Building a small home server

[Lord Alpha]

I'm attempting to build a relatively small home server (in terms of both budget and size). The server itself will most likely not be on 24-7 and only in use for testing various things or doing backups. It will run windows 2008 server 60-day trial (which can be itself extended 3 more times) and once that runs out some variation of Linux (most likely Ubuntu server edition).

The things it will be asked to do:

File server (for backups)
Windows Domain Controller
HTTP server (IIS/Apache/Apache Tomcat)
Small database server (MS SQL Server 2005 trial/MySQL)

In each of these situations there will be a maximum of like 4 people connected at once as all of these are for testing/self-teaching/etc. This will not be asked to serve anything too large (no more than a few hundred Mbs) over the internet

I'm giving you this info so that you can see why I chose the parts I did. Let me know if this is too much or too little and where I can improve/cut corners.

Here's the list of parts

Intel Pentium E2200 Allendale 2.2GHz 1MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819116063

Kingston 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820134384

hec Black 0.7mm Thickness SECC 7K09 Micro ATX Media Center / HTPC Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6811121027

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKB 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache IDE Ultra ATA100 Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136111

LINKSYS WMP54G IEEE 802.11b/g, PCI 2.2 and 2.3 32bit PCI2.2 Wireless-G Adapter
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6833124115

MSI 945GCM7-F LGA 775 Intel 945GC Micro ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813130163

LG Black 20X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 10X DVD+R DL 20X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache ATAPI E-IDE Super Multi DVD Burner
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6827136117
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Some problems/questions I have:

Is the PSU strong enough to support this setup? 270W doesn't seem powerful enough.

Does the motherboard support the CPU I've chosen? The socket types match but the Pentium E isn't listed on the mobo's compatible cpu list according to newegg so that leaves me wondering.

EDIT: I just checked the MFG's website; the cpu appears to be supported by the mobo, can someone just double check for me and make sure?

I'm getting the wireless card because I am unsure weather or not this box is going to be close enough to my router to warrant running cable

For those interested the total pricetag (including shipping) comes to $397.30

[adventure_of_link]

Believe it or not, I run my web server off a 250 watt PSU.

[Lord Alpha]

Does your server have a DVD burner? and how big an HD?

[funkyass]

if its going to be a server, its really not going to need its own dvd burner.
The CPU you chose will work in that board you chose, Something in the 4000 series would the next closest one in price, and be less power draw as well.


i'd spend more money and get an actual core 2 chip, the 2xxx series are just P4's sold cheap(hence the Pentium in the name). If you really want a cheap setup, go with AMD. Need to pick another motherboard, but thats not to hard.

To save more money: drop the wireless card and plug it in via Ethernet. Cable is much cheaper.

Either way it'll work with the PSU - no high-end video card to suck most of the power.

[adventure_of_link]

Does your server have a DVD burner?

No, just a CD Burner. It DOES have DVD reading capabilities in said burner though.

and how big an HD?

1x40GB for my home directory, OS, WWW, and swap
1x250GB for all other things

it also has 1.25GB of RAM.

I also second Funkyass's suggestion of getting a ethernet card rather than a wireless. Running a server off wireless just didn't go right in my experience.

Just so you know, my server runs Apache, MySQL, OpenSSH, and IRC+Services. I've been meaning to add Samba support, but I could never get it working. Also, despite this small setup, I've had it running for six months straight now, no problems whatsoever.

[odditude]

i'd spend more money and get an actual core 2 chip, the 2xxx series are just P4's sold cheap(hence the Pentium in the name).

Never thought I'd be correcting you, that's incorrect. Pentium Dual-Core processors are Core 2 derivatives.

* Longer explanation follows, stop reading now if you don't care.

Allendale is a Conroe with a cache reduction (and resultant die-shrink). Current Pentium Dual-Core and Celeron Dual-Core processors are based off the same micro-architecture as the respective Core 2 chips (i.e. 65nm chips are Conroe derivatives, 45nm chips are Penryn derivatives). It's also good to note that they have the same overclocking headroom as their big brothers.

The last processors to use the legacy P4 architecture are the 65nm Pentium 4 6x1 sequence, Pentium D 9xx sequence, Pentium Extreme Edition 965/955, and Celeron D 352/356/360/365 chips.

[Lord Alpha]

Well, I took your advice, and changed the mobo and processor, dropped the CD and wireless nic. Saved about ~$40

Probably gonna oeder this in the next week or two