Tiny,Mini,Micro, with PCI-e?

[funkywaltz]

The title says everything. I'm in the market for a 1L node after all of Patrick's great youtube posts.

So far I've only found two definite sku with a PCI-E lane for possible short depth expansion:
Lenovo M920q
Lenovo P330

Ultimately I'm searching for a low power solution for possible 10Gbe routing.

Anyone who could help me off the top of their head or maybe help me research would be greatly appreciated.

 

[newabc]

If you don't mind the larger size, HP T740 is a not-so-pricy solution with passmark 7000-7500. It allows much more standard low profile PCI-e cards.

 

[juma]

If you don't mind the larger size, HP T740 is a not-so-pricy solution with passmark 7000-7500. It allows much more standard low profile PCI-e cards.

Do you know if the T740 supports ECC?

 

[newabc]

I don't think home routing needs a ECC ram. At lease I never learned the pfSense home router needs ECC rams in netgate's forum.

 

[funkywaltz]

My grand idea is slapping a Intel X540 or Intel X550 into a riser card for the low TDP solution:

Intel X540-T2 10G Dual RJ45 Ports PCI-Express Ethernet Converged Network Adapter | eBay

Connectors: 2x RJ45 Copper. RJ45 connections over CAT-6a cabling. Remote boot iSCSI and FCoE. Component Interconnect (PCI). Virtual Machine Device queues (VMDq). Remote Installation Services (RIS). MSI-X support.

www.ebay.com

Maybe even go the extra mile and get the Intel X710-T4 for some more configurations:

New Intel X710-T4 Ethernet Converged Network Adapter X710T4 X710T4BLK 4-Port | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for New Intel X710-T4 Ethernet Converged Network Adapter X710T4 X710T4BLK 4-Port at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Have any power consumption info?

EDIT* ; watching Patricks' vid now.

 

[ReturnedSword]

With a T740 Plus you’ll want to stick with lower power fiber cards like a X520-DA2 or a X710-T2/4L if you’ll go copper. The T740 Plus only has one fan, the one on the HSF so heat build up will be a concern.

 

[funkywaltz]

I think X550-T2 is my best bet with my regular residential internet in firewall applications with it's 2.5g compatibility for pfsense.

 

[zer0sum]

This thread is gold for Lenovo TMM machines with PCIe

https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/lenovo-thinkcentre-tiny-project-tinyminimicro-reference-thread.34925/

Here's my little M920q with a Mellanox ConnectX-3 dual port card

 

[zer0sum]

I think X550-T2 is my best bet with my regular residential internet in firewall applications with it's 2.5g compatibility for pfsense.

You can always run a transceiver that does the conversion to 2.5G and 5G on any 10/40/56G card as well

https://www.servethehome.com/mikrotik-srj10-review-convert-sfp-to-10gbase-t-inexpensively/

 

[funkywaltz]

Perfect, just what I was looking for. Thanks!

I think these ThinClients newabc mentioned need a deeper dive from me, and these Mini Micro series on the backburner.

@zer0sum you're setup is awesome. What kind of performance you getting from iperf?

 

[zer0sum]

Perfect, just what I was looking for. Thanks!

I think these ThinClients newabc mentioned need a deeper dive from me, and these Mini Micro series on the backburner.

@zer0sum you're setup is awesome. What kind of performance you getting from iperf?

Almost the full ~10G with a single iperf thread from my windows PC to Proxmox on the m920q

 

[CIR-Engineering]

You can always run a transceiver that does the conversion to 2.5G and 5G on any 10/40/56G card as well

https://www.servethehome.com/mikrotik-srj10-review-convert-sfp-to-10gbase-t-inexpensively/

Are you sure? I think the card has to support the multimode Base-T as well as the transceiver?!?

It's true! It works!

 

[nicoska]

Really love your setup, I was wondering of building something similar.
Quick question, how is the thermal situation with the Mellanox and the transceiver? I've heard that things got really hot over there.

Thank you
Nico

This thread is gold for Lenovo TMM machines with PCIe

https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/lenovo-thinkcentre-tiny-project-tinyminimicro-reference-thread.34925/

Here's my little M920q with a Mellanox ConnectX-3 dual port card

View attachment 22093

 

[zer0sum]

Really love your setup, I was wondering of building something similar.
Quick question, how is the thermal situation with the Mellanox and the transceiver? I've heard that things got really hot over there.

Thank you
Nico

I switched over to SuperMicro aoc-stgn-i2s cards as they are smaller, run cooler and are better for SR-IOV than CX3's.

 

[nicoska]

Always inside the M920q?