1U E31245 Server Build - Aus

[ImJay]

Hi all. I'm not too sure if the form applies to new server builds, but anyhow I will oblige.
I'm a young fella that provides a nice service hosting gameservers, but I am looking for a change from renting dedicated servers. So, I am going to create and colo my own and that is why I am here. I am able to maintain and run the system. I'm looking for an oversee of the build and help with a part or two.
I have most of the build done, except for a motherboard and case, and this is where TH comes in.

Approximate Purchase Date: N/A

Budget Range: $1600 AU

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Gameserver

Are you buying a monitor: No

Parts to Upgrade: New build.

Do you need to buy OS: No. Using a Linux distro

Preferred Website(s) for Parts:umart Digicor Anything located in Australia, or ships to Aus

Location: Brisbane, Australia.

Parts Preferences: Intel, Supermicro, Kingston, Western Digital

Overclocking: No

SLI or Crossfire: N/A

Your Monitor Resolution: N/A

Some selected parts:

Umart.com.au:
[strike]E3-1245v2[/strike]
E3-1275v2
Kingston 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 ECC x2
[strike]Western Digital 250G VelociRaptor x2[/strike]
Western Digital 500G RE4 x2
(sorry about no links, as I'm not too sure how to on their site)

Supermicro5017C-MTFBarebone


Thank you to those that can help with this build,
Jay.

 

[blazorthon]

Do game servers really need ECC memory? Also, why get Veloci Raptors when several much cheaper hard drives could provide much more capacity and performance at a lower price? You don't even need to skimp on reliability and such; you can get a few Western Digital Caviar Blacks or Reds (enterprise/24/7 hard drives with great warranties).

Really now, why not just build a good desktop or two? Assuming that game servers aren't extremely limited by single-threaded performance, an AMD Opteron would probably be much better than a lower end Xeon if you want a server-component build.

If you really wouldn't want to sell any components that would be unusable in such a system as my example and must choose between your two motherboard choices, then I'd choose this one:
http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C202_C204/X9SCM-F.cfm

As for a case, unless you're against a regular desktop case, I'd just recommend a cheap Micro-ATX case since both boards are Micro-ATX and you're not using any components with high volume needs. If you give me specifics of what you want in a case, I can make mores specific recommendations (IE color, space/bay needs, connectivity needs, desired form-factor).

 

[ImJay]

Do game servers really need ECC memory? Also, why get Veloci Raptors when several much cheaper hard drives could provide much more capacity and performance at a lower price? You don't even need to skimp on reliability and such; you can get a few Western Digital Caviar Blacks or Reds (enterprise/24/7 hard drives with great warranties).

Really now, why not just build a good desktop or two? Assuming that game servers aren't extremely limited by single-threaded performance, an AMD Opteron would probably be much better than a lower end Xeon if you want a server-component build.

If you really wouldn't want to sell any components that would be unusable in such a system as my example and must choose between your two motherboard choices, then I'd choose this one:
http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C202_C204/X9SCM-F.cfm

As for a case, unless you're against a regular desktop case, I'd just recommend a cheap Micro-ATX case since both boards are Micro-ATX and you're not using any components with high volume needs. If you give me specifics of what you want in a case, I can make mores specific recommendations (IE color, space/bay needs, connectivity needs, desired form-factor).

Minecraft, being the main game does require ECC memory.
The reason for Veloci Raptors is for a lot of small read and writes that minecraft produces.
It needs to be a 1/2U server, as it is not for personal use.
And Minecraft is limited to a single thread.

Could you recommend a case, preferably 1U

The server will be colocated for business use, to remove the need for server rental.

 

[blazorthon]

Sorry, I'm not really familiar with rack cases. Any recommendation that I make would probably be no better than if you were to look it up yourself.

It seems like you'd benefit more from an SSD than from Veloci Raptors based on what you said, but I don't mean to act like I know more about that. I'm obviously not knowledgeable on MC servers if I'm wrong about how well-threaded they can be and their RAM reliability needs

 

[ImJay]

Sorry, I'm not really familiar with rack cases. Any recommendation that I make would probably be no better than if you were to look it up yourself.

It seems like you'd benefit more from an SSD than from Veloci Raptors based on what you said, but I don't mean to act like I know more about that. I'm obviously not knowledgeable on MC servers if I'm wrong about how well-threaded they can be and their RAM reliability needs

SSD would be the best choice, but for the price and limited storage, might go over my budget.
Minecraft isn't the best planned out game, in terms of hardware utilization.

Thank you for you help

 

[blazorthon]

Just a thought, but you could use a cheap SSD used as a cache drive to really speed up those Velociraptors in random throughput performance.

Glad to help, granted I didn't do much

 

[ImJay]

Anyone able to oversee my changes/setup and give it a small rating?