C-60 enough for media server?

[TRWOV]

I'm currently using an old Celeron D for file server duties but as you might guess I'm itching for an upgrade.

I was thinking about picking up one of those dual core Atom D2500 ITX boards but so far I've only seen them with two SATA ports and a single expansion slot which is too few, then I found this ASUS C60M1-I (http://mx.asus.com/Motherboards/AMD_CPU_on_Board/C60M1I/#specifications) which has 6 SATA ports but I'm not sure how the C-60 would fare in file server duties. It'll stream music, video and it'll also store BD images which will be mounted over the network. No video transcoding.

Should I be looking for more omhp or would the C-60 suffice?? Maybe a standard mATX board and CPU would be required?

The server is projected to have 12 HDDs and I'll use unRAID, don't know if that would affect the CPU selection.

 

[jgunning]

Maybe a standard mATX board and CPU would be required?

Personally I would do this. It is comparable I guess, i have no xp with the c-60 but even still I think I would just go with a standard rig and get a decent cpu to handle what you need..? =)


Cheers

 

[TRWOV]

I guess you're right. Limetech's prebuilt servers use a Celeron Dual Core, I guess I'll go with that too.

 

[vawrvawerawe]

C60 looks fine to me; although I'm no expert

 

[TRWOV]

I took the plunge and ordered the ASUS C60M1-I. Let's see how it rolls.

 

[stinger608]

I took the plunge and ordered the ASUS C60M1-I. Let's see how it rolls.

As a media or file server it should work pretty dang well TRWOV! My only issue with that system was the fact that it only had D-Sub and DVI. No HDMI out. If a person wanted to use this system for an entertainment HTPC as well as a file server/media server, he or she would have to purchase a video card for HDMI. Aside from that issue it is pretty sweet and a great price as well.

 

[de.das.dude]

c-60 is good but E-350 is better. and they cost almost the same. the gigabyte E-350 combo comes for <100$

 

[TRWOV]

c-60 is good but E-350 is better. and they cost almost the same. the gigabyte E-350 combo comes for <100$

Yeah, I saw that but it only has 4 SATA ports

 

[de.das.dude]

you need more?

 

[TRWOV]

yup, 12 to be exact. I can later buy a 6 port SATA card and plug into the PCIe slot but 6 ports will serve me well until I get more HDDs (currently using 3 3TB drives).

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

Wow you plan to run 12 drives? Yeah a PCI-e card will work. Don't try to run high performance SATA 3 SSDs on such an add-in card though (that's just a general FYI statement; not directed at OP).

 

[TRWOV]

yeah, I'm confident it'll perform well for music and videos, it's the BD images I'm concerned with. I think I'll run first with some spare drives I have lying around before moving over.

 

[Completely Bonkers]

I would avoid the atom. It is quite enough for file-server only duties... but let's say you wanted to run some "services" like PDF, OCR, http-server (even if just for LAN and not open to internet), then you will find the Atom a little disappointing. I run 2x D2700 supermicro 1UE racks, one as a RAID1 fileserver, the other as a web-server exposed to the internet. They both manage fine... but the webserver doesnt do video and has MAX only 20 users (it's a private website). I wanted to run a watchfolder with PDF-shrink-and-OCR service, and also HP Digital Sender Service (pretty similar function... scan, OCR, PDF) but it was so too slow on the Atom, I had to run it on a desktop.

I remember seeing recently on the supermicro website, they have a MOBILE CHIPSET ITX board. It runs idle near-nothing power, but when demand hits, it will significantly outperform the Atom.

Let's see if I can find it...

http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/1U/5017/SYS-5017P-TF.cfm

 

[TRWOV]

Well I don't expect much. Users would be, IDK, 3 at max maybe 4. Maybe I would run a printer server too but that's it.

 

[Completely Bonkers]

Then the Atom is OK in your usage scenario. Think of an Atom as a Pentium 4 Willamette (pre Northwood) on a much lower power envelope. It is, performance wise, nothing more. You will find atom systems dirt cheap on ebay as people who bought them quickly decide to upgrade to more powerful systems.

 

[de.das.dude]

i agree with bonkers. if you dont need any graphics capability or video playback, go for the atom.

 

[TRWOV]

Yeah, but Atom boards come with 4 SATA ports at most (at least the ones I know of). I went with the ASUS C60M1-I, has 6 SATA III ports and a PCIe slot I can use later for expansion.

 

[Completely Bonkers]

Good choice. Good price. Enjoy!