Any Dell R510 users?

Darryn

Darryn

Darryn

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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Colne.... Up Norf.
Hi guys, a bit of a long shot and probably a few noob questions.

Ive currently got a pair of HP N30L Microservers, both with 5x 3tb HDDs, I use Freenas on one full of my media which my HTPC and audio gear stream from. I use Windows HomeServer on the other, which runs SabNZB, backup software and a few other Windows only apps I need to run. The WHS has basically a full backup of the Freenas contents, as most of the media are my own dvd/bluray rips that I wouldn't want to waste the time re-ripping but aren't hugely important.

Both run headless and both are pretty much maxed out and I'm considering upgrading to a single dedicated server, I've had quotes of £600 for a refurb Dell R510 with a pair of L5520 Xeons, 16gb ram, a H700i RAID and 12 empty hot swap 3.5" sata caddies.

I've currently got ~15TB of usable space, with the backup method I'm currently using, with the same 10x 3TB drives in a single Raid6/60 array I've got 24TB and 2drive failure redundancy.

I know its a 2U server, I've got space and cabling to install it out of sight, so I'm not too bothered by the size and potential noise, ideally Id want to stick an SSD in, Windows on, Home server I know, but 7/8 if they do all the same things. Then 12x 3tb drives in a hardware raid array with some level of redundancy.

So, my questions;

Has anyone used a Dell R510 or H700i and are they suitable for my needs?

Is £600 a reasonable price for the spec i quoted above?

Is Windows an option? Ive been away from Windows for a long time being an Apple user, from what I've read theres a lot of talk about Virtual machines, is there any benefit to using them instead of just a native Windows install?

Any stumbling blocks I've not considered?

Thanks for reading, Darryn.
 
keep in mind that enterprise hardware such as an r510 /610 and 710 or the 20's will all uses SAS drives and not SATA making it expensive to put SSD's in them.
 
The seller has assured me that my existing SATA HDDs will drop in no problem... is it just SSDs that wont work?
 
SATA drives are absolutely compatible. SAS has some better error correction, and better early warning of impending failure but connection wise they are compatible.

I'm curious on your source for SAS drives being in decline, Archeum. Is it just because SSD drives are squeezing them?
 
Thanks Archeum and Little_Crow, just the answers I needed and hoped for, for a home server Im more than happy with Desktop and NAS grade hardware. :)
 
Little_Crow said:
SATA drives are absolutely compatible. SAS has some better error correction, and better early warning of impending failure but connection wise they are compatible.

I'm curious on your source for SAS drives being in decline, Archeum. Is it just because SSD drives are squeezing them?
Click to expand...


like wise as i install servers daily.
 
Off the top of my head the H700i will take either SAS or SATA drives, you can't mix them. You may struggle to run it in JBOD mode, if it's something you need to do then consider flashing the card with LSI firmware.
 
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