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SFF machines for simple server (lemmy.sdf.org)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

17 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hi there,

What SFF machines do you recommend for a server to basically run opnsense (with a 4 port expansion NIC) and a bunch of extra disks to serve as a NAS? I was looking through Thinkcentre m720, m800 et al. I believe these allow for up to 3 disks

I know usually you'd run opnsense on a dedicated machine, but I'm a bit constrained on space so am trying to fit all in one. I don't want to stream Linux ISOs on this NAS just to store my own files.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (2 children)

That's the info I'm looking for. I wasn't considering I would need 2.5'' instead of 3'', besides glueing is not great That idle power is awesome though and why I was looking into SFF

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Have you considered just getting a NAS instead?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I don't know enough about them but how much vendor lock-in is there usually? Could I use a distribution of my choosing, or even add an extra NIC?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

If you're talking about the Synology and Qnap branded systems, there isn't any vendor lock-in in the traditional sense, since at its core it's just a low-power disk host. They have their own OS setups and such, but are all Linux based. You could also just build a low-power box with a bunch of disks and install something like TrueNAS or Unraid if you are so inclined.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

It's not perfect, but Goop is some magical stuff - only takes a couple blobs and it will never come loose on its own. Great thing is you can easily remove it, it's like thick rubber cement. Just swapped out drives yesterday.

I wouldn't do this in a business environment, but it's my box - no one else needs to work on it.

This SFF can support two 2.5" drives, since it has a cdrom. There may be a proper drive mount if I took out the CD.

An option could be an add-on card for M2 drives. The card is cheap, but M2 drives aren't.

There's also add-on cards for SATA drives. I'm using one in another box, but originally bought it for the SFF.