witch processor for old board

Hi ive got an old socket 775 motherboard i want to give a new life to by using it as a nas drive and a few other little things Possibly in a few weeks once FTTC installed might be using to host a little personal website,
Ive got 2 old 775 processors an Intel® Celeron® D Processor 347 (512K Cache, 3.06 GHz, 533 MHz FSB 64bit)
& a Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 520J HT (1M Cache, 2.80 GHz, 800 MHz FSB 32bit)

witch one of these would be best to use to get the most performance out of im not fussed on the lecy bill either of these will generate there both about the same power outage anyway but in generally witch would be best in general the 3.06ghz celeron or the 2.80 p4 HT.

Other bits of info it will have 2.25GB ram (256 shared gfx so 2GB usable) and i haven't decided on OS yet but it will be either the latest ubuntu or windows 7 pro so recommendations on best processor of the 2 for those 2 os's.

Thanks in advance for any help Ash

Edited by acpsd775 (Tue 21-Feb-12 20:57:52)

I can't help with the choice of processor (although personally I would probably go for the Pentium 4 as it has more cache), but can I make some suggestions about the OS.

1. If you want the best performance forget Windows 7. It has a lot of overhead which helps it as a desktop system but is just a waste of resources for a NAS/server.

2. Although Ubuntu will do the job, I still think you are using a desktop system to do a server's work.

3. Can I suggest that you investigate FreeNAS. This is built specifically to do the job that you want, so will make the best use of your hardware. It's built on FreeBSD rather than Linux, but don't worry about that. It's actually a better, more mature, and stabler OS that is ideally suited to this application. You don't specify what "other little things" you want to run but all should be available under FreeBSD. The 2GB of memory will be more than enough for this setup.

I would be pretty confident the Pentium 4 will beat the Celeron hands down. In fact, some OEMs used none other than the P4 2.8GHz in 1U rackmount NAS storage boxes a few years ago (with HT enabled).

If you are running Windows 7 you could probably swap the processors around without a reinstall of Windows and actually test the performance, if you so wished

Can't speak for Ubuntu.

Thanks both for your answers

In reply to a post by AEP:

I can't help with the choice of processor (although personally I would probably go for the Pentium 4 as it has more cache), but can I make some suggestions about the OS.

1. If you want the best performance forget Windows 7. It has a lot of overhead which helps it as a desktop system but is just a waste of resources for a NAS/server.

2. Although Ubuntu will do the job, I still think you are using a desktop system to do a server's work.

3. Can I suggest that you investigate FreeNAS. This is built specifically to do the job that you want, so will make the best use of your hardware. It's built on FreeBSD rather than Linux, but don't worry about that. It's actually a better, more mature, and stabler OS that is ideally suited to this application. You don't specify what "other little things" you want to run but all should be available under FreeBSD. The 2GB of memory will be more than enough for this setup.

Ill look into freenas i have tried BSD before but did not get right far but it was a fair few year ago when i first started looking at linux/unix ect but now i know what im doing more its proably a good time to give it another go.

As for the other little things i haven't 100% decided what they are yet possibly a print server as ive got 2 printers a network one and a USB one currently i have to have my pc on so other people can print from the USB one but if im having a dedicated NAS it might as well double as a print server and possible other little things in the future lol.

I know a fair new webservers run BSD so will freeNAS be ok to run a basic website ive hosted a site from home before but used windows server 2000 and Apache2triad but both of those are now redundant so again if 1 box can do all id be happy its nothing big it will just be a password protected site with some links to private game servers of for my friends (why pay X amount a month for hosting when FTTC has 10meg upload more than enough for 1 site with no downloads on it lol)

EDIT will a 80GB IDE HDD be ok to install FREENAS on as the main HDD ive got 2x1TB sata 2 hdds for all my files but want to keep the OS separate.

I would be pretty confident the Pentium 4 will beat the Celeron hands down. In fact, some OEMs used none other than the P4 2.8GHz in 1U rackmount NAS storage boxes a few years ago (with HT enabled).

If you are running Windows 7 you could probably swap the processors around without a reinstall of Windows and actually test the performance, if you so wished

Can't speak for Ubuntu.

TBH i thought the P4 would be best but with it been 2 year older and not having 64 bit support (then32bit os better with only 2gig ram so wont really matter) and been slower in general i thought it would be best to ask lol.

Ash

Edited by acpsd775 (Tue 21-Feb-12 21:24:43)

Probably the best place to find out more is the FreeNAS web site. I'm not sure if it installs Apache by default, but doing so would be no problem. Indeed any other server processes would not be difficult to install; as you say, much of the web runs on BSD.

The only caveat that I would add is that you ignore what it says about ZFS (which is actually rather wonderful) as it really needs 4GB+ and a 64-bit processor.

80GB of disk space is more than enough for the OS install (much more than enough).

If you don't think FreeNAS is for you then any Linux distro would do. If you go for Ubuntu (as good a choice as any) I'd look at Xubuntu, which has a much less resource-hungry interface. There's no point in having a flashy interface that uses precious resources if the thing is to be used primarily as a server.

(I'd better declare my interest and say that I run FreeBSD as a general purpose server - web, ftp, subversion, backup, iSCSI, NAS - that sort of thing. I don't use any graphical interface on it; in fact I don't use a screen, keyboard, or mouse but access it from a PC via SSH. Also, there's a program called WebMin that is very good for configuring server applications via a web interface.)

Knowing the make/model/revision number of the board would be a help in deciding which processor is best suited. However, in this case, notwithstang any limitations that the board may present, it's fair to say the 520J HT wins hands down.

In reply to a post by AEP:

Probably the best place to find out more is the FreeNAS web site. I'm not sure if it installs Apache by default, but doing so would be no problem. Indeed any other server processes would not be difficult to install; as you say, much of the web runs on BSD.

The only caveat that I would add is that you ignore what it says about ZFS (which is actually rather wonderful) as it really needs 4GB+ and a 64-bit processor.

80GB of disk space is more than enough for the OS install (much more than enough).

If you don't think FreeNAS is for you then any Linux distro would do. If you go for Ubuntu (as good a choice as any) I'd look at Xubuntu, which has a much less resource-hungry interface. There's no point in having a flashy interface that uses precious resources if the thing is to be used primarily as a server.

(I'd better declare my interest and say that I run FreeBSD as a general purpose server - web, ftp, subversion, backup, iSCSI, NAS - that sort of thing. I don't use any graphical interface on it; in fact I don't use a screen, keyboard, or mouse but access it from a PC via SSH. Also, there's a program called WebMin that is very good for configuring server applications via a web interface.)

Thanks for that i just burned it to a disc and im now running the setup i had a little look on there webby and it seams to do everything i want.

Knowing the make/model/revision number of the board would be a help in deciding which processor is best suited. However, in this case, notwithstang any limitations that the board may present, it's fair to say the 520J HT wins hands down.

I dont actualy know the modle of the board all i can remember is its a MSI OEM board lol it actualy came with the P4HT so i know that 100% works ive tried the celeron D before in it too didn't tell too much diff lol.

In the end ive put the P4 back in as most people say the HT side of it will proably help it be better in the end an it came with the board so i know wont have any compat probs.

The only prob im having at the moment it getting it to boot it dont seam to like my USB DVD drive lol and that pc dont have a drive of its own easy fixable though ill just take the drive out of my main pc temporally

Ash

Edited by acpsd775 (Tue 21-Feb-12 23:18:57)

Is the BIOS correctly set for booting from your USB CD?

In reply to a post by Deadbeat:

Is the BIOS correctly set for booting from your USB CD?

Yea it boots fine then after about 5-10 mins it starts getting read errors i think the external drive is on the way out just in the middle of swapping drives out of other pc now

Ash

right still same tried 2 drives burnt the image twice and still getting looking for instalation CD rom on and cant get past it ive tried setting different masters/slave combos and nothing

in the end i couldn't get it working no matter what i tried i got various errors i did how ever get Open Media Vault working witch is based off freeNAS so all good

Edited by acpsd775 (Wed 22-Feb-12 03:44:11)

Any version of Linux. Given that the box may be connected to the www I'd go for something like Debian which has timely (if irregular) security updates.

Linux has become much more usable than it was 5 years ago.