New mini-itx Proxmox Build

Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

Hi Ivan,

well a few, if not many, things worry me.

1. Don't u ever use USB! No, the "home server" argument isn't one, at all! Do you want to rebuild from backups (which doesn't always work smoothly) in your sparetime, weekends? No you don't. USB thumb drives are the worst crap (silicon wise, firmware wise, chipset wise). They're affected by temperature very much, they often just die after a powerloss, they phantom write, they bitflip and the list goes on...
I can elaborate two hours on that topic, but I hope you get the point.

2. Why RAID? Why not just use one SSD as a boot medium, which also serves as a VM/container medium. Think of these commands at proxmox setup:
linux ext4 maxroot=6 swapsize=4
Swap needs to be created, and you definitely don't want it on spinning rust (HDD). You can specify how much the root partition allocates and the rest goes to your local storage lvm2.

3. Don't u ever save money on a PSU! I see this all the time, every day, esp. with not so experienced home users. And I don't get it, every day. People are so accustomed to brand names when it comes to HDDs/SSDs, Mainboards, RAM. But the most important component (I mean it) is the PSU. Because if the PSU is of bad quality, it could f*** up your whole build. It could even cause data loss you don't recognize until it's too late (think of backups and restore).
To me, the priority goes like this: PSU ---> RAM (ECC) ---> normal RAM ---> mainboard (redundant NICs, good BIOS, brands like Supermicro) ---> HDD (Enterprise) ---> HDD (normal) ---> rest is details mostly.

But I realize we have to cut somewhere since it's your personal budget:
- Use normal RAM, since for ECC you need a compatible (server) mainboard and compatible CPU (XEON is).
- Use a properly sized SSD for boot + local lvm as mentioned above
- Use one good HDD (Western Digital Velociraptor preferred or any RAID WD) and use a backup strategy
- Do not use Hardware RAID. The mobo's RAID is most likely a fakeraid, meaning it's sending the commands to the CPU instead of using a dedicated processor for the calculation. Well, in your RAID 1 case it doesn't cause measurable CPU load. But what if your mainboard dies? Believe me, I've been there a few times: The RAID dies too! If you absolutely must use RAID at some point, build a software RAID mirror with mdadm, mount it as a directory and be happy for the next ten migrations.
- Quality PSU!
- Intel NIC preferred, avoid Realtek if you can. Broadcom is also o.k.

And did I mention a backup strategy? I want to elaborate on the "home" argument a bit since I don't know you. Home users often make these conceptional mistakes you're likely about to run into, saving money on the wrong end. I then ask them: Do you want to be happy in your sparetime or do you want to live through the nightmares of rebuilding/restoring, finding the correct snapshot, finding out the backups were broken for weeks due to bad RAM, bad blocks on HDD, PSUs and so forth? No you don't! You want to enjoy your sparetime / project / learning.

Cheers,
Jo
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

One more thing I absolutely want to make clear. It's slightly OT that's why I'm posting seperately:
Do not use pfSense withtin a VM unless it's for testing purposes. If you want pfSense as a router/firewall for your home network, use an old machine. I don't know your WAN bandwidth, but unless it's north of 50 MBit, you can chuck along with an old Pentium 4 2.8 GHz with 512MB of RAM and still have lots of headroom. Or with any Atom mainboard.
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

One more thing I absolutely want to make clear. It's slightly OT that's why I'm posting seperately:
Do not use pfSense withtin a VM unless it's for testing purposes. If you want pfSense as a router/firewall for your home network, use an old machine. I don't know your WAN bandwidth, but unless it's north of 50 MBit, you can chuck along with an old Pentium 4 2.8 GHz with 512MB of RAM and still have lots of headroom. Or with any Atom mainboard.

That P4 will draw more power than it's worth, plus the added cooling, space, etc. With a vm router, you have eggs all in one basket (unless a proper HA setup), yes, but you also save the issues. Since this is a home box and Mini-ITX, I assume these things are important.
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

There is nothing wrong with my statement. I said that a P4 would be the minimum I'd throw on a pfSense. I also said that nearly any atom would do fine. I installed one of those atoms at a friends' house. 15 Watts, approx. 20 by 20 cm, pico PSU, and "massive heat and power consumption" ;).

Since we're assuming now: I assume that network integrity and security > saving 15W and the couple of squareinches space.
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

That P4 will draw more power than it's worth, plus the added cooling, space, etc. With a vm router, you have eggs all in one basket (unless a proper HA setup), yes, but you also save the issues. Since this is a home box and Mini-ITX, I assume these things are important.

Ok guys, sorry for my delayed reply, busy day. As a long time pfsense user I already have atom mini-itx with 2gb of RAM serving proudly as a router on my 100mb fiber link (and due to it I am well aware of the realtek lan's), sharing it to half of the hood and I am not willing to replace it, but thank you anyway.

It's a home box, playground for me to build my virtual experience with a stretch (looong term) goal to build two of the same/similar and create a cluster etc, because this is where it becomes fun, right? I would love to keep my project reasonably cheap (started with 500-600$ budget, extended it to 800$, that's it, no more dollars in this project!) - that's why I choose mini-itx and stackable cases(I love them) and not so cheap PSU.

Jora, I can see your points, however, the Corsair PSU is there to stay - 80 Plus bronze certified, semi-modular and I am not seeing any high load in a foreseeable future, done. I do not consider myself as an inexperienced home user, I am here to ask more experienced by me, because I have 0 Proxmox experience and I am not afraid to ask if I do not know anything. I just got the idea, selected a hypervisor and now I am willing to develop it to a Proxmox home server that makes sense performance wise, in other words the best for this amount of money, today, with community help if possible.
USB's are unreliable, I know, will dump them for now, can always try them in the future if I want. Normal RAM was there from the very beginning, agreed. Raid - agreed. SSD, HDD idea was avoiding me :D all that time, now it finally make sense, thank you.

The only thing now is to continue with the initial mini-itx, 16gb limited build or turn it to something micro-atx like:

Z97M-PLUS ,plug an m.2 drive instead of the 840 EVO and keep everything else the same with 32gb option in a slightly bigger case :)
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

A great MB which is also having future extension in mind would be one of these boards from SuperMicro:

Atom Avoton based: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182855R
Intel Xeon based: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182854 (Requires a CPU)

How are those new Atom boxes as virt hosts? I gave up on Atoms beyond simple work loads a while ago, but at the costs I'm seeing them at now, I'm tempted. Realistically, what kind of workloads are they capable of?
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

Ok, juggling with numbers and dollars, desperately trying to keep 800$ budget I ended with the following:


  1. Mobo - Asus Z97M-Plus
  2. CPU - Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1231-v3-8M-Cache-3_40-GHz
  3. RAM - Crucial Ballistic Sport - 2x8gb kit
  4. PSU - Corsair CX Series 500 Watt -
  5. Case - Silverstone Tek PS07B
  6. HDD/SSD - Crucial M550 256gb M.2

This will be my home server, free space should be enough for my needs (5-6 vm-s, testing bench) from what I've read it's not a problem to add additional hard drives later, another 16gb of RAM are always an option too. I'll wait until next week before I hit order if someone have something to say, just remember, do not cross the budget :)
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

This is a nice mobo, but feature-wise an overkill for a server. Unless you want to experiment with passthrough and/or using it as a desktop too.

@mir: Software bridge in linux and VLANs should work transparently on any NIC.

EDIT: additionally, according to the datasheet, it supports VLANs.

EDIT2: sorry, you were talking about the USB3 NIC, as it seems. I wouldn't fiddle with it in any case, only as the last resort. Additional layers of complexity and drivers (does it support Linux properly, is there a stable driver at all?).
 
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Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

Jup, or this one, which is mATX, with 2 PCIe ports for expansion:
http://www.supermicro.nl/products/motherboard/Atom/X10/A1SRM-2758F.cfm

I have this one, and its running great. the four GBE ports are bonded to 2x 2 ports for vmbr0 and vmbr1, getting 115 to 118MBytes/s transfers to and from my workstations, with some 7 or 8 VMs running. The SAMBA / NFS fileserver is running in a KVMas well BTW....
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

Jup, or this one, which is mATX, with 2 PCIe ports for expansion:
http://www.supermicro.nl/products/motherboard/Atom/X10/A1SRM-2758F.cfm

I have this one, and its running great. the four GBE ports are bonded to 2x 2 ports for vmbr0 and vmbr1, getting 115 to 118MBytes/s transfers to and from my workstations, with some 7 or 8 VMs running. The SAMBA / NFS fileserver is running in a KVMas well BTW....

What case/psu do you have? This board is priced at 260$ in the moment, which makes it quite tempting, especially if the performance is not bad at all! So a quick build made of this boad, 256GB mx110, non-ecc ram ~ 140$, ecc ram ~ 180$, non-ecc ends remarkably at 516$ without a case.
The only thing not clear for me is the case - will any matx case fit or i have to find one especially build for this case?

I have a bunch of full size Intel nics, so nic is not the issue if the slot is available, however, I have bad experience with external nics/linux/bsd combination and I would rather not use them, thank you for the suggestions.
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

What case/psu do you have? This board is priced at 260$ in the moment, which makes it quite tempting, especially if the performance is not bad at all! So a quick build made of this boad, 256GB mx110, non-ecc ram ~ 140$, ecc ram ~ 180$, non-ecc ends remarkably at 516$ without a case.
The only thing not clear for me is the case - will any matx case fit or i have to find one especially build for this case?

I have a bunch of full size Intel nics, so nic is not the issue if the slot is available, however, I have bad experience with external nics/linux/bsd combination and I would rather not use them, thank you for the suggestions.

The more I look, the more I like this Rangeley board - it seems sufficient for a first time home server so I decided to stick with it. I was confused with the old model of this board - the real price of 2778 is 338$, which is still good and fit's the budget nicely, I even had some extra money for a nice looking (wife acceptable ;) case, I don't have a rack and I have no intentions building one. In addition many people seems happy from them, this is important for me, because nowadays I just don't know which review is real and so on. So ladies and gentlemen I present you final of the finals ~ (740$) :)


  1. A1SRM-2758F-O Mobo
  2. RAM - Crucial Ballistic Sport - 2x8gb kit
  3. PSU - Corsair CX Series 430 Watt -
  4. Case - Corsair Air Flow 240
  5. HDD/SSD - Crucial MX110 256gb

Order button will be pressed after lunch.
 
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Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

The PSU is quite enough, since my Rangley board with a RAID controller and 10 Harddrives draws just about 70Watts idle and 80 to 85Watts at load.
However, the M.2 needs a PCIe adapter to work I guess...
 
Re: New Mini-itx Proxmox Build

The PSU is quite enough, since my Rangley board with a RAID controller and 10 Harddrives draws just about 70Watts idle and 80 to 85Watts at load.
However, the M.2 needs a PCIe adapter to work I guess...

My bad, I was really hungry. About PSU - I know, just wasn't able to find anything decent/value wise better than it.

  1. A1SRM-2758F-O Mobo
  2. RAM - Crucial Ballistic Sport - 2x8gb kit
  3. PSU - Corsair CX Series 430 Watt -
  4. Case - Corsair Air Flow 240
  5. HDD/SSD - Crucial Mx110 256gb
 
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