Good ITX board with limited availability

[rungekutta]

They’ve started selling them in Sweden now. Bit cheaper than the equiv Xeon D-1500 and certainly D-2100 but no 10Gbit ethernet on the other hand. For 10Gbit the Xeons still look pretty good, also considering that architecture  would likely be the best supported from software/driver perspective.

[daquirm]

Cool I wish I had a project where I could justify the spending for it

[rungekutta]

Looking at it rationally, I guess for only a firewall and <=1Gbit, anything but the smallest Epyc 3101 is probably way overkill even including IDS. So if the need is there for a larger model, 10Gbit is probably in the mix too somewhere.

Bit different if the server is multi purpose, e.g. running ESXi and OPNsense only being one of several applications. Then the Epyc 3251 looks pretty bad-ass and great bang for the buck.

[harshw]

What about these for that matter, has anyone tested them? I think this is better than Asus as it has IPMI inbuilt without having to buy an extra module and with celeron G4900T it would be cheap and it would perform fairly well, while still having ECC memory:
X11SCL-iF https://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/X11/X11SCL-iF.cfm
Personally I would buy this one, but I’ve seen no performance reports on that one:

I am going to get the X11SCL and the Xeon E-2126G. Anyone here with experience of this board?  What do they use for a cooling solution? Thinking of using ID Cooling IS-30 however it looks to be a tight fit ...

Oh and after various QXXX chipsets and Intel vPro, I find that I absolutely need IPMI - my equipment rack is in the basement and I don't want to go down there every time I have to hard reset something.

[rungekutta]

Supermicro recommends this one: https://store.supermicro.com/1u-active-proprietary-cpu-cooler-snk-p0049a4.html

... but I guess that’s if you use their chassis too. What chassis are you planning for it?

[harshw]

I was thinking of getting this one: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811165402.
The Supermicro one is quite expensive https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=2KH-0001-00031 bt comes with the power supply

[rungekutta]

Yes, Supermicro a bit more expensive but probably not by a huge margin when you account for power supply? Then you know the CPU fan will fit too. I would have gone that option... Still a relatively low cost compared to m/board with CPU and RAM.

What are you planning to run on it out of interest? Opnsense alone, or VMs / other stuff?

[harshw]

Yes, Supermicro a bit more expensive but probably not by a huge margin when you account for power supply? Then you know the CPU fan will fit too. I would have gone that option... Still a relatively low cost compared to m/board with CPU and RAM.

What are you planning to run on it out of interest? Opnsense alone, or VMs / other stuff?

I got a super micro chassis for $30 off eBay - https://www.supermicro.com/products/chassis/1U/512/SC512-260B, comes with a loud non efficiency rated 260W PSU. Will try to get the X11SCL motherboard and use an i3 or i5-8400. I’ll be running opnsense alone but I have gigabit internet and I wanted to run IPS/IDS on it as well as VPN. The other thing is I’ll be using opnsense to bypass my ATT RG using netgraph. Have you had to use opnsense with gigabit throughput on IPS/IDS?

[rungekutta]

Will try to get the X11SCL motherboard and use an i3 or i5-8400. I’ll be running opnsense alone but I have gigabit internet and I wanted to run IPS/IDS on it as well as VPN. The other thing is I’ll be using opnsense to bypass my ATT RG using netgraph. Have you had to use opnsense with gigabit throughput on IPS/IDS?

Nice. Yes I'm running gigabit internet with IPS/IDS on an i5-5250U cpu in a passively cooled Qotom box. I get close enough to full gigabit throughput that I'm happy. Haven't stressed openvpn speeds so not sure how it would perform then. An i5 8400 on the other hand should be almost twice as fast.

[daquirm]

For i5 I would buy something non server grade as you can’t use ECC rams anyways, or I would buy rather a similar Xeon...and by that time it’s better to invest in Xeon D as it get expensive and power hungry...

[daquirm]

For everyone who prefer non server grade hw, look what I’ve come across, UP Squared, it’s smaller than ITX: https://up-shop.org/home/270-up-squared.html#/100-up_squared_board-atom_quad_core_4gb_memory_32gb_emmc
Looks better than APUs...

[Antaris]

For everyone who prefer non server grade hw, look what I’ve come across, UP Squared, it’s smaller than ITX: https://up-shop.org/home/270-up-squared.html#/100-up_squared_board-atom_quad_core_4gb_memory_32gb_emmc
Looks better than APUs...

Yep, but it costs like a Supermicro with ECC support, 4 INTEL GIGS and IPMI...

[daquirm]

That’s right, but don’t forget, that it already has 4GB RAM and 32GB eMMC card in it for that price....so for 232 USD you have complete build with power supply and case with atom x5-e3940 and dual ethernet. It doesn’t look that bad, I think it could do Suricata as well. I only expect OpenVPN to be just about 100ish Mbps...which is still fine for many I guess...

[daquirm]

One more find, the Up Core Plus and UP Net Plus Expansion Card: https://up-shop.org/945-thickbox_default/up-core-plus.jpg

I love this form factor, full specs here:
https://up-board.org/wp-content/uploads/datasheets/Data-sheet-UP-Core-Plus.pdf

[Antaris]

People who prefer non server grade hw, want it at proper price too. If it made way cheaper, why not be with way cheaper selling price??