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Slightly OT but can anyone recommend ARM servers for home use? I have x86 server but is too noisy and overpowered, and a raspberry pi which is too weak. Can som

by rb808 10y ago

Slightly OT but can anyone recommend ARM servers for home use? I have x86 server but is too noisy and overpowered, and a raspberry pi which is too weak. Can someone recommend some hardware in-between?

turblety 10y ago
Depending on your requirements you could have a look at the ODROID (http://www.hardkernel.com/main/main.php http://www.hardkernel.com/main/main.php).
voltagex_ 10y ago
Marvell Espressobin or ODroid. Also check what upstream kernel support you have, as the community size will be a fraction of that of the Pi
Symbiote 10y ago
I have two Odroids in different houses, one is three years old, the other four. They required some fiddling to get Apache not to exhaust the RAM available. I use one for backups, and the other for a web site / image gallery + UPnP media server + storage + Bittorrent seed. They're OK, but the initial setup took a while due to the lack of clear documentation which x86 or a Pi has.
rjsw 10y ago
Maybe a CubieTruck (CubieBoard 3), it is one of the few boards that has both SATA and Gb Ethernet built in to the SoC. My actual home server is an HP MicroServer though, totally silent and uses ECC RAM.
floatboth 10y ago
RPi 3 with an overclock isn't as weak as the previous ones… and you can boot it over network or USB. Still, the lack of SATA and Gigabit Ethernet is disappointing. So I currently use a Mac mini '06 as my home server. Used to be my main desktop back in the day… I upgraded the CPU (Core Duo → Core 2 Duo), flashed the firmware from the '07 model (allows running OS X Lion, but idk if that did anything else), installed an SSD (yeah, SATA 1 limits the bandwidth, but latency is sooo much better & I was slightly concerned about the old drive failing) and installed HardenedBSD (because this machine has 32-bit firmware, that was more complicated than usual — I compiled GRUB 2 for 32-bit EFI! And that happily boots the 64-bit FreeBSD kernel. From ZFS, even.) One downside of that machine is called "Marvell Yukon 88E8053 Gigabit Ethernet". It just… stops working after a while: https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=206567 https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=206567 So my home server is currently on Wi-Fi :D Another thing is that you have to shove a resistor into the DVI connector to let the machine boot w/o a display https://soledadpenades.com/2009/02/10/mac-mini-as-a-headless-server/ https://soledadpenades.com/2009/02/10/mac-mini-as-a-headless...
dboreham 10y ago
Not ARM, but I've used a mixture of Intel NUCs and Atom SOC-based Supermicro machines like this : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HS4NLHA https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HS4NLHA (both are fanless and quite cheap but run stock x86 binaries). The Supermicro machines have a proper IPMI interface which is nice for when your box falls on its face when you're on vacation).

by rb808 10y ago

turblety 10y ago

Depending on your requirements you could have a look at the ODROID (http://www.hardkernel.com/main/main.php http://www.hardkernel.com/main/main.php).

voltagex_ 10y ago

Marvell Espressobin or ODroid. Also check what upstream kernel support you have, as the community size will be a fraction of that of the Pi

Symbiote 10y ago

I have two Odroids in different houses, one is three years old, the other four. They required some fiddling to get Apache not to exhaust the RAM available. I use one for backups, and the other for a web site / image gallery + UPnP media server + storage + Bittorrent seed. They're OK, but the initial setup took a while due to the lack of clear documentation which x86 or a Pi has.

rjsw 10y ago

Maybe a CubieTruck (CubieBoard 3), it is one of the few boards that has both SATA and Gb Ethernet built in to the SoC. My actual home server is an HP MicroServer though, totally silent and uses ECC RAM.

floatboth 10y ago

RPi 3 with an overclock isn't as weak as the previous ones… and you can boot it over network or USB. Still, the lack of SATA and Gigabit Ethernet is disappointing. So I currently use a Mac mini '06 as my home server. Used to be my main desktop back in the day… I upgraded the CPU (Core Duo → Core 2 Duo), flashed the firmware from the '07 model (allows running OS X Lion, but idk if that did anything else), installed an SSD (yeah, SATA 1 limits the bandwidth, but latency is sooo much better & I was slightly concerned about the old drive failing) and installed HardenedBSD (because this machine has 32-bit firmware, that was more complicated than usual — I compiled GRUB 2 for 32-bit EFI! And that happily boots the 64-bit FreeBSD kernel. From ZFS, even.) One downside of that machine is called "Marvell Yukon 88E8053 Gigabit Ethernet". It just… stops working after a while: https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=206567 https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=206567 So my home server is currently on Wi-Fi :D Another thing is that you have to shove a resistor into the DVI connector to let the machine boot w/o a display https://soledadpenades.com/2009/02/10/mac-mini-as-a-headless-server/ https://soledadpenades.com/2009/02/10/mac-mini-as-a-headless...

dboreham 10y ago

Not ARM, but I've used a mixture of Intel NUCs and Atom SOC-based Supermicro machines like this : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HS4NLHA https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HS4NLHA (both are fanless and quite cheap but run stock x86 binaries). The Supermicro machines have a proper IPMI interface which is nice for when your box falls on its face when you're on vacation).