775 board, help choosing :)

[qisback]

Hi,

New user here, but found this post via google. (double checks post date)

I have a increased need than yours, because I'm needing some where in the range of 40-50 SATA ports, however I though I'd throw the solution I've had for about a year into the works.

My old NAS system was a Headless Ubuntu system consisting of:

E6600
4GB Kingston Value
AB9 Pro (9 internal SATA, 1 eSATA)
2 x SATA PCIe 1x controllers (4 Port)
1 x Highpoint 2340 PCIe 8x controller (16 Port)
2 x Sil 25xx based cards (4 ports)

This ran:
2 x 16 - 500GB (SATA 300) disk RAID 6 Array
1 x 8 - 200GB (SATA 150) disk RAID 6 Array
1 x 2 - 160GB (SATA 300) disk RAID 1 Array (boot)

http://www2.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?fMTYPE=LGA775&pMODEL_NAME=AB9 Pro
Might suit your needs, AB9 Pro boards are £30 here in the UK. From what I can tell they clock quite well, although I don't clock it because of needing reliability for the RAID 6 parity calculations. I used to use it with the 9 internal and a eSATA to SATA cable (looped though a pci slot). The 1x PCIe cards where £25 each from ebay, and the Highpoint 2340 was £230ish from ebay as well.


for those who want to know http://tyan.com/product_board_detail.aspx?pid=541 is what I went for. (again an ebay jobbie, £132)

Hope the info helps

-={Q}=-

 

[Mussels]

thast the most sata ports of any recommended board so far.

 

[imperialreign]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131236

I know it's on newegg, but you can at least see specs

8 SATA, 2 eSATA at rear I/O, 2 PCIE 2.0 slots, 1 PCIE x1


and on the P5W DH Deluxe recomendation - good board, 5 SATA connectors, 1 SATA for an eSATA PCI panel, or another internal drive

 

[qisback]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131236

Might be a good motherboard but for what it is, it's WAYYYYYY over priced. £130ish is just not worth paying if all your going to do is stick HDD's in it, not unless it's like the tyan I've just brought which gives 16 connections on board and a vase array of expansion slots. (even new there only £200ish which is still worth it for a tyan)

From looking at your "Storage" system specs you seem to running some heavy hardware in there. Is there any particular reason for that, i.e. 2nd gaming rig etc.

I just think that personally a storage system shouldn't have anyone anywhere near it once it's up and running other than to put more drives in it of course.

Also why no raid? Thats a crap load of data to loose if a drive dies. Unless it's full of porn in which case it wouldn't take long to refill. You might want to consider a raid solution of some form just to give you a little protection.

Ubuntu + a stack of hard drives is a nice easy and effective way to set a storage system up.

-={Q}=-

 

[Mussels]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131236

Might be a good motherboard but for what it is, it's WAYYYYYY over priced. £130ish is just not worth paying if all your going to do is stick HDD's in it, not unless it's like the tyan I've just brought which gives 16 connections on board and a vase array of expansion slots. (even new there only £200ish which is still worth it for a tyan)

From looking at your "Storage" system specs you seem to running some heavy hardware in there. Is there any particular reason for that, i.e. 2nd gaming rig etc.

I just think that personally a storage system shouldn't have anyone anywhere near it once it's up and running other than to put more drives in it of course.

Also why no raid? Thats a crap load of data to loose if a drive dies. Unless it's full of porn in which case it wouldn't take long to refill. You might want to consider a raid solution of some form just to give you a little protection.

Ubuntu + a stack of hard drives is a nice easy and effective way to set a storage system up.

-={Q}=-

I dont use raid because its somewhat expensive to waste half my storage in raid 1, and raid 0 increases the risk of failure.
RAID on the mobo also has the problem, that the RAID is linked to the mobo - i dont like the idea of raid unless its on a dedicated card.

The hardware in it IS being downgraded soon enough, at one point it was the 2nd gaming rig (now the media PC has that role)

 

[qisback]

Ah I understand now, it's not a 2nd rig it's an old one.

As for RAID I use raid 6 because that way you loose 2 drives out of an any size array which means that the array it's self can drop 2 drives with no data loss.

So for the 16 drive arrays that I run, I get 14 usable drives but the safety that 2 drives could fail and still not loose any data. Might be worth looking into.

And as for the RAID being linked to the motherboard, most raid systems that are used create generic arrays. So there not necessary locked to that one motherboard. However I do understand your concern, I don't like using on-board RAID but my reasons is because on-board RAID controllers are actually software based, or hybrid. You can tell if it's software by the fact that you have to install drivers for them to actually work in windows, and Linux just sees through them to the individual devices.

I actually use software RAID which is controlled by the mdadm tool set in Linux, works great and is actually faster than running it on a hardware card because the resources these days of core computer components well exceed that which is on hardware RAID cards. a 2+ GHz CPU vs a 400MHz RAID controller CPU not much of a competition really is it? Another plus point is that even if the hardware dies the array will still work on any other system that has the mdadm tool kit available to it.

There are software RAID implementations for windows as well, however I can't comment on them because I've never used them really.

-={Q}=-