Having a hard time settling on a server...is the R610 worth $365?

[Dajinn]

2 PSU, H700, 2 2.5" trays.

The H700 could be resold for about 115-140 I bet if I wanted to use an embedded hypervisor. I haven't been able to scope out a good deal on the C6100 yet and the R610 looks like a good alternative since it has 2 full height PCI-e expansion slots in a 1U form factor. I was thinking if I don't go with an HP S6500 then I can build a rack out of R610s. Another decent bonus is they have quad GbE built in.

A couple of these configured for clustering + a 24-bay SuperMicro chassis would serve as the first foundation for my home lab...a pair of L5640 6 core CPUs run about 120-125 bucks, and to fill them with 48GB of RAM would be about 240 bucks...so 730 for a fully built out R610 minus 2.5" storage/infiniband/QSFP/SFP+.

I can't seem to settle or decide on a good couple of servers to get. I'm still leaning towards the fat-twin SuperMicro 6026TT 2 node 2 PSU 2U barebones for 325 + shipping, but, those only have 2 GbE. They do have two full height expansion slots though. Wouldn't cost much to build both of those out. All of the front 3.5" inch bays on the front would probably be wasted though =/.

I've seen a lot of suggestions for E-series Xeon CPUs but they seem to be decently more priced than Nehalem chips to the point where I"m like ehh....too much.

Does anyone have any other good server suggestions that I can find on ebay for a good price if the R610 isn't any good? I would prefer redundant power supplies.

 

[T_Minus]

"Good Server" and "Good Price" is subjective to the person and tasks... care to elaborate more on 'lab'?

 

[Dajinn]

I'd really like to just go balls to the wall with VMs and compartmentalizing everything. I really want to try to deploy and set up a bunch of technologies that you would find in most environments. Fully configured exchange and domain controllers, hyper-v/vmware failover clustering, multiple SANs, game servers, a pfSense server, and much more. I want to dive into as much stuff as possible and scale out as much as I want to, within a reasonable cost. The main purpose is because I want a professional-grade environment for me to learn in so that I can take the experience to future jobs and stuff like that..

 

[NetWise]

So the hardware for the things you're talking about wouldn't matter too much of its all VMware and virtualized.

But where the R610 can help out is in the specifics for learning the Dell stuff. How OMSA works on ESXi, how to do LCC upgrades, how to automate or script configuration of the BIOS and IDRAC to standardize, vSphere Client Integration, etc. Those are things most Dell shops I've worked for had no employees who knew. Same applies for other vendors. They were always treated like an Intel CPU/NIC sled and never upgraded, maintained, or managed at all. Which is what I found value in for a home lab.

The C6100 worked out better for me though because for 4 nodes it's only two power supplies and 2u vs 8 power supplies and 4u. Also the 10gbe Mexz cards for the c6100 are stupid cheap even if you have to dremel out the back of the cage.

To do a cluster of r610's you'll need at least two - 3 preferable for N+1 stuff (which may not be relevant in a lab much) or VSAN, etc. so your $730 jumps to $1400 or $2100 quickly. A c6100 with 24gb/node gets you 4 nodes, CPU is 'likely' to never be your constraint (at least with most environments, customers, and my own lab observations). You can bump the RAM over time but still have the same as 2xr610's to use and vmotion/DRS around.

So for people I know I still recommend the C6100 for $1100 USD. Get 4x2-4pt 1gbe NIC's for the PCI slot and 2pt 10gbe for the Mezz for 20-40 and 65$ respectively and you've got a lot of lab.

That's just one guys opinion. Labs are pretty personal and everyone has their own spin .

Most r610's you find will be the 4x2.5" bay ones the 6 and 8 bay are harder to come by. Doesn't matter if you intend to boot from USB though (there are two internal headers behind the LCD panel). Make sure you get an IDRAC enterprise to have the IPKVM and remote ISO mounting. No one wants to sit next to either of these servers to do installs.

 

[Dajinn]

Yeah, I still drool at the idea of having a C6100 cluster but the prices aren't as competitive as they once were.

Also, in regards to the R610, what do you mean 6 and 8 bays? All the R610's I'm seeing on ebay are 6x2.5".

Thanks!

 

[Marsh]

Few assumptions here:
I don't know your budget, what other machines you already have.
Assume you are starting out today with no other server.

I would get a newer and more current beefier E5-2xxx v1/v2 server with lots of ram slots.
A server that would let you run nested virtualization such ESXi, KVM, or other hypervisor,
A nested virtual lab would let you run VSAN cluster, Hyper-v cluster, Proxmox cluster, virtual SAN etc.

The cost would not be huge difference if you shop Ebay with luck and patience.
E5-2xxx v1/v2 server would extended the life of your lab into next 5 years.

 

[Dajinn]

E5 v1 and v2 chips of comparable core/thread counts easily cost 2.5 times that of what it costs to get 2 low power Nehalem 6 core chips...e.g. 300 for just one E5 2420...I don't have a hard number on my budget but I really don't want to go that crazy. I'd rather have the "environment" than the raw computing power.

edit: Also, concerning budget, I'd like to keep the overall cost-per-system low because I know that a lot of the time unless you get lucky with a machine that has the i/o built-in that I'll have to shell out money for SFP/QSFP interfaces, and other stuff like switches, HBAs, etc.

As far as what other machines I already have, all I have right now is a 1366 build using 2 X5650's in a Rosewill Rsv-L4412. I might re-use it but ideally I'm going to want to swap the internals into a Supermicro SC846 chassis to act as my NAS for the R610's.

 

[Marsh]

Take a look at ForSale thread, T_Minus have lots of goodies, he is not paying me commission to say that.

Friday, I purchased a pair of E5-2658 C1 step ( 8 cores each ), the ending bid was $263 for 2 CPU. It is more than I used to pay.
The seller's title had a typo "E5-2568", instead of E5-2658.

Shopping on Ebay is half of the fun.

 

[T_Minus]

Take a look at ForSale thread, T_Minus have lots of goodies, he is not paying me commission to say that.

Friday, I purchased a pair of E5-2658 C1 step ( 8 cores each ), the ending bid was $263 for 2 CPU. It is more than I used to pay.
The seller's title had a typo "E5-2568", instead of E5-2658.

Shopping on Ebay is half of the fun.

Niceeee score!!

 

[Marsh]

As far as what other machines I already have, all I have right now is a 1366 build using 2 X5650's in a Rosewill Rsv-L4412. I might re-use it but ideally I'm going to want to swap the internals into a Supermicro SC846 chassis to act as my NAS for the R610's.

My nested ESXi Lab is also a dual X5650 GigaByte systemboard loaded with 18x4gb mem in the same Rosewill case.
You'll be surprise the computing power it has. Loaded it up with SSD. or Buy some cheap 10gb / 40gb Mellanox card, connected to a SAN.

I had lab with nested ESXi5.5 and ESXi6 vsan cluster, Hyper-v failover cluster, OpenStack, Proxmox, virtual FNAS, virtual Xpenology, virtual Cisco , HP routers...etc.

Have fun with your current Lab, and shop around.

 

[Dajinn]

Damn, that sounds like so much fun.

 

[Marsh]

BTW, nested ESXi6 is not official support by VMware, BUT, ESXi6 have Vmware tools integration.
Now, you would be able to use the newer network driver, shutdown from the GUI.

Check this out
Subscribe to vGhetto Nested ESXi Template Content Library in vSphere 6.0 | virtuallyGhetto

 

[mrkrad]

r610 has dedicated storage pci-e slot that is only x4 ! not great for the H700!