A newbie and not knowing where to start.

[WI_Hedgehog]

Now that I have a second. About to go blow snow for 6 hours. I'm thinking a single cpu system for now sounds like a better idea for me then a dual cpu based system. My untrained and zero experience brain is telling me that a second cpu is pretty much useless for a file sharing Minecraft system. I am open to being wrong about this.

So C602 vs C612 is just cpu and ram? If so, that's about what I was thinking. In a overly simplified nutshell.

Just to pick your brain. If you were to pick one of those boards, what would be your strongest recommendation and a brief why please. I'm in entirely new waters for me and looking for guidance. Also, why is the ecc mem listed with specific board models? I don't see that in consumer grade stuff and it has my attention.

Cooling. How do you keep the cpu's cool if its not in a rack mount system? Can these be, for example, watercooled? My current one is and in a custom wooden enclosure. It'll be in a Minnesota basement. So, cooling it shouldn't be, fingers crossed, a big problem.

And a fyi. I'm not expecting to have this up and running for about 6 months. I do hope to have stuff ordered and tested out by then. The whole "make sure the hardware works first" thing and play with the software a lot before I move all saved stuff over. This is a whole new journey. So, slow and steady.

Minecraft is a single-thread server, so a single CPU for home use is fine. $$$ wise, you're farther ahead in your build with 1 screaming fast CPU vs. 2 slower CPUs. If Mincraft was multi-threaded that situation would be different, but it is not. Now, if you're spinning up a bunch of Virtual Machines running 17 Minecraft servers, that's a different scenario.

The Intel C612 Chipset uses less power, is smaller/faster, and supports newer hardware than the C602, such as USB 3.0 (vs. 2.0). The other bigger differences are CPU and memory support. The memory probably isn't that concerning given the price/performance, but the CPU of course is.

ECC isn't typically found on consumer-grade equipment. I deal with this all the time at work where people running large Excel spreadsheets have RAM errors and corrupt the sheets--they really need to be on workstations with ECC, but management "didn't see the need" until last week when they put 15 hours (or more, who knows) into writing a spreadsheet that corrupted; fortunately they had saved it only on their USB thumb drive so there are no network backups to recover and they can now see the issue as it appears they missed an important tax deadline. (Irony is a dish best served cold, in large portions.) (ECC post)

We usually keep CPUs cool by putting 5 small dots of thermal compound on them and attaching a tall heatsink with heatpipes and fins, no fan. Server cases tend to have enough directed airflow to keep the heatsink cool. This is far different than on a gaming rig, and far more reliable. We do not overclock CPUs because electron tunneling makes CPUs highly unreliable.

Slow and steady will save you a bunch of money and frustration; good idea.

 

[Griffey]

Is the "certified" ram really a thing? I'm looking at it and not sure if it necessary or not. I picked the X9SRL-F and curious if the ram can just be of size, speed, capacity and reg ecc. I was watching a few on Ebay and somebody shot me a deal on one. So, why not.

 

[jgreco]

Is the "certified" ram really a thing?

Yes. And so is branded.

I'm looking at it and not sure if it necessary or not.

It's not necessary. What it means is that the engineering dep't at Supermicro picked up enough sticks of the RAM to fill all the slots on a board, then (we hope) proceeded to put a scope on the memory bus to see if the signals remained within spec.

If you buy Supermicro's branded memory that was certified to work on a given board, and it doesn't work, you should be able to RMA the memory to Supermicro. This memory will cost you a bit of a premium price.

If you're cheap, then what you do is that you look for non-Supermicro branded memory carrying the certified part number (because Supermicro typically gives you both the Supermicro module number AND the OEM's underlying part number). You then just buy the modules at whatever price the market is offering them for. Supermicro does NOT warrant these modules to work, because who knows, fakes, other stuff, etc., but Supermicro HAS tested the modules to work. I will strongly prefer acquiring certified parts where possible because life's too short. But make sure you have a return/RMA strategy for the seller in the exceedingly unlikely case they don't work.

I will warn you that there are a small number of cases where tested memory modules (search forums for "Kingston Elpida") later become incompatible due to a manufacturing revision, but this is relatively rare.

So with that said, I will note that Supermicro systems are generally very permissive about what modules they accept. Many memory parts are only manufactured for six months to a year because of evolution in the industry, so often you will not be able to find your EXACT certified memory part for sale new. You may then choose to buy them used, or dabble with similar parts that have the same characteristics. Most of the manufacturers have a guide to decoding their part numbers, and often it is just a few trailing letters or digits to indicate generational changes.

 

[Griffey]

I found websites for helping with that early this morning. And after reading that it's about the same as consumer grade stuff. It's not certified, but still works as it should. Such as Memory Stock and Memory.net. As well as a few others I can't remember off the top of my head. I found some stuff that was on multiple places as to work with it.

Thank you @jgreco and @WI_Hedgehog

You both have been a huge help.

 

[Griffey]

Ok. Toilet emergency replacement is over.

For anybody reading this. What hba card would you recommend for this system? And in the other hand. With throwing the budget out the window, what hba's would you recommend with that idea? I'm looking for options and kinda heavily relying on your experience for guidance. I know not much, but slowly changing that.

 

[jgreco]

About to go blow snow for 6 hours.

Toilet emergency replacement is over.

Your life sounds like mine, heh.

What hba card would you recommend for this system?

For basic HDD, you can usually find something like a Dell PERC H200 or PERC H310 for about $30-$40, maybe a little bit more if it comes preflashed from a vendor such as Art of Server on eBay. This gives you eight SAS lanes that can directly handle eight drives, or indirectly (via an SAS expander) dozens or maybe hundreds. These are relatively old cards (~2010-ish era) but are pretty good for basic use. Make sure some airflow is across them.

I also like the (12Gbps) LSI SAS 3008 based cards which may be a better choice; the cards are newer, the onboard CPU is faster, and they do not have weird issues with ESXi and PCIe passthru. However, these typically are in the $100+ range.

 

[Griffey]

Your life sounds like mine

Yep. Life of a midle aged dad/husband.

Lsi 3008 based? I'll have to look into that as well. I'm not worried about speed to much at this point. But, if its worth the future investment. I'm in.

 

[Griffey]

Lsi 3008 it mode? Found one on ebay If that's correct.

 

[Etorix]

I'm thinking a single cpu system for now sounds like a better idea for me then a dual cpu based system.

Sounds reasonable.

So C602 vs C612 is just cpu and ram?

"Just" a whole Intel generational change: New socket (LGA2011 vs. LGA2011-3), CPU ranges and RAM (DDR3 vs. DDR4).

Just to pick your brain. If you were to pick one of those boards, what would be your strongest recommendation and a brief why please.

You'll be buying refurbished, so it's largely a matter of offer and opportunities rather than looking for a specific reference unless you have very specific requirements.

Cooling. How do you keep the cpu's cool if its not in a rack mount system?

With… a cooler. Most consumer-style tower or AIO coolers should be compatible with the socket (if only because there were Core-X HEDT processors with the same sockets), and these Xeon E5 burn a lot less power than the current Alder/Raptor Lake offers.

 

[Griffey]

Ebay item number 325167910765

LSI SAS9300-16i

Found one of these poking around. Looks like 2 cards in one. Bad idea? I'm thinking more condensed storage solution. I know it seems like a simple question. But I just want to verify its something that works. And not some weird thing with a size limitation that I'm totally unaware of.

Thanks.

 

[jgreco]

No, it's just a single card with 16 SAS lanes. Perfectly usable if you need more density.

 

[Griffey]

No, it's just a single card with 16 SAS lanes. Perfectly usable if you need more density.

Thank you for verifying my assumption. Much appreciated.