My ancient Asus P5B-VM DO is finally dying (random freezes).  New power supply and swapping out RAM hasn't solved the problem, so I'm looking to upgrade.  This box is used solely for file storage (a lot of pictures, audio files, some ripped DVDs and BDs, etc.).  Right now I have ten drives (using a Rosewill SATA controller card).  I don't foresee ever going above 10 drives.  No transcoding, virtualization, or anything fancy.  I've actually been reasonably pleased with the speed of the Asus, so I'm hopeful that even the slowest CPU available today will be OK.  This machine also idles a fair amount, so it would be nice to get something with a lower idle draw to save on power consumption.

 

Any thoughts on a combo?  Based on some posts I've seen around here, most of the AMD solutions tend to use more power at idle than Intel but cost less.  But that's based on a few posts I've read rather than any scientific survey (and it's not clear if those posts were comparing comparably speedy processors).  Of course, the Intel solutions also tend to cost more, but that's something I might be willing to pay for if the power savings are significant enough.

 

Also, this is going in a Cooler Master CM stacker case so I'm looking at either ATX or micro-ATX form factors.

 

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

 

Well, I can say that the 1151 (Skylake) could fit in your situation. At 91 watts, It uses 7 watts more power than a standard 1150, costs more, but does have more raw thread processing power. Skylake processors seem to be red meat for the gaming crowd and are reportedly very overclockable and stable (a rare combination) plus they run a bit cooler. Having said that, I looked at a Skylake capable motherboard today, an Asus Z170-AR that had 10 SATA 3 headers and an Intel Ethernet port. It also had a bunch of other stuff unraid doesn't use or need - advanced 7.1 audio, onboard video, etc. The board was $165 and the i5-6600 CPU was $230 (The AR series are not top of the line - kinda in the middle). That motherboard also used DDR4 memory - that's also pricey, but it supports dual channel and XMP. This motherboard also supported an M.2 port - so, theoretically, if using it doesn't block any of the other 10 ports, this would use 11 of the 12 port assignments in a PLUS configuration in unraid. Pretty nice - no cards required and it uses 95% of unraids' resources - that M.2 would be smokin' fast for running apps. If you were going to run this in a media center where you could take advantage of the 7.1 audio and advanced video, it might be pretty awesome but there are bound to be issues with the drivers unless you employ some form of Windows in a docker. I didn't find out if the DDR4 memory might be ECC or strictly non-ECC - it looked to be about $200-$300 for 32GB. So, the total build cost was $600-$700 depending on memory. At that price you may as well go with real supermicro server boards. All those juicy SATA3 headers got me looking - of course, you can get 8 SATA ports in a AMD X88 platform and run an FM2+ A10-7800 - 4 cores @ 65 watts and your total cost for that upgrade is a way more reasonable $200-$300 and it is 26 watts cooler running and less hungry. You could get your last 2 drives running with a 2 port pcie SATA2 card.

 

Yeah - I'm a cheapskate. My Zotac GF6100 is an old nforce430 board and it runs unraid, with Serviio, Transcoding MKV rips with subtitles and it uses between 51 to 96% of a single core Sempron 145...if the Sempron could be unlocked to a dual core - I could do it super cheap! I couldn't support multiple streams and I expect it wouldn't do for BluRay rips at all...just SD stuff. But, this system idles at 5% to 7% CPU, so it doesn't use much electricity.

 

Best of luck with your research - let us all know what you decide to do.

I think the Intel Avoton chip is a "good Combo" for you.

BUT Note this is not the cheapest...~260-300$/€ but if you want to have a low power CPU you can't buy a cheap amd or something else... A CPU with a TDP at 35W dont have a Idle von 35W... because the other Hardware need power to... and AMD more then Intel

 

But you must choose the right Board for you.

You must look at the memory-slots if you want to use your own memory.

The second point is the SATA Ports, a few Models have only 6 Ports and no PCIx Port...

But many Boards have a second SATA controller onboard and you need nothing more.

A low graphic is onboard.

Use the Avoton 2550 or Higher

The REAL idel power is about 30-42W (CPU TDP 14-20W)

And this is a Server Board!

 

Have a look an this example

http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/6842/asrock-rack-c2550d4i-intel-avoton-mini-itx-server-motherboard-review/index.html

 

if this is to expensive you can look at mobile CPU's on a normal board like this

http://www.supermicro.com.tw/products/motherboard/Xeon/QM67/X9SCV-QV4.cfm

I have a combo with this Board an a Intel Core i5-2520m idle is 40-45w, but you need new Memory...

 

 

Thanks!  That Asrock option is definitely interesting.  I would just need to be sure I was running enough air across that heat sink (maybe a very low RPM fan).

 

Another option I came up with last night is this combo (which would also require new memory):

 

ASRock Z97 Extreme4 coupled with an Intel Core i3-4130T Haswell Dual-Core 2.9 GHz LGA 1150 35W processor.  Definitely has the SATA ports I need (I could ditch the Rosewill controller as another potential source of conflict/failure) and the CPU is acceptably fast while drawing relatively little power.  But it's a pricier combo.  EDIT:  it looks like there are other decent MBs out there for much less money that would work for me if I continued to use the Rosewill card).  EDIT #2: Also, it looks like the "Extreme" in that motherboard name means a lot of power hungry features that unraid doesn't need (and I'm not sure I can turn them off in the BIOS).  Just a thought.

Unfortunately, my current Asus motherboard has decided to completely crap out on me today.  I've determined that the USB ports are causing some sort of problem.  If there is a USB device connected with I turn the power on, the Asus splash screen comes on and then the entire machine locks up (i.e. I cannot get into the BIOS).  I've connected 4 different thumb drives of various types to the machine with the same result (and I've used my unraid thumb drive to successfully boot up two different machines) so the unraid flash drive isn't the problem.  So I no longer have the luxury of taking my time with a replacement decision and will likely so with some 1150 CPU (MB yet to be determined but perhaps that Asus Extreme6 just for simplicity's sake).

 

On a related note, am I going to run into issues when I dump all of my drives into the new machine?  I'm running unraid 5.0 and I don't have a screen shot of the drive serial numbers assigned to unraid drive numbers.  Will unraid correctly assign the physical disks to the correct unraid drive assignments when I go through the replacement?  I'm sure this is answered somewhere on the boards and will read up, but if there's a simply yes/no answer someone could provide, I would be grateful.

Ouch.  While it sounds like an Atom based board would meet your needs I'm more familiar with 1150 based boards.  I'm sure that

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157504 combined with a Pentium G3258 or Celeron would make a great server.  There are lots of very nice motherboards from Asus, Gigabyte, ASRock, etc.

 

Search for Supermicro based server motherboards using an Atom if you want to try that...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007629%2050001655&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&SrchInDesc=atom&Page=1&PageSize=30

 

unRAID 5 and up identifies drives by serial number so you should be able to just plug them into the new machine.  Earlier versions required you to know which slot to put each drive into, but you should be fine.

There are basically two different approaches you should consider ...

 

(1)  If you're focused on lowest cost, go with a desktop H97 board with a moderately low-end Haswell CPU.  If you're confident that you aren't going to change your mind r.e. "... No transcoding, virtualization, or anything fancy ..."  then a very low-end processor will be fine.    Something along these lines would be fine:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157512

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116974

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820239613

 

(2)  If you want a robust server-quality board, then I'd buy a Cxxx chipset-based board with an i3 that supports ECC.    I gather from your comments that you're not inclined towards this, so I won't suggest specific components, but if this is the way you want to go just say so and we can suggest good options (figure at least an extra $150-200 compared to option #1).

 

In either event, all you have to do after you've put the components together is connect your drives and boot to your v5 UnRAID flash drive => the drives will automatically be assigned to the correct slots.    As noted above, UnRAID began tracking the assignments by serial number starting with v5, so this is FAR easier than it was with the previous versions.

 

One thing to keep an eye on with lower end chips is graphics.  I believe all current Pentium and Celeron CPUs support onboard Intel HD Graphics but some of the older generations don't.  Most desktop motherboards today rely on the onboard GPU, so check the motherboard/CPU combo.  If you're buying new from an outlet like NewEgg this shouldn't be an issue.

Thanks all!  I decided on a cheaper H97 board with the 35W haswell.  As it turns out, I eventually got my current system running, but it's still bit iffy.  In a bit of desperation, I tried booting it up without any drives connected and it worked!  So I took a screen shot of the drive assignments just to be safe.  I then tried booting up with just 3 drives attached and it wouldn't get past the Asus splash screen (couldn't get into the BIOS).  I figured there might have been some sort of power issue (unrelated to unraid at this point) so I tried booting up with just a single drive attached and it worked!  So I continued with each individual drive with different power cables, sata cables, etc.  After a couple of hours of this I couldn't isolate a bad drive, power cord, or SATA cable, so I tried booting the system up with everything connected and it worked!  Maybe there was a sketchy cable connection that got fixed when I went through the trouble shooting process.  So I have access to the system for now.  But the stuff on this server is important to me (at least 3TB of it) so I'm picking up a seperate drive to back everything up on while I still have access and am building a new system (with a new set of power and sata cables).

Just thought I’d follow up.  Although I was able to get the array to boot up, it was still very sketchy.  Under no load at all (no activity), it would stay up for a few hours at a time.  But as soon as I started reading/writing, it would freeze up and either lock hard or reboot.  I saw a few error message about IRQ problems (weird since I haven’t done anything to the system in a LONG time). 

 

So I settled on the Asrock Extreme6 motherboard, coupled with the i3 35W Haswell CPU (and 8GB of RAM).  Everything’s up and running now. A few observations:

 

1.  I was astonished at how quickly this got set up.  Less than 10 minutes from FedEx delivery to unraid boot up (without disks).  The minimalist HSF that comes with the Haswell, combined with a power button directly on the motherboard (so I don't have to deal with the damned tiny power button case leads) made things a snap.

 

2.  WOW that HSF is small.  I thought I had somehow managed to order a bare CPU.  But no, it really is that tiny.  I might think about a passive solution.

 

3.  I was surprised at how much faster the system boots up.  Haven't noticed a difference in operating speeds (and likely won't given my use).

 

4.  Given the flakiness of the prior array, I ended up using the disk internals Linux Reader freeware program (recommended by several people on this forum) to pull vital data off some drives before messing around with the rebuild.  I'm now doing something I probably should have done a long time ago and am periodically backing all important data up to a completely separate NAS box. 

 

...  I'm now doing something I probably should have done a long time ago and am periodically backing all important data up to a completely separate NAS box.

 

:)    Always nice to see folks get "backup religion" 

Good to hear the new system is working out.

...  I'm now doing something I probably should have done a long time ago and am periodically backing all important data up to a completely separate NAS box.

 

:)    Always nice to see folks get "backup religion" 

 

Yeah, I've always sort of thought of the unraid system of at least some sort of hedge against failure.  And I guess it still is (at least with respect to a single drive failing).  But for more systemic failures, something more robust is warranted, especially when every photo you've taken over the past 20 years of your life is on a single drive.  So I picked up a Western Digital My Cloud box and a 4TB HGST drive, which now sits in our outbuilding (connected to our main home via wired LAN) and will be backing up my unraid system to the NAS periodically.  This doesn't back up everything, but it does get all of the irreplaceable stuff.  Thanks for all of the help.  The unraid community has been enjoyable to listen in on (in the past) and get advice from (in the present). 

Although a NAS does provide fault tolerance, it is NOT a backup -- it provides NO protection against accidental deletion of a file; corruption/infection; etc.    And of course no protection against loss -- theft, fire, etc.

 

Your backup plan sounds good -- not only are you backing it up to another server; but it's also in another physical facility (even though it's very close) ... which is always a good idea.

 

 

I think the Intel Avoton chip is a "good Combo" for you.

BUT Note this is not the cheapest...~260-300$/€ but if you want to have a low power CPU you can't buy a cheap amd or something else... A CPU with a TDP at 35W dont have a Idle von 35W... because the other Hardware need power to... and AMD more then Intel

 

But you must choose the right Board for you.

You must look at the memory-slots if you want to use your own memory.

The second point is the SATA Ports, a few Models have only 6 Ports and no PCIx Port...

But many Boards have a second SATA controller onboard and you need nothing more.

A low graphic is onboard.

Use the Avoton 2550 or Higher

The REAL idel power is about 30-42W (CPU TDP 14-20W)

And this is a Server Board!

 

Have a look an this example

http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/6842/asrock-rack-c2550d4i-intel-avoton-mini-itx-server-motherboard-review/index.html

I have this one with 6 drives on the Intel controller. Had some issues with the Marvell controller but not sure if I will ever need them.

My UPS reports about 22-24W on idle! I haven't got S3 sleep set because not all the devices I use with it has WOL capability.

So power consumption is great.

I have found it runs quite hot with too low an airflow and the rated operating temperature according to Asrock is only up to 40C. But with a low rpm fan directly blowing on it it is fine.