Good Cheap Server - HP Proliant Microserver 4 BAY - OWNERS THREAD

steinooo said:
I think your main problem (if anything) with the superhub will be the wireless if you use it for that.

Weird about your hd streaming problem. On my PS3 you can press something which shows you the bitrate of the bluray, i've never seen it go much above 30Mbps so assume 100Mbps would be plenty. Unless something else strange is going on, like your previous device (615 is it?) didn't have the port speed settings set right or something? :confused:
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I've noticed the wireless is bait crap compared to the dr 615 with dd wrt firmware on it. I would have loved to have the superhub in modem mode but don't wanna pay £70 for a top of the range asus router. Il play around with the wireless settings tonight. If anyone has any more info why my 100mbs 615 kept buffeting on 1080p content (14gb) file size please let us know as the way I had it before was better as I could use open dns. Now I can't. LAN wise everything seems to be working fine with the hub.
 
Got mine running last night - XBMC plays BR rips @ 1080 without issue but the CPU is sitting at about 50%. Also noticed that I can't enable video hardware acceleration in WHS2011.

For those running WHS - how have you got on?
 
K@rl said:
Got mine running last night - XBMC plays BR rips @ 1080 without issue but the CPU is sitting at about 50%. Also noticed that I can't enable video hardware acceleration in WHS2011.

For those running WHS - how have you got on?
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About the same but hardware accelration can be enabled in XBMC just fine - wont work otherwise!
 
Thanks for that - just glad to know that its doing what it should be.

Still get some juddering when the movie is playing in the background behind the menu - but its not often I am even in that view.

Just need to run some external cat 5 down to my living room so I can make a proper home for it.
 
I currently have mine running next to my PC in the spare bedroom, but I'm thinking of moving it to my bedroom to use as a HTPC to save me having to buy anything else for there.

Will it be ok playing things via XBMC and streaming to the HTPC downstairs at the same time?

Is the HD 6450 the best card to get?
 
The 6450 seems to be a sound choice going by people on here and the XBMC forums.

Its low power, can deal with 1080 just fine and cheap.

Not sure about streaming to 2 different boxes at the same time - depends if the box can deal with the data transfer required for both. But realistically when will it be accessed by both boxes at the same time?
 
Not all the time, but it will happen. I'm sure it will be fine though, my HD TV Shows are only about 1.5GB MKV's so even if access is from the same hard drive that's not much.

K@rl said:
The 6450 seems to be a sound choice going by people on here and the XBMC forums.

Its low power, can deal with 1080 just fine and cheap.

Not sure about streaming to 2 different boxes at the same time - depends if the box can deal with the data transfer required for both. But realistically when will it be accessed by both boxes at the same time?
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What kind of data transfer speeds would one of these Microservers enable? Suggested scenario being from a desktop PC to the microserver hardwired via a gigabit switch.

Thanks
 
Mike1983 said:
What kind of data transfer speeds would one of these Microservers enable? Suggested scenario being from a desktop PC to the microserver hardwired via a gigabit switch.

Thanks
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You'll easily saturate the gigabit on normal file transfers..

I have mine as just basic NTFS single volumes, I can transfer internally at 110+ MB/s which is basically as quick as the drives will go, and over gigabit from one microserver to another, I get well over 80MB/s, normally to other PC's with slower HDD's, it might dip a little.. The CPU is just ticking over, I know internal reads can top 120MB's for single files, so it must be saturating the network..


They perform well for home use IMO, I do video/photo editing, and transfer stuff to/from the servers (always work on local copies for speed on my SSD equipped PC) all the time, performance has never been an issue..
 
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Demon said:
You'll easily saturate the gigabit on normal file transfers........
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So in summary they perform significantly better than an off the shelf NAS? I currently use a Thecus N3200PRO.

Are there any downsides to the Microserver, would you recommend I swap out the NAS for one of these? I'd be interested in using it as a file server / streaming and ftp.

Thanks
 
Mike1983 said:
So in summary they perform significantly better than an off the shelf NAS? I currently use a Thecus N3200PRO.

Are there any downsides to the Microserver, would you recommend I swap out the NAS for one of these? I'd be interested in using it as a file server / streaming and ftp.

Thanks
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Advantages Over A Consumer NAS
* Faster performance due to more memory and faster CPU.
* More flexible - can run whichever OS you want and could even re-use it for something completely different in the future.
* More expandable - can fit 4 hdd's internally, plus external drive(s).
* More interesting for those of us that like to tinker.
* Cheaper than a 4 bay NAS if you get £100 cashback.

Disadvantages Compared To A Consumer NAS
* Not quite as simple to setup and run. A consumer NAS wil be more plug-and-play.
* Slightly higher energy usage.
* Slightly noisier (but still very quiet).

If you are already happy with your current NAS then it's not worth swapping it out. But if you are looking for a new storage solution then I'd recommend one over a consumer NAS if you are happy that you may need to put in some time to set it up.
 
^ That sums it up well enough!!

The only real downside is in your ability to setup the OS (Whether the FreeNAS/UnRaid or other Linux/BSD type stuff), or WHS2011, or just plain old Windows XP etc..

It's just a PC at the end of the day..
 
Hades said:
Advantages Over A Consumer NAS
* Faster performance due to more memory and faster CPU........
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Thanks for the comprehensive reply.

I like to tinker with things and plan to have it in the loft so I don't see any real disadvantages there. Maybe pick one up in January.

Thanks
 
I have had my N36L for a number of months now and have Server 2008 on it and I have really only used it as a download server and for learning Server 2008.

Anyhow, I need to get more out of it and I want to connect it to one of my Pansonic 42inch Plasma's to watch HD mkv's.

What is the prefered video card that supports HDMI and can output at full hd to suit my plasma without issues or is that res pushing it?

I know nothing about XBMC so I want to play with that and really make it a media center. Is there a downside to using Server 2008 with XBMC or issues with any of the video cards you may suggest as I don't really want to ditch Server 2008.

Cheers.
 
Scream said:
I have had my N36L for a number of months now and have Server 2008 on it and I have really only used it as a download server and for learning Server 2008.

Anyhow, I need to get more out of it and I want to connect it to one of my Pansonic 42inch Plasma's to watch HD mkv's.

What is the prefered video card that supports HDMI and can output at full hd to suit my plasma without issues or is that res pushing it?

I know nothing about XBMC so I want to play with that and really make it a media center. Is there a downside to using Server 2008 with XBMC or issues with any of the video cards you may suggest as I don't really want to ditch Server 2008.

Cheers.
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You are in for a treat as an XBMC virgin :)

Server 2k8 with a cheap recommended Radeon should work fine from what I've read. I use XBMC live personally but plenty of people use Server 2k8 which I assume is similar kernel wise to WHS.
 
Does anyone know if one of these cheapo PCI-E SATA Cards would work?

BWL031_top.jpg


Wanting to stick 2 3.5" in the optical drive bay and a laptop drive for OS..
 
Right got one of these sitting here on the floor now along with 8GB of RAM.
Going to put on ESXI 5 and then a VM of Win Server 2008 R2 to run, AD DC, DHCP, DNS, (proberley will run a VPN server on here as well). Also a VM with Ubuntu server 10.04 running samba, PS3 media stream (or whatever it's called), sabNZBd, sickbeard (so a NAS box really). I think I could run both these with 2GB of RAM each and maybe 50GB of the HDD for Win2k8 and 100GB for NAS (will be buying some bigger hard drives for the NAS part once prices are better), does that all sound ok? (I've never really played with VM's before which is why I want to give it a go). Also will it be able to run another VM (or two :) ) as well and if so what would be worth looking at, if thats all it will be able to handle I might as well give each VM 4GB of RAM and be done with it.
 
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