Reusing old parts for server.

[Chikensoops]

Budget (including currency): Preferably under 50 USD.

Country: Indonesia

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Server hosting for 4-5 players(friends and family only). Hosting ARK Survival Evolved and maybe Minecraft Java.

Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc): 

 

*: Reusing/already bought

#: Buying used, working fine(enough)

^: Buying new

CPU: Core 2 Duo E7300*

Motherboard: Biostar G41-M7# (6 USD)

GPU: HIS R7 240 2gb# (7 USD)

PSU: Micronics Classic II Bronze 500w^ (15 USD)

Case: Simbadda BG-148*

RAM: Vgen ddr3 1333mhz 2x4gb*

SSD: RX7 128gb Sata3^ (8 USD)

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 500gb 5400rpm# (11 USD)

Case fans: Deepcool Xfan 120 x3*

CPU cooler: Segotep Wind Clear T2^ (4 USD)

 

 

Recycling an old system. Going to change the motherboard as it was ddr2, changing PSU too since old one was a no name brand and is extremely loud(and rattly).

Chose the GPU since it was cheap, and will only be going to use it as a display output. Case was from my current PC before I upgraded, same with the fans. RAM I got for free from a friend. The SSD is known for being the absolute cheapest, and I won't be storing anything important on it anyways, just windows, everything else will be on the HDD. Cooler was also really cheap, and the e7300 doesn't run that hot, and I do like how the cooler looks, so why not. 

 

This would be on for maybe 10 hours a session. Will be hosting a single world of ARK Survival Evolved with max 4 players, and maybe Minecraft sometimes. Peripherals are taken care of, and that's about it. Looking for extra suggestions before I actually go out and buy the parts. Thank you!

[mariushm]

What are the requirements of an ARK server?  Is it single threaded or multi-threaded?  Does it use a lot of memory or a lot of disk space? 

 

If single threaded, you'd want to focus on a cpu with high IPC or high single core frequency to get more performance. If it's multi-threaded, then that's less important. 

If it uses a lot of memory but minimal disk access, then you may want to focus on something that supports lots of ram, not some ancient motherboard that would support a maximum of 2  x 4 GB sticks. 
 

This page says minimum 6 GB of ram and 2 cores at 3 ghz for 10-15 players : https://www.servermania.com/kb/articles/what-are-the-requirements-for-running-an-ark-dedicated-server/

 

So I'd say you shouldn't go with that CPU and motherboard. I'd say aim for a newer generation with higher IPC, maybe get a motherboard with 4 DDR3 slots so that you can reuse those 2 sticks of 4 GB of memory and maybe add another 8 GB when you have some spare money. 

Look maybe at some i5 3xxx or 4xxx series, somewhere in that range. They also have integrated graphics, so you'd save money on graphics cards if you need one.

 

Look maybe at ebay at motherboard + cpu kits, sometimes you can score some good combos at around 40-50$, but it's gonna be a problem finding people that will ship to Indonesia.

 

 

[Chikensoops]

6 minutes ago, mariushm said:

If single threaded, you'd want to focus on a cpu with high IPC or high single core frequency to get more performance. If it's multi-threaded, then that's less important. 

If it uses a lot of memory but minimal disk access, then you may want to focus on something that supports lots of ram, not some ancient motherboard that would support a maximum of 2  x 4 GB sticks. 

I have heard that it is multi threaded, and the memory use is directly tied to the amount of players. 

 

8 minutes ago, mariushm said:

This page says minimum 6 GB of ram and 2 cores at 3 ghz for 10-15 players : https://www.servermania.com/kb/articles/what-are-the-requirements-for-running-an-ark-dedicated-server/

So in theory 8gb and 2.66ghz 2 cores would be fine for 5 players right? Also I could try OCing the e7300 to 3ghz.

 

11 minutes ago, mariushm said:

So I'd say you shouldn't go with that CPU and motherboard. I'd say aim for a newer generation with higher IPC, maybe get a motherboard with 4 DDR3 slots so that you can reuse those 2 sticks of 4 GB of memory and maybe add another 8 GB when you have some spare money. 

Look maybe at some i5 3xxx or 4xxx series, somewhere in that range. They also have integrated graphics, so you'd save money on graphics cards if you need one.

My friend has tried hosting with an i5-3339Y and the game worked pretty well, although with a bit of stuttering since he had crap wifi and was playing, hosting, AFKing in another game, listening to music, and in a discord call in the same time(I seriously don't know how his PC doesn't struggle with that). According to Passmark, the e7300 has better single threaded performance than the 3339y so it should be fine. I also decided to go with a dedicated gpu so that it doesn't leech off the ram to use for vram, but yea maybe with 5 players the ram usage will be negligible. I have played around with the idea of using 2nd and 3rd gen, but it totals up a bit too high, and it kinda misses the whole point of reusing old parts. I also have an extra 4gb stick but I've heard that using 3 sticks causes some stability issues, so I won't try that.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Since you have the ram already and you need to buy a 775 board just upgrade to 1156 or 1155 (e7300 is worthless, wont even sell for like 10rb), also g41 suck ass dont bother with those since 775 you need to overclock for it to run well

 

If you need singlethread performance which definitely the mc server needs and seems like ark is singlethreaded if it only mentions needing 2 cores

 

Actually i happen to be selling a p7h55m-lx at 100rb and i do happen to have an i3 540 which i bought mostly just because i wanted to screw around with westmere on 1156, the board needs a jumper wire on the psu to turn on and you cant shut it off or youll need to cmos reset with the jumper to make it post again (power button is defective and it doesnt work properly). ill just sell with the cpu at 150rb aka 10$ if you want, ofc ill give instructions on the jumper wire (very very simple to setup) and ill just tune the i3 as far as itll go. Only other option in this pricerange would be shitty 775 systems (westmere destroys wolfdales esp the crappier 3m cache wolfdales like your e7300)

[Chikensoops]

8 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

ill just sell with the cpu at 150rb aka 10$ if you want, ofc ill give instructions on the jumper wire (very very simple to setup) and ill just tune the i3 as far as itll go.

I'm interested. Wanna discuss this further in DMs?

 

Aside from that, would everything else in the spec list be good, and would using all the ram sticks help or worsen the performance? Planning to buy these in a week or so. 

 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

11 minutes ago, Chikensoops said:

I'm interested. Wanna discuss this further in DMs?

 

Aside from that, would everything else in the spec list be good, and would using all the ram sticks help or worsen the performance? Planning to buy these in a week or so. 

 

Yea sure

 

Cooler is pretty weak but for 60rb thats not bad.

How the hell did you get such a cheap r7 240?

500gb used hdd only goes for ~100rb last time i checked.

You may consider getting a 240gb ssd instead, someones selling samsung pm870a at only 285rb tokopedia ans thatll be far better than a crappy generic chinese ssd thats for some reason powered by a rotary

 

Any other parts laying around? May still have some usable ones

Also howd you get the cooler, psu, and ssd for so cheap? Best i can find for cheapest cooler would be a crappy deepcool 80mm 2 heatpipe tower at 110rb

[Chikensoops]

3 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

How the hell did you get such a cheap r7 240?

Oh yeah my bad, missed the part where it said broken in the desc. The cheapest one that isnt broken apparently is 350rb. At that point I think I'll just go for integrated.

3 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

howd you get the cooler, psu, and ssd for so cheap?

7 words: Harga Terendah, Power Merchant, Official Store, Baru. lol

https://www.tokopedia.com/funhouseflagshipstore/segotep-wind-clear-t2-cpu-dan-12cm-fan-orange-internal-fan?extParam=ivf%3Dfalse
https://www.tokopedia.com/cvtugujayalestari/kode-cvtjl01-psu-micronics-500watt-the-classic-ii-series?extParam=ivf%3Dfalse
https://www.tokopedia.com/indolegend/ssd-rx7-120gb-garansi-resmi-3thnextParam=ivf%3Dfalse%26src%3Dsearch&refined=true

 

 

10 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Best i can find for cheapest cooler would be a crappy deepcool 80mm 2 heatpipe tower at 110rb

I miscounted and the cooler is actually 75rb, but there is a 60rb one but from a completely unknown brand so I won't buy it. Segotep is a less-known brand but at least it still has a reputation. The other one is from Asura, and I can't find anything about it.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

3 minutes ago, Chikensoops said:

miscounted and the cooler is actually 75rb, but there is a 60rb one but from a completely unknown brand so I won't buy it. Segotep is a less-known brand but at least it still has a reputation. The other one is from Asura, and I can't find anything about it.

The asura is a generic china 80mm cooler and the segotep is a 120mm fan strapped on to a 92mm heatsink so seems like itd perform slightly worse than my alseye eddy 90b

[Chikensoops]

4 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

120mm fan strapped on to a 92mm heatsink

Actually that's a small scam from the seller. From the reviews and even the specs, it's just a 92mm fan on a 92mm heatsink. The actual height of the entire cooler is just 116mm. Either way it's cheap and I really shouldn't expect too much.

 

Edit: wait I rechecked, it's not 92, it's 80 lmao. 

Edited October 24, 2022 by Chikensoops
Seller dum dum

[Somerandomtechyboi]

6 minutes ago, Chikensoops said:

Actually that's a small scam from the seller. From the reviews and even the specs, it's just a 92mm fan on a 92mm heatsink. The actual height of the entire cooler is just 116mm. Either way it's cheap and I really shouldn't expect too much.

 

Edit: wait I rechecked, it's not 92, it's 80 lmao. 

Bruh

At this point i think ill just grab my 775 copper core and ziptie it onto the damn cpu since that copper core will likely perform better than these crappy 2 heatpipe towers considering it only lost abit to my 4 heatpipe alseye

[Chikensoops]

8 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Bruh

At this point i think ill just grab my 775 copper core and ziptie it onto the damn cpu since that copper core will likely perform better than these crappy 2 heatpipe towers considering it only lost abit to my 4 heatpipe alseye

My 2 pipe HS115 from pccooler keeps an i5-2400 at around 54c on load, with my r9 290 also full load, so I guess that one doesn't suck so bad. Also I do have a spare wraith prism and I wonder if I could mod it to fit 775. If it doesn't work then I'll just give it to you as compensation for the copper slug.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

1 minute ago, Chikensoops said:

My 2 pipe HS115 from pccooler keeps an i5-2400 at around 54c on load, with my r9 290 also full load, so I guess that one doesn't suck so bad. Also I do have a spare wraith prism and I wonder if I could mod it to fit 775. If it doesn't work then I'll just give it to you as compensation for the copper slug.

Bruh wraith prism is just stupid overkill and i have no idea how youd go about modding that to 115X, theyre worth around 250rb and thats enough to get a cooler like the raijintek themis evo (very beefy and good performing 4 heatpipe tower, 8mm heatpipes for some reason over the usual 6mm heatpipes youd find on other coolers). And these 775 copper cores i bought mine for 35rb but theyre worth somewhere around 30-50rb, pretty good at cooling for the price

[Chikensoops]

1 minute ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Bruh wraith prism is just stupid overkill and i have no idea how youd go about modding that to 115X, theyre worth around 250rb and thats enough to get a cooler like the raijintek themis evo (very beefy and good performing 4 heatpipe tower, 8mm heatpipes for some reason over the usual 6mm heatpipes youd find on other coolers). And these 775 copper cores i bought mine for 35rb but theyre worth somewhere around 30-50rb, pretty good at cooling for the price

Oops sorry I meant stealth. I keep forgetting the amd stock cooler names.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Just now, Chikensoops said:

Oops sorry I meant stealth. I keep forgetting the amd stock cooler names.

Thats just crap, itll lose to the 775 copper core by a landslide

 

if i do manage to ziptie it ill just include the copper core for 30rb so youll get a better cooler for less although its abit dinged up aesthetically