Help choosing X11SSM-F-O or X11SSH-F-O

[Wade]

current pricing X11SSM-F-O $196.00
current pricing X11SSH-F-O $148.00

After researching my first thought was X11SSM-F-O, but, when I was ready to purchase the X11SSM-F-O, the X11SSH-F-O went on sale for $148.00.

I understand these boards are very similar. Where I'm lost particularly is booting a Freenas SSD if the X11SSH-F-O has 8 sata drives as storage.

Can this be accomplished with a PCIe M2 SSD?

Will the X2 speed hinder my boot drive performance?

Should just forget the savings and go with X11SSM-F-O?

 

[nightshade00013]

They both have the same number of sata ports. The difference is one swaps a pci-e slot for a m.2. As far as it being bootable I am not sure but it doesn't really matter since they both have the same number of SATA ports so the plan of action doesn't need to change. You can however easily pick up an m.2 optane and use it for something like swap or jail storage etc.

Just buy the cheaper one and move on. If you need more drives add a SAS HBA.

 

[Wade]

thank you nightshade.

for clarity, buy the cheaper board, use the existing 8 sata ports for storage, buy a SAS HBA to go on the one pcie slot, then run freenas off a regular SSD via the SAS HBA?

 

[Inxsible]

thank you nightshade.

for clarity, buy the cheaper board, use the existing 8 sata ports for storage, buy a SAS HBA to go on the one pcie slot, then run freenas off a regular SSD via the SAS HBA?

I would do it the other way around. Or,

1. forget about a HBA and a SSD and simply use a USB or a pair of USBs as your boot drives. -- That is if you have max 8 storage drives.
2. If you have less than 8 storage drives then you can use one SATA port for the boot SSD.

 

[nightshade00013]

I would run an SSD off of the SATA ports and the drives off of the HBA. It will allow you to leave the SAS as basically non bootable storage so you don't have to mess with things. Make it so it can boot from a sata port and it doesn't matter if you remove a drive for whatever reason. The HBA will require more work.

 

[Monkey_Demon]

Have you read through this forum thread about the X11SSH? You should.

 

[kernalzero]

Thought I would share this. x11ssm-f is $149.99 on amazon. I'm looking at the same mobo for my build and was randomly searching the forum and saw your post.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B018AX44Q...olid=3051UT1683MD8&psc=0&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it