Intel DH55TC working well.


Recommended Posts

I promised, in other postings, to provide details of the machine I've built as an unRAID server.

 

Abbreviated version:

Thermaltake V5/VL7000 black case, housing Intel DH55TC micro-ATX mobo, sporting an i3-530 processor and two Geil 2GB/1333 DDR3 memory sticks, all powered by an HEC Raptor 500W psu.  Currently with three WD drives - 10EADS, 10EARS and a 4000KD.  This is probably a well-over-the-top configuration, but it is all working very well - quiet, cool, fast and attractive, and it is very expandable.

 

I can heartily recommend this as an excellent configuration for anyone else looking to build a new server box.

 

 

The long story:

My primary reason for adopting unRAID is as a media server:

Last year I purchased a Popcorn Hour C-200, believing that the 1TB drive I ordered it with, would last me for a long time.  I also planned to install a bluray reader, but suitable drives are difficult to obtain here in Philippines.  A few months ago, in order to make more space, I started pulling files off the PCH internal drive, and storing them on the small ubuntu box I've been using to support my Squeezeboxen.  I considered adding another internal drive to the PCH, but decided that this was a short-sighted solution.  Also, I was concerned about the thermal conditions inside the box - ambient indoor temperature here is over 30C most days, and reaches 37 or 38C on occasions.  I toyed with my old QNAP TS-101, but its lack of power, lack of natve nfs support and a limited 100M network interface soon ruled that out.  I looked at newer, more suitable, dedicated nas systems, but was soon put off by the price of anything that even remotely met my expectations.  Then I read on the Popcorn Hour forum of people building their own servers, using offerings such as freeNAS and unRAID!  A little research soon convinced me that unRAID was ideal for my needs.

 

Concerns over temperature guided me to building a system from new parts, using one of the new low-power processors/support chipsets.  Initially, I investigated an Atom solution, but found that most boards are limited to 4 sata ports, and limited expansion.  Although I currently only have three drives in my build, I wanted to allow for future expansion.  This led me to selecting the i3-530 processor/H55 chipset (although the server will run headless, I wanted the on-board video support for maintenance activity).  I read here, of someone successfully using the Asus P7H55-M motherboard in an unRAID setup, so this became the core (excuse the pun) of my specification.  To this, I added 2GB (1GB modules for dual channel) 1333 (or 1600) memory, a silent case with capacity for at least seven drives, and a minimum 300W silent PSU.

 

I explored the four online PC stores in Philippines, and the five main PC stores in my local city.  I found that one of the local stores was offering prices which beat those of the online stores.  Unfortunately, supply of goods here is often severely restricted and obtaining anything which is not in stock can take months.  The local stores couldn't really offer a suitable case, so I ordered a Thermaltake V5/VL7000 case and HEC 500W Raptor psu online, and ordered the other items from the competitive local store (who didn't have stocks locally, but could obtain the items from their sister branches).

 

The only DDR3 memory they could get was Geil 2GB/1333, so 4GB it had to be.  The processor was fine but, when the motherboard arrived, it turned out to be the P7H55, not the -M version.  The difference between ATX and uATX didn't worry me, but the ATX didn't include the essential onboard video support.  Hurried attempts to obtain the -M elsewhere, online, or locally, proved fruitless.

 

Researching the net, there was another board which looked attractive, and was reasonably priced - the Intel DH55TC (uATX), or DH55HC (ATX). This preserved the '3 PCI-e, one legacy PCI' format of the Asus board, added a DVI connector, but omitted the PATA.  The PATA didn't feature highly on my requirements list, so not a major issue.  The local store said they could obtain the DH55TC within one day.

 

However, detailed research showed that there had been problems with support of the 82578 version of the PRO1000 network chip under Linux.  Thankfully, it seemed that the chip is supported in the  latest kernels and I reasoned that even if current unRAID builds didn't work, the update would soon filter through (especially if I pleaded with Tom!) - and I could use my spare Netgear 311 card as a stop-gap.  In any case, in my experience (going back many years), Intel network chips are much more reliable and compatible than Realtek (as on the Asus mobo) offerings.

 

So, 24 hours later, I had all the parts ready for the build.  Within a couple of hours of careful assembly, I had the machine (minus drives) ready to power up.  Using HDMI to my 46" Sony, I checked the BIOS settings and made sure I was happy with them.  Then, with some trepidation, I inserted my usb thumb drive, and powered up.  Yep, it went through the motions of loading and booting the 'bz' files - it appeared to recognise the network interface, but told me that the network was 'unreachable'.  Ooops, this was possibly the problem of the network chip not being properly supported?  Pinging to my router returned the 'unreachable' error, but so did a ping to localhost ... nothing to do with the physical interface, then!  After some head-scratching, and searches on this forum, it appeared that my problem was due to the network configuration not being loaded - probably because the thumb drive was inaccessible to O/S.  Yes, this much was true - I couldn't access 'flash'.  I suspected a problem with the number of usb ports supported by the slackware build, so tried another port.  This time - success, and the network was fully accessible ... no problems with the chip!  The usb problem turned out to be a BIOS bug - an update soon fixed it.  Incidentally, BIOS updates are simple with this mobo ... put the BIOS image on a flash drive, hit F7 during power up, and it all happens, as if by magic!

 

The next day, I moved the drives from my old Athlon/A8N-E box which had been serving as a test bed for unRAID, and the new machine was soon in service.

 

I have to say that I'm extremely pleased with it - it's quiet, cool and fast (where 'fast' is a subjective assessment, but I know that others have made measurements for i3/H55 systems), serving video to the Popcorn without any hitches.  It also looks very acceptable, with 9 5.25 drive bays, concealed behind a black perforated fascia.  The box comes with cages to hold four 3.5 drives in the 5.25 bays.  Obviously, more cages could be added, or even replaced by hot-swap sas/sata backplanes.

 

I have now added unMENU, and migrated my Squeezeboxserver from Ubuntu to unRAID, together with my library of flacs.

 

I have also added an APC BK650 ups to the configuration and it served its purpose during the power cut this morning (power cuts are a way of life here - most days we have at least one, and I have counted as many as 7 in one day!).

 

As an illustration of the difficulty in obtaining goods/advice in Philippines ... I went into the store to ask whether they could get me an APC UPS with usb management port.  The response I received was "Oh, no, we have nothing like that", as I was shown the stock of BE500-R units in the locked glass cabinet.  Instead of walking out, I asked whether they could check their computerised catalogue to see whether they could obtain anything suitable ... as the list scrolled by, I spotted the BK500-EI and BK650-AS entries.  "There, what about those?", I asked, pointing to the screen.  "Oh yes, we have those in stock!" was the reply.  The storeroom at the back of the shop (which is only about 10ft by 20ft - the storeroom is even smaller) was unlocked and there, behind the door, was a stack of APC ups boxes!  It pays to show a little persistence in this country!

Link to comment
  • 2 weeks later...

Okay, so I've been running this configuration for more than two weeks, so I think it is fair that I post a syslog with a parity check.  I understand that this is what is necessary for a 'tested level 1' status in the hardware compatibility list.

 

I fear, though, that I'll never be able to make a level 2 or level 3 submission - I'm lucky to have gone two days with only short power outages.  One week would be unlikely enough, but one or two months - no chance!  We're on a nominal 230V here but, as you can see, there are several occasions in a day where the line voltage drops below the medium threshold setting of 180V, and I have seen a high line voltage of 258V.

 

There are a couple of oddities in the syslog, but I don't think it's anything which relates directly to unRAID compatibility.

First is the 'ACPI Warning: Incorrect checksum in table [sSDT]'  A quick google shows that very similar errors are reported on a number of different Linux environments.

Second is the perl segfault occuring at 17:01 on both days.  This is almost certainly something to do with a plugin in Squeezeboxserver, and I'm not aware of any ill effects arising from this - there's certainly no entry in the squeezeboxserver logfile.

 

Since I've been running this hardware, I've rebuilt parity, I've moved several GB of .mkv files to my movies share (using rsync) and played a few movies.  I've also moved about 120GB of .mkv files between the physical drives, installed unmenu and several packages including apcuspd, installed squeezeboxserver, uploaded all of my flacs (more than 80GB), and played quite a few albums.  As far as I am aware, the system has performed flawlessly - not failed to supply data requested and never crashed or given any concerns over performance.

syslog-2010-08-03.txt

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.