I have been using an HP Slimline 290-p0043w with a Mellanox Connect-X2 10 gigabit card to share a Samsung 970 Evo plus with my editing workstation (over the 10 gig connection) and 7 other render nodes (PCs built specifically for rendering 3D animations in parallel) over the gigabit connection. Although this works, there are enough small issues with the HP Slimline bothering me that I'm wondering if there's another simple alternative I'm overlooking.
Things I like about the HP Slimline:
It's possible replacing the board could fix the last two issues, but for all I know all of these HP slimlines have those problems. The only way I'm aware of to get two more M.2s in here while keeping 10 gigabit would be to try something like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Synology-Ethernet-Adapter-E10M20-T1-RJ-45/dp/B089RHK7CF
but that seems overpriced, and I don't know if it will work for sure with the HP on Windows 10.
I have also seen this, but it is far more than I need (I only need three M.2s, not 12) and it doesn't seem reasonable for the price:
ASUSTOR NAS - FS6712X
I'm wondering if I should just get that Synology adapter and try to replace the HP motherboard (they sell replacement boards, such as here), or if I should go for something totally different altogether.
Any suggestions?
Things I like about the HP Slimline:
- Very small (12 inches deep, 4 inches wide, 11 inches tall)
- Was very cheap (I think I got it for $160 in 2021)
- Can fit a 10 gigabit card into the top PCIe x16 slot
- Very low power consumption (9 watts without the Mellanox Connect X2 when idle, and 17 watts with the Connect-X2 when idle, even with an i7 8700 CPU)
- I was able to swap the G4900 Celeron with an i7 8700 (since I do some ffmpeg video encoding on this machine, this made a big difference, even with the 8700 power limited to prevent overheating)
- Only one M.2 slot (I would like to install two more M.2s into the system, but I can't)
- The M.2 does not run at full Gen 3 speeds (the 970 Evo Plus was getting half the speed in crystal disk mark compared to when I tested it on other motherboards).
- This isn't a huge issue since I still get 1440 MB/s reads and 1700 MB/s writes, which is good enough for 10 gigabit.
- The second PCIe slot is only x1 physically (and the end is closed off, so you physically can't fit bigger cards into the slot either), so it's not useful for much.
- The gigabit LAN doesn't work fully; for some reason I can only read from it at 60 MB/s (no matter what OS I use, no matter the drivers, it's always is limited to 60 MB/s)
- Even after replacing the button cell battery on the motherboard, the system still does not keep time when powered off.
It's possible replacing the board could fix the last two issues, but for all I know all of these HP slimlines have those problems. The only way I'm aware of to get two more M.2s in here while keeping 10 gigabit would be to try something like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Synology-Ethernet-Adapter-E10M20-T1-RJ-45/dp/B089RHK7CF
but that seems overpriced, and I don't know if it will work for sure with the HP on Windows 10.
I have also seen this, but it is far more than I need (I only need three M.2s, not 12) and it doesn't seem reasonable for the price:
ASUSTOR NAS - FS6712X
I'm wondering if I should just get that Synology adapter and try to replace the HP motherboard (they sell replacement boards, such as here), or if I should go for something totally different altogether.
Any suggestions?