Brandon
thanks for the great work you've put into setting up and testing these systems and putting out content on your experiences.
I've ordered from your parts list to build a Xen server based on the MINISFORUM BD795m. I run xcp-ng and XO here. One of the issues I've run into is that the xen 8.2 LTS and 8.3 latest installers crash (Dom0) with a kernal panic prior to the blue install screen coming up.
I've seen that a few have gotten this to work but it seems to be unresolved. Do you have any ideas on workarounds to test installing xcp-ng on the BD795m board?
Also I see that the MS-A2 is available to order now, exciting to see the release of this server.
Thanks again for the great work!
@brandon-lee I forgot to mention my BD795m motherboard bios is still at version 1.0 and it's not clear if anything related to the xen install issue is affected by the 1.02 bios.
@greg that would be interesting to see. Also, have you tried playing around with some of the BIOS settings?
@greg thank you so much for sharing your configuration and setup here. I haven't installed XCP-ng on the BD795M in testing, only Proxmox and VMware. You mentioned specifically the latest installers. Do older installers work do you think? Curious if you have tested even older to see. Let me know if you have tried any of the workarounds mentioned by others as well. I will see if I can get some time with the 795M and throw a quick install of XCP-ng on there to see.
@brandon-lee Great news! I got the installer to run and successfully installed xcp-ng 8.3. I did make a classic mistake by making two changes instead of one but I hope to circle back to narrow the root cause down.
The solve: I took another look at the bios settings and disabled "PSS Support" under the CPU configuration menu. I also changed the PCIe/GFX Lanes Configuration from x16 to x8x8 after doing some research on other failed installs. I don't think I need x16 anyway for the 10GBe card. There are still a few xcp-ng boot errors that I need to chase down but I have a working install for now.
I did try the 8.2.1 installer for xcp-ng and I also tried a variety of grub edits like (iommu=0) for the installer config that xcp-ng supports before the bios changes with no luck.
Thanks again for hosting the forum and the feedback on this issue.
Greg
@greg that is amazing news! Thank you so uch for sharing as well. This will be a great resource for any others who may think of using this board with an XCP-ng install. All in all, I am loving mine and the performance is great. As a question as well. What took you to XCP-ng? I love it, just like asking what features and capabilities drive ones selecting different options.
@brandon-lee at the time I deployed xcp-ng and Xen Orchestra it was just prior to the whole Vmware licensing blow up. Proxmox was also maturing and I ran into Tom Lawrence's videos on xcp-ng from another project I was working on. The interface made sense to me and I loved the scalability as well as their approach to pool management. My understanding is that the features are comparable between them which is great for the market. I have also heard others really don't like the interface much but I expect that to improve with the upcoming 6.x release of XO.
For me it's been a big win but I have much to learn and am looking forward to putting the BD795m to work.
@greg this one worked for me if you want to purchase the same one, it is here: https://amzn.to/4hAKIwG .
Brandon
Hey, joined the forum after seeing this video today 🙂
What's the realistic impact of not having ECC memory in a build like this? I've kind of gone into the homelabbing scene functionally blind as my boss handed me a 42u rack and a synology storage server full of drives and told me to have fun. The Synology is pretty old at this point and it's loud as anything so I ended up building a quieter system but for all intent/purpose it's just a custom PC build without any mind to being a server beyond having as many SATA ports as I could find on a board. From what I understand DDR5 memory has some built in ECC capabilities but any digging I've done has emphatically encouraged to prioritize some amount of ECC or risk losing every file you've ever cared about.
Not virtualizing a ton of stuff on my own build right now but I'm finding it hard to get clear/nonconflicting information on home server stuff, some folks talk with a lot of confidence but it's not like they're including sources or how-to's in their reddit posts.
@briane welcome to the forums! Glad to have you hear. You are right DDR5 does have some on die memory correction, but it only corrects internal errors in the chip from my understanding. This wouldn't be data going to the CPU. So full ECC memory would be preferred for absolute memory correction.
Not running ECC does come with a little bit more risk than ECC memory, especially if you have a LOT of memory in your system, the chances of bits getting flipped go up. ZFS I believe is more sensitive as well I believe. But, I would say if you have your data backed up, or mirrored in another location as a backup of sorts, then you should be ok. I would never tell you to not go ECC if you wanted to, but most likely, you will probably be ok without it as well, if you have a data contingency plan for data backups. Let me know if this helps! Thanks Brian.
@brandon-lee Makes sense to me!
I need to figure out what I'm going to do with my system, I think some of the complexity of virtualizing the small number of services I am is ultimately a detriment to the system. I'll have to find someone wiser than myself to ask about it at some point.
@briane I think perhaps the best argument for virtualization is backups. One of the main reasons I like virtualizing is that you can easily grab a backup of the system that can be restored easily even to another system. While many backup solutions allow bare metal restores, these are often more complex due to drivers, etc. So even if a small number of workloads and self-hosted resources, this makes it worth it for me. I like to create a backup of a docker host VM. This way if you have persistent storage assigned to the VM for your containers, this is just backed up by default. Also, you can use a secondary backup of containers like Duplicati, etc. Let me know if this helps.
How did you find a compatible CPU cooler?
I just purchased a Minisforum BD795M, and the first cooler I bought didn't work. The manual said it was compatible with any LGA 1700 cooler, but that's obviously not the case. The mounting holes are 78mm apart, but the cooler's "AMD" brackets were 90mm. The cooler's "Intel" installation option didn't fit over the processor.
Can you help me understand how to select a compatible cooler? None of the listings I reviewed showed mounting bracket sizes.
Thank you.
@brandon-lee Thanks for the reply! How did you determine that that one would work?
@riftor_77 I actually have built the BD795M. Like you I ordered the wrong one my first purchase. Had to go back and look at the tech notes on the board and a couple of forum posts I believe led me to determine the one needed. Hopefully this helps 🙂
Hello there,
I've already purchased Minisforum BD795M
I plan to place the home lab server directly on the desk or underneath - I don't have a rack 🙂
I'm wondering if you could recommend a case (perhaps a tower) that can accommodate the following parts:
* Cooler Mastger MWE Gold 850 V2 Full Modular 850W 120mm
* Noctua NH-L9i-17xx, Premium Low-Profile CPU
* Network Card Intel X550T2 2x2,5Gbs
While m-ATX format is more space-efficient, I'm concerned about whether it will fit the power supply.
Bests,
Yoshi
My current choice is Lian Li A3, mainly because of its design and space-efficent
It looks like it can accommodate all the parts.
https://lian-li.com/product/a3-matx/