Recommendations for a small footprint server, please

[johnhaines]

Hi,

After a lot of frustration trying to get SS to work on my desktop after upgrading to Vista Ultimate I have decided to look at buying something small, cheap-ish and preferably quiet to use as a dedicated server on my network.

I have looked at the various NAS options on the forum ... but I am afraid that I have lost my enthusiasm for digging into code and hacking boxes to get them to work. What I really want is something I can get off the shelf and have a very high level of confidence that it will work as soon as I install SS on it.

Does anyone use a Mac Mini, for instance? Is it up to the job? I wouldn't really want to spend any more than the cost of an entry level Mac Mini ... about £400 here in the UK.
Are there other options with a similarly small footprint?


Thanks in advance for any suggestions,
John

[bobharp]

Try a Shuttle (http://shuttle.com) system
or look at:

http://www.epiacenter.com/modules.php?name=Topics

for small form factor resources.

Even cooler run your squeezebox with the way cool
SlimCD

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36538

[topa]

On the cheap, go for HP/Compaq Evo USDTs (Ultra Slim Desk Top), either s/h 510 or 530 modells or the currrent line (550?). Works a treat!

[qirex]

I run a fall 2005-vintage Mac mini [1.8ghz] with a firewire HD, works great and I haven't even upgraded the RAM. I run it headless and use VNC when I need to control it.

[tot]

Try a Shuttle (http://shuttle.com) system

I had a shuttle few years back and when it expired (well, I modded it slightly...) I replaced it with Asus Pundit. It is cheaper and slimmer, very good.

Teemu

[ratso]

i love my mini and HIGHLY recommend it (to anyone that will listen actually)

[Balthazar_B]

If you're looking for something to run some recent flavor of Linux, you might try:

http://minipc.aopen.com/Global/spec.htm

Now some of the bits on these machines *may be* too new for drivers to have been written, but a little research should tell the tale.

If you're looking for something even smaller, there are many DIY, low-power setups that would run Slimserver quite well.

[googdot]

i run slimserver on an older Mac Mini G4 (1.25) that I picked up second-hand and can highly recommend it. A great cheap alternative! Its run headless, and use VNC when necessary for updates, etc.

i upgraded the HD to 160GB and everything else is stock - even the RAM which is only 512mb. been running well over a year now with no issues at all. and best part...it looks good in the lounge too

[Ron F.]

See my post:

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?p=213394#post213394

The nano-ITX box in the photo I attached is an eBox model 3850. It can be had for a reasonable price here:

http://www.wdlsystems.com/ebox/ebox.shtml

My total cost for the whole thing was about $1k. I have 750 GBytes of storage, and very fast response time from the little server running Michael's SlimCD. The system is also extremely quiet - no fan.

-Ron

[johnhaines]

Thank you all for your replies. I am going to start working through all of the options suggested over the next couple of days. I hadn't realised that there were so many options available.

The SlimCD approach looks very interesting. I definitely need to have a closer look at it.

John

[mherger]

Recommendations for a small footprint server, please

> The SlimCD approach looks very interesting. I definitely need to have a
> closer look at it.

....and don't forget to consider FreeNAS/SlimNAS as well. It's imho simpler
to set up.

http://www.herger.net/SlimNAS

Michael