Motherboard Suggestions

[ngvd]

I was given a LGA 2011 Xeon workstation, with 16 gigs of pc3-14900 server ram, but it’s looking like the motherboard is dead. Any suggestions  on replacements? I would want something less than $150 or so. I am going to use it as a FreeNAS box. 

[ngvd]

2 minutes ago, Alexsolo said:

What's the CPU?

E5-1620V2. For reference it was an HP Z420 circa 2014.

[ngvd]

6 minutes ago, Alexsolo said:

You would need an LGA2011 X79 motherboard. 

 

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313.TR11.TRC1.A0.H0.Xx79.TRS0&_nkw=x79&_sacat=0

 

Ebay has them around 150-200... maybe check your local classified as well like Kijiji, Craigslist, Facebook marketplace. 

Would I be better off keeping this processor and buying a x79 motherboard or switching to a different platform?

[Fasauceome]

The cheapo chinese boards work for basic tasks

https://www.aliexpress.com/af/x79-motherboard.html?SearchText=x79+motherboard&d=y&initiative_id=AS_20190525054521&origin=n&catId=708045&isViewCP=y&jump=afs

[ngvd]

9 minutes ago, Alexsolo said:

It makes for a $150-200 free nas... I'd say go for it. It's a good PC building project and it's not too expensive compared to a new CPU/MOBO/RAM bundle. 

I also have the option of throwing the drives into my main rig and making a FreeNAS VM. I have a i5-8400 with 16 gigs of ram. Which do you think would work better? 

[ngvd]

Just now, Alexsolo said:

It would work, but that would take away resources from any tasks you're doing on the PC. Ideally a NAS is running 24/7, my NAS is a prebuilt QNAP system, but I keep it separate from the PC's in my house.

Thank you for the help