Recommended Mobo For Home File Server

[imported_riggz]

I'm looking for a good quality Intel P4 mobo for a home file server. I'm going to be running 4 250gig SATA drives in RAID 5 with a controller card. Doesnt need to be fancy, but I am looking for reliable. I've always favored AMD and Asus for my desktop/gaming boxes so this is new territory for me. Unless you think AMD would be a better route. Any input is greatly appreciated.

 

[edelbrock]

I know it is kinda expensive but I have the ASUS p5ad2 Premium motherboard. It is perfectly suited for a file server. Can do Raid 5 with the silicon image sata controller on the motherboard.

 

[Zap]

What is your budget? If you're running a PCI RAID card and a PCI NIC (even "built-in" to the motherboard will be PCI) then almost don't matter what you are running if it will just be essentially a NAS. A "fast enough" CPU on whatever motherboard would be fine. If you have more money to burn and want FAST FAST FAST, then you'll have to get a "server" board that has 64 bit 66MHz slots so you can run 64 bit PCI network card (unless already built in to the board) and 64 bit PCI RAID card. On the more budget side you can get the AMD 760 MPX chipset boards for about $175 that you can pop in some cheap chips (maybe mobile Athlon XP?) and if you really wanted to you can go dual CPU. For about $200 you can get a board like this SUPERMICRO "Super P4SCi" E7210 Chipset Server Motherboard for Intel Socket 478. It has integrated ATI video (perfect for file server), Intel CSA Gigabit Ethernet (very high performance, offloads your PCI bus) and two 64 bit 66MHz PCI-X slots for your RAID card.

My home file server uses a Tualatin Celeron 1.0a@1.33GHz, 512MB SDRAM and a bunch of big hard drives on a PCI card (not using RAID). Performance is sufficient and I used all leftover parts (except the hard drives).