Are The Choices For Motherboards Really This Sparse?

[lungnut]

I'm beginning to get really frustrated.

 

I've ordered all the hardware for my build EXCEPT for my mobo/cpu/ram combo, and I'm having a tough time choosing the right mobo.

 

Is there a comprehensive list of mobo's that are known to work? It seems everything hinges upon a micro-atx ASUS mobo that no one has in stock.

 

What I would really like is this:

 

1) a full ATX mobo that is known to work,

2) with at least six (the more the better) SATA II ports,

3) on board video and

4) gigabit ethernet.

 

The cheaper the better, of course, but I wouldn't mind spending up to $175 or so.

[bubbaQ]

1) Many, in fact almost all, mobos that can boot from a USB stick will work with unRAID if configured properly. 

 

2) Do you have to have built-in everything (video, LAN, etc.)?  Requiring built-in video will severely limit your choices.  If you can live with video in a PCI slot instead of built-in, you get many more choices.

 

3) Many mobos work perfectly well with unRAID except for their built-in ethernet.  So you use your own ethernet card and disable the on-board ethernet card.  (That is the way I run unRAID because I wanted to use the Biostar mobo with the AMD 960 chipset, but that chipset  has the problematic RealTEK NIC that is not supported in unRAID 4.2.1).

 

4) Some SATA controlers on the mobo are not yet supported by unRAID.  On those boards, you can use a PCI controller like the SAT2-MV8 controller that has 8 SATA ports (which is supported in unRAID 4.2.1)

 

5) Speed of the system is of little importance above a certain point.  I clocked a Dual Core Athlon BE 2400 at full clock, the same system undeclocked to 1 gHz, and a single core AMD 64 3500, and all turned in nearly identical (w/in 10%) numbers, both reading, writing, and copying disk to disk.  The only noticeable difference was that booting was slower.

 

Look at the chipsets on the mobos that are known to work, particularly the details of the NIC and SATA controllers.  Practically any mobo using that exact same chipset/controllers is going to work to the same level of compatibility with unRAID.

 

Decide what features you want.  Then decide if those features (video card, ethernet, number of SATA ports) must be built in, or can they be on their own PCI cards?  That will make a huge difference in what mobos will meet your criteria.

 

For example:

 

• I want 15 SATA ports ... they can be 8 on mobo and the rest on a SAT2-MV8 card, or 4 on the mobo, one SAT2-MV8, and one Promise 4-port SATA card.
   
  
• I want video, either built in or on a PCI slot.
   
  
• I want GigE, either built in or on a PCI slot.
  

 

So practically ANY motherboard, with 4 PCI slots (1 for video, 1 for NIC, and 2 for SATA controllers) will satisfy me.  Or with 3 PCI slots (i.e. micro-ATX) if it has a compatible built-in NIC or built-in video.

 

Sure it is simplier and often slightly less expensive to have it all built in, but if you happen to have a surplus video card and ethernet card laying around, you can use them at no cost, and it greatly expands your choice of mobos.

 

The P5B-VM DO uses the Intel 82566DM LAN chipset, so any mobo with this LAN chipset should work for ethernet in unRAID.  It also uses the North Bridge  Intel Q965 Express (NB) and Intel ICH8DO (SB) ... both of which you can find on may other mobos.

 

Some devices, such as the Realtek RTL8111B LAN controller chipset are known to have problems (it doesn't currently work with unRAID later than 4.0, so if you have that chipset (like I do) you have to disable it and use a PCI NIC).  (This is actually fixed in the 2.6.23.9 kernel which should make it into unRAID very soon.)

 

My advice is to either 1) read the posts and the WIKI and find a mobo that is known to work (limited choices), or 2) use the advanced search features of Newegg or another reputable vendor to narrow down your choices to mobos with the features and number of PCI slots you need and are at your price point, then check the chipsets to make your final choice.

 

[lungnut]

Wow, thanks for that reply. That really makes a LOT of sense. I will definitely take your suggestions and I hope to build mine next weekend.

 

 

[Gog]

The Wiki isn't bad either:

 

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Hardware_Compatibility#Motherboard

 

Gog

[boosted]

Also please note that just because the ethernet chipset supports gige, it does not mean it supports jumbo frame.  I found that out the hard way and currently waiting to see if the jumbo frame development will allow better throughput.  So far there are little improvement to use jumbo frame, so that's why I haven't went for a supported jumbo frame nic.

[RobJ]

I hesitated to respond in your other thread, as I haven't been keeping up with motherboards lately.  I found Bubba's reply above to be excellent, I very much agree with the points he made.

 

I can recommend a great motherboard resource, should call it the Motherboard Motherlode, linked in my post here:  http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=872.0.

 

I did a little 'research' at Newegg, was somewhat disappointed in ASUS, but found several Gigabyte boards (no video though) that seemed quite interesting, like this one:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128050, great specs, P35-based with 8 SATA, could not determine the exact networking chipset, and it may be the currently unsupported Realtek one.

 

I'll just mention my own Epox board, although I'm not sure it can be recommended, because the Epox company has practically disappeared.  I have an Epox EP-MF570SLI AM2 motherboard, and an EP-AF590SLI AM2 motherboard.  Both have outstanding specs, and little extras that are helpful to the DIY builder.  Epox still has a clearance store at https://www.epoxstore.com/Default.asp, where these can be picked up quite cheaply, if you don't care about support or its maker's future.  The MF570 and AF590 are almost identical in specs, except the AF590 has an internally higher performance chipset, with more PCI Express lanes available, which I don't believe make a significant difference for an unRAID user.  Add an inexpensive AMD 3600, 4200, or 4600 (65 watt versions), and you've got a high performance server with 8 SATA II ports, 4 IDE ports, Gigabit LAN, plenty of slots, no video.

 

For video, I like many others added a very cheap video card, and when it won't be needed, leave it in its static bag inside the case on the bottom.