking into building my own with this server chassis from amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0091IZ1ZG/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The PLEX Server recommends a 2000 Passmark per 1080p transcode.

The FreeNAS Community recommends server grade hardware for best performance: https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/hardware-recommendations-read-this-first.23069/

 

[Netwerkz101]

It really doesn't matter. I thought about making an Mini-ITX, but the HDD space is not there. I don't want a huge full tower either! That is why I was looking at a rack mount system (smaller with HDD bays). I plan on purchasing a half rack server case down the road for my switches and was going to add this to it.

I was also looking into building my own with this server chassis from amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0091IZ1ZG/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

<snipped for brevity>

From a Mini-ITX to a 4U rackmount ??
Did you consider sizes in between?? (Micro-ATX or ATX)

4U rackmount case you listed is similar in size to a full tower on its side.
So when you say you don't want a full size tower ...you just mean vertical size??

What about desktop or HTPC cases .... don't get tunnel visioned ..you have options.

The older servers are great for their up front price .. but you pay in power bills if you
run them 24/7 .. so I'd say pass if money (long term) is a concern.
2950 is definitely loud too.

Note: A Dell PowerEdge T110 or Lenovo TS-140 are mid tower systems that are rated to be quiet and
would be more efficient than the older servers you mentioned ... can you deal with the form factor though??

Saying all that ....

Do you want to buy a server or build one using your own case..and clarify
if it is to be rack mount or is a Micro-ATX to mid-tower size okay?

 

[peanuthead]

I personally would look to built a mITX system or mATX system.

This is my current setup that I have/presently am unloading. (I'm not unloading due to it being slow. It's not slow by any stretch.)
2x Supermico X9SCM-F-O (has IPMI) with Intel Xeon E3-1230, stock Intel cooler, mATX case, Artic MX-4 TIM under the cooler, and a low profile USB keys with ESXI loaded on them.

You could build something similar (or the same for that matter) that would perform better than the above and be WAY better on power. I idle at 48 watts with 6 network connections and IPMI plugged in.

 

[Curlyp]

From a Mini-ITX to a 4U rackmount ??
Did you consider sizes in between?? (Micro-ATX or ATX)

4U rackmount case you listed is similar in size to a full tower on its side.
So when you say you don't want a full size tower ...you just mean vertical size??

What about desktop or HTPC cases .... don't get tunnel visioned ..you have options.

The older servers are great for their up front price .. but you pay in power bills if you
run them 24/7 .. so I'd say pass if money (long term) is a concern.
2950 is definitely loud too.

Note: A Dell PowerEdge T110 or Lenovo TS-140 are mid tower systems that are rated to be quiet and
would be more efficient than the older servers you mentioned ... can you deal with the form factor though??

Saying all that ....

Do you want to buy a server or build one using your own case..and clarify
if it is to be rack mount or is a Micro-ATX to mid-tower size okay?

LOL, yes, it seems crazy! Reason why I was looking at the Mini-ITX was of the sleeknees of the size/case (BitFenix). The only thing that the Mini-ITX cases and boards lack is SATA Ports.
http://www.amazon.com/BitFenix-Mini-ITX-Without-Midnight-BFC-PRO-300-KKXSK-RP/dp/B008RJQ0LE

I have considered the in between sizes, which is why I was looking at the 4U Rachmount case (plnet of HDD space and supports ATX and Micro-ATX). I should have been more specific about the full size tower in that I don't want vertical. Reason being, my two previous gaming computers were enourmasous full-size towers and takes up way too much space. I recently stripped all my water-cooling out and moved down to a small mid-size tower case for it.

I haven't cosidered a desktop or HTPC cases. Actually I am not familar with HTPC cases. Are they similar to desktop?

Power bill (long term) was another concern which is why I was steering away from the 2950 (as well as it is loud). That is why I was looking at the HP Proliant in hoping they would not draw a ton of power.

I also want something that is expandable and will scale longterm (in terms of HDD space, CPU, and RAM). Based on what I have seen, Rackmount servers can handle upwards of 64GB RAM+, come with multiple processor in the event I would like to create some VM's, and have ample amount of storage bays (some hot swapable). This way another reason of looking at the 4U Case from amazon, i.e., 8 bays, can use my own motherboard and processor, with a nice CPU cooler (thermalright - http://www.thermalright.com/html/products/cpu_cooler/axp-200.html).

Lastly, here couple of the main reasons why I was considering a rackmount case:

1. When we build our next house in a couple of years, I planned on having CAT6 Nextwork drops in everyone room coming from the basement. This was where I planned on putting my half rack with my switch and servers I planned on using.

2. The passmark scores for PLEX are considerably in the 7000+ (due to dual processor) with these $200 servers on ebay. For me to compete with it, I would have to purchase a $300 4th gen Intel or AMD. This is the other delima - If i decide to build, do I choose Intel or AMD? Accoring to FreeNAS Intel is more stable. According to Plex, get the best one with the passmarks.

Side note: Do you recommend keeping both the storage server and media server separtate?

I believe this pretty much covers it all. If I think of anything ese I will post it.

Thank you all in advance for your help.

 

[dclive]

I run a Plex server on an Intel NUC - an i3/1.7 machine. It works great with multiple clients. Oh, and it runs VMware ESXi 5.5 on it, and hosts a few other servers on it too, based on DRS loads.

I run a Windows Home Server backup server on an HP EX490, a Celeron 450 @ 2.2 ghz (single core). The main benefit is simple backup software, low power use, and lots of drive bays (I have 4 bays available).

I think your choices are madly, wildly overspec'd unless you have a small army of people using the setup (Plex, really) concurrently. Go for broke and get an i5 NUC - you're still ahead of the game.

Oh, and the NUC shares from a Synology 414 box with 2 6TB drives.

 

[Netwerkz101]

<snipped for brevity>

I also want something that is expandable and will scale longterm (in terms of HDD space, CPU, and RAM).

<snipped>

That rules out NUC or Mac Mini

@OP ..well ... since you know you will be moving to a rack and because of the mention above ...
I'd say go for the 4U rack mount case and fill in with what you need.

I don't have first hand experience with the HP unit mentioned or Plex ..so I'll leave those
for the other's that do.

I can say that both QNAP and Synology have plugins for Plex so this tells me that the combo you asked about should be doable..
as those units run on lower performance/power CPUs (Atom, Celeron, and i3)

FreeNAS seems to have a plugin as well.
So you can run a single physical FreeNAS box with Plex plugin or
get a purpose/pre built NAS ..or continue to build your own.

FYI - The folks over at the FreeNAS forums frown on virtualizing FreeNAS.
If you want to go all virtual all-in-one ... search the forums for _GEA's Onios/Nappit posts.
Plex seems to be okay in a VM ...so this could really make a box that was overkill for a media server a
beast VM host for many things you want to run with the space to add storage as you go.

Just thought I'd bring those up to make your choice harder

 

[Curlyp]

I run a Plex server on an Intel NUC - an i3/1.7 machine. It works great with multiple clients. Oh, and it runs VMware ESXi 5.5 on it, and hosts a few other servers on it too, based on DRS loads.

I run a Windows Home Server backup server on an HP EX490, a Celeron 450 @ 2.2 ghz (single core). The main benefit is simple backup software, low power use, and lots of drive bays (I have 4 bays available).

I think your choices are madly, wildly overspec'd unless you have a small army of people using the setup (Plex, really) concurrently. Go for broke and get an i5 NUC - you're still ahead of the game.

Oh, and the NUC shares from a Synology 414 box with 2 6TB drives.

Interesting...I have never heard/seen Intel NUC drives. I will have to look more into it. You are running a PLEX server and VM's on your i3!? How many drives are you using? The specs of the Intel NUC on Newegg only has 1 SATA and 1eSATA. Any way to use 4-5 drives?

Does WHS use less power than FreeNAS?

Thanks for the recommendations!

 

[Curlyp]

That rules out NUC or Mac Mini

@OP ..well ... since you know you will be moving to a rack and because of the mention above ...
I'd say go for the 4U rack mount case and fill in with what you need.

I don't have first hand experience with the HP unit mentioned or Plex ..so I'll leave those
for the other's that do.

I can say that both QNAP and Synology have plugins for Plex so this tells me that the combo you asked about should be doable..
as those units run on lower performance/power CPUs (Atom, Celeron, and i3)

FreeNAS seems to have a plugin as well.
So you can run a single physical FreeNAS box with Plex plugin or
get a purpose/pre built NAS ..or continue to build your own.

FYI - The folks over at the FreeNAS forums frown on virtualizing FreeNAS.

Just thought I'd bring those up to make your choice harder

LOL, thanks more choices!

The 4U chassis is nice. I thought it would be more efficient to take the $102 and put it towards a production server. What what others recommend, it would be way overkill, loud, and drain too much power to run 24/7. I guess I will scrap the production servers and build one myself or look into other options.

I have read conflicting information on NAS/PLEX on the same machine. Some people do it and have no problems. Many recommend against it as there can be issues with performance. Plus now that dclive mentioned WHS I need to look into the pros and cons of it versus FreeNAS.

The 4U chassis that I am looking at houses 15 HDD's. That is a decent amount! Where would I find a motherboard that has 15 SATA ports!!? Could I possible fit two motherboards in the case and use one for PLEX with a RAID to 6 Drives and the other for NAS with a RAID to 6 drives, leaving me 3 left over (could use two of them for SSD's to run the OS's)? Another possibility is purchase a dual or guad CPU motherboard to house multiple processors. This would allow me to run Windows Server 2012 with Hyper V, and create two VM's one for PLEX and NAS. What do you think?

 

[Netwerkz101]

I am a fan of virtualizing everything possible.
If WHS can handle your file server and Plex storage needs - go for virtualizing them
via your hypervisor of choice.

In your OP ..FreeNAS was the only hangup on virtualization .. so If it can be eliminated..do it.

As to the other comments/questions ....

Again ... you can pretty much find/build anything for a price .. no tunnel vision

Supermicro X10SRH-CLN4F

Or .. RAID controller like: LSI 9260-16i

There are also other controller/expander combos ..but it's possible.

You can always start off with a single server and see if performance is really affected and then separate functions if needed by adding a second (dedicated) server.

I am sure you could get away with a single decent spec machine.

 

[Curlyp]

I am a fan of virtualizing everything possible.
If WHS can handle your file server and Plex storage needs - go for virtualizing them
via your hypervisor of choice.

In your OP ..FreeNAS was the only hangup on virtualization .. so If it can be eliminated..do it.

As to the other comments/questions ....

Again ... you can pretty much find/build anything for a price .. no tunnel vision

Supermicro X10SRH-CLN4F

Or .. RAID controller like: LSI 9260-16i

There are also other controller/expander combos ..but it's possible.

You can always start off with a single server and see if performance is really affected and then separate functions if needed by adding a second (dedicated) server.

I am sure you could get away with a single decent spec machine.

Thanks for the recommendations.

I having been looking up some server boards on line and found this:

Mobo: Supermicro Only has 6 SATA ports, but takes 2 processors.

CPU: Xeon x5650 Six core server processor (Only 95watts)

What do you think?

What did you mean by "second (dedicated) server"? VM or hardware for a new server?

 

[Netwerkz101]

That's an aged board/cpu combo but should be useable for your mentioned task initially.
Just price out components for your initial build vs. newer or pre-built systems.

"Second (dedicated) server" could be physical or virtual.
Again ..go virtual where you can and physical where you have to.

Think about a physical server running FreeNAS + the Plex Media Server..you starting
with any modern quad-core should be fine.

If those pre-built NAS units from Synology/QNAP can handle Plex Media Server with Atoms/Celerons, modern quad-cores should be able to handle the same.

 

[Curlyp]

That's an aged board/cpu combo but should be useable for your mentioned task initially.
Just price out components for your initial build vs. newer or pre-built systems.

"Second (dedicated) server" could be physical or virtual.
Again ..go virtual where you can and physical where you have to.

Think about a physical server running FreeNAS + the Plex Media Server..you starting
with any modern quad-core should be fine.

If those pre-built NAS units from Synology/QNAP can handle Plex Media Server with Atoms/Celerons, modern quad-cores should be able to handle the same.

Good point about the pre-built NAS units; makes absolute sense.

Thanks for all the advice. I will continue researching boards and CPU's to see what would best fit the needs. I will post back when I find something.

 

[Kerbysj]

For plex i would stay away from pre-built units. Synology etc are nutoriously bad for transcoding. You see horror stories of not being to even chromecast as the cpu's cant handle the load.

I have a xeon 1230v2 that is in a DC that i can have 14 or so play backs concurrently. that is a mixture of direct plays and transcodes about a 75% split those that are converting.

I would look at a purpose built machine and use esxi to virtualise. I built a machine on a 4770 (non k) so i can use VT-D.

I would suggest a build once and save yourself the hassle. Unless you went down the route of a NAS + a Small host like a NUC. Keeps power ussage down and noise!

 

[Curlyp]

"Second (dedicated) server" could be physical or virtual.
Again ..go virtual where you can and physical where you have to.

Think about a physical server running FreeNAS + the Plex Media Server..you starting
with any modern quad-core should be fine.

The more reading up on FreeNAS I do, the more I keep hearing "DONT RUN FREENAS IN A VM!!" From what I am gathering, one of the main reason people choose FreeNAS (besides it being free) is for ZFS RAID. ZFS protects all data with 64-bit checksums that detect and correct silent data corruption.

The down fall with using FreeNAS in a VM is loosing the full native support of ZFS (post 1 and post 2):

Quoting from post 1 "Without direct access to the hard drives, FreeNAS lacks the ability to read SMART data and identify other developing problems or storage failures.
A lot of the power of FreeNAS comes from ZFS. Passing a single virtual disk to ZFS to be shared out via FreeNAS is relatively safe, except that ZFS will only be able to detect and not actually correct any errors that are found, even if there is redundancy in the underlying storage."

Don't get me wrong, there are people that run FreeNAS in VM and never have an issue. It's not encouraged. The whole point of me building the storage server is to back up all our PC's and Laptops, Movies, Pictures, and Shows. I might as well take advantage of ZFS.

Now to throw another monkey in the wrench. As I mentioned in my previous post, I want to build a system that is expandable as my needs/collection will grow. My plan is to start with 3x 2TB HD's or 2x 3TB HD's. I am not sure which RAID to use. To be honest, I have never setup a RAID (as I have not needed on). From what I have read, RAID5 is purely for space, but has no redundancy. RAID6 has a minimum of 4 drives and if one fails, the array will have to be rebuilt. I would like to use a RAID that will provide both space and redundancy. If one drive were to fail, replace it with a new drive (exact same brand) and the data is mirrored over, causing no interruption to the whole data. However, I still want the option to expand my amount of HD's space over time to fit our home needs. So, my question is, which RAID would best benefit my situation (or would you not recommend a RAID at all)?

Here is a quote from Leandrodafontoura when I researching RAIDS, "Nowadays, when TB is cheap, RAID protection is no longer necessary. You already have a backup drive, so RAID 0 the other ones. If you feel better, use 2 drives for backup and RAID 0 the other 2. In a way, you will be making a RAID 10, lol." Based on his first part of the comment, is it true that RAID protection is no longer necessary?

I started this thread with recommendation for server requirements on FreeNAS and to use ZFS; as I hear it is one of the best RAIDS to use. I am a little reluctant to use FreeNAS and ZFS based on a few threads I have read with dead drives and expanding storage (adding more drives). One thread specifically, 'Replacing a failed disk. Dead drive not showing anywhere' gives me the creaps with using FreeNAS and ZFS! Basically, to sum it up, the gentleman/woman started their FreeNAS with a 3x 4TB volume. A few weeks later they added another 4TB to the volume making it a total of 4 HD's. One of the drives failed, and the data is unrecoverable now. When adding a new drive, the data from the drive that failed was not mirrored to the other 3 drives. So, now the user has to completely rebuilt the array and start over from scratch. It' always been my understanding (or lack of knowledge) that if a HD fails in a storage setup, you can swap it out with another HD and continue on like nothing had happened. Am I correct, or just flat out wrong!

 

[peanuthead]

You can virtualize FreeNAS and run a ZFS setup. You just need pass through the storage controller (more on that shortly) to the FreeNAS VM. When you pass a device through to a VM it is just like the device being directly being present in a physical machine. Pass through = the VM controls the RAID (or ZFS). The storage controller for ZFS just needs to be a basic controller (JBOD) without any RAID setup. Either FreeNAS or the RAID card can control the RAID setup/arrays, not both. RAID = continuous up time, PERIOD. In theory, the more disk protection (RAID) the higher the up time. Known, good backups are there to save you in the event of a crash or accidental delete, etc.

Here is a site that covers some basic RAID setups.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/hard-drives/sata/RAID_Guide/RAID_Concepts

RAID 6 requires at least 4 drives and you can loose two drives before the whole array is degraded (degraded = on the very dead edge of loosing the whole array). RAID 6 with 4 drives is similar to RAID 10 in terms of number of disks but slower performance in the data write. RAID 6 seems to come into play when you have 5+ disks and you want to allow two drives to fail before a degraded state occurs. RAID 5 requires at least 3 drives and you can loose one drive before the whole array is degraded.

 

[rhansen5_99]

My personal opinion is that if you are looking at a per-built system at least look for one with a 1366 socket or two, that way you could load it up with cheap ecc ram and cheap 6 core processors.

As far as plex, if you had a microcenter around you can grab the AMD FX 8320e for 99 and 40 off a motherboard. You would get around 8k passmark and most likely could do 6 or more 1080p streams (transcodes).

From experience I have the Xeon 2687w and an i3 2100 setup at the inlaws, the 13 can do 3 transcodes easy, really haven't maxed out the xeon .

 

[Netwerkz101]

As already mentioned by Peanuthead above ..

RAID is for uptime
Backups are for recovery.

Because my knowledge hovers around the dangerous level ...
I work with the mindset that I will need to recover from backup. If the rebuild works...that's just a bonus.

I personally heed the warning to avoid using virtualized FreeNAS when it comes to storing data I am concerned about.

Just because I can doesn't mean I should!

Remember: it wasn't all that long ago that software vendors would not support products on virtualized servers ...you have to prove a problem existed on a physical server ????
Some decided to go ahead anyhow and some decided to heed the vendor warnings.

Anyhow .. i'm drifting again ..lol ....

If you are going to use FreeNAS, I recommend sticking to physical - especially since you say you are new to it - you may actually want forum support.

In my lab, it's FreeNAS (both physical and virtual used) ..but for file serving, I use my QNAP box that backs up to an external drive in a dock.

Don't forget this option: Omnios/Nappit (can virtualize this and it's popular for all-in-one setups).

 

[Curlyp]

@peanuthead - thanks for explanation and information about RAID. I was not aware of pass through and the ability it allows the VM to use. I have a feeling I keep getting both RAID and backups intertwined together (as you and netwerkz101 pointed out the differences).

So, since I keep associating RAID and backups together, I think I may have another issue with how I plan on using the storage server. Besides backing up My Documents, Pictures, Videos, Movies, etc, I also want to have the My Documents and Pictures folder remapped to the backup. This way, I am able to access it from all machines and out PC's go down, the data is not lost. However, I don't think this is how it works! Since backups are for recovery, I need to have it sit in the closet and perform nightly backups. In case one of our PC's flops, I am able to rebuilt the data on the quickly. I feel like a noob! haha I am not sure why I keep associating the two together. Oh well, I am learning though!
-----

@rhansen5_99 - I was looking at the 1366 socket Mobo's and CPU's the other day! I found these on eBay and have contemplating pulling the "trigger" to buy them.

2x Xeon X5650 = $162 ($81/e)
1x Supermicro XDTI-F Dual Socket LGA 1366 = $129

Microcenter is about 20 minutes from my house. I was up there 4 times this past week/weekend trying to decide on a CPU and mobo for the PLEX server. I actually purchased the AMD FX 8350 for $149.99 and an ASUS motherboard. I ended up returning it the next day as the motherboard did not support 8 SATA's~!

I think this is where more lack of knowledge comes into play. I keep reading threads where users have 16-50TB of HD space for their PLEX server. So, I think to myself, I must need the same. I have never converted a DVD or Blu-Ray to MP4. I have this preconceived notion that I need a TON of HD space as these files are going to be 2-3 gigs. Honestly, do I really need that much space? Do I want to setup a RAID for the PLEX server and do I want the storage server to backup the PLEX server?

If I purchase the AMD FX 8320e for $99 and receive $40 off a motherboard, which board would you recommend?

LOL for an almost $2k processor, I would hope you haven't maxed it out!
-----

@Netwerkz101 - Thanks for reiterating the differences of RAID and Backups!

I think your right and will stick to physical if I use FreeNAS for the forum support. From the little research I have done (reading threads on the FreeNAS forums), many of the "experienced" users will not comment or provide support on a virtualized FreeNAS.

I have never heard of Omnios/Nappit. I will look into it.

 

[dclive]

Interesting...I have never heard/seen Intel NUC drives. I will have to look more into it. You are running a PLEX server and VM's on your i3!? How many drives are you using? The specs of the Intel NUC on Newegg only has 1 SATA and 1eSATA. Any way to use 4-5 drives?

Does WHS use less power than FreeNAS?

Thanks for the recommendations!

I run ESXi on the NUC. I have a Synology box with 2x6TB drives in it for storage for movies/TV and 1.5TB in SSDs for VMs; there's no storage in my NUC (related to ESXi). Plex does not run directly on the Synology; the Synology box is just for storage.

The i3 is easily fast enough for a few VMs and the Plex server; typically I'll have at max 2-3 people hitting Plex, so it's not as if the i3 is at all stressed. I also have a Mac Mini (i5/2.3) and a Gigabyte BRIX (i3/1.7 IIRC) in the ESXi cluster as well, running AD, a few Linux VMs, a few webservers, and more. RAM is the limiting factor; CPU never comes even close. I only have 48GB, spread across 3 hosts (I lose about 1G/host for ESXi), so that's not much for what I'd like to do.

I also have 2 HP ML110 boxes (32GB, Xeon E3 1220 4 core @ 3.1 ghz, full remote management, 4 NICs, etc...) - massive overkill, noisy, and hot. I only use them in the winter and on free electricity days.

Google can likely tell you how much power a standard HP EX490 is using; I'd guess 40w or so. I suspect the OS, as long as it can take advantage of certain CPU state features, doesn't make *that* much difference to power usage; it's more a function of how modern & hot the CPUs/chipsets/etc. used are.

Most of the suggestions I've seen going your way are overkill, IMHO. I've virtualized Windows Home Server, Windows Media Center (and 4 tuners recording to it over gigabit ethernet), and all kinds of webservers and other things. You don't need enterprise class hardware at home for most of these things. I'd suggest SSDs for your VMs, and big spinning disks for the bulk storage, tied to a Synology-like device, with a few inexpensive, small, cool NUC-like boxes for running the VMs.

 

[Curlyp]

I run ESXi on the NUC. I have a Synology box with 2x6TB drives in it for storage for movies/TV and 1.5TB in SSDs for VMs; there's no storage in my NUC (related to ESXi). Plex does not run directly on the Synology; the Synology box is just for storage.

The i3 is easily fast enough for a few VMs and the Plex server; typically I'll have at max 2-3 people hitting Plex, so it's not as if the i3 is at all stressed. I also have a Mac Mini (i5/2.3) and a Gigabyte BRIX (i3/1.7 IIRC) in the ESXi cluster as well, running AD, a few Linux VMs, a few webservers, and more. RAM is the limiting factor; CPU never comes even close. I only have 48GB, spread across 3 hosts (I lose about 1G/host for ESXi), so that's not much for what I'd like to do.

I also have 2 HP ML110 boxes (32GB, Xeon E3 1220 4 core @ 3.1 ghz, full remote management, 4 NICs, etc...) - massive overkill, noisy, and hot. I only use them in the winter and on free electricity days.

Google can likely tell you how much power a standard HP EX490 is using; I'd guess 40w or so. I suspect the OS, as long as it can take advantage of certain CPU state features, doesn't make *that* much difference to power usage; it's more a function of how modern & hot the CPUs/chipsets/etc. used are.

Most of the suggestions I've seen going your way are overkill, IMHO. I've virtualized Windows Home Server, Windows Media Center (and 4 tuners recording to it over gigabit ethernet), and all kinds of webservers and other things. You don't need enterprise class hardware at home for most of these things. I'd suggest SSDs for your VMs, and big spinning disks for the bulk storage, tied to a Synology-like device, with a few inexpensive, small, cool NUC-like boxes for running the VMs.

Intel is releasing i7 versions of the NUC this year. I am curious how much more expensive it will be over the i5. Based on the prices I was able to find online, the NUCs have a similar cost to building a Mini-ITX PC, and use less than half of the power. I am definitely going to keep this on my radar to look into. B the way, what OS are you running?

What Synology model are you using? Does yours include the beyond cloud?

I have read several threads and blogs about Mac Mini's being used as either their media or file server. I'm not familiar with the Gigabue BIX, but from the quick Google search it seem similar to the NUC. Since you have and used all three, which one do you like better? Does the Mac Mini give you more options over the other two?

What do you mean by free electricity days!?

Thanks for all the recommendations, I appreciate it!

 

[Curlyp]

Lenovo ThinkServer TS140 Tower Server System Intel Core i3-4130 3.4GHz 4GB 70A4000HUX -$199 after rebate. Tempting for PLEX server. I wish I knew what motherboard was in this.

 

[dclive]

Intel is releasing i7 versions of the NUC this year. I am curious how much more expensive it will be over the i5. Based on the prices I was able to find online, the NUCs have a similar cost to building a Mini-ITX PC, and use less than half of the power. I am definitely going to keep this on my radar to look into. B the way, what OS are you running?

What Synology model are you using? Does yours include the beyond cloud?

I have read several threads and blogs about Mac Mini's being used as either their media or file server. I'm not familiar with the Gigabue BIX, but from the quick Google search it seem similar to the NUC. Since you have and used all three, which one do you like better? Does the Mac Mini give you more options over the other two?

What do you mean by free electricity days!?

Thanks for all the recommendations, I appreciate it!

I'm running ESXi 5.5 on the machines, and then Win 2008R2 and 2012R2 (and Win10) VMs.

I have a Synology 414. I don't use cloud functionality.

I like all three equally - they're all essentially the same thing - a CPU and RAM host to run ESXi on.

My provider has free electricity every Saturday.

 

[Curlyp]

I'm running ESXi 5.5 on the machines, and then Win 2008R2 and 2012R2 (and Win10) VMs.

I have a Synology 414. I don't use cloud functionality.

I like all three equally - they're all essentially the same thing - a CPU and RAM host to run ESXi on.

My provider has free electricity every Saturday.

Must be nice! Use all the electricity you can in one day! haha

 

[dclive]

Lenovo ThinkServer TS140 Tower Server System Intel Core i3-4130 3.4GHz 4GB 70A4000HUX -$199 after rebate. Tempting for PLEX server. I wish I knew what motherboard was in this.

My only concern with that would be power and noise.

Why is the motherboard used a factor? For $199 that's hard to beat. Add $300 in RAM to take it to 32GB, and you're in business with a great ESXi foundation. Add some shared storage, like a Synology with SSDs, or keep it local, using a few local SSDs (assuming just one ESXi server).

 

[Curlyp]

My only concern with that would be power and noise.

Why is the motherboard used a factor? For $199 that's hard to beat. Add $300 in RAM to take it to 32GB, and you're in business with a great ESXi foundation. Add some shared storage, like a Synology with SSDs, or keep it local, using a few local SSDs (assuming just one ESXi server).

I was curious about the motherboard for future CPU upgrades. Plus I would like to know if Lenovo used a cheap mobo or not.

 

[diizzy]

It's no brainer really, by the time you want to change CPU there's another socket out anyways. In best case you can reuse housing but that's pretty much it if you build your own server. For that price just grab it while you can...
//Danne