mrow

Ordered from Newegg 3 weeks ago and got 2.0a.

I'd go with the Core i3-3220 and 8GB of RAM. For the motherboard see if there are any on sale on the sites you are looking at buying from. Pretty much any motherboard will be compatible. Since you are looking for expandability, go with a larger power supply now so you don't have to upgrade later. Also, go with a case that has all 5.25 bays in it like the Antec Nine Hundred so you can add 5 in 3 cages. Sounds like you've got 8 drives already so you may want to get some off the bat if you have the money. I like the Supermicro 5 in 3 cages personally. I have two. For controller cards go with the Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8 or the IBM m1015. Check Monoprice for good prices on the breakout cables for the controllers.

You're making this way more complicated than it needs to be. I understand the desire for an all in one box but it's not worth the headache. Just keep the server and HTPC separate.

I'm assuming you mean you can't delete them on your server over the network from a Windows PC? Reboot the server and you should be able to delete them.

Bump. Just use the plugin from the Plugin Designs section of the forum and point the data directory to your current install.

Newegg has a combo deal today on the Supermicro X9SCM-F and a Western Digital 2TB Green drive for $239.99 with free shipping. It is essentially like getting the drive for $40 bucks. http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1071275&nm_mc=EMC-IGNEFL092012&cm_mmc=EMC-IGNEFL092012-_-EMC-092012-Index-_-Combo-_-Combo1071275-LM1A

Parity check is 65-75 MB/s so far (9%). About what I was getting with RC6. All array disks except one are on an MV8, the other is on an on board SATA port. Speeds usually pick up a bit after the small disk not on the HBA has completed and the rest of the check is on the HBA only. Specs: Core i3-2120 3.3GHz, Supermicro X9SCM-F, 8GB 1600MHz RAM (running at 1333MHz because of the CPU) and a Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8. Disks are all WD Greens except the parity which is a Seagate ST3000DM001 7200rpm and a 320GB WD Scorpio Black 7200rpm 2.5 inch drive.

I promised myself I was only going to buy WD Red drives from here on out but this is tempting! How long is that code good for?

Never used it but there's this. It has apps for all the big mobile platforms plus Windows and Macs. http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=10376.0

So then you're looking for something more like the Chenbro CK23601 (4 pin Molex power only however) though I don't know if that is easy to find in Europe or not.

I believe the RES2CV240 and RES2CV360 are the replacement for the discontinued part.

I'd suggestion people that are having a hard time getting used to XBMC take a look at some of the other skins that are out there. That might make them feel more comfortable. My personal favorites are the aeon mq skins.

I like the Antec Neo Eco PSU over the Corsair. I used one for years. It's only sale on newegg right now for $29.99 with free shipping.

Weird, because my last board was EFI and I formatted my thumb drive as FAT32 and didn't need to do any configuring at all. Just plugged it in straight out if the box and booted with no issues. Must be because of the card reader.

I think the Antec Nine Hundred is worth the extra $50 bucks for the ability to add two additional drive cages to give you plenty of expansion room in the future, plus that silent, monster 200mm fan on the top moves tons of air for cooling. It's got a $20 rebate and a $10 dollar promo code on Newegg right now bringing it down to only $20 more or $69.99 and free shipping. Promos end on the 19th so don't sit on it.

Does Amazon really need to put the PC case inside another box? What a waste of cardboard. Newegg just ships you the case in the box it comes in.

I don't know if this was meant to be mocking or not, but I have a jailbroken ipad 3 with XBMC installed on it, plays 8gb+ MKV files that are hosted on unRAID with no problem. The latest version of Air Video Server has video passthrough and I can play back uncompressed bluray over my wireless network. We're talking 30GB+ mkvs. On another note, uncompressed 1080p blurays look amazing on the retina display of the iPad 3.

Interesting. I didn't think those Atom chips would support ESXi so I didn't mention them.

I have no issues with iTunes at all. Maybe that's because I use a Mac. I keep my music library on my main Mac and then use rsync to sync my library with my server and use the SimpleFeatures iTunes Server plugin so my library shows up as a shared source in iTunes on the rest of my computers and streams the music from the server. I do one better and run iTunes from the share that the iTunes Server plugin runs from. However, I only do that because I find holding 350Gb of music on an SSD a waste Haha. Figure out a way to get the server to work over the Internet and I would too!

This is the only mini itx board I've found that supports a xeon processor. It only has 4 SATA ports but it has a 16x PCIe slot so you could use a SAS HBA to add up to 8 more drives. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121553

Can you update the firmware and optimize the drive if it is your Windows primary drive? The Intel drives let you do all this, that's why I buy the Intel. I tried OCZ drives and you can't do any updates if it is your main drive. Very lame. I just had to update the firmware on a bunch of our M4s we have in PCs at work because they were rebooting and not being able to see the drive. The latest firmware fixed the issue. In any case, they were the main Windows drive. Never heard of that being a restriction in drives before, but that is pretty lame.

You can do this in FileExplorer and most Samba file browsers, no special hardware "and stuff" required, so I'm not sure what it is you're going on about.

I have no issues with iTunes at all. Maybe that's because I use a Mac. I keep my music library on my main Mac and then use rsync to sync my library with my server and use the SimpleFeatures iTunes Server plugin so my library shows up as a shared source in iTunes on the rest of my computers and streams the music from the server.

I was looking at the specs of the one in his original post, not the one I told him to get haha Yes the Antec does have 5. $1.26 cents on monoprice for a 3 foot if you don't have any around the house. http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10228&cs_id=1022801

Yes, any cage will work. I personally use two of the Supermicro CSE-M35T-1B (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817121405). I like it because it's got a really nice build quality and the fans on the back are 92mm vs 80mm all the other popular cages have. The fans are a bit on the loud side so if that bothers you you might want to replace them. I would recommend the Noctua NF-B9 (http://amzn.com/B002CQU13Q) to ensure good airflow through the cages while being whisper quiet. They are on the expensive side but it's worth it. The one thing with the Antec case is that it has little notches that stick out to hold 5.25 inch drives level but you can bend those in with some plyers or a clamp in 5 minutes. As for HBA cards there are two popular choices. Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8 or the IBM m1015. The Supermicro is 4x and the IBM is 8x PCIe. Outside of parity checks you will notice no difference in speed and even during the partity checks the difference will be minimal. Deals on both of those cards a cropping up all the time so look around to get the best price. I saw a deal on the Supermicro card in the Good Deals section of the forum. The IBM you won't find new as in "new in box" because they are all pulled from servers and resold to the best of my knowledge. They still are new though. As for cables to work with those cards you'll need breakout cables. I and a lot of others on here use these from Monoprice (http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10254&cs_id=1025406). They're high quality and you won't find a better price anywhere. The half meter cables are more than enough but you can get longer if you want to.