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HP ProLiant Microserver AMD-N36L 1GB250GB NO-CD $168.16 + ship

1111

UPDATE 2 MegaBuy are all out, congrats to everyone who scored this awesome deal. The server is great (mine arrived today). Commiserations to those who paid by BPay or bank transfer and may miss out.
UPDATE dessytek are all out, if you paid by BPay or other non-instant payment type you better cancel your order and buy from MegaBuy for a few dollars more…
http://www.megabuy.com.au/hp-microserver-amd-n36l-1gb250gb35…
Even megabuy are saying that you must use CC or other instant payment, otehrwise you will miss out as these things are flying out the door.
dessytek had 59 on Friday and nearly 300 on Saturday, so its a case of snooze you loose.

I ordered from desssytek 2pm Friday using PayPal, and my server arrived 11am Monday - NSW to VIC via StarTrack Express.

I just bought one of these today and it has already shipped ($16 shipping to VIC). Luckily I fond this site still says it has 50+ in stock becasues the boys over at OCAU have been snapping them up left right and centre last few days.

The prices are fluctuating all over the place right now so please check the usual places before committing.

These were circa $500 since they were released, but just recently the price has been slashed.

It is an ideal setup for a NAS if you put something like openfiler on it, or WHS if you want to pay for an OS. Basically this is killer bang for buck if you were going to go down the DIY NAS route. The AMD laptop CPU in this is faster than the even the newer dual core atoms. It is targeted at small business with a 1 year onsite warranty and the spec is really great for the price…

HP Part number: 633724-011
Processor: AMD Athlon II Model NEO N36L (2 core, 1.30 GHz, 1MB L2, 15W) supports 64Bit and VT
Number of processors: 1
Standard memory :1 GB
Memory slots: 2 DIMM slots
Memory: PC3-10600E UDIMMs DDR3 (can use ECC or non-ECC RAM 2x4GB max)
Expansion slots: 1 half-height, half-length PCIe x16 Gen 2; 1 half-height, half-length PCIe x1 Gen 2
Network controller: (1) 1GbE NC107i 1 Port
Standard storage connection: Non-hot plug 3.5-inch SATA
Storage controller: Integrated 4 port SATA RAID
Power supply type: 150 Watt

Some linkage…

It comes with a 4 bay mini-SAS backplane (1 bay populated by the 250GB bundled disk, woo hoo) but there is an additional external 5.25" SATA bay and an internal USB port so you have other options to run an OS off of and keep the 4 bay backplane for storage etc.

Related Stores

DessyTek Online
DessyTek Online

closed Comments

  • +1

    Other shops have also been dropping the price so it might be worthwhile to shop around for best price+shipping:

    http://www.myshopping.com.au/ZM--1214495163_HP_MICROSERVER_A…

    And here's a review:

    http://blog.samat.org/2010/12/10/Hardware-review-of-the-Hewl…

  • Well holy crap.. I was seriously considering buying it @ $205 from HT - out of stock - but for this price…….. Possibility of it dropping more?? Doubtful..

    DAMN YOU!!

  • Basically is an NAS, right?

    • Yeah, if you install the right OS

      • which os would that be, to run it as a media/file server, with bittorrent and usenet

      • +2

        Some ideas for "the right OS" are to be found here:

        . http://DistroWatch.com

        eg:

        . NAS - FreeNAS (ver 8 was just released)

        . music - VortexBox (v 1.9 just appeared)

        . VoIP - Alpine Linux ver 2.2.0 just out)

        . secure - OpenBSD (v 4.9 out on 1st May)

        . S.M.S. = "Superb Mini Server" (v 1.6.0)

        . repair = Ubuntu Rescue Remix (v. 11.04)

        (All of the above are on today's DW page,
        but more are available there & elsewhere)

        etc. etc.

        You'll find hints that HP has tested this
        box for Red Hat Linux and SuSE Ent. Linux

        Other Linuxes are known to run fine on it

        Almost oall of the above are FREE, so en-
        joy picking, loading & testing, until you
        find the "best" one for your application.

        Instead of buying SELS (fr a SuSE vendor)
        you can download OpenSuSE, from its dev'r
        community (or from SourceForge.org, etc.)

        [The above was written for OSS newbies…
        the rest of you knew all that stuff :-) ]

        • +1

          Yet another possible application:

          . Web-Server - ApacheFriends' xAMPP
          , (includes eMail & FTP servers, MySQL RDBS
          , and both PHP & Perl programming languages)

          . http://ApacheFriends.org (fr Germany)

          …Am I forgetting any app'ns? :-)

          (There are also several FREE Linux & maybe BSD-based OS's that include xAMPP; xAMPP installs ready-to-go, as you
          install the OS)

          [Again, most likely know this stuff, so it's for noob's]

    • +2

      NAS would be the most basic task this can do, and it can do it well. Thats what I'm going to do with mine. but people have used them as an HTPC with a dedicated half height GPU card.

      Basically its a low power, low noise, small business server grade PC. so you can do pretty much anything you want with it.

      • I'm actually considering this as a HTPC as well - which GPU card would slot into this machine?

        • +1

          Looks like a tight squeeze… But if you're after HDMI audio, 1080p playback, check out the GF210. I've got a fanless version in my low profile HTPC, and it's perfect - but due to the fanless design it's a 2 slot. I'd imagine one with a fan could easily fit into a single slot solution.

        • +1

          Hey just wondering - that GF210, the card looks 1/2 height but the bracket looks full height? Will that still fit? Note: never even seen a half height card!

        • +1

          The one I got came with a low profile bracket, just had to swap that in.

  • tempted

  • +6

    There are times where I really hate this site…. and this is one of them :) Nice, quiet, low power replacement for my old "server"

    • haha. i know right?
      my life is becoming "ozbargained" and I often find myself justifying my rationale to buy stuff from this site when I probably don't need it. this box + dedicated slim profile/lowered GPU would be an awesome little HTCP :)

  • I like it , it would be more good if it not shipped with the 250gb hdd and 1gb RAM,and reduce the price for those. as everyone will update those things in the first place

    Does it is a proper alternative for the Netgear Readynas NV -4bay???

    • At the price it is, you can just consider the HDD and RAM a freeby, and the unit is a barebones. =P

      And with proper softwre, yes, this would be a good replacement for the ReadyNAS - any NAS really. Should be faster as well.

  • Yeah sorry guys. If its any consolation I shouldn't have bought it either.

    I've only had my LS-QVL NAS for a month. But I just couldn't pass this thing up.

    • +2

      NOOOO - my LS-QVL is a month old too…and I was trying to use that as justification for not buying…
      NOOOOO!!!!…if you have….and my mate has….then I have to!

    • +1

      Ahuh! You bought it to cancel out the "ripped off" feeling that you get when you paid more for something in the past. Alas, the result is not rewarding, just guilt-inducing and it means you get stuck with more loot around the house.

  • soo tempting

  • Perfect! Got one. Just as I was looking to decommission my old Intel based power hugger.
    The N36L CPU only uses 12W for itself (http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/384/AMD_Athlon_II_Neo_N36L_…) or about 45W for a full 4-disk system (http://blog.samat.org/2010/12/10/Hardware-review-of-the-Hewl…).
    That unit pays for itself in a year with my 24/7 usage.

  • Couldn't resist, great bargain. Thanks OB for making me spend like $270 today that I usually wouldn't have :P

  • Damn! Just went over to HT and bought the Linkstation QUAD and then see this. Cant resist and get one as well.

  • Hangs head in shame……I bought one.

    Damn…that was the monies for a PS3….hmmmehhh now I find more monies and have this as the media box for the PS3!

    GREAT FIND @stumo!!!

    • But you can stream any media file from a PC using PS3 Media Server, making its intended role kind of pointless if you also own a PS3.

      • +1

        SHHHHHH! - Dont tell the MRS, its my justification!

  • does NO-CD mean no cd drive? or no OS install disc?

    • Well it comes with no DVD drive, so possibly what it means… But I don't believe there is an option to purchase it with an OS included, from HP anyway.

    • In this case, it means no for both!

  • it has only one sata port, so how we can add extra drives on it? suppose we can add a raid controller to the pci, then how we can add graphics card?? what you guys are doing

    • It has a miniSAS port on the board, that connects to the HDD bays. Other than that, you have an eSATA on the back. Realistically, if 4 HDDs aren't enough for you, then don't get this unit.

      • Is the CD/DVD Sata or IDE?

        • SATA

        • Yeah its sata but you need a modified bios if you want to run it at full speed.

          Will add a link to the op tomorrow when back in the office.

  • Caved and bought one too… chuck a HD5450 in this baby and 4 x 2TB HD and you'd got a hell of a HTPC for the olds!

    • Looks like there are no audio ports on this….so no soundcard? If so might need to grab a cheap usb audio dongle off ebay.
      http://cgi.ebay.com.au/USB-2-0-3D-AUDIO-SOUND-CARD-ADAPTER-V…

      or i guess you could route it through the gfx card with hdmi

      • I'm leaning more towards the gfx with HDMI, if I can find one that fits in this baby! 1080p movies should then also be able to stream smoothly.

        • I think the lower end cards like ATI 5450, 5570 or Nvidia GT430 or lower should fit provided they are the low profile ver. In terms of power sufficiency I think this article http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1023-page6.html shows its possible as the 5450 & 5570 use only 7W & 29W respectivery under load.

          Recon' it could run Starcraft 2 on low-med settings at ~10-35fps similar perf to 9500gt/9600gt.

  • Has anyone found some performance stats for this? Trying to see what it's network performance is like in a RAID setup w/ 4 disks. Best I found was a 2 disks setup that said Linux isn't really optimised, with Windows 2008 server beating all the Linux setups quite handily… :(

  • sold!

    will order one ASAP

  • but using only one SAS port to connect all four drives, how the performance and data transfer speed? does the speed is enough for streaming 1020p? I am little confused, what i read is we need to use a 1 to 4 sata spliter for using 4 HDD's

    • One SAS port is able to handle 4 SATA drives easily.

  • Anyone know who the manufacturer for hp branded hdds are?

    • Not 100% sure, but the reviewer in the YouTube video link above pulls out the drive, and it appears to be a Seagate.

  • +1

    placed my order. I love my qnap but i need something more

    • Same here, just ordered one too to replace the trusty QNAP. Funnily enough, I will probably end up selling the QNAP and it will probably pay for most of what this new one costs :) Can't complain about that!

  • Sexy. Exactly what I'm looking for.

  • Kudos not just on a great deal, but also on a very comprehensive post Stumo! :)

    As Elmer Fudd would say, I'm wewy, wewy tempted myself! ;)

    • +1

      I think I was so quick to impulse buy based on the comprehensive post itself, damnit Stumo, why you so detailed.

  • does it have a vga port? I cant seem to see from the spec sheet

    • yes

    • yes it does. and 128mb shared video memory

      Edit: BOOO! too slow :P

      • Its a server, not a desktop

        • and your point is?

          As taken from the HP product page,
          Graphics - 128MB shared supporting 1920x1200 @ 60Hz

        • A misunderstanding between replied too slowly and performance too low?

  • Found the spec with VGA. To install Win XP do I just connect a USB DVD and install on the first drive? Or is there another way?

    Thanks

  • Is dvd connector SATA?

  • Given that there are 3Tb SATA drives now available - any idea if these will work, or is the server limited to 2Tb as per the spec sheet?

    • I'm also interested in this

    • 3TB SATA HDD price is still too expensive compared to 2TB. I wouldn't bother for 3TB HDD for another couple months.

      NTFS is still limited to 2TB bootable, more than 2TB have to be formatted with GPT (non bootable).

      This mainboard has 4 SATA (1 for DVD ROM, I assume), therefore it only has 3 SATA port left. Stumo has posted a link that uses HP Smart Array P410 512MB (with battery?). It supports RAID 5, then it will be a super sweet configuration.

  • I bought one - don't really need it but couldn't resist =P
    Yay (or is it boo… mmmm) ozbargain.

    • you can always kit it out and sell it. makes a great HTCP project for many.

  • BARGAIN! Just purchased one - will hopefully find a use for it :)
    Although just noticed that the units in stock # (59) hasn't changed in the last hour or so, even after I placed my order … need I say more?

    • Well, if they've taken your money, they must think they can get you one… At least, I HOPE that's the case….

      BTW, has anyone done business with Dessy Tek… The DO
      exist, don't they…? :-/

      • If not, expect a lot of apologetic refunds!

  • I don't think it includes on-site warranty cover; I recall seeing Parts Only warranty support ("Labor: 0 year" & "On-Site: 0 year" etc.).

    Still good value IMO, all for under $190.00 (incl GST & S+H).

    PS Dessy Tek's web site hints that you can save "up to $10" on your 2nd order… so - if ordering more than one - order separately. ;-)

    You'll get an Order Confirmation eMail with your Order # in it,
    of form TEKnnnn (or similar), that you can enter in during the 2nd (3rd, etc.) order entry.

    Dunno how much you'll save… hopefully, $10. (reduced shipping).

    I think the offer applies to orders made in the last 12 months, but you may want to check their web site - or ring 'em - to check.

    (Let us know… if & how-much you save.)

    • Ok will check when it arrives. I was under the impression that the AU ones were onsite.

      • You may be right.

        At least, there were at least 2 different, region-specific "QuickSpec" documents (in PDF):

        1 "North America" ver &
        1 "Worldwide version" v

        Lots of info available on this puppy, which is good.

        I hope there's a disc in the box, to save hunting on-line for it all.

        (Of course, any updated stuff still's needed from on-line)

  • Guys - silly questions but….
    how do you think the price/specs compare with a similar desktop/personal computer?
    any main advantages of using a server box over a desktop? I heard they are made smaller, quieter and more reliable.
    Would be thinking of undertaking a little HTCP project and this seems like a great buy.

    On a side note - i found some detailed specs and anatomy here : http://www.server-warehouse.co.za/index.php?main_page=produc…

    good review here : http://blog.samat.org/2010/12/10/Hardware-review-of-the-Hewl…

    • +2

      You'll be be disappointed if you expect the CPU to do any heavy grunt, e.g. encoding. It has about the computing power of an Atom. But of course the power consumption is low. Still for serving media, it should be just fine.

  • Good deal, bought one, now have to buy 4 x 2TB WD Green HD, any good bargain on these?

  • Bought two of these.

    Got them from HBOutlet though.

    EDIT: Free shipping to Ryde area! :) $175.

  • So tempted … then I'll have to buy RAM and drives … currently using external 2TB drives on my Media Center PC

  • +3

    I have no idea what I'd do with it, but I'm gonna buy it.

    • +2

      That's the Ozbargain spirit. :)

  • so according to one of the articles posted above getting raid 5 on this would need a hp p410 raid controller card which according to staticice costs $909?. anyone used a cheaper compatible raid card on this server?

    • -2

      If you want decent hardware raid you gotta pay to play.

      Imma look into this zfs raidx thing that's all the rage theae days, and free.

    • I havent get but will be trying a Dell PERC 5i when mine arrives. You can pick these up on ebay relativly cheaply. (The thing to note with these cards is that they will need active cooling if there isn't enough air flow)

    • Or you could just use FreeNAS, unraid, or some other flavour of BSD/solaris/linux and use software raid, which turns this into the best value NAS you've ever seen.

  • Are there any techos who can tell me whether I can install XP on this via the first hard disk. I looked on the HP site and there arent any XP drivers for the motherboard.

    Thanks.

    • Just run xp in a esxi vm, job done.

      • Stumo pardon my ignorance, do you install esxi like an operating system? (I've only ever installed Linux and XP OS's)

        Does it need to be installed onto the USB drive, or can you just install onto the first SATA disk and then let it configure itself and the remaining drives?

        Thanks

        • +2

          ESXi can be configured a few different ways, you can boot from a USB device and then address all the other internal drives but the easiest config is to have the first drive the bootable one and then all the others as datastore volumes. When you boot it then lets you address each of the data store areas, it’s a little like a normal file system. Each data store can be used to store the virtual machine and its drives (which can appear as single files that you mount as a drive and appears to the guest OS as a hardware device).

          ESXi is painful if the hardware isn’t easily supported (even if you do a “whitebox” or homebrew build one update can blow your clever custom driver support out the window as some of the 2011 updates have done to me). The linked article above said that they did it out of the box with the onboard gear which is fantastic; really lowers the risk there.

          You could run it with 8gig of ram and run several virtual OS’s under it (e.g. windows server, XP, 2000, ubuntu, you name it). I’ve used a low power solution ESXi system for quite a while, originally on a Shuttle K45 (until it died due to shoddy components in use on the board) and now on a slightly iffy G41 chipset. This thing should be good for that type of scenario I think…

        • Having said that, I did see a post somewhere online where someone had stuck XP on one native. It makes sense since the hardware ie pretty standard. Can't find a link now.

  • +2

    Thanks for this very tempting offer. I already have my LS Quad Pro so I will pass on this one…but there are some thoughts i would like to share if anyone is intending to make this HP a NAS of somesort.

    Unless you are planning to run something like openfiler, clearOS (previously clarkconnect), freenas on this box, there is no easy way to get the kind of web admin interface similar to the synalogy, qnap, buffalo one. If this is important to you, perhaps this should be one of the considerations as well.

    Also, it might be easy to slip a ubuntu onto it, run webmin and a whole bunch of monitoring stuff like phpsysinfo but think of the kind of things you need to muck around to get it to work…a traditional nas box like the qnap make this a breeze and support QPKG packages…which is almost all you would really need for a server box…less a media player like what u can possibly do with this HP box.

    By buying another raid card to get raid 5, i am guessing (i haven't checked) that the total cost would be quite similar to lower range nas like the LS quad pro that i have.

    My 2 cents..

    • This can be used as a headless server, if you run Windows Home Server on it, you will get all that and more of a NAS box.

      And can transfer at 100-110mb/s can the NAS you have do that

  • I ordered 1 last night, but the websites Stock quantity has not changed.
    I am worried they may have sold out but not updated there stock on hand
    It was 59 in stock at about 11.30pm
    Still is 12hrs later

    I hope i get one..
    Thanks for the bargain

  • S jeeg you still reckon a NAS over this? I am still deciding, was looking for a NAS then this one came up. Which one is energy efficient, as I am planning it to run 24*7, this is my main concern

    • +1

      That's my main concern too. I have the LS-QVL @14W idle with 1 hdd. That is good for an off the shelf fully featured nas.

      But I've seen reports of this HP microserver as low as 25W idle with 6 drives. Given that the microserver wees all over the LS on specs/applications/prices, its a bit of a no brainer really (unless you need it turn-key).

  • Is this thing going to be picky about the RAM it takes?

    I.e. would this stuff work?

    http://www.techbuy.com.au/p/158960/MEMORY_MEMORY_DDR-3_RAM/A…

    • would be better to get ECC ram for it.
      http://www.ramcity.com.au/system/66520.htm

      • that's double the price though, is it necessary?

        • +1

          why would you need 8gb though? 4gb would be more than enough for most applications.
          also, if your a student, you can get free copy Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard via https://www.dreamspark.com/ if you want to go via the Windows route.

        • No, it isn't necessary unless you're running a mission-critical server. All it does is check for bit-errors in memory operations, and unless you're serving something very important it is usually completely unnecessary.

        • why would you need 8gb though?

          if you want multiple virtual machines in vmware?

      • lol now that is expensive.. r u sure ur an ozbargainer?!

  • +1

    This is one excellent price for a DIY NAS.

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