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Re: Low cost, energy efficient home pc server?



 I decided on a Shuttle KPC.  It was $209 for the complete system   
(Intel Celeron 430 1.8Ghz  cpu, 80gb sata drive, 512mb ram, gigabit   
ethernet, 1 pci slot) INCLUDING shipping!  It comes with Foresight   
Linux.  I'll probably run FreeNAS on it with a SATA 4 port card.  Or   
swap it with another server...  If it works out, at this price it may   
be worth getting 1 or 2 more for dedicated servers. 

http://us.shuttle.com/kpc/index.htm

Any experience with Foresight Linux?  The system does not have a CD/ 
DVD so I will need to use USB to install anything like another distro. 

On Aug 4, 2008, at 10:15 PM, Matthew Gillen wrote: 

> Robert La Ferla wrote: 
>> I'm looking for recommendations for a small energy efficient PC to   
>> be used as a home NFS server: 
>> - Should run Linux 
>> - 2-3 PCI slots 
>> - SATA is a plus (especially if it can handle 4 external SATA   
>> drives, non-RAID is ok) 
>> - energy efficient 
>> - should be SFF (small-form factor) or mini-tower 
>> - VGA out 
>> - < $500 
> 
> I have two SFF boxes, one Shuttle and one ASUS.  They're both great   
> in terms of noise and power (both have Athlon64s with frequency   
> scaling). Running linux is almost never an issue unless you're   
> buying the absolute latest and greatest, in which case you   
> occasionally have to wait a bit for the nforce drivers to catch up.   
> But if you're going for cheap, you're buying slightly older stuff   
> anyway.  I got each for ~$200, sans CPU, memory, HD, etc.  I like   
> exactly the right stuff in my computers ;-) 
> 
> The 2-3 PCI slots might be tough to find on a SFF.  The good news is   
> nowadays all them have built in gigabit ethernet, so there's one   
> less slot you need for that...  I guess the question is: what do   
> envision needing PCI slots for?  In the old days, they were   
> essential for expansion, now most peripherals are USB or firewire   
> anyway... 
> 
> Some of the newer shuttle and ASUS boxes say they support eSATA, but   
> it's not clear to me whether you can multiplex a single eSATA jack   
> on the back of the computer into multiple external drives, a la   
> USB.  I'm guessing you can't.  Depending on what you want your PCI   
> slots for, you could use one (the only one?) for an eSATA card like   
> this http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3646095&amp;CatId=1455
> 
> You could also use firewire ports in conjunction with external drive   
> enclosures. 
> 
> HTH, 
> Matt 


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