[geeks] Nifty NAS board (Atom-based FlexATX from Supermicro)

[Lionel Peterson]

There is a brand-new Intel Atom 330-based MB out there that looks nice
on several levels - the Supermicro X7SLA-H - a "FlexATX" MB.

What sets this board apart from other Atom-based MBs are the following:

 - Dual Realtek Gigabit Ethernet ports
 - Dual memory slots (with 2 Gig limit, but dual-channel supported)
 - Four ICH7R SATA ports (supports RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 under Windows)
 - On-board USB "Type A" connector (use standard flash drive for boot media)
 - One PCI-Express x8 slot
 - One PCI-Express x4 slot (in an x8 socket)
 - One PCI slot
 - Atom 330 CPU (1.6 GHz, dual core, hyperthreading supported, faux
quad-core, x64 supported but no Virtualization Support)
 - Intel GMA 950 integrated video

And the price is around $135-175, depending on vendor (scarce at the
moment, just released)

MFG URL: http://supermicro.com/products/motherboard/ATOM/945/X7SLA.cfm?typ=H

This thing was made for a small server with lots of room for growth -
I can see this as an ideal platform for Windows Home Server.

Wonder how it would do as a Solaris ZFS fileserver...

There is also a lower-priced version ($115-140) with the Single Core
230 Atom CPU, no on-board USB socket, and only one Gigabit Ethernet
port.

Here's a perfect chassis for the above MBs (in tower form), it lists
for about $100 including a 300 Watt PS from Supermicro:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811152123

Of course, Dell can undercut this with one of their "insane" Poweredge
tower server blowouts, but for about $250 (plus RAM and HDs) that
could be a nice, low-power server with some nice expansion options.

-- 
Lionel Peterson
lionel4287 at gmail.com