Inexpensive & Stable Motherboard

[tsapiano]

Hi,

I am currently looking at setting up a simple server at home to do a number of basic tasks. It doesn't need a whole lot of horsepower, however I do need a system that can be as stable as is possible. The idea is to have it running 24/7/365, so it would also be beneficial for it not to consume a lot of power or produce a lot of heat as well.

I'm basically intending to run either Linux or FreeBSD on it, and for it to act as a simple low-volume print server, file server (mostly for the laptop machines to archive data) and maybe be able to occassionally act as another web browsing terminal. I might also have it act as a caching DNS server for the other clients, as well as doing a few other odd jobs (X10 control, etc.) if there is some spare cycles. I'd normally use an older machine, however my early pentium-class hardware are laptops and are still in usefull operation for other purposes. I have a pile of old 486 and 386 machines, however the very limited ammount of memory they can take has prooven to be an issue (besides, try finding matched pairs of 36-pin SIMMs nowadays ).

So any suggestions on a motherboard that would be suitable to form the foundations of such a system? Also, if anyone has any experience with those VIA Mini-ITX boards I'd be interested, as they seem somewhat appealing for this purpose - I'm somewhat renescent to play with a different processor archetecture without a big track record, but they are an attractive configuration (which is why I'd like to hear some personal experiences with them if anyone has tried).

 

[birddog]

The most stable board I have ever delt with is the Tyan S1854 Trinity 400. It is a VIA apollo pro 133a chipset board that has both a s370 & slot 1 interface. It can use celeron's, PII's, PIII coppermine & katami's, & celermines. Tyan is know for thier stable server boards. I have probably built 20+ system's on this board. Never a problem with any of them. More stable than any BX, i815, i845 board I have ever used. Very little overclocking features, but that is the price for the stability. Some used ones pop-up in the FS/FT forum for $30-$40. You can still buy them new for @ $80 (per pricewatch.com) -- still in production -- not bad for a board that first hit the market almost 4 years ago.

 

[CraigRT]

I agree those Tyan's are great.. and you can recycle older CPU's, if you wanted to pit a socket CPU in there, but it dies one day, or you can get a faster slotted CPU, you can just plop it in.. great mobo. i have a few at work in systems, they run great, I hear no complaints.

 

[acemcmac]

I like the older boards that sport SDRAM and DDR slots... i have an ECS with a VIA [something something something] chipset... the board is P4VSASD2+

It's solid as a rock, can't wait to ditch it for a canterwood though. They're llike 10$ on ebay, so good luck

 

[zephyrprime]

Might want to try a used server board if you really really care about stability & price.

 

[Peter]

VIA miniITX boards are very nice and low power, but they're comparatively expensive.

ECS have a respin of their K7SEM just 'round the corner, this will have onboard everything - including a Duron CPU, fan and heatsink, and 256 MBytes of RAM (!).

 

[nan0bug]

Epox 8K7A, based on the AMD 761/Via 686b chipset is probbably the most stable motherboard I've ever come across, for AMD anyhow. A testament to its stability is the fact that it's what my mother's computer is built on, and she's afraid to upgrade because it's so stable that she doesn't want to mess it up. My mom is clueless when it comes to anything but MS Office, yet somehow she managed to get through nearly 2 years with no problems worth mentioning (except for issues with her ISP). I bet she has more uptime than most of the members of this board.

 

[KF]

>I bet she has more uptime than most of the members of this board.

Not to be difficult, but statements like this mystify me. I'd toss a mobo that wasn't 100% stable in anything I could devise. I don't need that kind of grief: zillions of just fine, new mobos are < $90 shipped. The only downtime comes if I change something or experiment. To my knowledge, 100% stability is normal for practically everyone except the most demented OCers. Popular major mobos are stable, at least after they have been selling for 4 months, or word should be out about it if it is unreliable. Do not buy discarded revision numbers the manufacturer decided to dump to the surplus resellers.

I really think the most temperamental aspect of a modern mobo is the AGP system. A reason to go with PCI video when you don't need need performance video.

Recent AMD and Intel CPU suck astounding oceans of juice. If you really want low power (and cheap) you are left with Cyrix.

 

[tsapiano]

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'll take a look into them

Power conservation isn't a huge thing (just it would be nice to keep the power bills from going up too much), I'm more worried about the heat that these things kick off making whatever room I put it in warmer than comfortable (I know my current machine does a very good job as a space heater). As for existing parts, I don't really have a whole lot I can salvage (unless I can pry the processors out of my old laptops ) - I guess I could upgrade this machine with a pair of BartonMPs and use the two MP1800+'s it already has in new machines, but the last thing I need is more heat coming out of that thing.

I have looked at those VIA boards and as you mentioned when everything adds up they are still pretty expensive (although there is something to say for not needing active cooling). Plus, with their really modest power use, I could get some really long run times off of the 650VA UPS that I have for it (it used to run several 386s that I am retiring). Still, looking at those prices I am somewhat tempted to spend a little more and get a smallish ~2.6C 875p system to do double duty as a PVR for my HT system as well

But anyway, getting back on track - thanks for all the helpful suggestions and keep them comming