Same, but for £200 cashback.. Thinking about putting the cash into a PCI-Express Esata (with port multiplier) and 4-5 bay enclosure for each Microserver, any recommended cards and enclosures?
Good Cheap Server - HP Proliant Microserver 4 BAY - OWNERS THREAD
- Thread starter dragonuk
- Start date
Same, but for £200 cashback.. Thinking about putting the cash into a PCI-Express Esata (with port multiplier) and 4-5 bay enclosure for each Microserver, any recommended cards and enclosures?
What RPM is the fan spinning at and what temps are you seeing? I ask because the BIOS seems to run fans @ 30% which means a 1300RPM fan such as the Apache would be running at ~466RPM which (A) should be too slow and the BIOS will auto power off the server and (B) push temps up. Just interested in your findings.
Same trying to find a Sans Digital TowerRAID TR4M in europe ( These come with the esata controllers ) the only ones I have found so far are on ebay don't fancy paying £70 for the shipping
heatspreaders usually allow you to overclock as they run better at higher temps, but a server machine shouldn't be overclocked, and ordinary rams at stock speed perform the same heatspreader or not.
I got the Kingston HyperX Blu 2x4GB, seems pretty good for the price, and no, you dont need to remove the heatspreaders, with the Kingston HyperX Blu the HS does not add much to the heigth at all. Although, I wouldn't try putting a corsair XMS3 on it (they're really tall and unlikely to fit).
I made the same mistake I bought a pair of value rams from a competitor at around £52 delivered. Luckily one of the sticks was faulty so I had to return it back to them for a refund, and then the HyperX came on sale and I ordered a pair with akasa apache fans.
The Akasa Apache hasn't resulted in good performance for me. It has sent the temps up to 10 degrees.
It used to run idle on stock fans at a mere 37 degrees. With the change of fans I've got around 47 degrees at 30%.. I've now set the rate up to 100% and will check the temps again in an hours time..
There is a chance that I could be doing this wrong because setting the rate from 35%--> 100% hasn't made any increase in noise at all.
I'm using speedfan.
It used to run idle on stock fans at a mere 37 degrees. With the change of fans I've got around 47 degrees at 30%.. I've now set the rate up to 100% and will check the temps again in an hours time..
There is a chance that I could be doing this wrong because setting the rate from 35%--> 100% hasn't made any increase in noise at all.
I'm using speedfan.
Associate
- Joined
- 10 Apr 2011
- Posts
- 1,763
- Location
- Burnham On Sea
speedfan cant control the fan I think you will find due to the non standard pin config
Can anyone confirm what graphics card they are able to put in the Micro-Server?
This is what I am currently planning (if anyone can advise if I am doing something wrong)
1 x HP Micro-Server
1 x Kingston HyperX Blu 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz (removing stock memory stick)
1 x Adaptec 2450 RAID Card in Pcie x 16
1 x Low profile Graphics card in Pcie x 1 to handle both video (1080P) and Sound over HDMI.
Any recommendations on a gfx card that you guys have installed and how is this running for you?
4 x 2TB drives hopefully in RAID 1+0
Cheers, and ideally if you guys can post your specs of what you have running it would help us noobs out greatly
This is what I am currently planning (if anyone can advise if I am doing something wrong)
1 x HP Micro-Server
1 x Kingston HyperX Blu 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz (removing stock memory stick)
1 x Adaptec 2450 RAID Card in Pcie x 16
1 x Low profile Graphics card in Pcie x 1 to handle both video (1080P) and Sound over HDMI.
Any recommendations on a gfx card that you guys have installed and how is this running for you?
4 x 2TB drives hopefully in RAID 1+0
Cheers, and ideally if you guys can post your specs of what you have running it would help us noobs out greatly
Thanks
I think the heat issue could be easily solved and further silenced by installing a passive PSU.
It's sort of ridiculous that the microserver makes so much noise for what it is, I have an equally matched laptop, SU7300 CULV laptop which is practically silent, it has an internal fan that rarely turns on.
It should have the same PSU as a laptop, but instead it's kitted up with this noisy PSU, that sounds like a tower PSU.
I came across another even better solution, picopsu, google it. It's basically laptop power, the brick is kept outsiide the case keeping it cool, and stopping it from heating up the inside of the microserver (thus keeping core temps down)..
There's a minimal amount of cabelling to delivery power to the mobo and one drive, I believe the power is devlivered to all 4 drives using a splitter as well. problem solved.
I have the Akasa apache which is very quiet, but now the PSU makes helluva lot of noise, I put a screwdriver to prevent the PSU fan spinning and boooted up, and can't hear a damn thing, pull the screwdiver out, and the loud humming nise is back on.
Adaptec Card will be fine I have a 3405 in mine at the minute. A friend has the normal unit and we have compared numbers the Adaptec is better but surprisingly the onboard is very good, Although limited by the Raid Array Choice.
Good luck with finding a Graphics card though PCIE x 1 are scarce with enough power to achieve what you want. In fact I dont believe I know of one. You will need something like a 5450 up which is x16.
So you will have to leave the Adaptec card out and put the graphics card in. I am installing one next week for a customer I will post my findings.
Also dont buy Seagate Barracuda LP 2TB ST2000DL003 Hard Drives. They dont play well with the adaptec every time it builds te array they fail soon after and start rebuilding as I found at my cost had to send them all back and buy Samsung F4 instead which work.
@tiger
Regarding the noise. Remember its a server from a reputable company known for their realiabilty. Making some very good servers. This one is made in the same fashion, and I am amazed at the build quality of such a small unit its price point. Its noisy for a reason 4 disks which would normally be enterprise 7200rpm need proper cooling to remain realiable.
The PicoPsu I have looked at also matched with a FSP power block would be a very good solution and very efficient power wise also. My friend has found that the power supply fan is a lot of the noise, and has removed the fan from the psu and mounted it inside in front of the grill. This is near the hotter parts of the PSU and cools as well, but the sound of the fan is quieter this way. might be worth trying. He also has bought the Apache fan.
Last edited:
I'm getting a 160w picopsu, and maybe a 120w power block. I ordered the 160w pico from the US, as all UK retailers were out of stock, one was expecting on 12th July.
The pico is too tall for the microserver, so you need a 24pin extension, which is great because I want to move the tiny psu to the now vacant PSU cage inside the tower.
Regarding the FSP brick, it's upwards of £40, that's before delivery fees. IMO. Way too much. I've looked into getting some 12V x 10A = 120W power bricks designed for LCD TVs, IMO, they should perform just as well, and I would image LCD power bricks were designed to stay on for long periods of times, maybe indefinitely in some cases.
With the benefit of hindsight, I don't think the Microserver is a paticularly sweet deal, I think after cashback it's a fair price, given that I've already bought brand new RAM, Fans, Power block. Will probably replace the stock HD at some point with a larger capacity one. The only two bits I'd keep would be the mobo and case.. Worth £130? Just about..
Although that's only the value to me, because the mods are necessary to make it super silent for a bedroom.
Last edited:
The Microserver is a very sweet deal with the cashback, it's sold as a small office server not as a super silent server I think you need to consider your product requirements before buying things that aren't suited to what you need then trying to blame the product....
Associate
- Joined
- 4 Jul 2006
- Posts
- 211
Are you getting audio out of that card too? or are you using a separate sound card?
I've mine sitting here in a box since Monday. Haven't had time to get it out 
and when I do tomorrow, I don't know what to put on it.
Any suggestions as to what to put on it? I like to experiment so the only thing it must do is be able to share media to users around the house but I guess they all can do that.
and when I do tomorrow, I don't know what to put on it.Any suggestions as to what to put on it? I like to experiment so the only thing it must do is be able to share media to users around the house but I guess they all can do that.
As above, freenas, although if you want more out of it then maybe freenas isnt the best way to go, I run Server 2008 R2 off mine, however I guess WHS could be a good option, if you want free then maybe try another form of Linux distro which will give you a bit of manoeuvrability over FreeNAS