SupermicroMini ITX DDR3 1333 NA Motherboards X10SBA-O

This is not a technical review with specs, port speeds, etc., because that wasn't too important to me since for my purposes this mobo/CPU combo is overkill anyway. Bought for a PFSense firewall/router, run it and a DMZ machine on top of Virtual Box/Ubuntu Server. Just 2 GB of ram and a 64 GB mSATA hard drive. Updated BIOS and loaded Ubuntu from a portable DVD drive. I seem to remember having some BIOS issues initially when trying to load Ubuntu from the DVD via USB port, but with a little experimenting, I got it to work. Now that the SSD loaded it boots quickly and works with no issues, no crashes, nothing. Just keeps purring until I do something with the software to screw it up. But that's the way I learn, break it then spend hours trying to fix whatever it was I did.I've seen others say you can get a better or similar MB/CPU package cheaper and maybe so, but Supermicro is supposed to be a good brand? Anyway that is why I got this one and not a single problem from the board itself. Followed other reviewer's advice concerning 1.35V DRAM and other tips, have had no issues.I used the Supermicro Rack Mount Server Chassis CSE-505-203B with this board and was very disappointed with the way it fit together mechanically; probably the worst part of the build. Not hard, just disappointing that the board was such a poor fit in the chassis since the manufacturer of both parts is the same and the chassis is listed as working with this board.I had to modify the front plane of the chassis to allow this board's HDMI and Displayport connectors to fit, the card riser and extra-cost bracket took some adjustment and metal work just to get the screws to align, and the power supply cable was too short and you had to crush down on the wires to get the top cover on, which flexes the Mobo a little.Otherwise no issues.

I bought this with a mini-box M350 case and pico power supply to build a home router. I added 8GB ram and a SSD drive. I used freely available router software with a good reputation. It's commercial quality and cost less than buying an equivalent one already assembled. It's fanless, quiet, and runs very cool. It's supposedly drawing very little power. I never see it stressed above a few percent in CPU usage and memory use is rarely above 1 GB ram even though I'm using IDS/IPS software. My VPN is completely reliable. Someday, I may put the router in a VM and use the remaining capacity for another purpose. My old router is only a wireless access point now.I wired the first floor in my house with cat6 using keystone wall plates and converted existing wall openings into media outlets. YouTube has excellent instructions about how to install network wiring. It's surprisingly easy. Media and voip are now wired discretely. The router is in the basement and there are no snake pits upstairs anymore. I no longer need a complex wireless installation.

So far this has been a very stable and surprisingly fast machine. I have a number of Supermicro Atom D525 based servers and they've always been very reliable but noticeably slow. I configured this machine with 4GB of RAM and a Kingston 30GB mSATA SSD to cut down on the wiring (it sits in a 1U case). Running Ubuntu Server 14.04, this thing is bizarrely fast. The D525 based boards make for nice routers/firewalls but, if you try to use them as a low powered silent desktops, it's not a great experience. I wouldn't hesitate to use this board in a silent/fanless desktop as long as you aren't planning on gaming.Some notes:- These require low voltage (1.35v) RAM. They will not boot with 1.5v RAM.- On linux, an mSATA drive works great with no fuss on installation and sequential read speeds of about 250MB/s- In a poorly ventilated 1U server with a 40mm Noctua fan on lowest settings, lm-sensors reports the cores idling at about 44C. In a case with good convection cooling, you shouldn't need any fans. The fan in the 1U case doesn't appear to be needed either but, it's quiet enough that I've left it in.- This has minimal rear panel connections but a number of onboard headers if you need things like SPIDIF or more USB ports- You can run an mSATA drive and a mini-PCIe wireless card at the same time. They look like they overlap in the picture but, the wireless slot is higher than the mSATA and they don't interfere with each other.- The PCIe slot does not have a rear backing and the motherboard components behind it are low profile. I believe that you could fit a modest video card in the slot without issue but I haven't tried it.Supermicro boards are extremely expensive but also very high quality. If you are looking for motherboards you can setup and then forget about for years, I don't think there is anything DIY that even comes close to Supermicro.

FIRST: A word of caution -- the RAM that Amazon recommended (and I ordered) was not compatible with this motherboard, so there was some delay while I waited for the correct RAM from Crucial. The board SEEMED to be defective, but a little research worked the problem out.The mSATA slot is reasonably fast and convenient, and frees all the SATA ports for hard drives. While I'm still in the process of configuring migrating data from the old server, it has proven to be fast and stable over the first 4 days of heavy I/O. ;-)

I'm using this as a gigabit pfSense firewall/vpn/qos router. Add in 4 or 8GB of DDR3 laptop memory, gigabit switch, case, power supply, supported wireless card or AP (I'm still using the Linksys WRT54GL with Tomato firmware in AP mode), router software and you're almost set. The Intel Celeron J1900 2GHz (burst 2.4GHz) quad core processor has a TDP of only 10 watts. With the router software and QOS simlpy setup you can download, stream, game, voip, and torrent bible music ("OG OG OG") all at the same time without delay. Any torrents that use DHT and thousands of connections to peers are handled with ease, whereas my ~$50 consumer routers would need a reboot.

I bought two of these units to install OpenBSD and create a two firewall solution (DMZ in the middle). I have used OpenBSD 5.8, 5.9 and 6.0 with no trouble. They run fast and reliable. I have 0 complaints about this product.

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