Dell C6100 at home

[TheThirdMan]

Hey Guys,

First time poster! I'm looking at one of the many xeon L5639 Dell c6100 servers on ebay to use as a render farm. I was just wondering what considerations needed to be made before having one of these. I know I need a rack and was thinking of getting a 9u/12u rack cabinet on wheels. I don't think it'll be a great power draw- it's 8 60w CPUs, so theoretically it would draw less power than my PC with a 3930k and a 7870 at full pelt wouldn't it? I would just hook them up via gbit ethernet to do networked renders (that works fine with my 2 pc setup at the moment). Is there anything else I need to consider?

Thanks guys!

 

[PigLover]

Noise...make sure you can tolerate a loud server in your home.

There are ways to help mitigate thiis - most successfully by swapping the fans. But even with the fans replaced it it still relatively loud. See http://forums.servethehome.com/processors-motherboards/1317-taming-c6100.html

 

[33_viper_33]

Its about 130w per node idle. If you look for the original c6100 thread, there is a power draw breakdown towards the beginning.?

 

[TheThirdMan]

Oh yes, that's definitely something I didn't think of. I thought with the CPUs being 60w they wouldn't be too loud, but I suppose each node is only 1u height so there'll be smaller fans at higher speeds rather than larger and quieter...

 

[33_viper_33]

The fans are high speed high volume 80mm fans. Not too bad when throttled down, but they sure scream when under load.

 

[TheThirdMan]

Well they'd only be used at 100%. I'll have to wait till I move into a place with a spare room away from the bedroom/living room to get a rack i suppsoe! Thanks guys.

 

[TheThirdMan]

Would a C6100 fit inside this alright:

4U 600 x 1000 Mini Acoustic Rack - Orion Server Cabinets & Server Racks

It says it reduces noise by 95%. I'm sure they're still quite loud but it might help!

Are server widths and depth standardised like ATX? Or is it just the width that standardised?

 

[dba]

Would a C6100 fit inside this alright:

4U 600 x 1000 Mini Acoustic Rack - Orion Server Cabinets & Server Racks

It says it reduces noise by 95%. I'm sure they're still quite loud but it might help!

Are server widths and depth standardised like ATX? Or is it just the width that standardised?

Server widths and heights are standard, but depths are not. The rack vendor needs to tell you the maximum server depth that the rack can hold.

 

[TheThirdMan]

Great, thanks!