Recommendation for inexpensive low power mITX with 6xSATA and/or >1Gb ethernet.

[eas]

I could use help figuring out an upgrade.

I have a storage server in a 4-bay mITX case using a ~10y old Kabini/Jaguar Sempron CPU and an SAS card. I'd like to upgrade it for under $200, including 8GB+ of RAM, my goals for the upgrade are keeping power consumption the same or lower, and increasing single core CPU performance by at least 2x.

I also want to upgrade from a single GigE port (so, 2x GbE, or ≥ 1x ≥2.5 GbE and want to retain the ability to connect 6x SATA devices. I don't really care whether I accomplish that with better onboard networking and my SAS card, or on-board SATA + a network card, or everything on the MB.

I don't care whether the CPU is socketed or soldered, but I don't have a lot of vertical space for a CPU fan (I had to fit a low-profile fan. 1cm, I think) I'd prefer at least 2x RAM slots, but a single slot would be Ok.

Thanks in advance for your help

 

[eas]

Bump...

 

[TrevorH]

You can buy $10 dual port SATA controllers that fit into an M.2 E-key socket designed for wifi/WLAN cards that would give you an extra 2 ports and then you can consider ITX boards with only 4 built in SATA ports.

 

[eas]

You can buy $10 dual port SATA controllers that fit into an M.2 E-key socket designed for wifi/WLAN cards that would give you an extra 2 ports and then you can consider ITX boards with only 4 built in SATA ports.

Thanks for the advice.

I guess that increases my options. Can anyone help me narrow them down?

 

[louie1961]

OK, here you go. I priced it out at $199 before tax and delivery at Newegg. If you want to shop around you might find some better bargains, OR you could always downgrade the CPU to an older generation and save $20-$40

ASRock B550M PRO4 AM4 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard - Newegg.com

Buy ASRock B550M PRO4 AM4 AMD B550 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Kingston ValueRAM 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4 2400 RAM (Desktop Memory) DIMM (288-Pin) KCP424NS8/8 - Newegg.com

Buy Kingston ValueRAM 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4 2400 RAM (Desktop Memory) DIMM (288-Pin) KCP424NS8/8 with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

AMD Ryzen 5 5500 - Ryzen 5 5000 Series Cezanne (Zen 3) 6-Core 3.6 GHz Socket AM4 65W No Integrated Graphics Desktop CPU Processor - 100-100000457BOX - Newegg.com

Buy AMD Ryzen 5 5500 - Ryzen 5 5000 Series Cezanne (Zen 3) 6-Core 3.6 GHz Socket AM4 65W No Integrated Graphics Desktop CPU Processor - 100-100000457BOX with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

2.5GBase-T PCI Express Gigabit Network Card for Gaming, 2.5G/1G/100Mbps PCIe Ethernet Network Adapter RJ45 LAN Controller With Intel I226 for PC, Support Windows 10/11, Standard & Low-Profile Brackets - Newegg.com

Buy 2.5GBase-T PCI Express Gigabit Network Card for Gaming, 2.5G/1G/100Mbps PCIe Ethernet Network Adapter RJ45 LAN Controller With Intel I226 for PC, Support Windows 10/11, Standard & Low-Profile Brackets with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

This gives you more than 2X the single thread performance and 14X the multicore performance. You get a single 2.5gbe (intel i226v) NIC, so no problems withANY operating system. I am going to guess this will be probably 1/2 or 1/4 the idle power consumption of your old Sempron. The motherboard gives you 6 SATA ports, PLUS a NVME M.2 slot for an OS drive if you want. It actually gives you two M.2 slots, but if you use the second one, you lose 3 of the six SATA ports, so that's a no go on the second NVME

If youshop for a used CPU, 8gb memory chip, etc. you could probably put this together for $130-$150.

 

[etorix]

Mini-ITX, low power, 6 SATA, >1 GbE NIC. You've just described a Supermicro X10SDV board.
Old CPU, but I guess it may still be an upgrade over a Sempron. Even though used DDR4 RDIMM are cheap, you may need to push a little bit over $200 total tough.

 

[eas]

That supermicro board seems well outside my budget.

@louie1961 thanks for the detailed suggestion. I was looking for a mini ITX form factor, but it looks like there is one in that motherboard family. It's a little more constrained on IO, though. I could probably make it work if i moved my boot drive to an M2 SSD. That, or switch the m2 e-key WiFi module to a 2.5Gbps ethernet card. Anyone have experience with any M2 >1gbps ethernet cards?

 

[nexox]

This is probably moving in the wrong direction, since it's older than your Sempron, but it's got a mobile i7 (quite a lot faster than the best Jaguar Sempron) with ECC support, quad 1G, IPMI (the KVM part is ancient and basically won't work but remote power and serial console are still good,) and PCIE 3.0x16 slot which I'm pretty sure supports bifurcation: Pardon Our Interruption... (there are more expensive X9SPV options that include more memory but no case, or a dual core i5 with dual 1G.) Ram is about $20 for 16GB: Pardon Our Interruption...

Downsides are four of the SATA ports are only 3Gbps and it's really kind of old. Still it's cheap, regular Mini-ITX sized, and the idle power is decent, though I don't really remember the particular measurements I took for mine, it's also got a 100G NIC that probably uses as much power as the rest of the system.

 

[louie1961]

Well this is the board I use, and its fantastic. PCIe bifurcation on the X16 slot allows me to have an X8 10gbe dual sfp+ network card plus two PCIe 4.0x4 M.2 NVME drives. It already has 2.5gbe networking built in on the board. I use one M.2 slot for the 6 port sata adapter. and I have three NVMe drives. But you have to cough up more money for a mini ITX board in general.

https://www.amazon.com/B550I-AORUS-PRO-DisplayPort-Motherboard/dp/B089FWWN62?th=1

PCI bifurcation adapter

Amazon.com: PCIe 4.0 X16 to Dual M.2 NVMe SSD Expansion Card, 2-Port Splitter Adapter, Supports PCIe 3.0/4.0, Plug and Play, Front & Back Mounting : Electronics

Buy PCIe 4.0 X16 to Dual M.2 NVMe SSD Expansion Card, 2-Port Splitter Adapter, Supports PCIe 3.0/4.0, Plug and Play, Front & Back Mounting: Network Cards - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases

www.amazon.com

 

[louie1961]

The other solution that might work well for you is one of these if you can find one for the right price

https://www.asrockind.com/en-gb/IMB-V2000M

I picked one up on ebay back in March for $150. Real sweet board. 8 cores/16 threads, 25 watts TDP. Built in 1gb and 2.5 gb ethernet ports. Supports ECC memory. Runs Proxmox very nicely. Easily meets your 2x single threaded performance threshold. Add a PCI to sata adapter like this and you are in business

Are you a human?

www.newegg.com

 

[eas]

@louie1961 The IMB-V2000M looks perfect, if only I could find one for $150. I have an email notification set on ebay.

I may have to table this for another 6-12 months. It looks like boards with 2.5GigE are still a bit too expensive.

@nexox that's a pretty interesting option. It looks like there are enough SATA ports to take care of my drives.

 

[louie1961]

I may have to table this for another 6-12 months. It looks like boards with 2.5GigE are still a bit too expensive.

Here's black friday deal for you that may solve your problem!

ASRock B550M-ITX/AC AM4 Mini ITX AMD Motherboard - Newegg.com

Buy ASRock B550M-ITX/AC AM4 AMD B550 Mini ITX AMD Motherboard with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Using the same parts from above except for the motherboard, you total $215. If you really can't break the $200 barrier, then swap out the CPU for something like this AMD Ryzen 5 3400G 4-Core 8-Thread CPU, 3.7GHz, 65W, Socket AM4 | eBay

It will still double your single threaded performance. Just be sure it is not a vendor locked CPU before pulling the trigger. You can usally message the seller and ask. If they misrepresent the part to you, ebay will refund your money.

 

[louie1961]

And if you search ebay, you can find 35 watt Ryzen 3, Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7 CPUs as well, if power consumption matters. But having purchased a Ryzen 5 Pro 5650GE CPU myself, I don't think these parts make much difference in the idle power consumption, its more like they save power under load. Just be sure to ask if the part is vendor locked. There are Ryzen Pro CPUs out there that came our of Lenovo workstations (and maybe Dell too?) that are vendor locked and won't work on any other motherboard. But if you ask this question before buying, eBay will protect your purchase.

 

[nexox]

I forgot the X9SPV has a Mini PCIe slot (because I have very little use for it in my router,) but it's full-length so you can fit a quad port SATA III or dual port 2.5GbE adapter in there.

 

[TrevorH]

My Asrock B550 board has a BIOS setting that you can change to 35/45/65W and toggling that appeared to reduce the power consumption of my old 5600G by a few watts. I'm not sure if that's quite as good as having a 'GE' processor but it seems to make some difference.

 

[KevinR]

If you want cheap but less reliability then the various CWWK boards with embedded cpus would easily meet your needs. As discussed in several very long threads on here. They have weaknesses but only the Chinese boards have lots of sata or nvme, and low cost. From N100 to i5, and a few AMD.

cwwk.net has some of them with automatic $24—48 discounts for black friday week. They also have a couple of Q680 boards for socketed cpus.

 

[eas]

Those CWWK boards are interesting. RAM prices are kind of blowing up the whole idea, though. Then there is the uncertainty stemming from the limited clearance for cooling in my case. I think this well end up being a new build at some point in the future.