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Which Motherboards for Headless Unix Servers?
nettdata asks: "So I'm a 'Sun' guy who's looking to build a Linux server. I've got everything picked out except the motherboard, and I need help. I've gone through some hardware sites (Tom's, etc.) but I can't seem to find a 'top 10' list for what I need, so I was hoping some experienced people in the Slashdot forum can help me cut to the chase. This will be my home server, so I want it to be as inexpensive as possible while still being something that will perform well. (Champagne taste on a beer budget). It will be a headless box, so more than anything I want the ability to do command line boot/BIOS control via the serial port to a VT100 session like I can with my Sun boxes. (This will be done via my handy dandy PortMaster). Lights Out Management (LOM) would be an added bonus. Google, Slashdot, and ExtremeTech searches haven't turned up anything usefull. Any thoughts or sites?"
I use Supermicro servers, and along with great linux support, they are able to be run headless. You can purchase motherboards only, or, a barebones server from them. I have seen some Intel based designs (Dells, Compaqs) that support serial console as well.
SuperServer 6010
If you can't figure out my address, just drop me an e-mail and I will explain.
Geez. Why did you have to post that?
I have a Pentium-133 motherboard. I have no idea what kind it is, just picked it up for $10 at Goodwill Computerworks here in Austin.
It works sweet.
BTW, any Linux box with a serial port will allow you to connect a VT-100. The Linux Kernel can handle that no problem. I've got a 486-33 Thinkpad running OS/2 and a term program set up as the console on the above described server.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
I have an old IBM PS/2 server. It supports serial consoles. Of course it's a 486 with 32MB ram, and 4 * 1GB SCSI hard drives. Makes for a great Linux server anyway.
There are always add-on cards that you can get for gaining access to the BIOS, etc. through the serial port. I wish serial consoles were standard on all Intel motherboards though!
I've found the Linux forum as well as the CPU/Motherboard one to be full of valuable info about building your own inexpensive Linux/x86 machine.
I use Macs for work, Linux for education, and Windows for cardplaying.
A mindless dialup/adsl gateway? Anything will do (try smoothwall as a distro)
A webserver/fileserver? Well, ignore supposed 'server category' systems with cache and blah and go for the fastest pony you can get (gigabyte ethernet... bite the bullet). Any distro but Mandrake.
try out PC weasel with any motherboard. I just got mine so I can't say too much about it.
http://www.realweasel.com/
Computer Science is all about trying to find the right wrench to bang in the right screw. -T.Cumbo?
Intel ISP1100 - a nice 1U chassis+motherboard, designed to run headless (with serial-console support). I don't remember exactly how much you can control over the serial port (e.g. I don't remember if you can power it on/off or reset it, like you can on some of the HP kit), but it does give you access to the BIOS.
Note that it's a bit noisy, so if it's going to be a "home server" you probably want to put it in the basement.
Or you could just slap a "PC Weasel" card into a regular server, and get console redirection over RS-232. [Note: despite the name, this is a real company and product AFAIK. No relation to www.realhamster.com.]
We've got several servers sporting a dual CPU Thunder LE mobo at work and they work marvelously, including serial console. Available with or without dual channel U160 SCSI. We're running FreeBSD on them, btw. The biggest downside is the price.
Some of our servers have an ISA PC Weasel card. They're not cheap, but work very well. They completely emulate the videocard/keyboard and you can also reset (and maybe powercycle, not sure about that one) your server with it.
Why not just get hold of a Sun Blade 100 or a Netra X1 and slap RedHat for SPARC onto it?
:)
You're a Sun guy - so if you need to buy a machine, and you decide you dont want Linux after a while you still have a use for the machine - OR - if you laready have one around simply use that, or buy another HDD, replace the one with Solaris on, and use that...
You'll get a capable machine for less than $1000 that fits all of your criteria, and you also get to maintain your brand loyalty
I've use some boards that have it (Intel G440LX series) and it's great.
The problem is (of course) finding a board that has that feature. I'm afraid that most boards in the 'budget' range will not do this.
If you have a bunch of them at a colo, you can daisy-chain the serial ports, (So the console from A is going into B, the console from B is going into C, and so on until the console from X is going into A) The only way to totally lose a machine is to lose ALL of them.
Nathan Brazil?
. . . because it isn't out there.
Someone else mentioned the weasel, it does exactly what you want, but they aren't cheap.
PC MBs aren't going to give you LOM or BIOS via serial.
Either get a second-hand Sun, or learn to live without this stuff (or fork out the $$ for the weasel).
Living without it isn't that bad. How often do you really need to mess with the BIOS? You can get arount boot options with "lilo -R [label]" (change the default boot image for the next boot only) and if it never comes up just pop in your boot floppy, get it up and try again. Worst case you have to schlep a monitor over to the system.
Welcome to the world of cheap hardware!
-Peter
If you boot from the ethernet, you wouldn't even need a hard drive. You could write specialized software or you could run e.g. BSD using a memory file system like on the boot floppies. You'd just have to build a boot image that would come up listening for an SSH connection. The boot prom could include an MD5 algorithm to calculate an MD5 digest of the booted image.
Seems like this could be cheap load distibution for serving static or cached pages, and likely you could do it with low-power ARM stuff. I think the pieces for this exist. Just wondering if anyone has made a nice package.
I would definitely recommend Ars Technica as a good source for hardware reviews and recommendations