I've got a fair bit of old hardware hanging around so decided to use it following this little project http://geekyprojects.com/nas/build-your-own-nas-using-freenas/ Just was not sure which motherboard to use, I have some random P4 2.6 mobo or Asus A7M222D Dual 1.9 AMD MP 2G ECC memory Asus PC-DL Dual 2.4 Xeon 2G ddr1 memory ( a bit too power hungry me thinks ) Asus P5K Premium C2D 6400 4g ddr2 memory Which mobo should I use remember this nas box will be running 24/7
Anything low power, you don't even need dual CPU. The most important parts are compatibility with your Ethernet and SATA controllers. Any standard hardware will be fine with BSD. FreeNAS 8 beta is much better than previous, but it's also been overly simplified imo. I was waiting until they launched the final retail to do a feature myself How many HDD are you needing? To be honest, sell it all and buy an Atom or AMD E350 motherboard. If I can find my FreeNAS USB key ill test this Gigabyte E350N-USB3 if you like.
I personally used an Atom 330+ION board from Asus (AT3IONT-I, the non-Deluxe variant) for two simple reasons - it had 4 onboard SATA connectors + it had a full PCI-E card slot (not a crippled one looking like a x16, but a full x16 PCI-E slot), which means i added a PCI-E SAS controller + 2 mSAS->4xSATA cables => maximum of 12 drives connected to one small Atom board. True, i used Arch Linux instead of FreNAS, so i can't comment about compatibility with FreeNAS.
Of course i needed more than FreeNAS could provide, and except the fancy web UI, i could get pretty much everything with the Linux too. But i didn't mean to talk about Arch Linux here, i meant it as a alternative, exactly because it has 4 SATA ports on the board and full PCI-E x16 slot usable for anything, not just graphics card (integrated graphics don't disable itself just because you have a card in the slot). I noted this for one reason - look at E350 boards : 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x4 Considering better RAID or HBA cards are using PCI-E x8, it can be a serious limitation. PS: Just for information, i used this SAS card : http://www.intel.com/products/server/raid-controllers/SASUC8I/SASUC8I-overview.htm
My point was, weigh up how much you can sell that kit for, because running it 24/7 vs a new, very low power system could be a better choice in the long term. Not to mention the noise reduction and modern advantages like ACHI for HDDs.
Just tested FreeNAS and no, the E-350 APU is not compatible. It just sits there and twiddles it thumbs right after if finds the boot loader.
Taking your advice onboard have found a nice low powered mobo with laptop style psu just need a cooler for a mobile 478/479 cpu. Thanks for tying FreeNas on the E-350 think FreeNas works better with older hardware though I might be wrong
Is this a hardware performance limitation, as there are plenty of Atom boards with 4 SATAII ports, there are even a few with 6 SATAII ports?
Exactly... Asus AT3IONT-I: http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=47#AT3IONT-I Asus AT3IONT-I Deluxe: http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=47#AT3IONT-I-DELUXE Gigabyte GA-D525TUD: http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=47#ga-d525tud Jetway JNC96-525: http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=47#jnc96-525 Zotac ION-ITX-G: http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=47#ION-ITX-G
It is a chipset limitation. NM10 = High-speed storage interface supports faster transfer rate for improved data access with up to 2 SATA ports. 945GSE - ICH7-M = 2 SATA ports. The ones with more SATA ports are either ION boards or have extra JMicron controller (the Gigabyte and Jetway boards).
They still sell first gen ION stuff? Cool, get one of those. I was referring to the standard Intel only hardware. I'm not sure if the extra chipsets added to the ones like the Gigabyte board are supported: I haven't tested them and FreeBSD is notoriously picky. It doesn't like the Silicon Image SIL3114 card I have Faugusztin - last time I tested it NM10 was actually slower than the older ICH7-M at SATA
See for yourself : http://www.intel.com/products/Internet_device/chipsets/NM10/NM10-overview.htm I never had any NM10 stuff (only Atom 330+ION), so i didn't think about removing all the marketing bla-bla, i just tried to show Repo and Fingers66 that there are really no Atom boards with more than 2 SATA ports unless they got ION or extra SATA chip.
Oh, no, sorry I wasn't doubting you at all. I was just faking surprise 'that marketing shields the truth'
Right I have made a right royal cockup, I have this motherboard coming 'AOpen i965GMt-LA Core 2 Duo Mobile Mini-ITX' which is powered by a laptop style psu so can someone tell me how to power the 6 x 1.5TB hard drives
