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Case looks surprisingly good. 
Sr Vr. The ACME server.
- Thread starter ALXAndy
- Start date
haha yeah I was surprised
Next week I should be able to build it. Fighting the SAS controller ATM. Get it wrong and the driver kills Windows lol.
Next week I should be able to build it. Fighting the SAS controller ATM. Get it wrong and the driver kills Windows lol.
Smogsy - cheers dude. Yeah, tbh it's not really workable in a server environment tbh. There's no cooling basically.
Semple - if I rack mounted it it would have no cooling at all. If you put the rails back on that's it, sides are totally blocked. Plus I don't have room for a rack.
I'm currently working out what does/doesn't work. However, look at the back there there's a door. That opens up to a crawl space that goes around 35ft all along my flat. It's going in there. Very well insulated, and always freezing cold in there.
My main room is a kitchen/diner/living room. 6m long by about 4m wide. At one end it tapers because I am in the roof, so the door wall there is 1m. Then I have a 4x4m bedroom, large bathroom etc. For me? it's ideal because it's easy to clean.
Sadly the 16 port SAS card is a no go. Drivers are old, and from 2013. Most report it still works, but all on AMD say it doesn't, which is my finding. You install the driver, it hangs, then kills Windows 10. Literally kills it stone dead beyond repair. 10 hours of messing with it yesterday and I gave up.
Going to need a more modern SAS card, but I have my eye on one. The Revodrive however works beautifully.
Semple - if I rack mounted it it would have no cooling at all. If you put the rails back on that's it, sides are totally blocked. Plus I don't have room for a rack.
I'm currently working out what does/doesn't work. However, look at the back there there's a door. That opens up to a crawl space that goes around 35ft all along my flat. It's going in there. Very well insulated, and always freezing cold in there.
My main room is a kitchen/diner/living room. 6m long by about 4m wide. At one end it tapers because I am in the roof, so the door wall there is 1m. Then I have a 4x4m bedroom, large bathroom etc. For me? it's ideal because it's easy to clean.
Sadly the 16 port SAS card is a no go. Drivers are old, and from 2013. Most report it still works, but all on AMD say it doesn't, which is my finding. You install the driver, it hangs, then kills Windows 10. Literally kills it stone dead beyond repair. 10 hours of messing with it yesterday and I gave up.
Going to need a more modern SAS card, but I have my eye on one. The Revodrive however works beautifully.
so yeh from memory i fit a 90/120mm delta fan in the front & then i removed backplates so it had Forced air flow
with stock cooler on a 8700K And a 460GTX CPu temp was 71C at 100% load in stress test & gpu was 65C
strange components in a server rack BUT at the time we had no budget so i built rack workstation out of spare parts They lasted 8 years of 24/7 The things that broke first where corsair crap Power supplies
with stock cooler on a 8700K And a 460GTX CPu temp was 71C at 100% load in stress test & gpu was 65C
strange components in a server rack BUT at the time we had no budget so i built rack workstation out of spare parts They lasted 8 years of 24/7 The things that broke first where corsair crap Power supplies
I'm hopeful the CPU temps won't be that bad. It's literally air in, through the cooler and out. We'll see though. I don't mind down clocking the CPU to Epyc levels if I have to.
After another couple of hours of digging my head was really starting to hurt over the SAS card. I'm waaaay out of my depth. Like, I just don't know what the heck is what in servers any more. Until 2004? that was all I used. After that I moved out of the IT game and yeah, not really had a need for being up on it.
I had a Adaptec 6gb card. Problem is? only one port so 4 drives. That said, I decided to play with it any way as if I ended up getting a larger Adaptec card or two I would need to know what I am doing. Set it to JBOD, booted into Windows. Was seeing the two 1tb SATA SSDs as 2gb drives. Erm. Went back into the RAID bios, set them up as simple volumes. Booted into Windows, same. Fork.
In the end I attempted to format one in the RAID bios. After four hours I gave up. However, when I went into Windows there it was all of a sudden FFS. So I did the same to the second one, let it run for about 5 minutes then rebooted and sure enough Windows saw it properly. Gawd knows. However, this thing takes aaaaaaages to boot. Especially with the Revo in there on its own RAID sorta bios too. Then I remembered.... My NAS !! I had all of this crap before with Adaptec, before realising FreeNAS wouldn't work on it no matter what. Which was a must, as it uses ZFS. However ! what I did learn through all of that is that Dell Perc H200 are the bees knees. Cheap, easy to flash into IT mode, no slow as balls RAID bios and support everything.
So I made an offer of £30 on two of those on the fleabay and they are on the way soon. Orsum !
Nice thing is if I ever decide to go with FreeNAS or the other NAS that uses ZFS? I can. Plus that was by far the cheapest solution too. For a really decent RAID card.
After another couple of hours of digging my head was really starting to hurt over the SAS card. I'm waaaay out of my depth. Like, I just don't know what the heck is what in servers any more. Until 2004? that was all I used. After that I moved out of the IT game and yeah, not really had a need for being up on it.
I had a Adaptec 6gb card. Problem is? only one port so 4 drives. That said, I decided to play with it any way as if I ended up getting a larger Adaptec card or two I would need to know what I am doing. Set it to JBOD, booted into Windows. Was seeing the two 1tb SATA SSDs as 2gb drives. Erm. Went back into the RAID bios, set them up as simple volumes. Booted into Windows, same. Fork.
In the end I attempted to format one in the RAID bios. After four hours I gave up. However, when I went into Windows there it was all of a sudden FFS. So I did the same to the second one, let it run for about 5 minutes then rebooted and sure enough Windows saw it properly. Gawd knows. However, this thing takes aaaaaaages to boot. Especially with the Revo in there on its own RAID sorta bios too. Then I remembered.... My NAS !! I had all of this crap before with Adaptec, before realising FreeNAS wouldn't work on it no matter what. Which was a must, as it uses ZFS. However ! what I did learn through all of that is that Dell Perc H200 are the bees knees. Cheap, easy to flash into IT mode, no slow as balls RAID bios and support everything.
So I made an offer of £30 on two of those on the fleabay and they are on the way soon. Orsum !
Nice thing is if I ever decide to go with FreeNAS or the other NAS that uses ZFS? I can. Plus that was by far the cheapest solution too. For a really decent RAID card.
OK. Been quietly plugging away when I feel like it. Got to a point where there really isn't anything else I can do.
After doing a lot of research it seems that the cloud software needs Linux. Either through Linux or a VM, no matter what. It does not function under Windows on its own.
I would have gone down the Linux rabbit hole (and will) but sadly it seems the 7300 GT is dead. What I mean is it works in Windows with no driver loaded, but if you go into Linux it installs a driver (which Windows doesn't have) and is garbled really badly. Due to this I can not work on it. Mostly because I am using a 7" screen. Maybe if I had it plugged into a better monitor or my TV I could get around that, but I really don't see the point in struggling for the sake of it.
As such I decided to focus my energy on other things. Like sorting out the PSU. I don't need many SATA connectors (maybe four?) but as of right now they were on Molex to SATA runs. Which are a real pain to plug in, and mean you need two lots of cable to do one task. Also, I decided to basically not use any extensions as they are not needed and the case doesn't have a hidey hole for left over wire.
Thankfully this PSU came with a set of connectors and a whole buttload of pins. You could basically get your own wire and remake every thing it uses. As such I removed the Molex ends from the SATA cables, and changed those to PSU connectors. I also found a Molex run (I didn't have any and was using red ones I made) which had a floppy connector on the end. I removed that and added a 5th Molex, which should be enough to power everything (the back planes use molex, so that's three). Any way, like I said I also decided to ditch the silver and red cables. So yesterday I got to that.
When I was done I was left with this.
Which is much, much better. The only other black braided cable other than the two SATA runs is the 4 pin (board needs 8+4) which I also had to make because the PSU only comes with 8 pin connectors and they don't split.
Am currently working to obtain a new fan for the PSU. It's cheap, flimsy and noisy and has developed a rattle. Am trying to get a Noctua, but it has to be a 3 pin so I have had to bid on a couple. If that falls through I will go with something else.
After doing a lot of research it seems that the cloud software needs Linux. Either through Linux or a VM, no matter what. It does not function under Windows on its own.
I would have gone down the Linux rabbit hole (and will) but sadly it seems the 7300 GT is dead. What I mean is it works in Windows with no driver loaded, but if you go into Linux it installs a driver (which Windows doesn't have) and is garbled really badly. Due to this I can not work on it. Mostly because I am using a 7" screen. Maybe if I had it plugged into a better monitor or my TV I could get around that, but I really don't see the point in struggling for the sake of it.
As such I decided to focus my energy on other things. Like sorting out the PSU. I don't need many SATA connectors (maybe four?) but as of right now they were on Molex to SATA runs. Which are a real pain to plug in, and mean you need two lots of cable to do one task. Also, I decided to basically not use any extensions as they are not needed and the case doesn't have a hidey hole for left over wire.
Thankfully this PSU came with a set of connectors and a whole buttload of pins. You could basically get your own wire and remake every thing it uses. As such I removed the Molex ends from the SATA cables, and changed those to PSU connectors. I also found a Molex run (I didn't have any and was using red ones I made) which had a floppy connector on the end. I removed that and added a 5th Molex, which should be enough to power everything (the back planes use molex, so that's three). Any way, like I said I also decided to ditch the silver and red cables. So yesterday I got to that.
When I was done I was left with this.
Which is much, much better. The only other black braided cable other than the two SATA runs is the 4 pin (board needs 8+4) which I also had to make because the PSU only comes with 8 pin connectors and they don't split.
Am currently working to obtain a new fan for the PSU. It's cheap, flimsy and noisy and has developed a rattle. Am trying to get a Noctua, but it has to be a 3 pin so I have had to bid on a couple. If that falls through I will go with something else.
Right, decided to go a different route on the fan regardless of whether I win the Noctua.
One main reason, getting it to work. The fan in the PSU has a non fan connector on. 3 wire, RPM, power and ground. It's also pretty short, meaning I would need to cut up the fan cable on the Noctua or whatever else and solder on the connector. With this? it has a connector about 40mm out of the fan. Meaning all I need to do is solder the wire from the Enermax fan to a fan extension. Meaning less soldering, and a much tidier solution without wrecking the fan itself.
I've also ordered an alu mesh filter/frame.
Right now the PSU has a two piece assembly on it. A sort of normal 140mm silver grille and a surround piece.
Which should replace both of those and offer filtration. Not that it needs much as the air it will be using is already filtered, but more to stop anything creeping through the PSU and ending up inside the PC. I will filter it at the back too, but any isolation "zones" will be better.
One main reason, getting it to work. The fan in the PSU has a non fan connector on. 3 wire, RPM, power and ground. It's also pretty short, meaning I would need to cut up the fan cable on the Noctua or whatever else and solder on the connector. With this? it has a connector about 40mm out of the fan. Meaning all I need to do is solder the wire from the Enermax fan to a fan extension. Meaning less soldering, and a much tidier solution without wrecking the fan itself.
I've also ordered an alu mesh filter/frame.
Right now the PSU has a two piece assembly on it. A sort of normal 140mm silver grille and a surround piece.
Which should replace both of those and offer filtration. Not that it needs much as the air it will be using is already filtered, but more to stop anything creeping through the PSU and ending up inside the PC. I will filter it at the back too, but any isolation "zones" will be better.
Right. Realised yesterday the cables on the PSU are mostly too long. Not the Molex and SATA etc, but mostly the heavy duty ones. So I spent the entire day shortening them.
Now they won't need to be stuffed in and coiled up. I left this morning, so it was like my birthday when I got here.
Now they won't need to be stuffed in and coiled up. I left this morning, so it was like my birthday when I got here.
So finally some fun time. Not cutting wires and crimping on pins.
Mum was right, they are bloody heavy.
They look amazing though. Very "nessy" which matches the decals I made.
Trial fitted the thin fans.
Which don't even reach where the board will be.
Made sure the 80mm filter would fit.
It will. Had a look over the 140mm Eloop.
This is why I got this over a Noctua.
All I need to do is cut the fan wire off the fan in there and wire it to a male connector, of which I have about 200. That's no joke either.
All I need now is one of those cheesy 80's keyrings that says "My other PC has a 3090Ti in it"
Mum was right, they are bloody heavy.
They look amazing though. Very "nessy" which matches the decals I made.
Trial fitted the thin fans.
Which don't even reach where the board will be.
Made sure the 80mm filter would fit.
It will. Had a look over the 140mm Eloop.
This is why I got this over a Noctua.
All I need to do is cut the fan wire off the fan in there and wire it to a male connector, of which I have about 200. That's no joke either.
All I need now is one of those cheesy 80's keyrings that says "My other PC has a 3090Ti in it"
Soldato
Nice. Brings back memories of pinching a paperclip from stationary when they inevitably couldn't find the key for the server or the rack. A lot of them had one tied to the back of the server for just that reason.
Will leave one key in a safe place at home. Other I will keep on my key ring. TBH they're just basic arcade machine locks. Very easy to pick.
Tomorrow I am going to cut out the lid to allow for full fan clearance. That's about the only crappy job left to do so I may as well get it out of the way.
I'm glad the planes weren't full depth. If they were they would have gone up right next to the board, meaning no room for cables to go down there.
Tomorrow I am going to cut out the lid to allow for full fan clearance. That's about the only crappy job left to do so I may as well get it out of the way.
I'm glad the planes weren't full depth. If they were they would have gone up right next to the board, meaning no room for cables to go down there.
Right, that's that crappy part out of the way. It was just as I expected. Jigsaw jumping around like zebedee when I turned the corners and really made me not very calm.
Decided against using the Quadro FX4800. It's a bit of a power guzzler, and uses up two slots. Spent hours and hours doing research as I don't want it to run games, but wanted something that behaves itself.
It's a Quadro K4000 3gb. In other words it's a GTX 660ish, clocked lower, with 3gb of VRAM. Meaning it will be cool, quiet and well behaved. Unlike the equivalent of a GTX 280.
Was £50. I will probably save that in leccy in a couple of months the way things are going.
It's a Quadro K4000 3gb. In other words it's a GTX 660ish, clocked lower, with 3gb of VRAM. Meaning it will be cool, quiet and well behaved. Unlike the equivalent of a GTX 280.
Was £50. I will probably save that in leccy in a couple of months the way things are going.
Soldato
Looking like a fun project, I especially like the use of the industrial style vents for the fans, cheap and reasonably effective. How much did you get the 4x 2.5" to 5.25" adapter bays for? Used a butt load of the ICY Dock ones, and they are great but the 40mm fans that are fitted to them are NOOOOIIISSYYY! So much so I replaced them with some Noctua's for one of the builds I did.
Totally off topic, have you had that TAG McLaren audio gear since new?
Totally off topic, have you had that TAG McLaren audio gear since new?
Hifi first. God no I'm not rich
That started out because my cousin is an a$$hole lmao. I keep telling him about my autistic traits and thus don't offer me any gear. About two years back he brings down the AV pre. Like, doesn't ask me or anything just brings it down. He was selling on behalf of a mutual friend, £180. With the remote, manuals, original box and in pristine nick.
Rotten git. That was where it all started ffs. Next thing I knew I bought a 60p, then another one, then a 100p, and the 60i (which can be used in either power or int). That will go into the rack soon with some Sonus Faber. But yeah that turned out to be an expensive spiral LOL. I did get some killer deals though. The front speakers are Revel M5 and I got them for £700, well under half price. I also made sure to only buy them with all of the original boxes, accessories, paperwork etc. So now I have an entire walk in closet full of bloody Tag boxes FFS.
Thankfully I've not seen him for a while. Or that would end badly
I got the bays from China. Having looked around and seen how expensive the Icy Dock ones are (about £150 each) I got them for £38 each. Which I thought was bad. Only today when I went back they have gone up £15 each. I really hate ordering stuff from China, but paying close to £500 was ridiculous. They're really nice. Nearly all metal, and when you release the spring loaded trays they make a really satisfying clunk.
OK, so the penultimate spend. £10.
All this time I've been failing to remember that once it goes into its home I will have no rear access at all.
The next thing will be to basically buy a 3.5" large drive (Ironwolf or something) that can have the whole lot backed up to once a week.
I'm not rich That started out because my cousin is an a$$hole lmao. I keep telling him about my autistic traits and thus don't offer me any gear. About two years back he brings down the AV pre. Like, doesn't ask me or anything just brings it down. He was selling on behalf of a mutual friend, £180. With the remote, manuals, original box and in pristine nick.
Rotten git. That was where it all started ffs. Next thing I knew I bought a 60p, then another one, then a 100p, and the 60i (which can be used in either power or int). That will go into the rack soon with some Sonus Faber. But yeah that turned out to be an expensive spiral LOL. I did get some killer deals though. The front speakers are Revel M5 and I got them for £700, well under half price. I also made sure to only buy them with all of the original boxes, accessories, paperwork etc. So now I have an entire walk in closet full of bloody Tag boxes FFS.
Thankfully I've not seen him for a while. Or that would end badly
I got the bays from China. Having looked around and seen how expensive the Icy Dock ones are (about £150 each) I got them for £38 each. Which I thought was bad. Only today when I went back they have gone up £15 each. I really hate ordering stuff from China, but paying close to £500 was ridiculous. They're really nice. Nearly all metal, and when you release the spring loaded trays they make a really satisfying clunk.
OK, so the penultimate spend. £10.
All this time I've been failing to remember that once it goes into its home I will have no rear access at all.
The next thing will be to basically buy a 3.5" large drive (Ironwolf or something) that can have the whole lot backed up to once a week.
GPU came. Didn't realise the whole cooler assembly was metal, it's quite heavy tbh.
Got an idea for stabilising the plane. Will get onto that later.
My buddy sent me three SSDs.
So a huge shout out for that ! Then, after doing up a lot of screws.
Should hold a copy of COD
Got an idea for stabilising the plane. Will get onto that later.
My buddy sent me three SSDs.
So a huge shout out for that ! Then, after doing up a lot of screws.
Should hold a copy of COD
Soldato
Yeah I think that is quite a good price for the China ones, the ICY Docks that do 6x 2.5" are ~£75 if you shop around "ICY DOCK ExpressCage MB326SP-B" not that you need them any more.
Hifi first. God no
Great way to get a hold of the gear cheap though, the way you did it, not buying new.
Should hold a copy of COD
Not a chance.
I didn't find those. That said I would have wanted to populate all of them (OCD) and thus that would have gotten really expensive Still, they also cost double the price I paid or there abouts so I'm happy.
The stereo took me two years. The front speakers and stands were new, just bought in sales. The rear speakers were on sale too (Quad with the ribbon tweeter). Just the waiting game really. I suppose stereo gear is as bad as an investment as most cars, as you never get the money you paid back if you buy new. Well, unless it's something mad exotic that is.
I also bought a set of Sonus Faber Principia III? something like that. They are the same as Chameleon B just cheaper cabinet construction. They sounded really good, but quite heavy on the bass and the vocals were nothing compared to the Revel. That was what I bought the whole system based on really. Sub is an Earthquake Couch Potato. Doesn't have the nicest cabinet but the driver and amp are very meaty. That said I am going to put the Fabers on desk stands and put them in front of the Revel (using the 60i) and see how it sounds. More like a floor stander I would imagine, but when I listen to them separately I can't help but think they would offer everything together if that makes sense. Good thing is with them on separate amps I can just switch between them really easy !
Yeah I was laughing at the COD thing. Like when you think about it 400gb or so seems pathetic in gaming terms. Thing is it will be all FLAC albums and movies. Most of my movies are like, 1.2gb or there abouts. So that's an awful lot of music and movies tbh. Then again I do have about 4tb in other SSDs too......
Just thrown out an offer on some 180gb Intel SSDs. Cheap like. If accepted that will fill every slot. If I then want to make a span larger I can just replace a drive and send the DATA back from the 3.5" drive. Which I may or may not have mentioned. There will be like, a 6tb Ironwolf or something equivalent in there too. I will grab a script to send a weekly backup from the spans onto that.
Still, they also cost double the price I paid or there abouts so I'm happy.The stereo took me two years. The front speakers and stands were new, just bought in sales. The rear speakers were on sale too (Quad with the ribbon tweeter). Just the waiting game really. I suppose stereo gear is as bad as an investment as most cars, as you never get the money you paid back if you buy new. Well, unless it's something mad exotic that is.
I also bought a set of Sonus Faber Principia III? something like that. They are the same as Chameleon B just cheaper cabinet construction. They sounded really good, but quite heavy on the bass and the vocals were nothing compared to the Revel. That was what I bought the whole system based on really. Sub is an Earthquake Couch Potato. Doesn't have the nicest cabinet but the driver and amp are very meaty. That said I am going to put the Fabers on desk stands and put them in front of the Revel (using the 60i) and see how it sounds. More like a floor stander I would imagine, but when I listen to them separately I can't help but think they would offer everything together if that makes sense. Good thing is with them on separate amps I can just switch between them really easy !
Yeah I was laughing at the COD thing. Like when you think about it 400gb or so seems pathetic in gaming terms. Thing is it will be all FLAC albums and movies. Most of my movies are like, 1.2gb or there abouts. So that's an awful lot of music and movies tbh. Then again I do have about 4tb in other SSDs too......
Just thrown out an offer on some 180gb Intel SSDs. Cheap like. If accepted that will fill every slot. If I then want to make a span larger I can just replace a drive and send the DATA back from the 3.5" drive. Which I may or may not have mentioned. There will be like, a 6tb Ironwolf or something equivalent in there too. I will grab a script to send a weekly backup from the spans onto that.