Help me figure out a low power Linux based server

__Tango · Post by **__Tango** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:41 pm

Hi folks.

I'm looking to create a new linux based home server (running CentOS5). The usage is mainly a file server, but will also be running VMWare Server with an XP guest to run quicken and some other relatively lightweight stuff.

I'm looking to make it as low power while providing enough oompf to serve files fast (i do photos and such so will be pushing around 20MB image files pretty regularly), and run the VMWare XP instance.

Here's what i think i've got so far: 2x1TB disks in Raid 1 (not sure about HW or SW yet). 1TB 3.5" disk because i just can't get the storage needed with 2.5" disks. I'm thinking Caviar Black disks. 4GB RAM.

I've been thinking of going with a E7200 but haven't figured out a mobo yet. i don't need any special graphics at all since it will essentially be a headless server sitting in my garage. But having onboard VGA is desirable. I do need it to have Gigabit Ethernet (preferrably two onboard nics but i guess i could put a nic card in for the second one).

Originally, i was thinking Atom 330. But after reading SPCR, i don't think that'd be enough power. Then i was thinking MoDT (Socket P something or other), but then after reading more SPCR, i saw references to how the E7200 + an energy efficient mobo is cheaper (by alot), has more power, and may be almost as energy efficient.

However, in reading even more SPCR, folks have been talking about AMD systems possibly being lower power for the chipset and/or system overall.

So now i'm completely confused.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 11:57 pm

All the AMD Athlons have virtualization support, while only the more expensive C2D (E8XXX and above) do. So, since you are planing to run VMWare, a low end X2 is almost certainly a better value. If you don't want to mess around with undervolting, get a 4X50e. If you don't mind trying to find a MB with decent undervolting support, a 5X00+ is an even better value.

I'd be surprised if you actually do enough file transfer to see a difference between a Caviar Black and a Caviar Blue. Meanwhile, the Blue is noticeably quieter. 2X the drives should exacerbate the difference.

rtamburo · Post by **rtamburo** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 12:00 am

Hello,

for my fileserver / VMWare Server Linux (Debian 4) I choose :

Antec P182 case
Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-DS2H
4x 1G DDR2 RAM 800 MHz (Corsair)
Phenom x4 9350e (underclocked @ 1GHz)
3 x 500GB WD Caviar SE16 (software RAID5)

The mainboard has 1 Gigabit port, and the 780G is fairly efficient.
Probably I will get a new PSU (80+) to replace my "old" Enermax

The Phenom x4 is good when using virtualization and for the software RAID5, and 9350e is still 65W max TDP.

Hope this helps !

Riccardo

__Tango · Post by **__Tango** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 12:33 am

rtamburo: Do you know how much power your system pulls at the wall during idle and during load?

Thanks!

__Tango · Post by **__Tango** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 12:50 am

jessekopelman wrote:All the AMD Athlons have virtualization support, while only the more expensive C2D (E8XXX and above) do. So, since you are planing to run VMWare, a low end X2 is almost certainly a better value.

Thanks jesse. the Virtualization support isn't that big of a deal for me. Like i mentioned, the XP instance is mainly used to run quicken (it's the only Windows app that i can't live without). It doesn't need to be a speed demon (it's currently running on a slower and much more power hungry machine).

jessekopelman wrote:If you don't want to mess around with undervolting, get a 4X50e. If you don't mind trying to find a MB with decent undervolting support, a 5X00+ is an even better value.

That's good to know. I have a couple of followup questions though:

How do these systems stack up against an E7200 system for power consumption
do you have any mobo recommendations that are currently available?

jessekopelman wrote:I'd be surprised if you actually do enough file transfer to see a difference between a Caviar Black and a Caviar Blue. Meanwhile, the Blue is noticeably quieter. 2X the drives should exacerbate the difference.

As for the difference between Caviar Black and Caviar Blue, i'll look into that. The Blue only gets as large as 750GB though. I'd like the 1TB for the extra space. Noise doesn't matter to me at this point because the server is going in my detached garage (currently, there's a 1U system out there...talk about noisy. Egads! But it doesn't bother me 'cuz i can't hear it unless i'm actually in the garage).

The disk speed is something that matters to me because like i mentioned, i'm a photographer, and offloading a couple of 2Gig CF cards full of RAW photos and then working with each of the images takes time, so the faster i can make it the better. Whether or not the Black vs. Blue makes a difference is unknown, but i'm staying away from the Green and other lower power 3.5" drives for that reason.

Thanks for your assistance!

vincentfox · Post by **vincentfox** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 10:47 am

I have a Fit-PC Slim and it works great for me.

http://www.fit-pc.com/new/whats-new.html

Total power consumption 4-5 Watts, small and silent. Dunno if the 512-meg version is enough to handle all your needs but it works great for mine. I am just running FreeRADIUS, Apache, Nagios3, lightweight admin server tasks not doing any file-serving so can't speak to it's performance there.

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 12:08 am

__Tango wrote: [*]How do these systems stack up against an E7200 system for power consumption

It's a tricky question to answer. The E7200 is more powerful than any Athlon X2 which means processor intensive tasks get done faster (ie less power used). Not only that, but peak power consumption is lower than all but the 45W Athlons and maybe even lower than those if you get a particularly good E7200. On the other hand, the X2s use less power at idle than the C2Ds. AMD socket motherboards also tend to use less power than Intel socket MB, especially when looking at non-gaming oriented MB. Most systems spend the vast majority of their time in an idle state or very close too it and that is where AMD wins hands down. By the way, for your tasks I see no reason to prefer E7X00 to E5X00, if you did go Intel. The only thing that could conceivably benefit from the E7X00 is vitualization, thanks to greater cache, and again AMD's virtualization support should make an even bigger difference. E5X00 and E7X00 have virtually identical power consumption.

If power consumption is your greatest consideration (beyond adequate performance), you should think hard about implementing Wake-On-LAN and letting the system sleep when not in use. That will save far more power than component optimization and it's free!

lm · Post by lm » Thu Jan 22, 2009 1:24 am

rtamburo wrote: 4x 1G DDR2 RAM 800 MHz (Corsair)

I'd rather go for 2x2GB so it's possible to upgrade later without having to throw away those 1GB sticks.

brucebertrand · Post by **brucebertrand** » Sun Jan 25, 2009 11:40 pm

vincentfox wrote:I have a Fit-PC Slim and it works great for me.

http://www.fit-pc.com/new/whats-new.html

Total power consumption 4-5 Watts, small and silent. Dunno if the 512-meg version is enough to handle all your needs but it works great for mine. I am just running FreeRADIUS, Apache, Nagios3, lightweight admin server tasks not doing any file-serving so can't speak to it's performance there.

vinventfox, I'm quite interested in the fit-pc's performance as a file server. Would you mind doing some quick file serving speed tests?

Could you time the transfer of a few files - say 10MB, 100MB, and 1GB - and post your results here? If you do, can you also include the basic specs of the client machine, and the method used to transfer (FTP, NFS, Samba, HTTP, etc...)

I think this info would be greatly appreciated by those looking for a low power and low noise server solution.

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 6:05 am

FitPC only holds an internal 2.5". That leaves you with USB if you want serious HDD capacity. About the best you can get over USB is 30MBps and it's more often around 15MBps. Then again, you are limited to 100Mbps Ethernet, so really you are talking about 10MBps max transfer speeds.

ShadowFaith · Post by **ShadowFaith** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 6:13 am

__Tango wrote: Thanks jesse. the Virtualization support isn't that big of a deal for me. Like i mentioned, the XP instance is mainly used to run quicken (it's the only Windows app that i can't live without). It doesn't need to be a speed demon (it's currently running on a slower and much more power hungry machine).

Rather try running Quicken with WINE... it consumes less CPU cycles... (no VM to run)

brucebertrand · Post by **brucebertrand** » Wed Jan 28, 2009 6:50 am

jessekopelman wrote:FitPC only holds an internal 2.5". That leaves you with USB if you want serious HDD capacity. About the best you can get over USB is 30MBps and it's more often around 15MBps. Then again, you are limited to 100Mbps Ethernet, so really you are talking about 10MBps max transfer speeds.

My concern is that the processor is so underpowered that it won't come close to utilizing the full 100Mbps bandwidth. Those running the OpenWRT distro on almost any off the shelf router hardware will see the lack of processor speed limit their disk to network throughput to about 20~30Mbps.

I'm just wondering if the Fit has a similar problem.

Arfa · Post by **Arfa** » Wed Jan 28, 2009 8:41 am

Current have an E7200 in an Asus P5K-VM mobo, 2Gb ram, with stock fan. PSU is a Seasonic 235W TFX. I'm just using the onboard Intel X3000 graphics card (not great) and have just a WD Scorpio 2.5" drive and M-Audio Audiophile 192 soundcard plugged in. I run Fedora 9. Whole lot tends to idle at about 45-48W ish. Never seen it go above 70W when pushed. Its very quiet too. In fact I'm getting more noise as background interference from the graphics card hosing the bus and sending a crackle through my amp, every time anything busy happens on screen! Keep meaning to grab a basic passive Nvidia card.