Mini ITX NAS Motherboard Intel CPU 6xSATA 4x2.5GbE 2xM.2
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 มิ.ย. 2024
- #review #nas #motherboard #pc #intel #windows #linux
See video update here (part 2): • ITX NAS Motherboard N1...
Review of Mini ITX Motherboards with Intel N100 and N5105 CPU's
Updates:
(1) PLEX TRANSCODING WORKS! • ITX NAS Motherboard N1...
(2) 32GB RAM Works! • ITX NAS Motherboard N1...
6x onboard SATA, 4x Intel I226-V 2.5GbE, 2x M.2 PCIe, 1x PCIe, 2x USB 3 10Gbps
1x16GB DDR5 on N100, 2x8GB DDR4 on N5105
Using Orico M.2 6 SATA adapter with Asmedia 1166 chipset
If you want to purchase one of these motherboards, then search "N100 NAS Motherboard" or "N5105 NAS Motherboard" on Amazon, eBay or AliExpress. There are many vendors. I'd hate to just provide a link to one.
Windows Driver Links:
Intel I226-V Ethernet: intel.com/content/www/us/en/d...
N5105 Chipset: gigabyte.com/Motherboard/N510...
N100 Audio: catalog.update.microsoft.com/...
N100 Audio: www.tenforums.com/sound-audio...
0:00 Intro
1:40 Components
8:24 SATA Expansion Options
11:24 Setup
12:50 OS Installation
13:55 USB, M.2, SATA Benchmarks
17:13 Windows, Ubuntu, OMV
22:28 Unraid
23:21 TrueNAS Scale
24:10 General System Performance
25:40 Encoding, Plex Transcoding
27:03 Power Usage
27:30 Final Thoughts - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
Updates:
(1) PLEX TRANSCODING WORKS!
(2) 32GB RAM Works
(1) Updated Video Here: th-cam.com/video/COdHtuzGG_Y/w-d-xo.htmlsi=bTHCHbtA1cc4V1MP
For those interested in the transcoding with Plex. I was using Windows version of Plex. Apparently Plex for Windows doesn't yet support HDR to SDR tone mapping with QSV: support.plex.tv/articles/hdr-to-sdr-tone-mapping/ I just ran it with Ubuntu and transcoding four 4k/24 videos to 1080p/24 without issue. I am making a short follow up video that I will post soon.
(2) 1x 32GB DDR5 in N100 motherboard worked. 2x16GB DDR4 in N5105 worked.
However, after installing the RAM the system sat there for nearly two minutes with a blank screen before it finally did a hard restart (shut down for a second then restarted), and then
RAM was detected and working fine.
With subsequent reboots, it started fine without delay, unless you swap RAM again.
@htwingnut It's perfectly normal behavior.
That's memory training to auto-optimize clockspeed and timings and to perform enough tests to validate basic stability of the memory at those settings. The memory controller in the CPU/SoC takes some time to do trial and error and fallback while doing the search for "optimal" values.
As long as the RAM is not changed/taken out, and gets identified to be the same modules (by SPD ...), on next boots, the memory controller of the CPU and the BIOS/UEFI firmware remember the already tested good values and use the directly, bypassing doing the whole memory training dance.
Enterprise servers generally do the same things on (hard reboot/power on), though they usually tend to do more diligent checks for better reliability, plus don't skip some re-checks/re-training stages (well, at least by default, sometimes it is possible to configure skipping more of that stuff to speed up booting), which is part if why they often (used to) take multiple minutes to complete there infamously slow boot sequences - the rest being various other initializations and self-tests.
And, naturally, having bigger memory modules, with bigger-capacity DRAM chips and/or more ranks and/or two sides of the DIMM populated vs only one and/or more memory slots populated (instead of just one) leads to a lengthier memory training procedure, because having more (and more complex) memory chips makes the electrical environment noisier and more sensitive to electrical loading/voltage drops/current limitations/cross-interference effects, so it takes the memory controller and the BIOS/UEFI/firmware more trial to experimentally determine (train) which sets of values lead to a good (enough) balance between stability, latency, and throughput.
@@victorsimeonov I understand, but usually there's some status indicator showing signs of life, not just a no signal blank screen with the CPU fan running full tilt. That's typically an indicator that something "isn't right".
I read that you need non-ECC RAM for both n100 and n305, so you should take that in mind when buying :)
@@HighFlyD Valid point. Except that's pretty much a given with any Intel non-server CPU's (like Xeon).
Now THIS is a review video that really tells you about a product instead of just repeating the manufactures key selling points. I am definitely greatful for the details on these as I was eye balling them for a few months now.
HOW?? I have been obsessively scouring every nook and cranny of YT for DIY NAS content, but only today the algorithm spat out your channel 😤 (subbed, obviously..)
This is some high-quality content, lots of effort! Kudos!
Thanks!
Finally someone have done a speed test on the orico m.2 to sata card, now i can finally choose it for my raid 5 setup
Thank you, you collected all the boards and adapters that interested me in one video and showed everything without further ado! Super!
Dude. This video provides such easy to understand data points and relevant info for my use case. Easiest subscribe of my life, thank you for the upload.
6:06 beautiful engineering, actually, the fact that it actually fits either 6 drives and x16 pcie
Incredible review! Really like the depth you go into for these rather than the more surface level tests other channels tend to do.
Thank you for watching and offering the compliment. It is much appreciated!
How can a single-man operation provide THAT extensive testing?! Damn impressive!
Phenomenal video sir, I'm currently looking to build a NAS server that will be primarily file storage and Plex hosting. My requirements are 2u (maybe 3u at a push), rackmount, 4/8 bay with hotswap capability, and QSV capability (so Intel). None of the major players in the NAS sector can offer something that will fit my needs without sacrificing a key element or costing a fortune so I found your video incredibly insightful on a number of fronts. Subbed! Peace to you and yours! (If you have any suggestions for a great backplane - let me know!!)
As i was curious about these boards, thank you so much for the work you put in.
What an amazing video! You covered all the bases!
Awesome work!
Thank you!
Great video! I like the way you presented your test results, very clear and easy to follow. Thanks!
Great comparison of these two cpus on basically the same board. Informative and in depth. Thanks!
Thanks for making this video! Been trying to find info on this exact n100 board for a nas.
Thank you for the thorough review, very comprehensive and helpful.
Great video. Thanks for the extensive speed tests
you illustrated the reason why addon drive controllers are always preferred. The PCIe expansion slot becomes near as important as the NICs you have on the board.
Amazingly detailed and thorough video, thank you, just the sort of board I'm looking for.
Finally the algorithm worked, thanks for the video it was very helpfull and ultra informative...
I saw one of that boards and know with your feedback I know what to expect.
Keep up the good work👍👏
Thanks for the kind words. I appreciate you taking the time to watch.
Awsome video! Thank you for doing this! Very informative.
I was asking AI to have this info, no luck, until I found out of your channel. Thank you for this video!
Very well done video!
I've seen a few videos about those NAS motherboards with N100 and in pretty much all of them I noticed that the power consumption is fairly high considering the CPUs TDP, thats kinda disappointing.
I meanz I'm building a NAS/homelab server with leftover computers parts and the Micro ATX board with an Intel i3-4170, 12Gb (2x8+4) RAM and a SATA SSD is around 11W on idle, and my PSU is a 240 Liteon rated 80+ Bronze, I'd expect a "proper" board with a modern CPU to be much more efficient but apparently that's not the case.
Is it the 2.5Gb interface perhaps? Have you tried to see if there's any difference using powertop?
This must’ve been a ton of effort to produce. Thanks!
this is very informative. thanks for the hardware breakdown.
Nice comparison!! 👍
What about C-states? Did you test if the boards can enter a deeper c-state using "powertop --auto-tune" under Linux?
I read somewhere that some JMicron SATA chips can prevent the system from entering a low power state, in that case ASMedia would be a preffered option (while disabling the JMicron SATA ports if that's possible)
The 20W consumption tells me that the system was not going deeper than C-2. I would not be surprised if 9W is possible when going to C-8
Nice boards to use as a combo Firewall, PiHole and cloud server. Just connect to your internal LAN using one NIC and your ISP connection on a different one.
Now all I need is an adapter so I can mount the motherboard in an old ATX case.
The slow performance of the JMB585 on the N100 board is because it's running at PCIE 2 speeds for some reason.
This is the (shortened) version of lscpi -vv on a BKHD 1264 board:
05:00.0 SATA controller: JMicron Technology Corp. JMB58x AHCI SATA controller (prog-if 01 [AHCI 1.0])
Subsystem: JMicron Technology Corp. JMB58x AHCI SATA controller
Capabilities: [c0] Express (v2) Legacy Endpoint, MSI 00
...
LnkCap: Port #0, Speed 5GT/s, Width x1, ASPM not supported
ClockPM- Surprise- LLActRep- BwNot- ASPMOptComp+
LnkSta: Speed 5GT/s, Width x1
TrErr- Train- SlotClk- DLActive- BWMgmt- ABWMgmt-
...
LnkCap2: Supported Link Speeds: 2.5-5GT/s, Crosslink- Retimer- 2Retimers- DRS-
LnkCtl2: Target Link Speed: 8GT/s, EnterCompliance- SpeedDis-
Transmit Margin: Normal Operating Range, EnterModifiedCompliance- ComplianceSOS-
Compliance Preset/De-emphasis: -6dB de-emphasis, 0dB preshoot
(apologies if this was already posted, didn't see it)
Thanks. One thing that I'm confused about though, is that single port speeds are only 400 MB/sec not 500. Yet the N5105 is not restricted. I really question the design decision for that. Especially for a NAS board.
great video! detailed tests! I love it! THX!
I have the N100 6WTDP board too!!!! You sir read my mind in making this video, legend!
Kudos! and Very illuminating. Also, looking forward to you getting your hands on the CWWK i3-N305 6x SATA NAS board and doing this same thing with it, eventually, I imagine, and hope. :)
If I can get some funding together for it, then sure.
I was thinking the same thing, with the n305 available now, I would love to see how it compares, in performance and power consumption.
Damn this is pretty useful. Exactly the kind of gear I need.
great articlle - I've subscribed now. Have you by any chance tested any Intel N5095 mini ITX motherboards recently, I searched but doesn't look like you have. I'm interested as I saw an N5095 motherboard with 12 SATA ports on board and am curious how it compares to the other recent Intel N series CPUs/systems.
Instantly subscribed
Thanks mate. After watching your video, I came to conclusion to buy this board and ordeed with BKHD. Very clear, power consumption, speed, mainly movies watching in different outlets all are good. Just a one question, did you check the 10Gb PCIE connecting and working? If you make another video with adding that 10Gb and the speed , movies all that will be great
nicely done review and comparison
hey man, great video 👏👏👏
The video we need. Thanks!
...Sensational video, great detail!
Thanks for your kind words. I appreciate it!
I bought a n5095 board with 12 SATA ports and a single NVMe and am very happy with it.
Hey, I just came across that recently too. Looks nice if you are ok with 1GbE and single M.2. Great option really for a basic NAS setup.
I am building home NAS (lab) with J6413 version of the same mb. It's worked well for around 6 months, I have only one issue - internal USB port not always worked for Unraid flash card, so I used external one. Except this mb well-built and I happy to use it as home lab.
Is the sata bandwidth tests bad on the n100 because single channel memory? Would seem to be when the nvme sata controller did so much better. Seems like to get around the limitation would be small video card for decoding, use dual nvme controllers for the drives, and put the OS on the sata port with direct CPU access.
Excellent review👌🏻
so huge amount of work and knowledge were put into this video. Thanks.
I'd be curious if you used cache or not in your benchmarks. If you force ignoring cache it might help your results.
I went full custom Ncase M3 Asus ROG Z790-i 12900KS 96GB DDR 5 6000mhz. 2x4TB Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus Nvme for caching one Intel DC 3610 1.6TB SATA SSD for VM storage 10x24TB Seagate Exos Drives 2 are backups since Ncase N3 holds 8xHDDS.
Really good review. There’s an i9 board like this I’m thinking of getting.
Wow! Thank you very much for this video! Such an in-depth testing is very rare. Others are just like "I installed unraid, connected drives and it works, great board"
The only thing i'm missing is some information about the noise. In some review i did read that the cpu fan is horribly loud and not controlled by temperature at all. Is this true for both boards?
That was one thing I did not notice at all, really was fan noise. Although a repaste of the N100 dropped temps by about 20C, the N5105 by over 10C, so that may help too. Also there is a fan curve setting in the BIOS, but I did not mention that much. I'm about ready to post a follow up video and I tacked that info onto it at the last minute now that you asked it. Thanks for asking!
@@htwingnut thank you for the videos, does the N5105 support PWM and also where does the fans could be plugged ? I saw a three pin port on the board, but three pins does not support PWM right ?
32GB RAM in n100 works for some people even though it is not supported on the website, maybe there must be one stick. Good job !
Good on you for your rigor.
Great video mate! Did you end up putting this any case after all or running as is?
No, I did not. Although I have an N305 version I'm testing right now and it may end up becoming my Windows based server
I think you can add a pcie x1 to quad pcie x1 extension board using by pi module or miners , which allow you to connect some nvme drive with adapter
Yes very bandwidth limited but still ok for 2.5G network and nvme have lower access time / good for cache or docker
About the slow speed on 5 of the SATA ports. The JMB585 is a 5-port SATA III controller running at PCIe 3.0x2 which provides less than 2GB/sec of bandwidth. Five SATA III ports can take up 5*600MB/sec worth of bandwidth which is ~ 3GB/sec. PCIe 3.0x2 does not provide enough bandwidth for 5 SATA III ports to be used simultaneously at maximum speed. I've shied away from JMicron because they've had problems with their chips since the early 2000's
Regardles it's a great little board and a very good review.
Except both motherboards contain the JMB585 chip, but it performs poorly on the N100 but perfectly fine on the N5105.
Also, the JMB585 chip runs PCIE 3.0 x1 only, so 1GB/sec each way. I was expecting this as far as a RAID was concerned. But each slot individually wouldn't reach near the 600 MB/sec limit on the N100 but did fine on the N5105.
@@htwingnut Their product brief states 3.0x2 so if it's only x1 it's even worse. Anyway, I still stand by my statement: Nice little board 🙂
@@antoniom.andersen6704 If you don't mind me asking, what product brief are you referring to. I only see the product manual at the product page: www.bkipc.com/en/product/1264-NAS-MB.html
I'd be happy to take a look.
Also if you look at my video at 15:53 you can see the single disk performance is only about 420MB/sec on N100 vs 550MB/ec on the N5105. Additionally, at 16:40 in RAID 0, the N5105 hits 1000 MB/sec where as the N100 hits only about 500MB/sec. So N100 definitely gimped, and also nowhere near PCIe 3.0 x2.
You can also see the JMB585 on the N5105 performed better than the Orico M.2 add-in card with the ASMedia 1166 chip. In a subsequent video I also have a board with N5105 with ASMedia 1166 chip onboard and it underperformed the JMB585 by a little bit.
If you guys want me to reach out to the manufacturer in Mandarin, I can try to get my wife to translate for us as to why the ports are limited and also why the power state is a bit more than expected.
Best review ever
I have the n5105 version, and I have 64gb (2 x 32gb) of ram installed there. Runs absolutely fine.
But, I'm worried about coolers. I'd like to change it for something more standard, but I don't know where to buy a bracket which will allow me to mount a different air cooler.
I really want to know your Hdd power usage? x6 pcs Seagate?
I got the same board from Amazon but it doesn't recognize any of my drives. I don't even see where I can format them in the Bios. Amy ideas?
I wish i had seen that video before i buy the n100 card. So much quality content in this video!
I didnt know that the pci slot was open... I just order today a m2 sata adapter.. i could just reuse my pci sata card 😅
What is your consumption with 6 HDD? I run at 50w in idle, i was expecting little less to be honest.
n100 card or motherboard?
@@tolpacourt motherboard
Always wanted to know if this boards will work fine with proxmox, to virtualize firewall and NAS. I was about to get one last year to try it out. Ended up using an Asrock ITX with a PCIE quad port network card and a SATA port multiplier on the M.2 slot.
I have a few more things to try for this board (or similar ones). WIll add proxmox.
it's funny that most of aliexpress offers seams to claim that those would support upto 32Gb of RAM, even Intel spec clearly says that it wouldn't. Fairpaly mate very good review! 100%
But they actually do
I bought (essentially) the same N5105 motherboard from CWWK, although it has a black PCB and yours is green. The layout looks the same. Mine definitely supports 32GB of RAM (2 x 16GB DDR4 3200 from Timetec). I think I did have to upgrade to the latest BIOS to get it to POST. I also tried 64GB but that didn't work. You can find lots of information and links from the servethehome forum.
My green n5105 booted and ran memtest86 succesfully twice with 64gb. Running 64gb on truenas scale
Thanks!
Subbed , i dont know wither to diy or buy oem , buy it has to be ssd or nvme! The noise from hdd drives me mad
What's that SAS/M.2 adapter you've got? As well as the drive mounting contraption.
You can find them on AliExpress, eBay, Amazon. Just search "M.2 SAS Adapter". I didn't have time to do any testing with it at the time of that video which is why I used the SATA M.2 adapter.
I finally was able to do some testing, however, and not sure if just this unit, but one port will manage 4 disks just fine. But the other port was only able to mange one drive.
I am trying to see if I can get it exchanged. But I'm well past my return period.
Sadly the N100, N200 and N305 does not support vPro AMT which will force you to get something like a PiKVM which will add 150-300$ to the price. And there is a discussion on STH about the stability of these boards.
N100 and above does provide AV1 hardware video decoding though. Given AV1 is taking off now I would not consider anything below the N100 CPU for AV1 hardware decoding support.
@@keithmiller9665 I did not say that the CPU isn't capable, but these boards have a limitation: you cannot remote control them.
@@casperghst42hardly a limitation for most people. Ssh or cockpit is plenty enough.
right away i would prefer a dual channel system so both options are from the table. i would use my nas for other things too because most of the time those systems sitting there and doing nothing. i had a self build nas with a j5040 in it but now i have running a ryzen7 5700g in that system. this thing is mostly packed around 30%. it is doing more as only being a nas. its doing home automation stuff, running some game servers, being a nas and backup system and some other things. i do have a dell r630 i can technicaly use for those things but this thing is way to powerfull and uses a lot more power on idle as the ryzen 7 5700g at full load also it has a 1.8gb per drive limit and only 8 2.5inch drive bays si 14tb is the limit. i use this thing for my analytic stuff where i need that 8 ram channels with 768gb and the compute power from those 44 cores. i have done this stuff in the past on my ryzen7 5700g system but 50h of waiting was not woth it also in that time the system cant do anything other and everything took ages to do something. i looked online and find a retailer for server stuff and find a r630 with one xeon e5 2699v4 for 600€ it had only one in it but bought a second used e5 2699v4 for 200€ and much as ram from the same type i got my hands on also used and some used sas drives and i was good to go. in the end i spend 1200€ on this thing in total and now i can do the same run in 3h and using only a third of the total power consumption of the ryzen7.
but using this thing as a home server with nas functionality is no option because of the 220W idle power draw if i config it do dynamic power mode and use automatic core count system it can go low as 75W but in this the system lag is high because of both options. for example i run ubuntu server on it and let it sitt in idle the system shows only 1 to 2 cores per cpu are active also there clock speed is down to 800mhz at this stage the system uses only 60w. the main power usage comes from the 24 ram modules and the ipmi / idrac system and the H330 raid controller the idac alone uses 25w. also each ram modul uses around 0.8w to 1W and the H330 uses also around 20w also the mainbord and the psu uses some power lower that this is not possible.
my ryzen7 system uses on idle 20w with all stuff deactivated i dont use. on that 30% load the system uses 35W this is ok for me. it was not the cheapest option using a ryzen7 but the best performance to power ratio with a reasonable price. in the end i payed nearly the same as for the r630. but this system is slower in all possible ways and had less functionality and safety and comfort features.
Thanks for the video!
About the N100 motherboard: Do you know if the PCIe slot can accept a PCIe to NVMe adapter as a booting device? I've ordered the mb and I am going to exclusively use NVMe for data (using 2x NVMe slots).
Thank you :)
I will give it a try. I don't see why it shouldn't work. I'll get back to you in a few days when I get a chance to try. Don't be afraid to reply to this comment if you don't hear from me. I can be forgetful at times, LOL.
@@htwingnut Thanks for your time!
It works fine. Didn't have to touch the BIOS or anything: th-cam.com/video/9ukHaJZ4Krk/w-d-xo.htmlsi=gfOIdfcBJOzHKAtK
@@htwingnut thanks! :D
May I ask you which PSU are you using? I’m having issues using a 80W picoPSU (powers on for 2 seconds then reboots). I have the same behavior with a 450W PSU, however it works with a 260W PSU, I really don’t know what could be the issue since both picoPSU and 450W PSU work well with another MB 😅
Greetings from the south of the world
14:47
Is that USB 3.0 speed for both or each?
We could leverage that speed and put it to hard drives like how chia people do it. 5 port usb 3.0 hub with separate power.
If its for each port, you could get an extra 10 HDD potential.
They are both 10 Gbps individually. I did not test both simultaneously, but maybe I will give that a go.
@@htwingnut
Definitely!
We can use cheap unpowered 5 port usb hub while connecting sata power directly to an atx psu. Well, that's how chia people do it.
Frankly, the Intel Atom C2000-series LPC bug left horrible taste in my mouth, and I've zero intention of trying another Intel.
Currently, perfectly happy with X470D4U + LSI SAS9211-8I set up I'm using. It's kind of old now, but perfectly reliable for all this time, which is the point.
I really wish I saw this video before purchasing the N100 board. I have the same one and have noticed that I’m not getting the performance out of my drives that I should be. Boggles the mind a little that despite being a generation older the N5095 is faster for data
Yeah, not sure what's going on with those SATA ports. It's the same JMB585 chip on both.
For plain homegrade NAS these MBs are great, I wouldn’t stretch them beyond that due to the lack of ram and cpu performance.
Agreed. these are best for budget builds .There are plenty of other better options out there if you're willing to fork over a few hundred for the motherboard.
Hi, at 26:23 Plex transcoding it seemed you only have software transcoding working. Both chips should have Quicksync and could transcode multiple streams with very little CPU overhead.
Quicksync is enabled. It seems HEVC/H.265 is the issue. For whatever reason HEVC doesn't make use of QSV. Follow up video incoming. Perhaps there is a driver or some other way to enforce it. H.264 videos seem to transcode fine with QSV.
I was using Windows version of Plex. Apparently Plex for Windows doesn't yet support HDR to SDR tone mapping with QSV: support.plex.tv/articles/hdr-to-sdr-tone-mapping/ I just ran it with Ubuntu and transcoding four 4k/24 videos to 1080p/24 without issue.
@@htwingnut great!
Create video, have a nas running myself on the n5105 board and can confirm that 32gb of ram also works, although is says it's not supported. Also, not sure if I missed it but did you manage to use the integrated GPU for the decoding in plex?
When I installed 32GB of RAM, at least in the N5105 version, the system never booted. Just sat there with a black screen. I didn't have a 32GB DDR5 stick to test. I may do that soon, however.
I did a follow up video, link in description, that shows Plex tests. 4K HDR transcoding does not work with Windows, but it does with Linux, as I found out. My initial tests were done with Windows which is why it was using the CPU.
@@htwingnut Interesting, have mine up and running with two sticks of 16gb in truenas scale and works like charm.. Thanks for the hint on the follow-up video, will watch that during the coming easter weekend!
@@baskoers8740 I got a 32GB stick of DDR5 to try in the N100 and also retried 2x16GB in the N5105.
It sat there with a black screen for over two minutes, then it finally beeped and it did a hard restart (powered off for a second then back on again). Then it booted just fine and 32GB was detected.
This was the same for both motherboards. I guess it had to go through some self-diagnostic or something, but you'd think it would at least show something on screen.
Now with subsequent boots it boots up like normal. I removed the 32GB, put in 16GB and it did the same delayed startup. Weird.
@@htwingnut Nice! TBH not sure if mine did the same think but it could, directly started with 32gb in it.. and first boot can tike a while on new machines anyway, so maybe a similar experience tbh.
If power consumption isn't much of a concern (like in the US) you can buy a $20-30 HBA like an LSI 9211-8i and get more HDDs than either of these cases can hold - plus the ability to run SAS drives (cheap refurbs). So the X99 mini ITX board comes out on top then. In Europe, you're probably better off with the N100 board if you can find it here.
Valid points. Except I live in USA and power isn't cheap, LOL (after all taxes and fees ~ $0.18-$0.20/kwh). Probably not as much as many European countries though. A 100W device will run about $150/year.
@@htwingnut A lot of European countries pay $0.35 to $0.45/kWh. The US (most parts) are fairly cheap in comparison. I've seen some cities go down as low as $0.12
They do have N305 version 8C/8T MoBo for NASes...
My N100 has a heat sink on the JMB chip. I bought it on Aliexpress.
But it came without CMOS battery
That’s due to a regulation issue, so no motherboards you order from China will have one unless they sneak it in.
Good job
Use Driver Booster or similar is the easiest way to get and install missing drivers when using Windows.
Snappy Driver Installer Origin is entirely free and regularly updated. Works for me.
Can someone help me with finding right board to upgrade my plex server pc. I have now asrock j4105. Running windows 10 and plex server. Have 3 hdd and ssd for OS. My system feels so slow and struggles with sharing files on plex. I use nvidia shield tv to direct play files. Can someone recommend a low power board that would do the job for me. Thank you 😊
Doesn't the n100 have Intel quicksync? I was able to get a mini pc with an n100 to transcode 4k with Intel quicksync
It does have quicksync. Check my description. Windows version of Plex won't properly transcode, which is what I used originally.
Linux version transcodes fine though. I made a follow up video showing this. I thought it was odd too, because quick sync is usually great at handline transcodes even on low end CPU's.
@htwingnut ah ok. I was confused you ran windows on it but I'm assuming you wanted to show multiple OSes.
Good content.... nice showcase of a couple of motherboards rather than just "i built a nas".
But please get a tri-pod for you camera.... shaky hand cam footage is nauseating.
Thanks for the feedback, I'll take that into consideration for future videos.
This was just my phone. I normally use fixtured web cams, but a fixtured camera isn't as versatile for close up shots, and quality isn't nearly as good (I've had focus issues with my cameras). I'm working on other options, but time, space, and funds are limited right now. I do testing, filming, and work from a confined workbench space at the moment.
Where can I buy the HDD holder that you used in this video?
I designed them and 3D printed them. Here is the one for traditional HDD thicknesses: www.thingiverse.com/thing:5882797 If you want the one for the thinner disks like I had in this video (they were only 500GB disks that's why so thin) let me know and I can upload it (if I can find it lol).
I have bkhd n100 board but i dont have any m.2 nmve drives for it so i cant test this, but can all of this 2 m.2 ports accept "real" nmve drives and not that one is ssd and one nmve
They are both NVMe.
i love this mobo but they are quitte expensive as for a single part of 4th hand piece of mb. what branded machines were they fited to?
The benefit of the motherboard is the number of M.2 ports, 2.5GbE, and onboard SATA ports. Typical Mini ITX boards don't have all these options on them. It's intended to be used as a NAS controlling a large number of hard drives.
@@htwingnut ... what is a good idea as an replacement for my current fan less industrial pc with 3HDDs hooked on USB3. Do you know what is the power consumption on idle and 1 HDD on spin down for this board?
@@zkc7718 Unfortunately idle power consumption is not good. It runs about 20W idle with only M.2 SSD, RAM, and ethernet cable installed. I'm looking into ways to improve that. There are ways with a modified BIOS, but I'm not comfortable with that as a solution currently.
@@htwingnut maybe bios modification (flash new custom) is not necessary. Are you able to disable LAN ports not needed and/or second m.2 if not in use?
17:00 the N100 board doesn't have a heatsink on the SATA chip.
Good point. However at 9:30 This was addressed. original N100 board did not have heatsink. I asked for replacement and they sent me a new board with heatsink.
what is the name of that computer case with the 8 disc bays?
Jonsbo N3. I did a review of it here: th-cam.com/video/3tCIAE_luFY/w-d-xo.htmlsi=t98CKhuuM2Iy71Xa
JMB585 is bad.
Why don't they use ASM1166 instead?
Do you know hdmi /dp version? Is it capable of 4k60 hz?
I'll add that to my follow up video. It seems through HDMI it supports 4k/50 but DP supports 4k/60. This is with Ubuntu. I will check with Windows as well.
why they still add 4pin cpu power for 10w cpu.. :(
It's regulated voltage specific for the CPU so it can get it direct from PSU without voltage sags due to other components utilizing the same power circuits.
The power at idle is disappointing. It should go lower. Maybe the PSU is not very efficient. Were all power states enabled and Windows configured for low power?
The power draw was the same regardless of OS run: Windows, Ubuntu, OMV, TrueNAS, UnRAID. I was using an EVGA 500W 80+ Gold PSU. But I also tried a Silverstone 300W 80+ Gold SFX PSU. It dropped idle usage down about 2W idling at 17-18W. There may be some BIOS settings that can be configured, but I haven't found anything yet.
@@htwingnut interesting, if there is nothing obvious in the BIOS then maybe the BIOS is just crap. One of the issues with these relatively new manufacturers is that they don't have the experience needed with the BIOS and optimising power. I heard that Intel doesn't really support using those CPUs in this kind of configuration either.
@@kuro68000 There are a ton of options in the BIOS actually. But with many of these generic boards I've used over the years, selectable options only appear in BIOS but don't actually affect registers to change anything. I haven't spent much time with it to be honest, so something might exist.
Was the Plex transcoding done with Quicksync?
Yes, I should have showed/mentioned that.
@@htwingnutInteresting. Now I'm nervous. I just ordered this board and other videos and people's comments said it could handle at least a few transcodes with QS.
@@alexaiverson I am doing some more testing and it seems H.265/HEVC conversion is not good. But H.264 is fine, but not conclusive at the moment.
I've got an n95 Beelink mini PC running Plex and pulling files from an openmediavault machine connected to a Mediasonic DAS over USB 10Gbps cable (janky, but cheap) I tested it streaming 3 4k videos which I forced to 1080P transcoding to 3 devices in the house, and it was only using about 20% CPU and not stuttering at all. It was using the hardware encoding. Don't know what to tell you, but my results don't line up with yours. Computers, eh?
@@camberwellcarrot420 Seems it's x265 conversion that's the problem not x264.
Odd, this CPU should be able to transcode at least 1 4K to 1080P stream if not a couple, with ease. You need to make sure the USE HARDWARE ACCELERATION WHEN AVAILABLE is checked in the Plex settings for it to make use of the intel Quicksync, which is can.
See pinned comment and update here: th-cam.com/video/COdHtuzGG_Y/w-d-xo.htmlsi=bTHCHbtA1cc4V1MP
On the N100 board, can you see if there is presence of a PCIE switch chip, such as an Asmedia 1806? Should show up in the windows device manager. Seeing the lower performance of some of the SATA ports of the N100 motherboard, I suspect they may be on a switch with something else, like maybe the ethernet ports.
Hardware Haven sniffed this out on their recent review of the ZimaCube NAS/server device: th-cam.com/video/qfXieR52j8o/w-d-xo.html
Thanks for that info, watching the video now! I'll take a closer look on the N100 board. Although it doesn't make much sense considering the N5105 version utilizes effectively the same setup minus the PCIe 1x Slot and there doesn't seem to be any bandwidth compromises.
@@htwingnut That the N5105 board doesn't have the bandwidth issues is precisely why I'm suspicious there may be a PCIE switch chip on the N100 board. As for why the OEM/ODM might have put one in there is a mystery to me too. They could just be recycling a design from another board, or there could be some sort of errata with the N100 and R&D money doesn't exactly grow on trees. It could also be that the JMicron chip doesn't like the N100, might be defaulting to PCIE gen 2.
BTW, loved your video. You hit on a lot of things people will be doing with these boards that other tech channels might not focus on as much, and you caught the JMicron SATA bandwidth discrepancy.
✌
@@namyun2743 Thanks for the kind words. Yeah, it is a mystery. Fair point about the PCIe Gen 2, which is 500 MB/sec about right on point with what we saw with the RAID config. But the individual disk performance is the real head scratcher too at about 400-450 MB/sec peak.
I did a physical inspection of the chips on the board and didn't see anything resembling a PCIe switch chip. I'll look more closely at the lspci details and maybe find something there.
HTWingNut, who follows (followed?) a certain Japanese metal band?
Kitsune UP!
@@htwingnut Roger here. Long time no see!
@@ytsgb Oh hey! Good to hear from you! You still over galivanting in Asia these days?
@@htwingnut Living in Oz, but visiting Japan fairly often. Coming to USA/Canada for the Hanabie tour in a few weeks!
@@ytsgb I just came across a photo the other day of you, me and Brian at Palladium. 👍🦊
For less money can't you just get a normal motherboard unless you need something as small as possible. What about a Plex server with GPU transcode?
There are many compact cases out there that support 4, 5, 6 (or more) hard drives and only support Mini ITX motherboards. Mini ITX only has one PCIe slot, and most only have a single 1GbE port, one M.2 slot, and two SATA ports.
These boards are attractive because they have 2.5GbE ports, six onboard SATA ports, and two M.2 slots, freeing up your PCIe slot for additional expansion and the extra M.2 slot for other expansion options.
This can handle Plex transcoding with the built in Intel GPU.
Wouldn't it make a lot more sense to just buy an old pc in a mid or full tower to use as a nas? You would have a much more powerful cpu, and many pcie slots for adding sata ports and ethernet ports and a 16 lane gfx card. Depending on the case and how many drives you wanted, you might have to buy 5.25 to 3.5 converters or mod the case a bit with a dremel. Yes those weak celerys use very little power, but the i3s,i5s,i7s, and old AMD cpus like Phenom IIs and FXs can be adjusted to enter low power states when not needed via BIOS and software like cool & quiet or QuickCPU that does core parking. My main system is still my ancient 12 yr old FX-8350 w/32GB ram. Runs 24/7 and still does everything I need to. My previous system is my backup system, a Phenom IIx4 w/8GB ram. I still want to build a nice new Ryzen system of course, and when I finally do I will probably make the Phenom II into a media server nas. The case is a Thermaltake H21 which is an old school black steel and plastic case with no glass. It has 3 5.25, 3 3.5, 3 2.5 bays. I have a DVD recorder in one of the 5.25" bays but it's not really needed for my nas so I could use that for a hdd bracket that converts 5.25 to 3.5.
Absolutely. Surely using an old PC is a great way to make use of old computer components. But many users want a compact solution, which requires a Mini ITX motherboard.
Also, older systems can frequently use a lot more power and have have antiquated technology and/or limited IO.
@@htwingnut Yeah I don't get why so many people get a hard on over PCs getting smaller and smaller. The latest ones that are the footprint of a cd jewel case that use an external power brick seem to be getting popular for no reason. Unless you live in a 150sqft Tokyo apt and have to use your TV as your monitor there's no need to have such a limited PC. I have never had a ITX system and never will. Full ATX FTW! ;-)
As for older systems using more power, I addressed that already. Using both the BIOS settings as well as software like cool & quiet on AMD and QuickCPU that allows you to have control over the cpu including parking cores that are not needed will drop power use a lot. Hard drives can be set to spin down when not in use.
As for being antiquated and having limited I/O, that's what all the pcie slots are for. Any normal ATX and most mATX mobos have enough slots to add ethernet ports and sata ports. Hell, you can even add nvme ssds to old systems like mine via pcie slots, although you can't use them as boot drives. But you only need one small ssd in a nas for the OS unless you are made of money and want to build a nas using only ssds.
How n100 is for Plex hardware transcoding?
Not great 26:22
Thanks, I'm searching for a power efficacy setup with 2.5mbp
Sadly I will stay with my setup: i7 7700, Quadro p2200, 16 giga ram, 4 disks in different 2 raid1
Openmediavault
@HaimPeretz I'm going to run a few plex scenarios in a separate video soon.
@@htwingnut There's something odd about these results. If hardware transcoding is used, it should definitely be doing better, according to other tests I've seen and read about. But absolutely great review!! I really appreciate someone reviewing these obscure motherboards
@@ivanmalinovski7807 I'm doing some more testing right now. Unfortunately my BD-R just bricked so I can't rip anything new to try.
Can they be used as a firewall?
Definitely, but it seems way overkill unless you also want to virtualize other stuff alongside
It would make a great firewall with those 2.5 Gbit ports. It can probably even handle a few tunnels.