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<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by tailwind</i>
<br />@moderator: I've had more trouble with links. Spaces and ( ) signs are not handled well, also when using the [ url ] tags.
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Me too!

<hr noshade size="1"><font size="1">Robert
http://www.hekkers.net <i>Digit's Online Home.</i></font id="size1">

I am planing on building a server based on a Intel D945GSEJT board.

It will not be a fast runner, but is should have very low powerconsumption.

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I will provide a 'Building Ubuntu NAS from scratch guide' soon on my site, if there is interest.

Regards,
Ron.
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Well, I am certainly interested, so if you have anything ready please make it known on this forum. It's been a long time since I last worked with Linux so help is very welcome.

I'm using a small low-power AS-Rock netbook now and it serves me very well:
http://www.asrock.com/nettop/spec/ION%20330.asp
It's dual core Atom based, it comes with 2GB of memory, DVD write and a harddisk for under 250 Euro. I have clocked it at around 23 Watts.

For storage I'm using a Thecus N5200Pro NAS with 3 Western Digital Green 2TB drives in RAID5 configuration. I chose Thecus because - at that time - it was the only NAS with a GigaBit Ethernet interface that can actually deliver more that 100Mbit/s of data.
I have consideren building my own NAS too, using FreeNAS:
http://www.freenas.org/
It runs on BSD, so you can use ZFS for a file system, it can be setup by anyone and can be managed fully from it's webpage. Give it a try!

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It's time for <u>my</u> conclusion based on your responses ...

To cut short: It's clear that Atom bases machines are most often used as domoticaservers by our fellow forummers.

In my opinion the Atom (330 dual core variant like the ASRock ION330) is perfect for the job. Therefore I've bought a Mac Mini today [:D]. hmm...I hear you thinking --> he thinks atom is the bomb, but he bought a mac?!!?? I will explain.

In my situation I want more than just a domoticaserver. The machine has to be able to record tv from 2 digital tv cards which can lead to 6 simultanious recordings at a givin time. An Atom based machine will not like this. This combined with all the other tasks it has to do (HomeSeer, Squeezebox, ASP .NET sites, etc.) and the fact that I've got a nice deal on a Mac Mini made me not go for the Atom.

How about laptops?
Laptops are great for the job to. It will have more power than an Atom based machine and it has a integrated UPS (a.k.a. battery) as added bonus. The downside is that laptops can be noisy (depending on the brand and specs) because of the small housing, which lead to more heat and therefore the tiny fan(s) have to work harder when the system is stressed. The main reason that laptops are not used widely as domoticaservers is because of the pricetag and the fact that an Atom based machine is sufficient in most cases.

How about full blown PC's?
This is for people with special needs. If the domoticaserver has to be a nas, router, webserver, mailserver and/or has other stuff that requires a lot of power, than the added powerconsumption over a Atom based machine can be justified. If you have a fat pc now, just measure the powerconsumption and compare it to the +/- 35 Watt that a Atom machine consumes. It is possible that investing in a Atom machine will save you money over time.

There you have it. My conclusion. I'm just waiting for a faster disc for my Mac Mini so I can setup my new domoticaserver!

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<font size="1">Why Tailwind? Because Jeffrey was already registered ...</font id="size1">

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Jeffrey</i>
<br />Currently I'm using an older laptop (Dell Insirion 5150) to host XP with HomeSeer, Squeezebox Server, Plugwise and IIS with some custom aspx stuff. This works, but it's a little to slow for me. For a while I'm looking at different replacement options, but I recon my fellow forummers are possibly struggling with the same question.
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Is it possible to run all this directly on a NAS server (ie no laptop, but installing squeezecenter and homeseer on a NAS server) ?

Due to the fact that most NAS servers are non-x86 and not Linux based it is impossible to run Homeseer on a NAS. However, there are a number of NAS devices that can un squeezecenter (or squeezebox-server as it is called since the last update).

Rene.

I'm setting a server for homeseer made with OLD components : m/b A7N8x , chipset nforce 4, built with a serial port native useful to connect my ctx35 interface. cpu athlon 2400+ : power usage was too high (70w) so i downclocked to 1250mhz (even better than an atom) , vga card = radeon 9200 , 1,5 gigas ram, 80 giga HD (enough for winxp + homeseer) . the power usage is now = 50w all included, in operative mode. cost is zero, because it's all waste stuff.

Last week i bought an Intel Atom D510 mainboard,4 Gb memory, a Hitachi 160 Gbyte harddisk and a PiccoPSU.
The power usage is about 20 Watt now...
The system is running Ubuntu Server as an OS, and VMWare Server2.0.
As guests:
- Ubuntu server - As a download server for NZB's (the files are copied to a ReadynasPro NAS)
- Ubuntu server - With Cacti (a network monitoring program)
- ClearOS - My router/proxy/dhcp/dns.

I still have to copy my mailserver (kerio Mailserver appliance) to this device....

I am building a UPS with a PiccoUPS:
http://www.mini-box.com/micro-UPS-load-sharing

@ the moment I'm contemplating if I should go for a sheevaplug or OpenRD-Client, both would be able to run domotiga mysql and possibly mythtv-backend on it. Max load would be 7-9 watts, unfortunately not really available in mainland europe and up to 35 euros for shipping is a bit steep...

Perhaps this is something to negotiate:

tweakers.net/aanbod/advertentie/209862/ ... -arm).html

j.hoekstra wrote:@ the moment I'm contemplating if I should go for a sheevaplug [...], both would be able to run domotiga mysql and possibly mythtv-backend on it. Max load would be 7-9 watts, unfortunately not really available in mainland europe and up to 35 euros for shipping is a bit steep...

Well, I got mine from NewIT in the UK last December, shipping was about 10 EUR I think (check their Shop for shipping costs).

Regards,
-kai

I'm thinking of building a new server with 2 Xeon L5520's (4x 2.26 GHz) on an Intel S5500WB (Willowbrook) motherboard. The L5520 is the low power version of the E5520 and together with the Willowbrook, which is also designed for low power, it is supposed to give great performance at low power consumption. 2 CPU's with 4 core's each and hyperthreading, it runs 16 threads simultaneous!! Sweet .
Probably obvious already, but this machine will serve as a VM host. It will be running Hyper-V Server 2008 R2. This version of Windows Server only has the core components required for hosting guest OS's, which reduces it's attack surface and limits the number of components that might need updating. But because of this, it has no GUI. Luckily everything can be controlled using powershell or the Virtual Machine Manager.
Sounds like overkill (and it probably is... somewhat ), but my current server isn't able to support the VM's I want, by lack of speed and memory. When testing or researching I have to shutdown some VM's to be able to start the ones I need at that time.

What I'm still not sure about is the casing, the powersupply and whether I should use a NAS. Since all my servers will run virtually within this single machine, I feel I could do without a NAS as the physical machine kind of acts as one. I don't need the feature of running software on it and I'm already spending enough money on the server . And if I do, I want one that allows me to place at least 4 disks.
But with a NAS, I could do with a smaller casing and a lighter powersupply. The powersupply should both be low power (but enough, of course) and low noise.

To round it up, I have 2 questions:
- What do you think about using a NAS (or not) in combination with VM's running all on one server? Could you do without?
- Any suggestions for a good, low noise, low power powersupply?

Thanks in advance.

To round it up, I have 2 questions:
1. What do you think about using a NAS (or not) in combination with VM's running all on one server? Could you do without?
2. Any suggestions for a good, low noise, low power powersupply?


1. You already have a full blown pc, so a few harddisks will not make all the difference. The overhead of a NAS will level the addition powerusage on your server. It all comes down to the PSU. If you calculate your PSU correctly and invest in a power efficient one it will be the best (your machine will however still consume considerably, but that the price to pay for power).
2. Check out --> http://www.silentpcreview.com/Recommended_PSUs

For psu calculation there are numberious tools/sites out there (just google : psu power calculator).

@codeblack: Why use Hyper-V? VMWare ESXi 4 is free and you can use VSphere client which is also free as a graphical GUI. I played with it this weekend and it looks darn good.