Server Motherboard + Server Processor Suggestions

[zefiris]

I am currently plan to get a server tower for both as my main computer and storage needs (having 6 external HD + gazillion dvds burned is getting annoying).
My laptop is 7 years old, the other computers in my house is 10-15 years old (what ever is my main cpu i leave on 24/7 most of the time).... so yea new junk time.

I noticed that there is a lack of server motherboard reviews or suggestions within SPCR.

The case will have hot swappable laptop HDs (i think its over 15 of them.... can be more depending on what i use), and i really want it to be quite, cool and use less electricity (having that many HD will start to take its toll quickly even if they are laptop HDs)

case I plan to buy supports these motherboards
MATX
ATX (CEB 1.01)
EATX (SSI EEB 3.x)


So does anyone have any suggestions?

PS: you can try to argue me out of the server motherboard, but your going to need to convince me why not to get errorless (more like less errors) computer parts (especially the ram, i think the processor is just made to run 24/7 without crapping out but i dont think it has any error checking stuff)

PPS: While we are at it, do you suggest Intel Xeon or AMD Opteron?

[m0002a]

If you want a quiet, energy efficient server, you should not be using laptop drives because their storage capacity is obviously too small for your needs. You can now get 3.5 inch drives with 2 TB, which will enable you to have a reasonable number of drives to reduce power and fan noise (even if you only use 1 TB drives).

Given that you are willing to use laptop drives (which are not usually speed demons), you should be able to use some "green" large capacity drives that will likely provide better reliability than their faster counterparts, and a very reasonably priced these days.

[b_rubenstein]

PS: you can try to argue me out of the server motherboard, but your going to need to convince me why not to get errorless (more like less errors) computer parts (especially the ram, i think the processor is just made to run 24/7 without crapping out but i dont think it has any error checking stuff)

Servers use ECC RAM so based on a check sum bit it can correct errors.

Some server CPUs are identical to the equivalent desktop model. The ones that are different are the CPUs that are intended to be used in dual CPU MB's, and the difference is an extra data line between the CPU's for communication. Modern desktop CPUs won't "crap out" any sooner than server ones.

There's quite a bit of server discussion here http://arstechnica.com/civis/ under other hardware.

[wsc]

Personally I don't see the need for "server grade" hardware in a home server. I have a used Q9450, 4GB DDR2, and a random mATX motherboard and it has been running awesome serving up a 6TB samba share plus whatever other random Linux stuff I feel like tinkering with.

In my experience I would say the reliability comes from the operating system. I work in unix and linux at work and we rarely, if ever, reboot them or experience true "crapping out" of the hardware.