Is there any brand new SOLID/STABLE motherboards available?

[opentoe]

I'm looking to possibly replace my old Intel 5 year old motherboard with something newer and faster. Knowing there are hundreds of motherboards out there I would rather ask this here and see what other people are using in their system. I would need 6 SATA ports on the mainboard (more is fine) and they have to be 6Gbit speed. I don't care about audio. Has to have an Intel Ethernet 1000Mbit LAN onboard. No Realtek for me. Wow, there are so many models out there.

 

 

[BLKMGK]

Right there with you! I have two UnRAID with older boards that I don't think will handle 3TB drives. I'd like to swap them to something newer and faster - and will probably still have lower power compared to what I have now! 6 SATA, onboard vid for troubleshooting, I'd love an onboard USB header, and I personally like Intel CPU. What's solid now?

[Frank1940]

My gut feeling is that you would be better to ask the converse question.    What motherboards are people having problem with and what are those problems?  (Of course, you could also do a bit of research on the board and find this information yourself.)

 

Another way that you might get responses is to look through the motherboards on Newegg (or some other vendor), pick out some boards that meet you needs and ask if anyone is having any issues with them. 

 

(The impression that I have is that most modern motherboards are working just fine with unRAID.)

[jowi]

I would suggest a server grade board like Supermicro's X9SCM. Or at least a board with IPMI.

[mrow]

I would suggest a server grade board like Supermicro's X9SCM. Or at least a board with IPMI.

 

+1 for the Supermicro X9SCM-F. Tons of guys on here, including myself, use it an it is rock solid, and as mentioned IPMI is awesome for management. 6 SATA ports on board, however 2 of them are SATA III and 4 of them are SATA II but unless you plan on using SSDs that won't matter. Spinning disks can barely saturate SATA I.

 

What's also nice is it supports the Core i series processors as well as Xeon E3 processors so you've got a wide range of processors to choose from. I'm personally using an i3 but plan on switching to a Xeon E3 at some point.

[BLKMGK]

I would suggest a server grade board like Supermicro's X9SCM. Or at least a board with IPMI.

 

+1 for the Supermicro X9SCM-F. Tons of guys on here, including myself, use it an it is rock solid, and as mentioned IPMI is awesome for management. 6 SATA ports on board, however 2 of them are SATA III and 4 of them are SATA II but unless you plan on using SSDs that won't matter. Spinning disks can barely saturate SATA I.

 

What's also nice is it supports the Core i series processors as well as Xeon E3 processors so you've got a wide range of processors to choose from. I'm personally using an i3 but plan on switching to a Xeon E3 at some point.

 

That's a really nice board for sure but also $200 worth! The cheaper version uses funky ECC RAM too so no real savings. I agree on the 6gb ports, sata isn't going to require it. Looks like no other i series CPU other than the i3 are supported. Is that enough for SAB and Sick if I run it?

 

Can you talk about the IPMI? How hard is that to setup and use? Useful?

[mrow]

Weird it doesn't support i5's and i7's because it does support Celerons and Pentiums. I use it with a Core i3-2120. It is more than powerful enough to run many plugins including on the fly video transcoding plugins. I am running 15 different plugins at the moment. And yes, these are server motherboards so they require ECC RAM but it is not much more than standard desktop RAM these days.

 

IPMI is as simple as plugging an ethernet cable into the IPMI port and connecting it to your router and letting the Supermicro IPMI software detect it. It is very useful as well. It allows for complete hands off, headless management. Here is a thorough overview of it: http://www.servethehome.com/supermicro-ipmiview-review-remote-server-monitoring-management-ipmi-20-kvm-over-ip/

[BLKMGK]

I have to admit I'm tempted! I'm torn between doing this board or going cheaper with an AM3 AMD. The AMD would save me a pile of cash but I moved away from them forever ago when Intel proved to have so much better performance.

 

Intel is going to be a tough sell here though. The AMD boards can be under $75 and the CPU not much more expensive. That might prove good enough for my needs but I'm still hesitant. Currently I run SAB, Sick, Couch, and Headphones on my desktop plus an SQL server. I'd love to be able to move this off my desktop for sure! The ability to remotely administer my machines would be terrific though and this hardware is certainly a cut above the cheaper stuff. I have a SuperMicro board in one of my systems now and it was noticeably better quality than I was used to although a good bit cheaper.

 

Appreciate the information and feedback. I'll price it all out and do a gut check to see if it makes sense or not...

[mrow]

Do you need the hardware right away? In the past two months there have been three sales on the Supermicro board, bringing the price down $30 bucks. If you can wait a little bit you might be able to catch another sale on it.

 

The other thing I'd say is if you even think you might want to do virtualization, as seems to be becoming more and more popular on here these days, in the future you're better off going for this board. Then all you'd have to do it buy the processor and pop it in, with the AMD you'd have to buy a whole new setup.

 

EDIT: I should also mention this board is picky about power supplies. The one you are using now may not work. If you weren't planning on upgrade that too right now, and yours doesn't work with it, you may be better off with the AMD.

[seanant]

Hear hear

[BLKMGK]

Well, my plan is this - remove my old mobo and CPU etc. (2x servers) and place them into new cases. The new machines will be fitted with new license keys and a couple of drives, likely older smaller drives of mine. They will be given as gifts to two families that I know could use storage but either cannot afford the outlay because they are supporting kids or don't have the technical skills and won't ever need multiple 3TB drives or at least not in the foreseeable future. My existing boards might even handle them as data drives if I'm lucky!

 

The two machines I have myself could most certainly use 3TB drives, in fact I have a pair coming now that I will use as Parity for the moment to facilitate upgrades to the other drives. I will try these on the existing boards just to verify compatibility. I need a mobo and CPU upgrade for the two machines I'll have gutted....

 

The SuperMicro board would be awesome! However it's $200 and the CPUs also appear expensive. It would be helpful if it was clear what CPU exactly the damn boards supported! Could I use say a G350? If so that's waaay cheaper than the i3-3220 I was looking at! It would still be an expensive upgrade but about $100 cheaper overall. Certainly wiser long term. This will be my 3rd mobo upgrade BTW, I've been using unRAID since nearly day one.

 

As it stands now I'm looking hard at an AMD http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157292 that would run me $60 and a CPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103953 that would run another $60. Those two together run me less than a single SuperMicro board alone!

 

I hadn't thought about the PSU situation but since I'm outfitting two other complete servers I could certainly buy compatible PSU while I was at it and move over my existing PSU. I have 12Gig of DDR3 in 4Gig sticks sitting so that is also handled I think.

 

As for virtualization... Yeah, I'm interested in it but I'm not sure how that is setup with unRAID exactly. Does the unRAID server run VMs in addition to unRAID? Is unRAID virtualized and if so isn't that risky? I currently have an ESX server sitting, I wasn't getting enough use from it to keep it up and running 24x7. However if I am already running an unRAID server I'd be happy to have a VM or two on it if that's the situation. I will be running SAB, Sick, and mySQL too as that would free up my desktop, might not even need VMs in that case. Seems I do everything complicated....

 

So, hopefully that outlines my situation better. As an aside, I'm looking to get a third family a media front-end ala XBMC (probably a Pivos). One of the other two families has something like that now from last Christmas so now they need storage! Just trying to do this smart as I upgrade my own older hardware and pass it along to others who will appreciate it is all...

 

P.S. No, I don't need this hardware right this moment, however the holidays are fast approaching and I want time to build and test, this could get complicated. I also have to build\test at least one Pivos front end so I'm feeling some pressure to get moving. One Pivos is already waiting my attention for testing.

[BobPhoenix]

As for virtualization... Yeah, I'm interested in it but I'm not sure how that is setup with unRAID exactly. Does the unRAID server run VMs in addition to unRAID? Is unRAID virtualized and if so isn't that risky? I currently have an ESX server sitting, I wasn't getting enough use from it to keep it up and running 24x7. However if I am already running an unRAID server I'd be happy to have a VM or two on it if that's the situation. I will be running SAB, Sick, and mySQL too as that would free up my desktop, might not even need VMs in that case. Seems I do everything complicated....

If you virtualize your unRAID server onto ESXi you could leave it as just a file server and only install plugins that contribute to the health of the server.  This is what I've done for my unRAID servers.  Then you could put SAB, Sick, and mySQL on another VM of their own. 

[mrow]

There was a comment on the Newegg feedback for the Supermicro board with a guy saying he used a Celeron with it.

 

Also, remember, the Supermicro requires ECC RAM so unless that 12GB you have is ECC it won't work in the board.

[BLKMGK]

There was a comment on the Newegg feedback for the Supermicro board with a guy saying he used a Celeron with it.

 

Also, remember, the Supermicro requires ECC RAM so unless that 12GB you have is ECC it won't work in the board.

 

Hrm, there are two X9SCM boards, I thought one of them required ECC and the other simply supported it. Looking more closely it looks liek both may require it, I think that kills me using this board

[dikkiedirk]

There was a comment on the Newegg feedback for the Supermicro board with a guy saying he used a Celeron with it.

 

Also, remember, the Supermicro requires ECC RAM so unless that 12GB you have is ECC it won't work in the board.

 

Hrm, there are two X9SCM boards, I thought one of them required ECC and the other simply supported it. Looking more closely it looks liek both may require it, I think that kills me using this board

 

Why? Afraid of ECC. I use the X9SCM with a Celeron G530 and 4 GB ECC. Which is OK for unraid.

[BLKMGK]

Well, the cost was already fairly high, having to use ECC RAM pushed it even higher as I have 12gig of DDR3 sitting in my desk drawer already. Cost for two HAF cases, 2 AMD, CPU, 2 psu, 2 Mobo, came to right around $500. Dirt cheap all things considered I think.

 

That said, talking to Bob about his ESX setup I'm becoming convinced that ESX might be a smart way to go for me. Collapse 2 servers into one maybe. Nothing budget about that but I'd be able to run additional VM and shut down hardware here which is attractive!

 

This board would be an option for that for sure as would a Tyan board. The AMD hardware would go into the new machines, not sure where the existing hardware would end up :-(

[BobPhoenix]

All Cougar Point based MB's will require ECC - I believe - I could be wrong.  I've never been mislead going to the Kingston site and looking up the correct memory for the MB there.  The Tyan S5512 MB's all take ECC memory like the SuperMicro X9SCM boards when I just looked at the Kingston site.