Mini-ITX HTPC/File server

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nelis

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Hi there

I'm looking for a Mini ITx build. It's going to be used as Media/file server. Please no HP Microserver as It's not fast enough. I want either 1155/1150 socket solutions. I'm planning on addin either an i3 or i5 CPU to it. I was thinking about getting the bitfenix prodigy as I saw it for around R900 online. So what motherboard etc etc do I go for. I will have 1 HDD for Operating system and then maybe 2 2TB-4TB Hard drives as storage.


Thanks
 
RoganDawes said:
Even the N54L too slow?
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What will you need it for that you think the MS is too slow?

I've got the old MS- as a server it's perfect. Browsing or doing anything on the MS is slow, but using it as NAS from a better PC is 100%
 
Yeah. I'm afraid the processor and controller is not fast enough. I would rather spend a bit more than that and get a bit better setup

I'm going to backup about 2 million small files over network and I think I need at least i3 with somewhat modern Sata chipset. Can you please do a test and report back what the copy speed is?
 
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nelis said:
Yeah. I'm afraid the processor and controller is not fast enough. I would rather spend a bit more than that and get a bit better setup

I'm going to backup about 2 million small files over network and I think I need at least i3 with somewhat modern Sata chipset. Can you please do a test and report back what the copy speed is?
Click to expand...

How much of the copy speed is determined by the client PC and how much by the server PC?

In the above example, would the heavy lifting not be done mostly by the client PC?

My MS is hooked up via WiFi- so any testing of the above is pointless. Besides, my Media PC is a pap Brazos APU - copying will be slow either way!
 
I was thinking of getting that very same mobo with bitfenix prodigy, i3 cpu,8GB ram, os drive and 2x 2TB-4TB drives
 
I'll maybe do a benchmark for you this evening, but my previous-generation Microserver maxes out gigabit LAN and gives me ~110MB/s throughput with larger files. Smaller files will probably be slower, so I'll check that for you.
 
Messugga said:
I'll maybe do a benchmark for you this evening, but my previous-generation Microserver maxes out gigabit LAN and gives me ~110MB/s throughput with larger files. Smaller files will probably be slower, so I'll check that for you.
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ok thanks
 
That lian-li Q27 looks nice cause we can fit enough hard drives but scared it might be a bit small. it's cheaper than the q28 but the q28 is an easier fit.
 
Nice build :)

I wanted a plain black case
So I got the Lian li PC-Q25, case is awesome... build quality and look are beautiful... little small, but fits everything I need.
Only space issue I had was the power supply cables press right up against the HDD cage
Holds 5 drives and a full length gfx card, but has no space for DVD/Bluray drive... Didn't mind giving that up thou
Very nice thing about the case is it has a back plane for the HDD cage, the drives are hot swappable and slide in just like the microservers. Thing is actually a miniature beast....


Asus Mini-ITX P8H77I
core i5
8GB Ram
OS drive and 3 x 3TB
Geforce GTX 570
 
Nice . I was also thinking of getting a mini-itx gaming pc as I like the idea of it being small. I think Mini-ITx Gaming pc's is getting popular these days. For my next pc build going to do a Mini-Itx build for sure.
 
I use a previous generation HP Micro Sever as a file server, via gigabit ethernet, and also consistently max out the ethernet, while the little server barely ticks over.
 
Okay, so only got around to this now. I copied 500MB of tiiiiiiny files (around 10k of them, the majority in the last 100MB or so) and it was doing 5-10MB/s, which is somewhat slow. The bottleneck was probably on the hard drive side though, as the LAN was idling along with the CPU. Copying back from the server, I again saw 5-10MB/s speeds. The hard drive light was blinking pretty seldom and the CPU was essentially idling, so again, I suspect the bottleneck was on the hard drive side with seek times being iffy since it's a 5.4k rpm drive I copied from. A larger file of 16GB is pulled down at an average of 106MB/s.
 
Messugga said:
Okay, so only got around to this now. I copied 500MB of tiiiiiiny files (around 10k of them, the majority in the last 100MB or so) and it was doing 5-10MB/s, which is somewhat slow. The bottleneck was probably on the hard drive side though, as the LAN was idling along with the CPU. Copying back from the server, I again saw 5-10MB/s speeds. The hard drive light was blinking pretty seldom and the CPU was essentially idling, so again, I suspect the bottleneck was on the hard drive side with seek times being iffy since it's a 5.4k rpm drive I copied from. A larger file of 16GB is pulled down at an average of 106MB/s.
Click to expand...
Small files will always copy slower than large files, there is no bottleneck other than the fact that you copy a bunch of non-contiguous small files. Transfer speeds on hard drives are optimized for large files, unless you use SSDs on both sides.

The fact that you can copy large files at 106MB/s is proof that there is no bottleneck in the hardware chain.

Don't expect small files to copy as fast as large files, pretty simple.
 
Well if I copy about 2mil files from internal drives on a modern i5 pc I get about 100-200MB/s copy speed to a usb3.0 drive so there must be a bottleneck somewhere. i know when you copy small files some sata controllers will fail to copy fast enough. but now that it's integrated to the cpu it's much better now. I think if i just build a diy server my copy speed will be faster etc etc. Could also be that Gigabit network can't handle small files by the way packets are handled. If you go 10GB LAN that's another story.
 
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