Which CPU for VM PC / file server?

[MrBubblez98]

So... I've recently replaced my FX8350 with an Intel CPU. I now have a full PC worth of parts from upgrading over the years, a spare AM3+ motherboard, as well as an old free PC I got from work. So I wanted to make use of this. I thought of setting up a PC for virtual machines, as well as a machine as a local file server all as a little project of my own. I knew that I would have to buy hardware to make it work since the PC from work only has 4 SATA ports, and I planned to use it as the file server. As well, the old PC case is too small for an ATX board. Then I could use the 8 core FX8350 for VMs, so I can dedicate more cores to VMs. But then I got thinking... I was thinking of Linus' "Under $150 CPU, Motherboard, 16GB RAM" video from last December. I could probably buy a decent server-grade CPU / mobo / RAM combo from ebay and throw that in the mix. And then I got thinking about that... Would I be better to use the FX8350 for the VM PC, or using old Intel server hardware for VMs? Also, do all old server motherboards that Linus talks about have non-standard mounting holes? If so, then that's probably not a good idea...

So here's the question.. Should I:

A. Just buy a cheap AM3 CPU and a new case to use for FreeNAS and use my full system of spare parts for the VM PC?
B. Buy an old Intel server CPU and board and a new case for FreeNAS and use my full system of spare parts for the VM PC?
C. Switch around the roles in part B.
D. Buy a cheap i3 CPU and motherboard for FreeNAS and use my full system of spare parts for the VM PC?

For storage I plan on using give or take 5 1TB drives in RAID 5. The reason for this is I can get them for free from work, which is the only reason why I'm going through with this. Normally I would use higher capacity drives, but hey, they're free.

Another thing, I was looking at the FreeNAS system requirements, and it says Intel is highly recommended... Why is this? Does it matter if I did go with AMD? Or should I go with Intel if at all possible?

Input on this is much appreciated!

Thanks,


Michael

[fjdhdhcyfhf]

AMD FX are pretty good for VMs. Phoronix benchmarks put them up there with Intel at the same price. You want a low power NAS, its only going to serve files to a few clients

[GDRRiley]

the old intel server gear should do well and may use less power than the fx 8350 with more threads 

[MrBubblez98]

3 minutes ago, SCHISCHKA said:

AMD FX are pretty good for VMs. Phoronix benchmarks put them up there with Intel at the same price. You want a low power NAS, its only going to serve files to a few clients

So basically any AM3 compatible CPU will work just fine for this?

[fjdhdhcyfhf]

1 minute ago, MrBubblez98 said:

So basically any AM3 compatible CPU will work just fine for this?

For the VMs the FX are great, just as fast as intel but you get twice the cores so you can run more virtual machines.

 

For NAS get a 25-45W CPU. The 25W xeon can be hard to find. AMD's A4 - A8 range have a bios option for 45W operation if you have to resort to non-server hardware. I think there is an i3 that is 25-40W but thats hard to find too. You only need as much power as the amount of clients you are streaming videos to. Youll only beable to go as fast as your drives and your network, hence the low power low freq CPU