HP ProLiant MicroServer N36L Owner's Thread

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I am going to use the USB stick method of installing WHS.

How To Use a USB Stick to Install Windows Home Server or anything else for that matter - Using Windows Home Server

I have prepared the USB stick ready to copy the WHS files from the DVD to the stick but before I do that can I incorporate the drivers for the AHCI/Display/SMBus/Ethernet etc ?

Thanks

I don't know how easy it is to incorporate the drivers - maybe this will help? Strictly speaking, I've noticed no degradation by using IDE instead of AHCI for the hard drives, and you can quite easily install the rest of the drivers manually after setting up the OS.
 
this looks like a good nas to replace my qnap , i have never seen or looked at freenas or unraid but so long as i can use samba shares and install python apps will cater for my needs. Also need to be able to backup to usb i assume that is possible too. Now is it hardware Raid controller and can i hot swap the drives using say freenas?

I don't know if FreeNAS/unRAID can back up to USB, but I would hope so.. It's not a hardware RAID controller, but I believe FreeNAS has built-in software RAID, and unRAID uses a different data redundancy method which replaces RAID anyway. I don't believe you can hotswap drives - is this really much of an issue though for a low-end NAS?

so how do i know if ebuyer are an authorised seller or not for this claim? Also is it only businesses that can claim its not too clear the the form asks for a company name?

I believe eBuyer are an HP Gold Preferred Partner for 2011. As said above, just put your name in instead of a company name - it's just a name they use for the claim / cheque, doesn't have to be a company.
 
i think i read that back up to local drive is an option in the webgui in freenas somewhere
 
If you use WHS Vail (2011) you don't need any additional drivers (except sound, but I've not bothered with that), to make it work, even with AHCI on.

Also can use the official MS Windows 7 USB Tool to make a bootable flash drive to install it.
 
i asume the 160gb option is the same server spec wise just smaller hard disk is that right?
 
i asume the 160gb option is the same server spec wise just smaller hard disk is that right?

I believe so yes (does not have the £100 cashback offer though)
 
I believe so yes (does not have the £100 cashback offer though)

true but i dont need the drive and getting the cashback might be a hassle and the 160gb is about £180 delivered hmmm what to do
 
true but i dont need the drive and getting the cashback might be a hassle and the 160gb is about £180 delivered hmmm what to do

I can't tell if you're joking, why would you pay £60 more for one with a smaller drive, why would you pay £60 more even if it had the same drive.
 
had it down at £40 diffrence though ebuyer and its because im lazy
 
[-]Sure I've seen it driveless so even cheaper[/-] seems the driveless version is discontinued
 
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Sorry seems the driveless one is discontinued :blush:
 
I added two 1.5TB Sata Hard Drives to the existing 250GB. I installed Windows 7 Ultimate and followed this guide to setup raid.

http://www.tenniswood.co.uk/technol...ow-to-setup-a-raid-array-on-a-hp-microserver/

I added the two 1.5TB drives into an RAID 1 array and rebooted, now the server will not boot into Windows.

I don't want to have to reinstall Windows, should I forget the on board RAID and just use software raid, AMD raidxpert?

I should add that if I turn the SATA mode back to IDE it boots up fine again.

Will the onboard RAID be significantly better than software RAID?
 
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Regarding not booting, as I have found, depending on what IDE mode you set in the bios, the boot order of the HDD's switches around, so I'd just check that when you put it into RAID mode, there is a section that determines your HDD order, make sure your 250Gb is listed first, mine always swaps around when I change modes, so that may well be the issue!

The on-board RAID is actually 'Fake-RAID', it's still largely using your CPU to do it's magic, and it's largely regarded as being not really quicker then software RAID..
 
OK now have a server sat here as an early birthday present to myself but someone seems to have bought the worlds stock of WD RE4 2TB hard drives...
 
Can u use 3tb drives like any other drives or are the 3+ tb ones different? Also any one got the dimensions I can't see them on hp site
 
Weight & dimensions: 31.5 x 37.47 x 39.98 cm, 7710 g

Probably wouldn't use 3TB drives myself as they are more than twice as expensive as 2TB for only 50% more capacity. 3TB is ~£140, 2TB is ~£60 (got two recently for £55 each).

Although if you need more than 10TB (or say 8TB with some redundancy) in the same box then it might be worth it. However, if you need that much storage, you might be better off getting a larger server with more room and more SATA ports (or an expansion card).
 
Dimensions (HxWxD)
(with feet)
10.5 x 8.3 x 10.2 in (26.7x 21.0 x 26.0 cm)
 
Assuming you measured that yourself wiz as you have one. If so, then my source (Crescent Electronics) has dodgy data.
 
However, if you need that much storage, you might be better off getting a larger server with more room and more SATA ports (or an expansion card).


Or two of these microservers! Hard to beat at the price after the cashback.

Noticed ebuyer had another 120 in stock last night after nearly running out yesterday. Now down to 115. These are going like hot cakes.

Going to get one myself as a second NAS to backup my existing one. Then I don't have to bother with raid, and have the added security of the data being in two physical places for better protection against theft, fire, flood, etc.
 
Assuming you measured that yourself wiz as you have one. If so, then my source (Crescent Electronics) has dodgy data.

It was straight from the HP data sheet :smashin:

Get mine next week
 
Hi, I would be interested to hear from anyone running esxi on their microserver. I am having great difficulties with mine. I have tried installing from USB and optical drive. Both with no success (although the same disk image works in VMware (on my mac) and other pc's boot from both the cd and usb I have made.

All I get when booting is a black screen after the F10/F12 bios options.

Is it possible that only having one stick on ram (4gb) installed could be the cause of the problem? (although on another pc i get the black and yellow screen warning about incompatible hardware) - this is the only thing I can think of.

Thanks - frustratedly!
 
It was straight from the HP data sheet :smashin:

Get mine next week

Cheers hopefully the smaller measurements are right :). Ordered one from crescent electronics now to work out what memory it takes
 
I bought:

Kingston ValueRAM - Memory - 2 GB - DIMM 240-pin - DDR3 - 1333 MHz / PC3-10600 - CL9 - 1.5 V - unbuffered - ECC (x1) , £17.99 + £0.00 shipping

From base.com

To give 3GB of ECC RAM.
 
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