FreeBSD & mini-ITX

[Erik Nørgaard]

Benjamin Keating wrote:
> I've been eyeing up these mini-ITX boards - would like to make a quite
> little file server. Does anyone here run a mini-ITX board (what
> model)? Does it work out of the box? Anything not supported? I'd go
> for one of VIA's as AMD's and others are still a little new and
> pricey. Recommend a shop to purchase from (in the US)?

I bought a VIA EPIA CL1000 (now PD, dual NIC) and a Morex Cubid 3688 
case one year ago from mini-itx.com.

I installed FBSD 4.10 and later FBSD 5.3-5.4 with out any problems. I 
haven't installed X11, I don't see the point as it's a server remotely 
controled with ssh, and I don't have a spare monitor anyway.

The only issues I have had are: 'halt -p' reboots instead of powerdown, 
so I had to 'halt' then powerdown manually. ACPI doesn't read cpu 
temperature.

I use it at home as my mail/web/whatever server with a DSL connection, 
generally with a load of 0.00. The DSL limits the traffic so it simply 
can't get too much network load.

I have had one problem that gave me some grey hairs, which I initially 
thought it to be MB or disk problem, but it turned out to be ip-filter 
rather than hardware.

mini-itx.com reports noice of < 25dB. The fans may produce that level of 
noice if they were not mounted. I found resonances causing the box to be 
quite noicy, in particular the cpu fan.

You can buy some stuff to make the fan run slower and it helps. But what 
really helps is to reduce vibrations: Raise the cpu fan a bit from the 
cooler plates using some heat tolerable silicon, this makes the fan run 
more freely and transfers less resonances to the cooler plates and onto 
the MB. Also place the box on rubber feet so it won't pass on vibrations.

I run my box with only the cpu fan, no others, the box is hot but it 
runs without problems.

Cheers, Erik
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