Backup Server Hardware thoughts

Lounge
1

Any one with experience using AMD OPTERON 4180 processors. If so how did they compare to Intels offering at the same gen/ Time period.
Now understand I’m not looking for a gaming system here just in a server application.

I’ve not touched or looked at a AMD processor since the 1990’s, so I absolutely have no knowledge of their capabilities in today’s applications.

Reason for input or rather discussion is someone is offering me a Poweredge R415 reasonable…powered with 2 of those AMD processors.

I know they are 6 core 6 threads at 2.6ghz each, so as configured 12 cores and 12 threads. Which is decent, not top of the line, nor a behemoth. Not really a weakling but still respectable.

2

@anon36188615 and those interested
I had asked the original question as while I was exploring backup options in the Help and Support section. My original plan of using my desktop with additional service as a backup server met with hardware shortcomings. Basically the SAS HBA didn’t play nice with the installed Nvida GPU. Couple that with GUI and other stuff overhead the i7-4770K didn’t have much of a chance.

So I looked at the existing systems I currently have for backup server duties ONLY.
Seeing how I had two media servers.
(RVmediaserver) a HP mini format with a i7-2600S processor, no expand ability options.
(Deepblue) a i7-3770 ATX board with 32GB ram in a cooler master HAF 922 case fit the bill for short term / interim use as it is expandable for HBA’s and (12 ) hard drives in the 3.5" SAS format.

The original plan was for Deepblue to replace the HP mini format (RVmedia) for home use. Once I settled on if to run Plex or Jellyfin, or even a combination of the two services.

While the interim setup of Deepblue To backup server is currently working well right now, I decided to pull a hardware upgrade. Which this path will allow me to set the original hardware into another case to support the original plan for media services.

I have in the background been discussing hardware with other enthusiast of home lab servers. Often the rack servers came up as options, which I really didn’t want to go that route not for the noise or any other factor than the size format. But a recommendation of maybe a Super Micro X9SRH-7F which I dug through the manual gathering the specs, single LGA 2011 (R1) socket, 512Gb Rdimm, onboard SAS (LSI2308) and SATA controllers, dual NICS, IPMI remote access via dedicated additional NIC.
Although my preference was for two processor sockets for expand ability I was reminded that it is a backup server and really does it matter? Not really was my conclusion, as honestly the setup is EOL, and by the time I need to employ more processing power than the board is capable of supporting it will completely age out.
The person whom recommended it as a option sent a link to a board on a auction site. I reviewed the link … hmmmm $119.00 plus shipping …buy it now …Bare bones MB… let’s see if I can get it cheaper. So I searched and found a different auction that I got EXTREMELY lucky on the exact same MB with a Intel Xeon E5-2630 V2 processor, 64GB ECC Rdimm ram, proper heatsink (supermicro brand with the heatsink fan) plus was already upgraded to the 3.3 bios version supporting the E5-2600 V2 family of processors. SOLD let’s watch it ( yes I won the bid in the end)
How lucky did I get??? welllllll…

Model	Launch date	Socket type	Cores	Threads	Freq. (MHz)	Turbo freq (MHz)	L3 cache (KB)	TDP (Watt)	Performance	TDP (difference)
Core I7-3770	Q2 2012	LGA 1155	4	8	3.4ghz	3.9ghz	8mb	77	BASELINE	
E5-2696 v2	 	Socket 2011	12	24	2500	3300	30720	 	Not tested	
E5-2658 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2400	3000	25600	95	Not tested	23.38%
E5-2618L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2000	 	15360	50	Not tested	-35.06%
E5-2628L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	1900	2400	20480	70	Not tested	-9.09%
E5-2648L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	1900	2500	25600	70	Not tested	-9.09%
E5-2651 v2	Nov 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	1800	 	30720	 	Not tested	
E5-2609 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	4	2500	 	10240	80	Below Baseline 	3.90%
E5-2620 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2100	2600	15360	80	Below Baseline 	3.90%
E5-2603 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	4	1800	 	10240	80	Below Baseline 	3.90%
E5-2697 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	2700	3500	30720	130	123.00%	68.83%
E5-2690 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	3000	3600	25600	130	111.00%	68.83%
E5-2695 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	2400	3200	30720	115	108.00%	49.35%
E5-2680 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2800	3600	25600	115	98.00%	49.35%
E5-2667 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3300	4000	25600	130	92.00%	68.83%
E5-2687W v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3400	4000	25600	150	91.00%	94.81%
E5-2673 v2	Dec 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3300	4000	25600	110	91.00%	42.86%
E5-2692 v2	 	Socket 2011	12	24	2200	 	30720	115	89.00%	49.35%
E5-2670 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2500	3300	25600	115	78.00%	49.35%
E5-2660 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2200	3000	25600	95	63.00%	23.38%
**E5-2630 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2600	3100	15360	80	62.00%	3.90%**
E5-2650 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	2600	3400	20480	95	54.00%	23.38%
E5-2643 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	3500	3800	25600	130	43.00%	68.83%
E5-2640 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	2000	2500	20480	95	19.00%	23.38%
E5-2650L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	1700	2100	25600	70	19.00%	-9.09%
E5-2630L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2400	2800	15360	60	5.00%	-22.08%
E5-2637 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	8	3500	3800	15360	130	1.00%	68.83%

As we can see as shipped with the E5-2630 V2 processor vs the i7-3770 it has a benchmark improvement of 62% . With the ability to upgrade to 91% over the shipped processor or 123% over the i7-3770. As the backup server doesn’t run 24/7 TDP draw means very little currently. Now if it was running 24/7 yeah I would look at TDP draw and see if I wanted to fund that extra cost associated with power cost (yes I know computer systems draw more than the processor TDP just using it as a rough guide).

Bottom line I got lucky and only had to outlay $66.00 USD after shipping and taxes for the upgrade.
Now the wait begins for shipment of the new MB combo for DeepBlue (as well as the true hidden cost occurs i.e. cables, power conversion cables, drive bay enclosure, or hard drive attachments which would have happened even if I didn’t upgrade the MB/Processor).
— update—
Just checked the shipping status
Should be here Feb 8th or earlier.
I’m like a kid the day before Christmas LOL

1 Like
3

The other MB’s that was thrown out there for consideration in the Supermicro line was the:
X9DRD-7LN4F
(IIRC there was a JBOD option in the model title which means no flashing of the LSI Controllers)
X9DRD-7LN4F Brief
and the
X9DRH-7
X9DRH-7 Brief

as well as variant’s of the above boards.

There is some very interesting aspects of these boards in the LSI SAS controllers they all share the same exact chipset / controllers. The LSI 2308 Chipset usually they are setup for HW Raid and most of us want the controller in IR or JBOD…

"ooohhh no I have to flash the controller, how do I find the Firmware … how do I do it what are the proper commands ? "

Not to worry in these particular systems with the LSI 2803 Chipset Supermicro has done the hard work. Thus they have on their site the firmware, update for the controller bios etc in a EXTREMELY simple package for download. All one has to do is download the package … extract the files copy to a bootable usb (dos or UEFI) copy the files to the USB in the root of the drive. Even instructions are included, which plainly tell you how to do it . To the point that a batch file is included that executes the proper commands … Neat huh?

The 2nd aspect of this controller is the above mentioned (including the one I bought) is the SAS connections which are usually SFF-8087 or SFF-8643 depending on if they are SAS, SASII or SASIII. NOT so on these boards they are SATA !!! usually cheaper than a $30.00 SAS Breakout cable.
( Yes Virginia, Not only will SAS Cards talk to SATA but can share the same connections, although may need a adapter for SAS Drives but a direct hook up to SATA). Why should you care?
I use SATA!!! you say SAS is too expensive…
Again Virginia your not listening!!! two channels of SAS = 4 drives Per channel so two channels support for 8 Drives couple that with onboard 10 other SATA connections.
18 Drives !! with NO additional cost.

Now a bit of sharing here in the SuperMicro Motherboard model Numbers X9 #### is the processor Generation so X9 = 9th Gen … X10 = 10th Gen The D or S following that means simply Dual (D) or Single Processor (S). The R if I recall correctly is the Intel R socket, which is the LGA 2011 (R1 not the famous R3 or AKA V3) for the 9th Gen. In the X10 and X11 I don’t remember which one is the R3 aka V3 of the LGA 2011 Socket

( but a quick review of the supported processor of the board will show that. ALSO quick note here Supermicro usually uses the NARROW version of the socket that affects the heat sink selection)

Soooo what processor are supported ?? well Xeon’s the the E5-2600 Family …

Model	Launch
date	Socket
type	Cores	Threads	Freq.
(MHz)	Turbo
freq
(MHz)	L3
cache
(KB)	TDP
(Watt)
	E5-2603	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	4	4	1800	 	10240	80
	E5-2609	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	4	4	2400	 	10240	80
	E5-2620	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	6	12	2000	2500	15360	95
	E5-2628L	 	Socket 2011	6	12	1800	2000	15360	60
	E5-2630	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	6	12	2300	2800	15360	95
	E5-2630L	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	6	12	2000	2500	15360	60
	E5-2637	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	2	4	3000	3500	5120	80
	E5-2640	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	6	12	2500	3000	15360	95
	E5-2643	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	4	8	3300	3500	10240	130
	E5-2648L	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	1800	2100	20480	70
	E5-2650	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2000	2800	20480	95
	E5-2650L	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	1800	2300	20480	70
	E5-2658	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2100	2400	20480	95
	E5-2660	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2200	3000	20480	95
	E5-2665	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2400	3100	20480	115
	E5-2667	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	6	12	2900	3500	15360	130
	E5-2670	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2600	3300	20480	115
	E5-2680	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2700	3500	20480	130
	E5-2687W	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	3100	3800	20480	150
	E5-2689	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2600	3600	20480	115
	E5-2690	Mar 2012	Socket 2011	8	16	2900	3800	20480	135

So Virginia let me tell you something else if the Bios is equal to version 3 or newer it will support the E5-2600 V2 Family …

Model	Launch
date	Socket
type	Cores	Threads	Freq.
(MHz)	Turbo
freq
(MHz)	L3
cache
(KB)	TDP
(Watt)
	E5-2603 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	4	1800	 	10240	80
	E5-2609 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	4	2500	 	10240	80
	E5-2618L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2000	 	15360	50
	E5-2620 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2100	2600	15360	80
	E5-2628L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	1900	2400	20480	70
	E5-2630 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2600	3100	15360	80
	E5-2630L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	2400	2800	15360	60
	E5-2637 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	4	8	3500	3800	15360	130
	E5-2640 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	2000	2500	20480	95
	E5-2643 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	6	12	3500	3800	25600	130
	E5-2648L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	1900	2500	25600	70
	E5-2650 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	2600	3400	20480	95
	E5-2650L v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	1700	2100	25600	70
	E5-2651 v2	Nov 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	1800	 	30720	 
	E5-2658 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2400	3000	25600	95
	E5-2660 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2200	3000	25600	95
	E5-2667 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3300	4000	25600	130
	E5-2670 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2500	3300	25600	115
	E5-2673 v2	Dec 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3300	4000	25600	110
	E5-2680 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	2800	3600	25600	115
	E5-2687W v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	8	16	3400	4000	25600	150
	E5-2690 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	10	20	3000	3600	25600	130
	E5-2692 v2	 	Socket 2011	12	24	2200	 	30720	115
	E5-2695 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	2400	3200	30720	115
	E5-2696 v2	 	Socket 2011	12	24	2500	3300	30720	 
	E5-2697 v2	Sep 2013	Socket 2011	12	24	2700	3500	30720	130

Now above I mentioned benchmarking I used the Technical City Benchmark. Which seemed to be more fairly or balance to the reports done.
(what I mean by that is most sites that do bench marking oohhh and aww over the CPU speed, which is good for single thread operations such as desktop or gaming, but what about server multithread?? they leave that out).

a Link for those whom wish to review technical City benchmark

Supermicro LSI 2308 Firmware HTTP

Supermicro LSI 2308 Firmware FTP Download

Link to Supermicro Archived X9 X8 and earlier Boards
(psst… pay attention if you see SCU mentioned it is the Intel SAS that everyone gives up on so unless you want to use HW raid they are basically useless)
Now some will complain HEY DIS ain’t the most recent Firmware …
OK Joe!! This is low hanging fruit.
And honestly, expect them to update a EOL Board ???

You can visit Broadcom’s Website and search high and Low for the most recent firmware and bios if you need it for any LSI based controller.
Knock yer self out… Good Luck… ( it is a pain to navigate but is actually easy once you learn their system)

Hopefully this will provide a tool kit for those assisting folks in the Help /support section.
And some even finding the humor I’m attempting above in the post. Really most that are reading this is way more intelligent than I with my 3rd grade education…

didn’t notice earlier that I had a bad (outdated ) link in the LSI 2308 Firmware for the HTTP: download it is now update to the correct working one.

1 Like
4

Figured I would add a graphic of the board I bought so all can actually see the ports etc on this family of boards. Just in case someone else decides to go this route

s-l1600
s-l16001297×1600 197 KB

If ya’ll recall I was mentioning the SAS ports that are actually SATA you can see them they are usually colored Blue.
The down side to this board is the three PCI-33mhz slots (colored yellow and white) . Today they are kind of useless as most of the cards for them have gone the way of the dodo. That leaves only three PCI-e slot.
But for my usage I really only project to need 1 (a LSI 9300-4i4e card) maybe two (maybe a pcie NVME adapter) so should be ok.
2025-02-06T06:00:00Z
The board combo arrived, installed in the case with no issues.
Luck again on my side the onboard SAS controller was already flashed so no work req’d there.
Outside the massive error I did with bonding the two nic’s (yes I had to do a hard reset cmos / bios clear to fix that) when I reinstalled Ubuntu server. The only feature that is giving any pain is the IPMI feature. Which I attempted the default log in and password to establish a new login/password to no avail. I suspect the issue lies in java version/browser selections in order to actually log in. But I will RTFM (read the fine manual) just to make sure. If it is the java/browser configuration I’ll have to go backwards in versions to use it, is my thoughts. Honestly I was expecting his hang up because of age of the board.
But WOL is working so I do have some degree of remote starting the system.
2025-02-07T06:00:00Z
access into IPMI achieved seems the previous owner changed the login on the default ( or as I understood default) from ADMIN to admin

5

While waiting on Deepblue’s new hardware which will be enterprise grade, I’ve been employing Deepblue in the backup server role. With the current i7-3770 processor in a commercial grade mother board with DDR3 - 32gb Udimm ram. Has thus far has been performing quite satisfactorily. So there is high hopes for the upgrade for the backup server.

Which brings me to the task of naming and figuring out (actually finalizing) the hardware for the media server to replace RVmediaserver.
While that media server (RVmediaserver) is working well. I’ve been monitoring the resources when under a load. At times the little i7-2600S is tagging 90+% load.
Which honestly if the connections of only 1 TV was committed to it .This probably wouldn’t occur , but the 3000 available movie titles plus a lot of TV series does take a toll (7.2 TBs of data). Couple that with providing services to family and friends.

For the new media server I’m planning on planting it in a Antec 1200 tower case (of course this after Deepblue has the new hardware set in and running) . As the media server only needs a small hard drive and the ability to pull data from the NFS (Beastie). This will allow me to use the 12 5.25" Bays as a disk shelf for the NFS or the Backup server. As the media server is running 24/7 this is a win win in my thoughts. No really additional power draw outside the just the added drive which should be less that a dedicated disk shelf.

This brings me in this conversation to Motherboard selection ( the finalization part) of what is in Deepblue or the spare msi z97 gaming 5 with a i7-4770K on the shelf.
The pro’s of the msi z97 is a available Nvme slot as well as the ability to support 5th gen i7’s.
Not to mention that the i7-4770K is a unlocked processor

The pro’s of the Deepblue’s Asus board with it’s third Gen i7-3770 is it is proven.

But I am open to suggestions of names for the media server
–added later—
I think I have pretty much settled on the i7-3770 Asus board solely based of the CPU TDP draw is less than the i7-4770K’s 84 Watts (a whopping 7 watts but when it runs 24/7 that stack up quick)

6

Ok as some can put 2 and 2 together will know the Backup server deepblue is up and running.
I’ve worked out most of the quirks of the new board. Such as the previous owner modification of the IPMI admin login from the default.
Except for IPMI console redirect is giving me a fit.
I can watch boot up and even use the remote keyboard to interact until the OS loads after that.
iKVM (java) will ficker between a connection and no connection. So far I think I have tried just about every setting in the com: 2 setting of terminal type all exhibit the same results.
So if any supermicro X9 board experts have a clue I would love to hear it.
I did notice that the SSL sertficates was out of date.
so I generated new SSL certificates with

openssl genrsa -out pvt.pem 2048

openssl req -new -key pvt.pem -out crt.pem

openssl x509 -req -days 3650 -in crt.pem -signkey pvt.pem -out crt.pem

and uploaded them thinking that when the IPMI output switches between the bios and then after POST it would switch from http:\ to https:\ and that would affect. Uploaded the new 10 year certificates. Yeah nope … no joy :thinking: , so I’m somewhat perplexed.

I’ve thought about a out of band license from supermicro to see if that would help (which should give me HTML5 access vs java that I don’t have right at the moment).

7

I had struggled with this for days now … pulled a all nighter last night trying to figure this out.
Many claimed Supermicro’s IPMIView worked right out of the box… and it sorta did versus using a browser with Java. IPMIView has it’s own java self contained…
Finally tired and a brief discussion with the wife I went to bed got up about noon sat down and really thought about it the iKVM Viewer only disconnects (then attempts a reconnect at a higher resolution only to fail) when the system changes resolution in the boot process.
huh what if I just get the screen to stay the same as when it first cranks up? 800x600… I know that resolution works.
OK now to edit the /etc/default/grub file changing

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="nomodeset"

now to set the resolution

GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=800X600

and of course update grub

sudo update-grub

reboot!

bingo worked … finally
and Just checked the the fix on the OS from Remond solved it as well…

( I Probably could have just un commented #GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480 , and achieved a working solution)

8

I have pretty much hit the end of the hardware side of this project.
The only remaining items left are
a. a bracket (the correct size full vs half height) for the added LSI 9300-4i4e
b. more ECC Ram / memory.
c. maybe a cpu upgrade to increase the core and thread count
e. more drives and or enclosures to house those drives (actually only 1 enclosure is needed to finish it off)

I really do like the supermicro IPMI lan port for several reasons, although the Dell iDRAC, and HP ILMO (I think I remembered that correctly). All actually serve the same purpose, when boiled down to brass tacks so to speak.

a. one of the best thing is that with the dedicated always on IPMI port makes find the server a snap with DCHP.

b. also with IPMI it does allow me to directly interact with the bios and booting without connecting a monitor or keyboard. Which is really a boon … I should have went this route to begin with vs the gaming/ non server boards.

The base system itself is running well, and the performance is notably better than the i7-3700 based motherboard. Which I alluded to above will be re-purposed.