This looks great. I’m about to retire a 1155 socket setup that has been running strong since 2011.
Mobo: ASUS P8Z68-V Pro Gen3 Motherboard
I have it paired with a 2500k running at 4.5ghz, which is a power sucker obviously, haha. I would source the 3470T, or something similar. Also has 8GB Ram ( G.Skill Sniper F3-12800CL9D-8GBSR2 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3). Waiting on Mellanox CX312A ConnectX-3 for my server and the pf-sense router I am building.
Might run this out of the DAS I am building in a massive Lian-Li PC-P80B
edit
Have ordered a Intel Xeon E3-1265L - also a Deepcool Alta 9 heatsink. Going to email noctua about getting an am4 bracket for the D15 that is currently on the 2500k. Going to move that to Ryzen build.
@JDM_WAAAT I recently stumbled upon Serverbuilds.net while listening to the self-hosted podcast talking about rolling your own PFSense router. Any other motherboards you would now consider for this build all the ones you have listed seem to have doubled or tripled in price or are relatively hard to find? I am looking to build a low power, small footprint PFSense router with the ability to run Wireguard at full 500/500 speeds I am trying to keep my build under $200. Any help would be greatly appreciated
If you live in the US, check out the HP 290 thread. It makes a very capable pfSense box when you add a NIC and a small SSD for booting, and your total costs should be well under $200.
HP 290 are going for 200$ + on ebay, so it seems for at least now that is dead. Any other recommendations anyone has? The original board in this build isn’t readily available anymore, at least not at these kind of prices. I found a few refurb desktops locally which might be my option + a intel NIC. Looking for something small w/ low power usage & several GbE ports.
If there are no other suggestions anyone have any thoughts on the few options I found locally as off lease/refurbs:
HP EliteDesk 705G2 - AMD A10 8750B, 8GB DDR3-1600, 500GB HDD: 129$
HP EliteDesk 705 G1 - AMD A4 Pro-7300B, 8GB DDR3-1600, 500GB HDD 129$
Dell OptiPlex 3020 - Intel Core i3 4130, 8GB DDR3-1600, 500GB HDD - 139$
Or do I just accept that if I want low power I scrap plans to go with opnsense & pick up a cheaper low power ARM router that fully supports OpenWRT? Unfortunately my current Asus router doesn’t support it due to Broadcom WiFi chipsets.
Currently have a NK 4.1 (E3-1230v2) set planned for pfSense since I have nothing else to use it for at the moment. Is the CPU a bit overkill? Thinking about selling it and getting one with lower power consumption (E3-1220L, E3-1260L, E3-1265L v2) for gigabit fiber. Really only planning having a VPN and ad blocking but got a lot of devices (IoT, PoE cams, servers).
Guessing I’ll actually save some money here too with the move.
@JDM_WAAAT This post seems to be extremely popular, having spawned other build posts and even YouTube videos. The motherboard recommended in this post is almost impossible to find now (humorously, you can get one on Amazon for over $600).
Do you have any other recommendations for the original price point that also have dual NICS?
If you can’t find it local in Canada, I’d recommend a re-shipper like cross boarder pickups or something similar. Pay the cheap-no shipping cost in the US then a small fee to have it shipped across the boarder. Works out beautifully for items like that.
I’ve used MyUSAddress in the past and had no issues.
I’m not planning to order one - just poking fun at the shipping costs. $2500! What is he going to do? Fly here to hand deliver it incl. the costs of the 14-day quarantine?
Something like this might be a good option for someone still looking for a smallish PFsense build.
Dell Optiplex SFF would be another option. Lots of different ones at different price points, and the ones that have a CPU with the same passmark as a G4900 are pretty cheap. Something with an i3 would be just fine.
