March 21, 201313 yr I just dropped 700 bucks on my new nas box, but the motherboard I wanted, the Asus E35MI-i is now discontinued Asus E35MI-i http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/E35M1I/ Asus do offer a cheaper model, the C60M1-i...however I read that its quite underpowered. http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/C60M1I/ I saw the other post regarding a new board from Asrock (looks great), but it wont be out in the uk for another few months (server boards are quite new line for Asrock, so they haven’t engaged with any UK local distributors yet). So, now I'm struggling to find a good m-itx board with 6 (or more) sata III ports. Can anybody help me find a decent board, would like it to be passive (if possible) and maybe allow me to install esxi at somepoint (again, not essential). These are the only places on the web that I think can help, if you http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/ATOM/ http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=2 Any help or advice would be great, thanks a lot!
March 21, 201313 yr Several of us are using the P8H77-I shown at that second link you posted. Don't know about esxi though. Here is one such build
March 21, 201313 yr Author Thanks for the suggestion trurl, I had look and perhaps this might be a better solution. I was originally looking for a passive cpu (just for noise levels), but heard it slowed down the write speed...so the AMD Dual-Core Processor E-350 in my first option (Asus E35MI-i) was actually quite good when compared to Intel equivalents. Im beginning to wonder if i would be better/cheaper buying a board with 2 sata III ports and and getting a sata card...never built a NAS box before so was wanting to get it right first time. So I have these sitting in my room, just no mobo Fractal Design Node 304 Mini-ITX Case with USB 3.0 w/o PSU (Std ATX) Silver Power SP-S460FL 460W Fanless SILENT 0Db Noise 8GB Corsair DDR3 Vengeance Low Profile Jet Black PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, XMP, 1.5V Samsung 128GB 840 Pro Series Basic SSD - Solid State Drive - MZ-7PD128BW 2TB WD Red WD20EFRX RED SATA 6Gb/sec, 64MB Cache, IntelliPower rpm 8ms NCQ OEM 24x7 Use Qnty: x3
March 21, 201313 yr My first build (nearly 2 years ago) used a fanless Atom mobo/CPU combo. I eventually decided to replace it so I could have >4GB RAM and have more processor power to run Plex on unRAID. I have actually replaced everything except the drives from that initial build.
March 21, 201313 yr There is a great passively cooled atom mitx board from supermicro. Don't have a model or link off hand, on my phone. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using Tapatalk 2
March 21, 201313 yr Author Hi bnevets27, I linked to the mitx section of the supermicro site, could you have a gander and point me in the right direction? Im not 100% sure about intel boards. Thanks in advance http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/ATOM/ How are supermicro when compared to Jetway (if Im being honest, I've not heard of either of them).
March 21, 201313 yr Hi bnevets27, I linked to the mitx section of the supermicro site, could you have a gander and point me in the right direction? Im not 100% sure about intel boards. Thanks in advance http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/ATOM/ How are supermicro when compared to Jetway (if Im being honest, I've not heard of either of them). Supermicro is a server motherboard manufacture and there quality is considered very good. We (Greenlaef) uses Supermicro boards in all of our builds. I think I have only ever had 2 supermicro board that did not work for me, and I have used a lot of there boards.
March 21, 201313 yr Author @ b0ssman I wondered why I never say that board, if you use the asus site and select mitx, it doesnt appear. Thanks for pointing that out. I dont need wireless and it only ahs 5 sata ports...but thats a serious contender...nice one...really appreciated. @ prostuff1 Cool, thanks for your input. Good to hear from a pro that supermicro is a safe bet, but I've already jumped in and bought ram...when looking at those supermicro boards, the mitx models require so-dimm sticks My build is cursed I tell ye.
March 21, 201313 yr Hi bnevets27, I linked to the mitx section of the supermicro site, could you have a gander and point me in the right direction? Im not 100% sure about intel boards. Thanks in advance http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/ATOM/ How are supermicro when compared to Jetway (if Im being honest, I've not heard of either of them). ...the mitx "section" on supermicro is not exclusively limited to ATOMs...see this: http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/Xeon/QM67/X9SCV-Q.cfm ...but VERY expensive.
March 22, 201313 yr Author I suppose I could always return the ram I purchased already, but im leaning towards one of the asus solutions. I dont need wireless (the first two have that built in), but the processor on the third option is quite underpowered (from what I have read on here). Also, the deluxe models are more than double in price, but if its worth it...then fair enough. I dont want a bottleneck when writing data. http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/E2KM1IDELUXE/ AMD FCH A50M (Hudson M1) / AMD APU E2-2000 Dual-Core onboard Processors / 5 x Sata III 1 x eSATA http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/E45M1I_DELUXE/ AMD APU E-450 Dual-Core onboard Processors / AMD FCH A50M (Hudson M1) / 5 x Sata III 1 x eSATA http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/C60M1I/ AMD APU C-60 1.0GHz Dual-Core onboard Processors / 6 x Sata III
March 22, 201313 yr This is the one I have used: X7SPA-HF http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/ATOM/ICH9/X7SPA.cfm?typ=H&IPMI=Y If you don't think you will use IPMI, X7SPA-H is the same as above just with out IPMI and therefore should be a little cheaper. As prostuff mentioned they are server boards and very nice boards to work with.
March 22, 201313 yr Author Firstly, thanks for all the advice here, I dont mean to drag this post out...but what are the pitfalls when going with http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/C60M1I/ AMD APU C-60 1.0GHz Dual-Core onboard Processors / 6 x Sata III I know its perhaps underpowered, but will it hamper the system too much? If so, by how much? Im waaay over budget, but would hate to think I screwed up my build at the last hurdle. Cheers again, sorry for all the questions.
March 22, 201313 yr Firstly, thanks for all the advice here, I dont mean to drag this post out...but what are the pitfalls when going with http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/C60M1I/ AMD APU C-60 1.0GHz Dual-Core onboard Processors / 6 x Sata III I know its perhaps underpowered, but will it hamper the system too much? If so, by how much? Im waaay over budget, but would hate to think I screwed up my build at the last hurdle. Cheers again, sorry for all the questions. From the builds I've read with that motherboard, they work quite well as long as you plan on running unRAID solely as a file server. If you ever intend to run any serious plugins (SABnzbd, SickBeard, CouchPotato, and especially Plex Media Server) that CPU is going to be woefully underpowered. As trurl mentioned earlier in the thread, there are several of us here using the Asus P8H77-I and it's a great mobo. 6 SATA ports (2x SATA III, 4x SATA II) and in combination with a low power CPU (such as the Core i3-3220T 35W TDP in my case), while it is not a passive cooling CPU, it is extremely quiet. I went this route because I intended to run Plex from the start. Basically it comes down to what are you planning to do with unRAID? Vanilla install, or media server/plugins?
March 22, 201313 yr Author Ha, I was actually about to buy the c60, glad i stopped by here first. Yeah i was planning on the full sab/plex thing, so the c60 wont cut it? The more expensive passive asus/supermicro boards are not far off the price of the Asus P8H77-I + Core i3-3220T...do the newer passive models handle all the plugins ok, or in reality do i need the Core i3?
March 23, 201313 yr Ha, I was actually about to buy the c60, glad i stopped by here first. Yeah i was planning on the full sab/plex thing, so the c60 wont cut it? The more expensive passive asus/supermicro boards are not far off the price of the Asus P8H77-I + Core i3-3220T...do the newer passive models handle all the plugins ok, or in reality do i need the Core i3? I've never run unRAID on one of the passive models, so can't speak from experience, hopefully someone that has one can. That said, a passive board SHOULD still work with SAB/Sick, it'll just be slow at par repair, unrar, etc. As for Plex, I suspect a passive board may also work AS LONG AS you are direct playing everything (i.e. all your media is in a format your media players can play natively). If you will be transcoding at all, the CPU on those passive boards isn't gonna cut it. The minimum recommended CPU for HD transcoding (720p and 1080p) on Plex is a 2.4 GHz Core2 Duo. If you will be running multiple plugins on the box, SAB/Sick and Plex, I have a feeling that would choke one of those passive boards. SAB/Sick without Plex, or Plex without SAB/Sick I could see working okay, but not both. On the other hand, I can confirm without a doubt that the Asus P8H77-I and an i3-3220T works like a champ. SAB/Sick/Couch all run flawlessly and fast and Plex works prefectly, even when transcoding multiple concurrent streams.
March 24, 201313 yr Author I ordered up the Asus P8H77-I + Core i3-3220T combo...I will see how much room I have and maybe order up a new cooler if its noisey. Finally, everything has been ordered...its came a long way from my original plan (which was to buy a hp n40l and use that). It wasnt much more than the passive boards and I think your right, its a good balance between cpu power and power consumed and generated in the box (plus its more future proof than what I was originally looking at). So cheers for the advice, no doubt I will be back with a whole new bunch of questions getting this thing rigged up!
March 26, 201313 yr I ordered up the Asus P8H77-I + Core i3-3220T combo...I will see how much room I have and maybe order up a new cooler if its noisey. Finally, everything has been ordered...its came a long way from my original plan (which was to buy a hp n40l and use that). It wasnt much more than the passive boards and I think your right, its a good balance between cpu power and power consumed and generated in the box (plus its more future proof than what I was originally looking at). So cheers for the advice, no doubt I will be back with a whole new bunch of questions getting this thing rigged up! Awesome, congrats on the purchase! Totally agree with the good balance between CPU power and power consumption, that's why I went this route in the first place. Looking forward to seeing your build post. PM me or post in my build thread (or yours) with any questions you have and I'll help where I can.
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