At the moment there is no silver bullet home server, which is cost effective, widely available and has all the features everyone loves...
However, there is a board, that is pretty good in all categories, the
Gigabyte MC12-LE0 (50-70 bucks)
(with CPU Ryzen Pro 5650G - ~150 bucks)
Costs around 50-70 bucks, supports IPMI (remote management), Bifurcation, ECC-RAM, has 2.5G Ethernet and one NVMe port (although it is speed limited). With one PCIe card for about 20 bucks you can add 2 full speed NVMe. Medioker Idle Power consumption and strange stability issues are the "only" drawbacks - with a modern CPU (e.g. Ryzen Pro 5650) it's pretty hard to get under 20W Idle. Although many people report it works rock solid, there are also many reports of having issues with randomly turning off, BIOS upgrade fails and other hardware issues.
There are indeed Ryzen B550 boards, that unofficially support ECC and have lower power consumption than the MC12, but usually these boards lack internal remote management options and other server benefits.
Low power boards like Asrock N100DC-ITX are good, but lack support of SATA Ports and ECC RAM.
Industrial Boards like the ASRock IMB-X1231 (or other ASRock RACK / IMB series boards) are either way too expensive or impossible to buy anywhere.
The "real deal" in my opinion are Fujitsu Boards with C246 chipset (e.g. Fujitsu D3644-B) or Gigabyte (C246N-WU2) - despite being older tech, these are really low on power consumption with pretty good performance and pretty stable. With these boards you can build a full steam spacemachine consuming <10W idle. Fujitsu also has remote management via Intel AMT (discontinued) or iRMT (a proprietary protocol).
Be aware that Fujtisu Celsius W550 Workstations and newer contain D3417, D3517 and similar Boards, but also a proprietary power header, so you can't use normal ATX Power Supplies without Adapter (e.g. Bojiadafast from Aliexpress).
So, my advice would be to get the Gigabyte MC12-LE0 or if available, Fujitsu D3x17/D3644-B series.
Unfortunately that board, like pretty much all consumer-like boards, suffers from a lack of PCI-Express lanes.
It has:
- 1x Gen4 x16
- 1x Gen4 x4
- 1x M.2 Gen3 x1
That M.2 slot can do only 0.985 GB/s, so literally all NVMe SSDs on the market will be limited by that. Maybe useful for a boot drive, but that's about it.
Assuming you want somewhat-decent storage your only realistic option is getting an x16-to-4x-M.2 adapter card, and stick at least two NVMe drives in there.
The board has pretty lackluster network interfaces, so you want to get an external NIC. That probably means grabbing a cheap second-hand 40G NIC from Ebay. But those are designed for PCI-E Gen3, so sticking it in your only remaining (x4) slot means it is limited to 31.5Gbps - in a best-case scenario...
With consumer CPUs it's all about compromises, and nobody seems willing to invest in making a low-volume homelab-focused board.
Unfortunately that board, like pretty much all consumer-like boards, suffers from a lack of PCI-Express lanes.
Depending on the use case, this is true.
That M.2 slot can do only 0.985 GB/s, so literally all NVMe SSDs on the market will be limited by that. Maybe useful for a boot drive, but that's about it.
Yeah I stated speed limited, but you are correct.
The board has pretty lackluster network interfaces, so you want to get an external NIC
This is also true (in my post I wrote 2.5G interface, actually this was a typo, I meant 2x1G interface).
That probably means grabbing a cheap second-hand 40G NIC from Ebay. But those are designed for PCI-E Gen3, so sticking it in your only remaining (x4) slot means it is limited to 31.5Gbps - in a best-case scenario...
Ok, this might be not the normal persons use case... I think 10G is already pretty unusual in the homelab of most people, whereas I would say that 2.5G should be standard.
it's all about compromises
That's the point. You can't get "fast, cheap and good" - I think the MC12 is a pretty good compromise. Sure, you can get a Supermicro X13SAE or ASRock IMB-X1314 (Intel, W680) - probably higher quality and far more reliable, but limited bifurcation and only the board would cost ~450 bucks. Another problem with the Supermicro may be that DDR5 ECC RAM is hardly available and expensive.
Comments
At the moment there is no silver bullet home server, which is cost effective, widely available and has all the features everyone loves...
However, there is a board, that is pretty good in all categories, the
Costs around 50-70 bucks, supports IPMI (remote management), Bifurcation, ECC-RAM, has 2.5G Ethernet and one NVMe port (although it is speed limited). With one PCIe card for about 20 bucks you can add 2 full speed NVMe. Medioker Idle Power consumption and strange stability issues are the "only" drawbacks - with a modern CPU (e.g. Ryzen Pro 5650) it's pretty hard to get under 20W Idle. Although many people report it works rock solid, there are also many reports of having issues with randomly turning off, BIOS upgrade fails and other hardware issues.There are indeed Ryzen B550 boards, that unofficially support ECC and have lower power consumption than the MC12, but usually these boards lack internal remote management options and other server benefits.
Low power boards like Asrock N100DC-ITX are good, but lack support of SATA Ports and ECC RAM.
Industrial Boards like the ASRock IMB-X1231 (or other ASRock RACK / IMB series boards) are either way too expensive or impossible to buy anywhere.
Intel W680 Chipset boards are too expensive and ARM alternatives (e.g. Friendly Elec CM3588 NAS Kit, https://www.friendlyelec.com/index.php?route=product%2Fprodu...) don't have support for ECC RAM, although OpenMediaVault is sometimes supported.
The "real deal" in my opinion are Fujitsu Boards with C246 chipset (e.g. Fujitsu D3644-B) or Gigabyte (C246N-WU2) - despite being older tech, these are really low on power consumption with pretty good performance and pretty stable. With these boards you can build a full steam spacemachine consuming <10W idle. Fujitsu also has remote management via Intel AMT (discontinued) or iRMT (a proprietary protocol).
Be aware that Fujtisu Celsius W550 Workstations and newer contain D3417, D3517 and similar Boards, but also a proprietary power header, so you can't use normal ATX Power Supplies without Adapter (e.g. Bojiadafast from Aliexpress).
So, my advice would be to get the Gigabyte MC12-LE0 or if available, Fujitsu D3x17/D3644-B series.
Unfortunately that board, like pretty much all consumer-like boards, suffers from a lack of PCI-Express lanes.
It has:
- 1x Gen4 x16
- 1x Gen4 x4
- 1x M.2 Gen3 x1
That M.2 slot can do only 0.985 GB/s, so literally all NVMe SSDs on the market will be limited by that. Maybe useful for a boot drive, but that's about it.
Assuming you want somewhat-decent storage your only realistic option is getting an x16-to-4x-M.2 adapter card, and stick at least two NVMe drives in there.
The board has pretty lackluster network interfaces, so you want to get an external NIC. That probably means grabbing a cheap second-hand 40G NIC from Ebay. But those are designed for PCI-E Gen3, so sticking it in your only remaining (x4) slot means it is limited to 31.5Gbps - in a best-case scenario...
With consumer CPUs it's all about compromises, and nobody seems willing to invest in making a low-volume homelab-focused board.
Depending on the use case, this is true.
Yeah I stated speed limited, but you are correct.
This is also true (in my post I wrote 2.5G interface, actually this was a typo, I meant 2x1G interface).
Ok, this might be not the normal persons use case... I think 10G is already pretty unusual in the homelab of most people, whereas I would say that 2.5G should be standard.
That's the point. You can't get "fast, cheap and good" - I think the MC12 is a pretty good compromise. Sure, you can get a Supermicro X13SAE or ASRock IMB-X1314 (Intel, W680) - probably higher quality and far more reliable, but limited bifurcation and only the board would cost ~450 bucks. Another problem with the Supermicro may be that DDR5 ECC RAM is hardly available and expensive.
I’m sorry i can’t upvote you more than once.