Multi-use server suggestions?

[callmejaccob]

Hola! I am currently attempting to find a solution for my server needs. I want to be able to host my website locally, host a minecraft server locally, and an ftp server locally. I don't expect traffic to become overwhelming, but I want something more powerful than the core 2 duo I currently have. I am considering two options.
 

Buiyng an older server off of ebay.

 

Building a server from scratch with older parts.

 

I do plan on making it into a rack, I just wanted to see suggestions before I made my mind.

 

 

(Anything concerning internet speed is already taken care of.)

[Windows7ge]

Depending on how busy you expect this to get you could look into 4C/8T Xeons or a retired LGA2011/v3 system and install a hypervisor.

[Scheer]

Be careful with some of the really old eBay servers you see for $50-$100, their power usage is really high for the relatively low performance they offer, and can be extremely loud.

 

I have a Dell R210ii, R220, T30 (tower), and Lenovo TS140 (tower), all of which are basically the same system within a few years of each other. The towers are near silent, the rack mounts are a bit louder but still quiet enough for a closet rack. The TS140 was actually transplanted into a 3U case quite easily, and still nice and quiet since you can fit larger fans in there. The TS140 and T30 were new for $300, the R210ii and R220s were both found on eBay for ~$100 with low specs, but I was then able to buy whatever CPU worked best for its use case, actually have a e3-1241v3 (roughly i7-4770 performance) on the way for the R220 that was only $70. The one downside is that you need UDIMM ECC RAM which is a bit more expensive than standard DDR3, but its come down quite a bit in price over the past few years.

 

Power consumption is between 50-100W running misc services on them, pry more than what you are wanting to do so that makes it negligible for operating cost, and the R210ii and R220 are short depth servers so they will fit in a lot of the small networking wall mount rack cabinets, dual Gbe is nice, and one PCIe slot for RAID or networking. IIRC there is only one 3.5" drive mount... I just lay SSDs in the front of the case though, and you can fit 5 in there easy.

[mariushm]

I'd suggest going on eBay to buy a kit with a FX series processor or some i5 2400 or 3rd gen ...

here's some suggestions

 

50$  FX 4300 + 8 GB ram + 780g mb : https://www.ebay.com/itm/AMD-FX-4300-3-8GHz-Gigabyte-GA-78LMT-S2-8Gb-DDR3-1600mhz-Combo/372958265973?hash=item56d60b8275:g:HwIAAOSwNTheTIf7

 

105$ i5 2400 + 8GB + mb (you could upgrade to a 3570k or something for more oomph) : https://www.ebay.com/itm/Gigabyte-GA-Z68MA-D2H-B3-LGA1155-Motherboard-i5-2400-8GB-RAM/283788022610?hash=item4213159352:g:6NwAAOSwec9eTL~K

 

[BloodKnight7]

Go for  a Dell PowerEdge R420 or even a R620, right now there are great deals on those in ebay, dont go for anything lower meaning 410 or 610 thats too old and power hungry.

[beersykins]

15 hours ago, BloodKnight7 said:

Go for  a Dell PowerEdge R420 or even a R620, right now there are great deals on those in ebay, dont go for anything lower meaning 410 or 610 thats too old and power hungry.

x10 series with 1366 is probably the oldest you'd want to feasibly go.  Power consumption isn't crazy like the gen before it so it's a good line to draw.

 

23 hours ago, mariushm said:

FX series processor

Cheapest up front does not necessarily equate to less expensive over the life of the use case.