My New/Old PC/Server
2026-06-27 17:33 - General
The quick opening context: I had some spare computer memory lying around. After RAM prices were almost perfectly flat from early 2023 to mid 2025 things got wild. The common narrative is that many companies, in a drive to build new AI systems that they can charge money for, drove demand for memory up significantly. So from April 2025 to April 2026, RAM prices nearly tripled. This reminded me of the sticks I had lying around unused. Why are they unused? Because they're registered ECC memory, which won't work in a typical PC. Several parts of the PC including the CPU must be specifically built to work with ECC memory, and for some reason CPU makers only put this support in the types of CPUs designed for servers, not for standard PCs. But: I've built servers, and really what makes a server is the use it's put to. "Server" hardware can be used as a desktop. So I had a mission.
Technically some "workstation" PCs are designed and built with ECC support as well. But with my experience building used-as-a-server type servers, I knew better what to look for and leverage there. I searched for both workstation and server parts, and I got lucky, finding a Supermicro X10DRi board being sold with dual Xeon E5-2680 v4 CPUs. It fully supports the memory I already have, and I got lucky that the power supply in my existing PC already had full support for dual CPU power connections. Asking price was $150, I haggled down to $130 because it turns out the seller was not including the heat sinks in the pictures. The pictured ones had fans integrated, they actually sold it with passive heat sinks. In a typical rack mount server case, this is fine. It's not what I wanted, though, so $20 off.
This is an E-ATX board. It rather has to be, to fit both processors. The ATX standard has existed for many years, but in more unusual cases like this dual processor board makers will exceed that. So this motherboard won't fit in any case. Again I searched for a while to find a nice solution. I got lucky, again on marketplace, to find a local PC builder with a "scratch'n'dent" case selection. Their largest case was just big enough! I had to remove two (of the twelve it came with!) fans to fit in the big motherboard, and make some of my own mounting holes that didn't line up, but it fit.
That was it, almost complete: motherboard and CPUs fit into a case, transferring power supply and disks from my existing PC, and voila! Almost. The motherboard did not come with an IO shield, but I found a compatible one already modeled online, and it fit and works great.
The eagle eyed among you will notice what I hadn't yet at this point, but did shortly: Being a server class motherboard, it does not include audio. Servers don't need to make sound! So I looked around, again. There is at least one compatible dedicated sound card still being made, but it's bottom of the barrel quality. For only slightly more I got a used Sound Blaster, which included the extra feature I wanted: support for the front panel audio connector. I've got memories of not only using, but very carefully selecting the model of discrete sound card I used back in the '90s. However, it's been built into the motherboard and a non issue for many years, until now.
I also had to figure out how to mount the disks in this cheap case. It was probably supposed to come with some sort of tray or sled for this purpose, but the scratch'n'dent model at least did not. I modeled it this time, for everything to line up with holes that already existed. A couple spacers to hold the 3.5" hard drive off the bottom, and curved arms to go from its side mount holes up to the 2.5" solid state drive. Then I had to address the CPU cooling. I first tried just hoping: the case is full of fans pushing a lot of air around, just like a real server case, right? No. Really using the CPUs would heat them up very quickly. So first, I tried to leverage the fans more directly: I designed and 3D printed a duct or baffle to direct two of the 120mm fans' output directly over the CPUs.
I was pretty happy when I first got this design to work. I managed to leverage my new-to-me large format 3D printer for a legitimately large part. It used the top two front case fans, and attached with their screws, directing that air right over the two passive CPU coolers. This was an improvement, but after only a few minutes of heavy load the high temperature alarm would go off, when one of the CPUs reached 95 °C. Not good enough. But I've got some old unused CPU coolers, and in fact two with identical fans, so I set to a new 3D modeling challenge: little ducts to directly attach these fans, one to each passive cooler. The first CPU is easy, being close to the edge of the motherboard where there's already some free space. The other, however, is crammed right between all the memory slots and quite close to the first CPU. So I started with a basic model of the motherboard, the CPUs with their big metal coolers, and all the RAM slots. Building from there, and taking into account the size and shape of the fans I had, to put in.
It took several false starts in CAD, learning to use some new features and figure out how to get them to do what I needed. All while trying to maximize the effectiveness: keeping a wide open path for airflow while squeezing in amongst all the obstructions. And with only one tiny exception (missing the nub for one of my attachment straps) it all worked first try!
After running a full 100% CPU usage (all cores/threads) stress test for over 15 minutes, CPU1 stabilized at 70 °C and CPU2 at 86 °C. (Both wiggling plus or minus one degree from there over the course of several more minutes. When idling: below 40 °C.) CPU2 has a more tortured path for its duct, and also experiences some of the exhaust of CPU1, based on their relative positioning. Anything in the 70 to 90 degree range is acceptable, at full load. And being intended as a desktop PC, it won't spend a lot of time at full load.
Used motherboard and CPUs: $130. Scratch'n'dent case: $40. Used sound card: $27. Memory: I already had it. Disks, power supply, graphics card: transferred from previous PC. Now I have a dual-CPU, 28 core/56 thread (14/28 each) monster with 80GB of RAM. Which lights up a lot more than I'd prefer, but thankfully the default mode is just a very slow and gradual fade between various colors. Not too bad, definitely beating the modes that do crazy flashing of colors. When I got the case, I assumed I'd be finding a way to defeat the lights, but they're gentle enough to have grown on me.
I didn't realize until I was actively building it: this case has no provision for an optical drive. I suppose it's mostly nostalgia that makes me want to have one, because to be honest I haven't used the one in the previous PC for ... well I can't remember, definitely a few years. I've got USB optical drives for that rare but eventually likely case.
