What is a good motherboard for NT?

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

Hello,
I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
motherboards work well with NT.

Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
Thanks

 

[Jim]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-206&depa=1

Latest and greatest Intel, if you want absolute stability, Intel can't be
beat. This assumes pairing w/ an Intel 800MHz CPU for best performance.
875 chipset includes Gigabit ethernet, w/ CSA support, which offloads LAN
traffic from the PCI bus to its own bus, a *big* plus for a heavily loaded
server (e.g., web server)!

The only issue is that NT is not going to support Intel Hyperthreading,
which is going to limit the benefits of the latest Intel processors. So if
you insist on NT, and want to save some money, then you might want to
investigate the lower end of the Intel spectrum, the 845x series:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-164&depa=1

These only support 400MHz and 533MHz Intel CPUs, no Hyperthreading, and
10/100mbps LAN (and thus, no CSA).

Personally, I would go for the high-end Intel 875 series, add on-board
graphics to save some $$$ (servers don't need much anyway), and 800MHz Intel
Hyperthreading CPU (as much as you can afford). Disable Hyperthreading
support in BIOS for NT. Then if you have the opportunity to upgrade to W2K
in the future, just renable it, install W2K, and you'll be running even
faster.

As far as IDE HDs, I find them all pretty much the same, particularly in
terms of reliability. You can find someone who has a horror story about
every brand (including me), so take your pick. I find WD's fine. What I
would recommend is implementing RAID1 (mirroring) for a server. A nice bit
of data protection. You can either use the on-board SATA RAID w/ SATA
drives (of course), or get an add-on PCI controller (e.g., Promise
FastTrak100 TX2 PCI controller card off eBay, ~$35) if you insist on IDE.
For a server, this is more important than worrying about the specific brand.
I will say the Seagate Barracuda models are DEAD SILENT comapred to all the
others, but a smidgen slower, while the WDs are *almost* silent, but can get
whiney from unit to unit at times, but faster. But for the most part, IDE
is IDE, and most times, you're just better off finding the best deal. If it
has a 3yr warranty, so much the better. But protect *yourself* w/ RAID!

HTH

Jim


"Scott Murray" <scottm@cland.net> wrote in message
news:124982b.0404201608.38782aa0@posting.google.com...
> Hello,
> I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
> I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
> motherboards work well with NT.
>
> Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
> Thanks

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

In article <124982b.0404201608.38782aa0@posting.google.com>,
Scott Murray <scottm@cland.net> wrote:
>Hello,
>I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
>I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
>motherboards work well with NT.
>
>Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
>Thanks


You're talking about NT 4.0 right ? You need to find a motherboard and
PCI cards that don't need Plug-and-play. Ebay's your best bet. Go to
the web site of a popluar mobo manufacturer like Asus and find a
mother board model and look at the docs to see if it works with NT4.

You might narrow down the search by identifying the fastest pentium
chip the day w2k was announced, Then search for Mobos that can handle
that chip and speed.

For a PCI cards, I go to the drivers page for the card and see if you
can download NT4-vintage drivers.

The unpatched NT4 has a boot partition as small a 2GB, I think.
Service packes increased that, but it depends on what SP your
installation CD has, and not by much (4GB ?)

By today's standards the max memory these mobos could handle is going
to be disapointinig. There were lots of mobos that could ony cache
64MB even though they allows 128MB based on simm size and number of
slots.

Unless you have an aplication that _requires_ NT IMHO you've got the
tail wagging the dog. The parts for a good mid-range machine (AMD
athlon, with a burner, 256MB memory etc) is under $300.This is
everything but a monitor and software. Add XP/home for $90 and you've
joined the 21st century.

A good Asus AMD mobo (A7N266) costs $50

All are newegg.com prices.

--
Al Dykes
-----------
adykes at p a n i x . c o m

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

In article <F5khc.25144$Yf6.4772@fed1read07>, Jim <null@null.com> wrote:
>http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-206&depa=1
>
>Latest and greatest Intel, if you want absolute stability, Intel can't be
>beat. This assumes pairing w/ an Intel 800MHz CPU for best performance.
>875 chipset includes Gigabit ethernet, w/ CSA support, which offloads LAN
>traffic from the PCI bus to its own bus, a *big* plus for a heavily loaded
>server (e.g., web server)!
>
>The only issue is that NT is not going to support Intel Hyperthreading,
>which is going to limit the benefits of the latest Intel processors. So if
>you insist on NT, and want to save some money, then you might want to
>investigate the lower end of the Intel spectrum, the 845x series:
>
>http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-164&depa=1
>
>These only support 400MHz and 533MHz Intel CPUs, no Hyperthreading, and
>10/100mbps LAN (and thus, no CSA).
>
>Personally, I would go for the high-end Intel 875 series, add on-board
>graphics to save some $$$ (servers don't need much anyway), and 800MHz Intel
>Hyperthreading CPU (as much as you can afford). Disable Hyperthreading
>support in BIOS for NT. Then if you have the opportunity to upgrade to W2K
>in the future, just renable it, install W2K, and you'll be running even
>faster.
>
>As far as IDE HDs, I find them all pretty much the same, particularly in
>terms of reliability. You can find someone who has a horror story about
>every brand (including me), so take your pick. I find WD's fine. What I
>would recommend is implementing RAID1 (mirroring) for a server. A nice bit
>of data protection. You can either use the on-board SATA RAID w/ SATA
>drives (of course), or get an add-on PCI controller (e.g., Promise
>FastTrak100 TX2 PCI controller card off eBay, ~$35) if you insist on IDE.
>For a server, this is more important than worrying about the specific brand.
>I will say the Seagate Barracuda models are DEAD SILENT comapred to all the
>others, but a smidgen slower, while the WDs are *almost* silent, but can get
>whiney from unit to unit at times, but faster. But for the most part, IDE
>is IDE, and most times, you're just better off finding the best deal. If it
>has a 3yr warranty, so much the better. But protect *yourself* w/ RAID!
>
>HTH
>
>Jim
>
>
>"Scott Murray" <scottm@cland.net> wrote in message
>news:124982b.0404201608.38782aa0@posting.google.com...
>> Hello,
>> I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
>> I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
>> motherboards work well with NT.
>>
>> Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
>> Thanks
>
>


If you need a business-grade solution with support (such as it is)
for everything you might see if Microsoft lists NT4 as a client OS
under it's new virtual machine products. This would let you
run a dusty old OS on the latest and greatest hardware.

--
Al Dykes
-----------
adykes at p a n i x . c o m

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

Scott Murray wrote:
> Hello,
> I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
> I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
> motherboards work well with NT.
>
> Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
> Thanks

What workload ?

If some types of heavily loaded MP, others loads of RAM or fast SCSI array
but without figures it's impossible to say.

Alan

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

In article <E7jhc.241$tB3.177@newsfe1-gui.server.ntli.net>,
Alan Walker <alan@lordkhaos.dyndns.org> wrote:
>
>
>Scott Murray wrote:
>> Hello,
>> I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
>> I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what new
>> motherboards work well with NT.
>>
>> Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
>> Thanks
>
>What workload ?
>
>If some types of heavily loaded MP, others loads of RAM or fast SCSI array
>but without figures it's impossible to say.
>
>Alan
>
>


Intel made a great quad-Xeon server that they OEM'd to lots of
companies, including Micron. hardware raid, triplicated power
supplies, partity and ECC everywhere. more fans than you could count,
all hot swapable. 6 slots for hot swapable SCSI disks. We had them
set up as 70GB raid5. Running NT4.

When we bought them they cost $20k each. A couple of years ago
searched ebay and found systems for about $300 each. I wish
I could remember the Intel model #.

It weighed bout 100 pounds.



--
Al Dykes
-----------
adykes at p a n i x . c o m

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

Al Dykes wrote:
> In article <E7jhc.241$tB3.177@newsfe1-gui.server.ntli.net>,
> Alan Walker <alan@lordkhaos.dyndns.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Scott Murray wrote:
>>> Hello,
>>> I need to build a new server to run Windows NT 4 and SQL server.
>>> I need it to be fast and reliable. I would like opinions on what
>>> new motherboards work well with NT.
>>>
>>> Also any ide hard-drive suggestions?
>>> Thanks
>>
>> What workload ?
>>
>> If some types of heavily loaded MP, others loads of RAM or fast SCSI
>> array but without figures it's impossible to say.
>>
>> Alan
>>
>>
>
>
> Intel made a great quad-Xeon server that they OEM'd to lots of
> companies, including Micron. hardware raid, triplicated power
> supplies, partity and ECC everywhere. more fans than you could count,
> all hot swapable. 6 slots for hot swapable SCSI disks. We had them
> set up as 70GB raid5. Running NT4.
>
> When we bought them they cost $20k each. A couple of years ago
> searched ebay and found systems for about $300 each. I wish
> I could remember the Intel model #.
>
> It weighed bout 100 pounds.
>
>
>
> --
> Al Dykes
> -----------
> adykes at p a n i x . c o m

mmmmmmmmmm..............sweeeeeet, supported MP boxes but never owned one
myself.

Alan

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.homebuilt (More info?)

Thanks Guys.

I feel like I am stuck with NT 4.0 because my applications use MS-SQL
6.5. I
know it's old but don't think client will want to spend the money for
newer MS operating system, SQL, and application modifications.

I looked on the Intel website and don't see any NT network or video
drivers listed for their motherboards. (Don't care about sound.) Asus
does list a NT network driver for the A7N266 mentioned earlier and
some other models.

There are about 20 users accessing the SQL server.

Scott.

"Jim" <null@null.com> wrote in message news:<F5khc.25144$Yf6.4772@fed1read07>...
> http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-206&depa=1
>
> Latest and greatest Intel, if you want absolute stability, Intel can't be
> beat. This assumes pairing w/ an Intel 800MHz CPU for best performance.
> 875 chipset includes Gigabit ethernet, w/ CSA support, which offloads LAN
> traffic from the PCI bus to its own bus, a *big* plus for a heavily loaded
> server (e.g., web server)!
>
> The only issue is that NT is not going to support Intel Hyperthreading,
> which is going to limit the benefits of the latest Intel processors. So if
> you insist on NT, and want to save some money, then you might want to
> investigate the lower end of the Intel spectrum, the 845x series:
>
> http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-121-164&depa=1
>
> These only support 400MHz and 533MHz Intel CPUs, no Hyperthreading, and
> 10/100mbps LAN (and thus, no CSA).
>
> Personally, I would go for the high-end Intel 875 series, add on-board
> graphics to save some $$$ (servers don't need much anyway), and 800MHz Intel
> Hyperthreading CPU (as much as you can afford). Disable Hyperthreading
> support in BIOS for NT. Then if you have the opportunity to upgrade to W2K
> in the future, just renable it, install W2K, and you'll be running even
> faster.
>
> As far as IDE HDs, I find them all pretty much the same, particularly in
> terms of reliability. You can find someone who has a horror story about
> every brand (including me), so take your pick. I find WD's fine. What I
> would recommend is implementing RAID1 (mirroring) for a server. A nice bit
> of data protection. You can either use the on-board SATA RAID w/ SATA
> drives (of course), or get an add-on PCI controller (e.g., Promise
> FastTrak100 TX2 PCI controller card off eBay, ~$35) if you insist on IDE.
> For a server, this is more important than worrying about the specific brand.
> I will say the Seagate Barracuda models are DEAD SILENT comapred to all the
> others, but a smidgen slower, while the WDs are *almost* silent, but can get
> whiney from unit to unit at times, but faster. But for the most part, IDE
> is IDE, and most times, you're just better off finding the best deal. If it
> has a 3yr warranty, so much the better. But protect *yourself* w/ RAID!
>
> HTH
>
> Jim
>