SuperChassis E300 Router Build

[Magius]

Has anyone built a system using just this chassis with an mITX motherboard?
http://www.supermicro.com/products/chassis/Mini-ITX/101/SCE300.cfm?parts=SHOW#jump
And no, this isn't for a NAS system, but I assume many of us building our own NAS are also building our own routers, and the c2758 board seems to be a popular option for both crowds, so I though I'd take a chance and ask here. You never know, someone might populate the PCIe slot with an external SAS HBA, hook it to a JBOD, and turn this into a killer NAS head, so it's not entirely off topic :p

I bought an A1SRi-2758F board last night which I'll turn into a router, and this is one of two chassis I'm considering, but I'm not really sure how the I/O shield, DC power input and PCIe riser would work out..? All of the images I've seen of this chassis are the stock photo of the Xeon D SuperServer, instead of shots of the chassis itself, it's empty internals, or any of the components that come with it. I guess I have three specific questions I was hoping someone who has bought just the chassis (and not the SuperServer) could answer:

1.) From what I can tell at the bottom of the above link, there is an optional accessory I/O shield compatible with A1SRi boards. I assume I'd have to buy that, rather than use the standard I/O shield that comes with my motherboard?

2.) There are optional accessory power supplies (DC bricks) but I can't tell if those connect to say a 4-pin input on the chassis itself, or if the connector expects to mate to something on a Xeon-D motherboard I/O. Is there a pass-through hole in the chassis where I could use any generic 4-pin DC brick and connect it to my A1SRi board, or do I need to buy SM's accessory power supply?

3.) It does not appear like the chassis includes the PCIe riser card or riser bracket (shown in the photo), however neither of these is listed as an optional accessory either. Does anyone know if either of these pieces is included or how to obtain them otherwise? Part numbers?

I'm planning to call Supermicro later today, but I thought I might get better and faster answers from other users. Thanks!

 

[melloa]

Sorry, don't know the answers for your questions, but if you don't mind me asking: That board lists for +$300 plus ~$90 for the chassis and you are planning to built a router with it. What will you be running that can't be done with a simple Pentium setup? Just curious as I do have a microPC somewhere that I'm planning to replace the MB with one with two NICs for a pf router someday.

 

[Magius]

I have a 1Gb/1Gb symmetric fiber connection at my house (it's included with the HOA fees, I don't even get a choice) and I wanted to build a router that can fully utilize the connection. It turns out that's easier said than done, and most consumer routers, even the top of the line $350+ Asus and Netgear stuff, top out around 750Mbps through NAT (first world problems, right? :D).

In fact, I'm not really just planning to build a "router", but a unified threat management (UTM) device, with anti-virus, caching proxy, web filter, IDS, etc. Hence the horsepower required to do all those things without hampering the throughput is high. My current R7000 router tops out around 750Mbps over NAT and can't do *any* advanced security stuff. Allegedly, reflashing it to DD-WRT would add some of the security features, but knock the throughput down to ~300-400Mbps.

The boards that are well known to handle this kind of UTM workload are the C2000 Atoms (like the c2758 I bought) and the (even more expensive) Xeon D-15xx series. In addition, because of where my router has to sit in an On-Q panel in a closet, I'm limited to ITX motherboards (~10"x10") and no more than 3" tall. Otherwise I'd probably have gone a cheaper route with something like an i3/E3 in a 1U in my server rack.

All that said, I got a great deal on this system used on Ebay. $245 shipped for the motherboard and two 8GB sticks of RAM. The cheapest I can find 8GB ECC SO-DIMMs on Ebay are about $35 each, so I'm looking at it as $175 for the board and $70 for the RAM. I'm debating between the $85 SM chassis and a $40 generic chassis, plus some cables, fans, etc. Either way I'm looking at $300-$350 all-in, which is comparable to buying a top of the line consumer router... I agree looking at retail pricing for the board and memory would tell a different story, but for the requirements I'm working towards I don't have a lot of options.

 

[Ericloewe]

I moved this thread to offtopic, to prevent confusion.

1.) From what I can tell at the bottom of the above link, there is an optional accessory I/O shield compatible with A1SRi boards. I assume I'd have to buy that, rather than use the standard I/O shield that comes with my motherboard?

You'd best ask the seller, but I think they generally include an I/O shield with their chassis which fits most of their motherboards.

2.) There are optional accessory power supplies (DC bricks) but I can't tell if those connect to say a 4-pin input on the chassis itself, or if the connector expects to mate to something on a Xeon-D motherboard I/O. Is there a pass-through hole in the chassis where I could use any generic 4-pin DC brick and connect it to my A1SRi board, or do I need to buy SM's accessory power supply?

In the bottom view, the left of the chassis has what looks conspicuously like a DC barrel jack. Internally, I fully expect it to just break out into what looks like a 4-pin CPU power connector, which is just wired with two each of +12V and GND. You'd just have to find something with the appropriate size of barrel jack (and polarity, careful with those evil center-geative things).

 

[Magius]

Thanks for the reply, and I'll say that I had similar thoughts, but I'm not confident enough to just buy the $85 chassis and hope for the best. If it turns out that I need to add a special I/O shield and a special power supply to make it work, plus a PCIe bracket, plus fans and cables, the cost would easily be over $150 just for the chassis and accessories...

I'm actually leaning more towards an m350 for $40 now, which should still be under $60 after adding a few pieces and parts. It means I won't be able to use the PCIe slot, but that was going to be a growth option for future (long term future) 10GbE LAN anyway. If I ever do upgrade to 10GbE, then replacing the cheap chassis would be the least of my expenses :)

 

[SweetAndLow]

You are spot on with your performance understanding and the limitations of open source firmwares NAT translations. I have been looking into building/buying a home router that can push 1gbps.

I have been looking at a pfsense sg-2440, 4860, 8860 and also some of the mikrotik router boards. These are all pre built units but you could easily copy them.

I know this doesn't exactly address your question but I'm doing a similar thing and figured I could share.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[Magius]

You are spot on with your performance understanding and the limitations of open source firmwares NAT translations. I have been looking into building/buying a home router that can push 1gbps.

Yeah I've been researching this for a while, hopefully I've got it right by now :). I did not want to spend ~$500 to build a c2758 router at retail prices, so I thoroughly investigated other cheaper options. I even went into my attic to see if I could run a new cable from the On-Q panel (2nd story closet) to the server closet (1st story, under the stairs) so that I could get away with a cheaper 1U solution. No dice, unfortunately, so it has to be mITX for me. Cheaper options in that form factor are too big a sacrifice in features or performance, so I decided to troll eBay and STH for used boards.

I did look at the pre-configured pfsense/netgate devices as well, but they're very expensive compared to building myself. For example, I'm using the same hardware as the SG-8860 ($1000+) and stuffing it into an ITX chassis similar to the SG-4860 ($750), but building it all for ~$350 (used parts, of course!). Even at retail prices you'd probably save $200+ building it yourself. I'm all for supporting the project, and if I end up using pfsense software I'll donate and/or buy a Gold pass, but I just can't justify the cost of their hardware for home use.

Thanks again for the tips, and if there's anything you think I can help with in your own router searching let me know.

 

[Ericloewe]

I've been looking for used C2x58 boards, too, but haven't found anything that ended up cheaper than buying new.

With any luck, now that Denverton is more than just vaporware (slightly), people will start offloading their hardware.

 

[Magius]

I've been looking for used C2x58 boards, too, but haven't found anything that ended up cheaper than buying new.

That's the problem I'd been having. Seems to be an issue buying gear from forums like this one, STH, etc. Folks have great gear, but they take good care of it, and there's no shortage of likeminded folks wanting to take it off their hands when they upgrade. That keeps prices pretty high compared to the crapshoot on eBay :)

I almost jumped on a used c2758 with 32GB RAM for $375 on STH last month, but I don't need that much RAM, and I could buy the c2758 new with a used 8GB stick for the same price, so the only real "savings" was having all that extra RAM. It took a few months of trolling eBay to finally score the deal I did last night. Good look in your own hunting!

 

[Ericloewe]

I almost jumped on a used c2758 with 32GB RAM for $375 on STH last month,

I wish, a new C2758 around here would cost around 380 bucks, plus some 50 bucks shipping if I want it from a reputable store that actually ships here.

Used stuff is even trickier, most of it is from the US, so I'd have to add some 25% on top of that, which quickly shoots past new prices.

 

[MatthewSteinhoff]

We used to build our own firewalls, installing pfSense. With our last expansion push, we were short on time and bought a handful of the SG-2440s and SG-2220s. The cost wasn't that much more than custom builds. Our corporate office core is still on server-grade hardware but I can't ever see us building a SOHO firewall ever again.

Performance has been solid even with IPsec and pulling all the remote security cameras back to the main office. Might not high full gigabit speeds but more than enough capacity for our needs.

Cheers,
Matt

 

[Magius]

I wish, a new C2758 around here would cost around 380 bucks, plus some 50 bucks shipping if I want it from a reputable store that actually ships here.
Used stuff is even trickier, most of it is from the US, so I'd have to add some 25% on top of that, which quickly shoots past new prices.

Ah yes, I often forget that many of you folks are outside the US and get screwed by currency conversions, VAT, and exhorbitant shipping. That does change the equation significantly...

We used to build our own firewalls, installing pfSense. With our last expansion push, we were short on time and bought a handful of the SG-2440s and SG-2220s.

For a small office I would 100% agree with you. And the pfsense hardware would be a great option for sure. My only remark was that for a home user, particularly one competent in building server platforms, the extra cost of the pfsense hardware could be a significant factor. For me at least, I didn't feel it was worth the extra cost. For a business, definitely buy something pre-configured and vendor-supported :)

 

[miniwalks]

As some of the guys have said, that super chassis looks like a PfSense box in the making!


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[Magius]

I wanted to come back and close the loop on this after talking to Supermicro a couple days ago.

First of all, the rep was telling me that if a motherboard and a chassis were meant to be compatible it would say so on the right hand side of the web page, and neither this board nor chassis mention compatibility with the other one. I understood this general rule of course, but I pressed him about the I/O shield accessory for this chassis that specifically calls out the model family for my Atom board. In the end he agreed that the board must work in this chassis as long as I buy that shield, even if it doesn't say so on the website. Really no better answer than the assumption I'd already made, but I took it and moved on.

On the power supply question, we went round and round and he put me on hold twice to go ask someone else about it. I could tell I'd finally gotten through to him after I explained why I felt there might be a "missing piece" to convert from the 12V DC barrel jack to the 4-pin ATX plug on my motherboard. Rightly or wrongly, I explained to him that I assumed his chassis takes the 12V barrel plug and converts it to an 8-pin ATX connector for his Xeon-D motherboard. That may not be correct, and he wasn't sure either, but the point was, I'd need an adapter from 8-pin to 4-pin in that scenario to plug into my Atom board. Since that adapter surely didn't come with the I/O shield, how would I get it? This was when he put me on hold the second time, and when he came back he was confident he had the answer. What he said is that when you buy the power supply accessory kit (84W?), it comes with the adapters you need to convert from the barrel jack input to the different ATX connectors. I didn't really want to buy their power supply, but at least this seems to answer the question.

For the final question I ended up not asking Supermicro, both because I'd been on the phone with them for over 45 minutes by this point, and because I believe I found the answer in another person's SuperServer build thread. What it looks like is that the chassis and super server come with the physical bracket to mount an expansion card, but not the riser card you need to make the electrical connection.

So with all of that information, it does seem like you could buy the E300 chassis and use it with an Atom motherboard, as long as you buy the optional I/O shield and buy the optional PSU kit (or else rig up your own with adapters from Amazon). If you want to use the expansion slot, you'll either need to buy the right Supermicro riser card, or you might be able to get by with a generic flexible one from Amazon, and just use the included bracket to hold the card.

I ended up deciding that the odds of me upgrading with a 10GbE NIC down the road are pretty slim, and bought a trusty m350 chassis with a few fans, extra HD bracket and power kit. I still like the idea of the Supermicro chassis, but at this time it's just a little pricey and harder to get all the special pieces together to make it work with Atom.