mITX, IPMI, 6+ SATA ports, Plex

[Smitty2k1]

Hi all,

 

My bedroom streaming box (WDTV Live+) is on the fritz and I can't seem to find a suitable replacement that can playback network media files without Plex. I've never used Plex or tried installing it on my unRaid server, but now that unRaid 6 is here along with easy to install dockers and pugins (honestly, I don't even know what a docker is and I have one running!) I finally installed Plex on my unRaid.

 

I was hoping playback would be smoother than it is, but sadly my SuperMicro ATOM 525 mITX motherboard cannot handle a single 720p stream. That means it is time to upgrade! It has been a long time since I explored the server motherboard market so I ask of you oh internet community to steer me in the right direction.

 

Here is my current setup:

Fractal Node 340 case + 450w power supply

Supermicro X7SPA-HF-D525 mother board

6x 3.5" HDDs

PCIE cache SSD (its a PCIE to mSATA adapter with an mSATA cache)

unRaid Plus 6.1.6

 

Here are my requirements for a new motherboard/CPU:

Low power + quiet (the case sits in a media rack in the corner of my living room in a tiny apartment)

IPMI (I don't want to run any KVM, just an ethernet cable and a power cable)

Ability to run a single 1080p Plex stream (over ethernet or wifi if it matters, is running an internet server any different?)

6+ SATA ports (I bough the Node 340 because my old board supported 6 and at the time I had an unRaid 5 key that supported 6 drives only, I'm not sure when it got upgraded to 12 but I don't plan on expanding the physical size of the case/server)

 

What are my options? I'd love to keep it integrated if possible, and passively cooled would be even better, but I'm not sure if the modern systems can handle a 1080p stream. I don't use my unRaid server for anything else, so no need to have massive horsepower.

 

Thanks!

[boxtor]

I use

http://www.asrockrack.com/general/productdetail.asp?Model=E3C224D4I-14S#Specifications

 

You can choose which ever CPU meets your criteria.

[spylex]

I would also like to see if there is a low cost ITX alternative to a server board that will have 6 SATA ports + m.2 on Skylake.

[garycase]

An Atom D525 definitely does not have enough "oomph" for Plex -- in fact I wouldn't even run v6 on it, as the increased CPU demands of v6 are really pushing a D525.

 

To stay with the mini-ITX I'd use one of two boards:

 

(1)  My first choice would be this:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813599009

 

8 SATA ports provided directly by the chipset;  Xeon E3v5 support (also supports Skylake Core i3-7's);  a PCIe x16 expansion slot; and ECC memory support.  The ONLY "nice-to-have" feature it's missing is IPMI.

 

   

(2)  A good alternative is this:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157486

 

14 total SATA ports (6 onboard plus 8 from a second controller chip);  Xeon E3v3 support (and Haswell i3-7's);  a PCIe x8 expansion slot;  ECC memory support; and IPMI.    Two caveats:  (a)  Be sure it will fit in your case.  It's an "extended ITX" board ... so it's 1.7" wider than an ITX board => be sure you have the much extra width available in your case;  and (b)  it's only got an x8 expansion slot, so if you are planning to add an x16 video card at some point it won't work unless you do a bit of "surgery" on the port to make it open-ended in the rear.

 

 

I'd go with #1 and just do without IPMI.  Toss in an E3-1275v5 and 32GB of DDR4 ECC memory [ http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/ct2k16g4wfd8213 ] and you'll have a superb system that will last for years to come.

 

[HellDiverUK]

The Atom D525 was rubbish when it was released.  6 years later...well... 

[spylex]

http://www.asrockrack.com/general/productdetail.asp?Model=E3C236D2I

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813599005&cm_re=E3C236D2I-_-13-599-005-_-Product

 

There is this also, a little pricier but has IPMI.

 

Not sure how this board will handle IOMMU groups and USB split... which is my biggest pain point and headache with my current setup...

 

Also you'd need a 2242 m.2 PCIE device which tops at 512GB for a big price hike.

[garycase]

The Atom D525 was rubbish when it was released.  6 years later...well... 

 

Clearly a matter of opinion.    My X7SPA-HF-D525 based server has been rock-solid since I built it several years ago [same board the OP is using here].    It's a GREAT board & CPU for a mini-ITX setup that's being used as a pure NAS (which mine is).  Idles at 20 watts, never gets about about 45 even during a parity check with 6 4TB WD Reds.

 

Clearly if you want to run other applications on it you need a board with more "horsepower" ... but that doesn't make it "rubbish" => just no longer the right tool for the job.

 

[Smitty2k1]

An Atom D525 definitely does not have enough "oomph" for Plex -- in fact I wouldn't even run v6 on it, as the increased CPU demands of v6 are really pushing a D525.

 

To stay with the mini-ITX I'd use one of two boards:

 

(1)  My first choice would be this:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813599009

 

8 SATA ports provided directly by the chipset;  Xeon E3v5 support (also supports Skylake Core i3-7's);  a PCIe x16 expansion slot; and ECC memory support.  The ONLY "nice-to-have" feature it's missing is IPMI.

 

   

(2)  A good alternative is this:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157486

 

14 total SATA ports (6 onboard plus 8 from a second controller chip);  Xeon E3v3 support (and Haswell i3-7's);  a PCIe x8 expansion slot;  ECC memory support; and IPMI.    Two caveats:  (a)  Be sure it will fit in your case.  It's an "extended ITX" board ... so it's 1.7" wider than an ITX board => be sure you have the much extra width available in your case;  and (b)  it's only got an x8 expansion slot, so if you are planning to add an x16 video card at some point it won't work unless you do a bit of "surgery" on the port to make it open-ended in the rear.

 

 

I'd go with #1 and just do without IPMI.  Toss in an E3-1275v5 and 32GB of DDR4 ECC memory [ http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/ct2k16g4wfd8213 ] and you'll have a superb system that will last for years to come.

 

Thanks for this (and later) reply. Why do you recommend that ASRock board over some of the other v3/v5 ASRock boards that do support IPMI? It seems they have quite the range that all hover around the $200 mark.

 

Honestly, I am calling IPMI a "must" have feature. I keep my server in the living room where it is not easily accessible to plug in a KVM. I ALSO live in a 500 sqft apartment and the less crap I have to have the better.

 

Additionally, what is the benefit of the 1151 socket with the v5 Xeon and DDR4 ram over the 1150 socket with the v3 Xeon and DDR3 ram? I don't see myself doing much beyond streaming/transcoding and they both seem to have the same horsepower and TDP to do just that, except the DDR4 ram is more expensive. In addition to this motherboard/CPU/RAM upgrade I need to buy a streaming box for my bedroom TV. I'm leaning towards the nVidia Shield but for no particular reason. So, I'm trying to do this cheap which is why I was hoping you would suggest one of those all-in-one motherboards that support the Xeon D-1520 for less than $500... but it looks like the ASRock ones are not in the wild yet

 

EDIT: I did way to much research into this stuff last night and my head is swimming, sorry for the wall of text.

[garycase]

Actually, now that you mentioned it, a D-1520 board would indeed be a great choice ...

 

e.g.  http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=MB-X10SDCT&c=FR&pid=f864b0a952df6c05dc05e0a16ea3599fa49f6627838dc270de0759a18949032e&gclid=CLnU9ou0gssCFYSDaQodBvQOsg

 

with a pair of these registered modules:  http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/x10sdv-4c-tln2f/CT7984499

 

[Note:  the board actually supports either registered (buffered) or unbuffered modules -- but you definitely want to use registered modules ... this virtually eliminates waveform distortion on the memory bus and will let you easily expand it with 2 more modules if you should ever decide to without any reliability issues]

 

would be a GREAT choice.

 

6 SATA ports (or 5 plus an M.2);  IPMI;  over 6000 PassMark (6396);  and a PCIe x16 expansion slot.

 

The only reason to use the extended ITX board I listed earlier would be if you need more SATA ports -- but that doesn't seem to be the case in your application => and you could always add ports via the expansion slot if needed.

 

 

[Smitty2k1]

Actually, now that you mentioned it, a D-1520 board would indeed be a great choice ...

 

e.g.  http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=MB-X10SDCT&c=FR&pid=f864b0a952df6c05dc05e0a16ea3599fa49f6627838dc270de0759a18949032e&gclid=CLnU9ou0gssCFYSDaQodBvQOsg

 

with a pair of these registered modules:  http://www.crucial.com/usa/en/x10sdv-4c-tln2f/CT7984499

 

[Note:  the board actually supports either registered (buffered) or unbuffered modules -- but you definitely want to use registered modules ... this virtually eliminates waveform distortion on the memory bus and will let you easily expand it with 2 more modules if you should ever decide to without any reliability issues]

 

would be a GREAT choice.

 

6 SATA ports (or 5 plus an M.2);  IPMI;  over 6000 PassMark (6396);  and a PCIe x16 expansion slot.

 

The only reason to use the extended ITX board I listed earlier would be if you need more SATA ports -- but that doesn't seem to be the case in your application => and you could always add ports via the expansion slot if needed.

 

That was definitely the one I saw last night! Also available elsewhere but I think it was a little over $500. The ASRock version of this board is not out yet, but it does show up on the ASRock website. They have a version that is just 1Gb Ethernet instead of 10Gb that would hopefully be less expensive.

 

Any comments on the power of that processor for transcoding for Plex? I found a review on Serve the Home but it doesn't discuss Plex at all. I'd imagine the base Xeon v3 would be more powerful, but at almost twice the TDP.

 

Also, any real reason to get 32GB RAM (two of the 16GB sticks you mentioned)? I would think 16GB would be sufficient and the board has 4 RAM slots so expanding later would be easy.

 

Final note, in reading the motherboard manual, I think you can use the M.2 slot simultaneously with all 6 SATA ports if the M.2 drive is a PCIE drive, not a SATA drive.

[mr-hexen]

Whatever CPU you choose, search for it's passmark score (google). Rule of thumb is 2,000 marks to successfully transcode a 1080p Plex stream.

 

16GB of ram would be plenty. I only run 8GB on my system (see sig for specs/ build thread).

[garycase]

... The ASRock version of this board is not out yet, but it does show up on the ASRock website. They have a version that is just 1Gb Ethernet instead of 10Gb that would hopefully be less expensive.

 

Depending on the price difference, you may want to go with the SuperMicro with its 10Gb Ethernet ... I suspect 10Gb may become reasonably common quicker than you might think.

 

 

... Any comments on the power of that processor for transcoding for Plex? I found a review on Serve the Home but it doesn't discuss Plex at all. I'd imagine the base Xeon v3 would be more powerful, but at almost twice the TDP.

 

As I noted above, the CPU has a PassMark of 6396.  An E3 12xx series Xeon scores between about 6600 (E3-12220v3) and a bit over 10,000 [E3-1270v5 = 10215; E3-1276v3 = 10257; etc.] ... but, as you noted, draw about twice as much power.    Plex generally requires ~ 2000 PassMarks per transcoded stream -- so the D-1520 should be PLENTY for what you have in mind.

 

 

Also, any real reason to get 32GB RAM (two of the 16GB sticks you mentioned)? I would think 16GB would be sufficient and the board has 4 RAM slots so expanding later would be easy.

 

Agree -- a pair of 8GB registered modules would be fine.

 

 

Final note, in reading the motherboard manual, I think you can use the M.2 slot simultaneously with all 6 SATA ports if the M.2 drive is a PCIE drive, not a SATA drive.

 

That indeed seems to be the case -- most of the boards with M.2 slots have a note r.e. sharing it with one of the SATA ports, but this one does not.

 

 

 

[Smitty2k1]

Thanks for all the input guys!

 

Serve the Home recently posted a review of the Supermicro board with the new Xeon D-1518 part, a 35W version of the 1520 we have been discussing. It looks like it will be the same MSRP so I might hold out a few weeks and see what comes out in the retail outlets.

 

For those interested, Serve the Home also recently posted benchmarks for the 12 and 16 core Xeon D parts on mITX boards... WOAH!

[garycase]

Even the 8-core 1540 is a rather impressive performer ... PassMark of 10883, which beats EVERY E3 series Xeon.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182964

 

... and SuperMicro already has the details of their D-1557 12-core board posted ("coming soon" for availability):

https://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/D/X10SDV-12C-TLN4F.cfm