whitebox motherboard for esxi

[dmccollum]

I've spent a few hours trying to research a good inexpensive motherboard to use with ESXi and I can't seem to find one that just works. I'm looking for an Intel 775 based MB with support for at least 4 DIMMS and supported SATA and CDROM that works without any hacking. On-board 1000MB NICs would be a great bonus. Thanks in advance for any help. I would really like to keep the cost under $150.00

[oreeh]

Check Dave's Whitebox HCL at vm-help.com

[dmccollum]

I've looked there and I'm just more confused. A lot of the boards just say working without any explination of work arounds or if SATA/NICs both work or just one or the other. The ones that say working with a link to a better description end up having some type of caveat.

[nick_couchman]

There are five columns - the first lists the system, motherboard, etc, the second lists anything particular about the component (e.g. controller found on motherboard), the third lists whether or not it works with ESX, the fourth whether or not it works with ESXi, and the final one lists any caveats or points to a thread in the VMware forums where caveats or help for the component may be found.

[dmccollum]

I understand how the page works, but most of the links lead to threads that do not give any diffinitive answer. The only one I see that give a clear answer is for the Gigabyte EP35-DS3L and the NIC doesn't work on it. I don't see any Nvidia 780i based chipeset motherboards for 3i. I was hoping to find one of those that works for 3i since it seemed to work very well for ESX3.5.

[nick_couchman]

The chipset of the motherboard itself doesn't usually matter. If that's an Nvidia network card, then, no, it probably doesn't work - the list of supported network chipsets is pretty small - Broadcom, e1000, e100, and a few 3com ones.

[dmccollum]

Ok. Thanks! Frys has the GA-EP35-DS3L for $86.00. I guess I run down and pickup one of those and give it a try.

[thingy]

I realise the OP wanted a recommendation of a good motherboard, but I think he should consider getting a very cheap server instead.

Let me explain why:

www.ebuyer.com are selling an HP ML110 G5 server for £115 inc vat (but not delivery).

You can look at the detailed installation process documented by someone else who purchased the same machine and decide for yourself whether you wish to purchase the machine.

Afaict, the HP ML110 G5 works out of the box according to the above article. (note, I only skimmed it and so please do read it carefuly and see if I'm wrong)

Another advantage of getting this server is that you might still be eligible for a promo that HP are doing whereby they will return the price of a HP 100c remote management card if you can prove that you have purchased a HP ML110 machine and send HP the invoice for the purchase. The card costs around £140! Again, confirm whether I am wrong or not before purchasing this as promo's usually have a closing date!

regards

JC

[nick_couchman]

What storage chipset is on the board?

[dmccollum]

Intel ICH9.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128337

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Spec.aspx?ClassValue=Motherboard&ProductID=...

[Dave_Mishchenko]

One thing to keep in mind is that ESX / ESXi don't tend to be bleeding edge in hardware support so newer chipsets may be an issue. A number of people have boards working with the ICH9 controller so that would be a safe bet. If you want a guarantee then it's best to stick with the official HCL .

[nick_couchman]

Should work with ESXi, though some of the threads indicate that you have to have the BIOS set just right...

[Formatter]

I am running an HP Pavillion a1109n with sata raid and intel gig network.. working great with ESXi, you can look up the MB specs on the HP site. added sata raid card and intell gig network.. Thats all I had to do.

[rpcblast]

I would somewhat argue the point about getting a cheap server only for one reason. CPU tech nology has improved DRASTICALLY in the past couple of years. I recently purchased an old 2ual HT xeon for 69.00 off surpluscomputers.com. I added a couple gigs of ram and am in the process of dropping in a raid controller. Not a bad start, and I think it will work ok with ESXI, BUT. The cpu's are only 32bit, so if im not mistaken I will be limited to 4g of ram total, even tho the board supports 12(if its 4g per machine let me know that changes a lot), However, the performance of those CPUs is dismal when compared to either of my desktops, running C2Qs.

Long winded post, but basically the main reason why id be reluctant to get an older cheap server is due to CPU tech. PS if anyone knows whether the 4g limit applies to everything or just per vm on ESXI 32bit lemme know.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

For memory you'll be limited to what the motherboard can support (unless it's more than 256 GB ). You would be limited to just 32 bit VMs and the memory limits of the guest OS but could go over 4 GB with W2K3 R2 Enterprise if you wanted to.

The other advantange with the older servers is that they typically have a decent RAID card with battery cache so you'll see better performance with them.