Topic: OT: buildng a box for SME

[Mark]

I was just about to place the order for the parts for a new machine when it occurred to me that one or two people on this list just might have built a machine before. Seemed like a good idea to ask since I haven't built a machine from parts since the S-100 bus days...

What I am interested in is something along these lines, from Outpost.com:

Shuttle SN41G2 nForce2 Mini BareBone System
toss in two 120 GB 7200 rpm ATA hard drives, an AMD cpu aprox: 1 ghz, and two nic's.

Any one care to offer an "old bee" a little help with a "new bee" project?

 - Mark

[dave]

S-100 BUS?  That brings back memories...  My first actual computer was a surplus S100 bus system that had a whopping 64K 'bank selectable' memory and a pair of televideo terminals.  2 external 8" floppy drives too, single sided of course.  Lots of apps and software included, pretty cool system.

Your spec should run just fine as you define it and I'm sure would be enough to last for quite a while as a SME server system.

BUT... two things I'd recommend:
1: As much RAM as you can afford to install.  SME won't really need it, it only requires 128MEG but as cheap as it is right now, why not?  

2: You may want to bump up the processor speed.  I know 1GIG is a pretty fast processor but with 3+GIG P4's and similar capable AMD's out there, the faster you go now means the longer it'll be able to do the work.  Linux in general and SME specifically doesn't really need that much power but when I build a machine from scratch, I always count on it being reallocated to something else at least once in it's life.

Just my opinions...  

Dave

[RayG]

I don't know about that particular model but I've generally avoided Shuttle for cooling reasons. And cooling will be a significant issue with two 7200 rpm drives in the box.

[Michael Smith]

The Shuttle comes with a NIC built-in, so you'll only have to have one additional.  Good thing, too, because the box only has one PCI slot!   I have one of these exact Shuttles and it's great but I don't know if the onboard NIC is supported by SME; I did have Mandrake 9.1 on it during my abortive attempt at using MythTV but had to install the chipset drivers from nVidia to get the onboard stuff to work correctly.  Good luck and let us know how it turns out!

[Michael]

I've got one of the first Shuttles, a Spacewalker SV24. It's intended for PIII class processors. I've been running it for 1.5 years with a VIA C3 800MHz, 256MB and an IBM 40GB harddisk and an additional Realtek NIC. As the processor is running at pretty low temperatures (>=35°C) there's no thermic problem for me. The integrated NIC (Realtek, too) is supported.

But after >150 uptime one day the system locked up and did not start again. Electrolytic capacitor had silently burst. This normally only happens with systems running at their limits (overclocking, heat etc.). I don't know why this happened in this case. But Shuttle replaced/repaired it free of charge.

[Mark]

Good information. Thanks to all.

This box is really just for SME, so high quality graphics aren't a necessity. It is the form factor that attracts me the most. If fits the space.

That was good news, Michael, about the burst capacitor. It is always nice to hear a manufacturer is supportive.

 - Mark

[Reinhold]

>>Shuttle SN41G2 nForce2 Mini BareBone System

- AFAIK the nForce2 on board NIC is not supported by SME.
nVidia's drivers are not completely Linux-friendly-free - look at their website.
You'll have only one PCI slot - so either get that onboard working or buy a 2 Nic board or forget about routing .-)
- PS is only 200W so take care which 2HDs/which CPU ...

If you haven't looked in detail: http://www.us.shuttle.com/specs_access.asp?pro_id=243

[Tom Keiser]

I'm a box builder, and don't have much time for off-brand stuff and the early failures and messing around that go with it. Stick with well-known, reputable vendors and you will be much happier.

First, depending on the size of your LAN, a dual-processor machine running linux is like night and day compared to a uniprocessor box. For a dual proc, I like the Tyan S2466, which you can get on the net for little more than $200. For single processors, any good ASUS board will do fine with SME, but I do prefer the AMD cpu's, as dollar for dollar, they are  faster, better, sturdier, etc than pentiums.

Use good memory, get it at Crucial.com, or equivalent. 1GB isn't out of the question, and your network will thank you.

If you can afford and justify raid, get a 3ware card and drives from Western Digital with 8MB of cache. I always do a raid array plus a separate boot drive.  3Ware has a new 2-channel SATA controller and WD has great drives to go with it.

Hope this helps,

Tom

[Tom Keiser]

Forgot to mention one thing:  Smartest purchase you can make for a server is a good case. An Antec SX1030 or bigger will give you a good 400W power supply, and lots of cooling fans, plus places to add more. If you properly cool the parts, they will last twice as long -- little cramped, or under-cooled cases are an early death for everything in a server.

Tom

[Mark]

Thanks for the critique, pro and con. To add to the gracious complement of experience posted here, I found these reviews of the Shuttle products:

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDE2LDE=
http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/Motherboards/shuttle_sn41g2.shtml
http://www.amdzone.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1259

I see now that the Shuttle is targeted to the home market. The benchmark tests suggest that Shuttle is on to something but it may not be ready for the application I have before me.

I have little space, without moving everything, and I am/was hoping the SFF would be a solution. Rack mount is an option but seems to be expensive.

I appreciate all the comments.

 - Mark

[Steve Bush]

I purchased a low end Dell PE400SC with a Celeron processor, 128MB Ecc Ram, 40GB HD, 1xIntel GB NIC onboard.  It runs great as my home SME6.0b3 server.

The price today at Dell.com Small business is $299 after $100 mail-in (plus tax)
Add $99 for a P4-2.4/800 processor upgrade.

This is based on the Intel 875 chipset.

[rmucb]

I have one of those SN41G2 models, they are great boxes but . . .

-  They can be *loud* unless you plan on hacking the box to do some custom cooling.  These are not easy mods because normally some of the loudest items on these boxes is the GPU fan and the fans internal to the PS.  Definately not the easiest to mod, and this definately not something you would want to do for a server device.  As previously stated in this thread, these boxes can run warm, so good cooling is important.

- The driver item was already mentioned.  I have never tried SME on the box, but you may want to confirm that the driver works.

- Be really careful with the RAM you use with these NVIDIA/Shuttle boxes.  The chipset is really picky with the RAM time when it comes to timing between the CPU, Motherboard, and RAM.  Crucial was listed as a solution, which is good.  After researching at the boxes I had purchased Corsair RAM because that was RAM I knew could be run at it full optimized clock speed and not be throttled down because of the CPU I have.

- If you are just looking at SFF solutions, as already listed here you may want to look at some other solution in the SFF arena before you commit.   Perhaps something that is considered more industry standard (don't get me wrong, I love my little XPC, but the NVIDIA chipset in them, though it runs great, is still relatively new).

- If you are really into getting a Shuttle system, you might want to look at the SB42G2 as an alternative:
http://us.shuttle.com/specs2.asp?pro_id=264
This product I think would better fill the server role of an SME box, the SN41G2 was designed with a different purpose in mind.  The SB42G2 was designed more around the idea of a small server/cluster server.  From the info I have read they have performed well in this capacity.

Good luck !!!

[rmucb]

Oops forgot to state that on the SB52G2 it is built around an Intel chipset with dual nics onboard.

Cheers

[rmucb]

Oops sorry again, the product that I was listing was in fact the SB52G2 not the SB42G2 (I don't even know if that is a valid product number), been up for waaaaaaay too long this weekend.  =)

[Noz]

If you like the wee shuttles you're gonna LOVE this!...
http://space-simulator.lanl.gov/
The Space Simulator Cluster
-N

[Mark]

Thanks again for the insight. I like the looks of the SB52G2; again it is a size thing. The SFF appeals to me and to the space I am working with.

But the comments about heat and noise level strike a chord. I guess I just want it all; can you say "palm server"? Just kidding.

The article about the space simulator is great! Wow, do these guys get paid to do that? Must be nice!

 - Mark