Tony
Staff member
If you have been on the Twitch Live Streams (www.twitch.tv/rchelpdotcom You Should Totally Follow Us!) then you know we are in the process of building a server thanks to the awesomeness that is NIC (aka @Delininja). This is a huge project for us as it is going to open up a LOT of functionality not only for me here at the house with file management, but also for the website as a backup server and for the live streams since it will be hosting a restream server.
We ended up ordering a Dell r710 server with 6 3.5" drive bays. It only had 4gb of RAM and a single quad core CPU, but the thing here is it is expandable. So in the upcoming days from ordering it, we started placing orders for more items.
First item, and most important was the RAID card. The Perc6i card that is in the server can only handle a max of a 2TB drive. Well I have 8TB drives so that wasn't going to work. Does it see them? YUP! But it only shows 2TB drive space. Yea, that's not going to work! So we ordered the H700 raid card. Well, the first one that I ordered ended up not getting shipped. He sent me a message asking me if I knew it wouldn't fit the r710, the cables were too short. I said no, I didn't know that, he never put it in the description... so yea, canceled that order. The new card and proper cables should be here this coming monday.
Second item was 2 drive trays. The server was shipped with some damage. The mounting ears were damaged and the two drive blanks were damaged. I sent a message to them and they agreed to a $30 refund. Just enough to pay for the new drive trays (and a little more lol). These will allow me to fill out the front of the server with drives. Yes, we are going to have some storage space which is going to be NICE!
Next item is RAM. 4GB is enough to turn the server on, but not much more than that. So we ordered 48GB of RAM. This will get us started. It is 6 sticks of 8GB and with a total of 18 RAM slots, I have room for expansion lol. I can put a total of 144GB in this server (that is all it can handle) and eventually I will have it full up. eventually...
This server was also shipped without the shroud that goes over the CPU's and RAM. This is important if you are going to run this server hard so with the refund on the server from the damage, not only did I order those drive trays, but I also ordered the shroud so that the fans can blow directly over the RAM and the CPU's to keep them nice and cool.
Speaking of the fans, this one, being a single quad core CPU server, had one fan missing and had a blank put in its place. So I ordered that fan. It's just a drop in replacement and I can put it in at any time since it's orange (hot swappable). For those that don't know, that means you can unplug and plug them in while the server is running and nothing will happen. Well, I received the box today that was supposed to have the fan in it, but I opened up the box and what I found was NOT a fan. It was a NIC lmao. A single port NIC. I sent a message to them and they are shipping me out a new one on Monday. So I get a free NIC out of this deal lol.
Speaking of NIC's, we also ordered a 4 port Intel Gigabit NIC for the new pfSense server that is going to be housed in a VM on this server. Yea, a bit of overkill for a router, but hey, I'm tired of replacing them hahaha.
The next item we are upgrading is the CPU's. Or well, CPU (singular). It has a single quad core HT CPU. That is 4 cores 8 threads. It will get me by for a while, but I know I'm going to over work it eventually. So I ordered two 6 core 12 thread X5660 Xeons. Yea, I think this will work for this sever lol.
Since it only had a single CPU, I had to order a new cooler for the second CPU. This is self explanatory, it cools the other chip, so I ordered it.
The final thing that I ordered for this server was an iDRAC which stands for Integrated Dell Remote Access Card. I ordered the enterprise edition that has a port that comes out the back. For $7, I figured it was a good purchase if I can figure out how to use it. It does have a "Management" port in the Riser 2 card, but I can't get it to connect. I would rather have one that is made for the board and has a dedicated plug on the MOBO. This iDRAC allows you to adjust settings and whatnot while the server is off, on, in sleep mode, whenever. It will be fun to play with anyway.
This server also came with dual PSU's even though I will only be using one. I will not be pulling a lot of power from this server, and these PSU's work way more efficient at higher loads. So taking one out will put all of the load on one PSU so the efficiency of the PSU will be higher than a dual unit. In Theory anyway lol.
So at this time, that is where we are at with the server build. I have been wanting one of these servers just for these reasons for a few years now, and now I have one. It will definitely be put to good use. And thanks again to @Delininja for allowing me to actually do this! Dude is a legend!!!
We ended up ordering a Dell r710 server with 6 3.5" drive bays. It only had 4gb of RAM and a single quad core CPU, but the thing here is it is expandable. So in the upcoming days from ordering it, we started placing orders for more items.
First item, and most important was the RAID card. The Perc6i card that is in the server can only handle a max of a 2TB drive. Well I have 8TB drives so that wasn't going to work. Does it see them? YUP! But it only shows 2TB drive space. Yea, that's not going to work! So we ordered the H700 raid card. Well, the first one that I ordered ended up not getting shipped. He sent me a message asking me if I knew it wouldn't fit the r710, the cables were too short. I said no, I didn't know that, he never put it in the description... so yea, canceled that order. The new card and proper cables should be here this coming monday.
Second item was 2 drive trays. The server was shipped with some damage. The mounting ears were damaged and the two drive blanks were damaged. I sent a message to them and they agreed to a $30 refund. Just enough to pay for the new drive trays (and a little more lol). These will allow me to fill out the front of the server with drives. Yes, we are going to have some storage space which is going to be NICE!
Next item is RAM. 4GB is enough to turn the server on, but not much more than that. So we ordered 48GB of RAM. This will get us started. It is 6 sticks of 8GB and with a total of 18 RAM slots, I have room for expansion lol. I can put a total of 144GB in this server (that is all it can handle) and eventually I will have it full up. eventually...
This server was also shipped without the shroud that goes over the CPU's and RAM. This is important if you are going to run this server hard so with the refund on the server from the damage, not only did I order those drive trays, but I also ordered the shroud so that the fans can blow directly over the RAM and the CPU's to keep them nice and cool.
Speaking of the fans, this one, being a single quad core CPU server, had one fan missing and had a blank put in its place. So I ordered that fan. It's just a drop in replacement and I can put it in at any time since it's orange (hot swappable). For those that don't know, that means you can unplug and plug them in while the server is running and nothing will happen. Well, I received the box today that was supposed to have the fan in it, but I opened up the box and what I found was NOT a fan. It was a NIC lmao. A single port NIC. I sent a message to them and they are shipping me out a new one on Monday. So I get a free NIC out of this deal lol.
Speaking of NIC's, we also ordered a 4 port Intel Gigabit NIC for the new pfSense server that is going to be housed in a VM on this server. Yea, a bit of overkill for a router, but hey, I'm tired of replacing them hahaha.
The next item we are upgrading is the CPU's. Or well, CPU (singular). It has a single quad core HT CPU. That is 4 cores 8 threads. It will get me by for a while, but I know I'm going to over work it eventually. So I ordered two 6 core 12 thread X5660 Xeons. Yea, I think this will work for this sever lol.
Since it only had a single CPU, I had to order a new cooler for the second CPU. This is self explanatory, it cools the other chip, so I ordered it.
The final thing that I ordered for this server was an iDRAC which stands for Integrated Dell Remote Access Card. I ordered the enterprise edition that has a port that comes out the back. For $7, I figured it was a good purchase if I can figure out how to use it. It does have a "Management" port in the Riser 2 card, but I can't get it to connect. I would rather have one that is made for the board and has a dedicated plug on the MOBO. This iDRAC allows you to adjust settings and whatnot while the server is off, on, in sleep mode, whenever. It will be fun to play with anyway.
This server also came with dual PSU's even though I will only be using one. I will not be pulling a lot of power from this server, and these PSU's work way more efficient at higher loads. So taking one out will put all of the load on one PSU so the efficiency of the PSU will be higher than a dual unit. In Theory anyway lol.
So at this time, that is where we are at with the server build. I have been wanting one of these servers just for these reasons for a few years now, and now I have one. It will definitely be put to good use. And thanks again to @Delininja for allowing me to actually do this! Dude is a legend!!!