Perfect SpinRite Hardware

[gdalgliesh]

Wondering if anyone has suggestion for the perfect SpinRite bench motherboard/system. My current machine that I have used for this is not up to the SATA performance that I believe the new 6.1 will be able to take advantage of and I am looking for a new bench system for media repair and maintenance without breaking the bank. Any thoughts?

Thanks

 

[PHolder]

If you're planning to buy the latest new hardware, you're probably already close to too late for SpinRite 6.1, which will not support UEFI Class 3 motherboards. I donno how you can know which motherboards support a CSM and Legacy Boot, and which do not. Intel has indicated that UEFI is the future, starting in 2020, and Legacy Boot is no longer to be supported in 2021. (See https://forums.grc.com/threads/the-end-of-legacy-booting.165/ )

SpinRite 7 is planned to support UEFI booting, but it is probably still a couple of years away.

Thinking of PC's I have to hand, that have cost effective hardware, I have a Ryzen 7 2700X on this motherboard https://www.asus.com/ca-en/Motherboards/PRIME-B350-PLUS/ and it has a CSM and Legacy Boot and works well with the current AHCI test program. (Even allowing the M.2 to show up in the BIOS.) It was a value board, and it's older now, so it might be hard to find, donno about that.

Since the MOBO provides video outputs, you could use an APU so you wouldn't need to invest in a standalone GPU. I think this machine would be quite happy to run a Ryzen 5 2400G or even a 3400G. That wouldn't have it being a killer gaming machine or anything but it should run SpinRite just fine.

 

[oupi]

It would also be interesting to get an answer with the cheapest/smallest form factor possible. It would be nice to have a small dedicated machine in the corner of my home office.

 

[rfrazier]

It would also be interesting to get an answer with the cheapest/smallest form factor possible. It would be nice to have a small dedicated machine in the corner of my home office.

@oupi NUC? or similar? I don't know for sure. You'd have to attach drives by USB3. But, NUC's are very small. Not cheap though.

Next Unit of Computing - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Ron

 

[PHolder]

cheapest/smallest form factor possible

My friend built a server out of one of these with the dedicated case... I wonder how it would like being a SpinRite box?

ODYSSEY - X86J4125800 v2 - with Linux and RP2040 Core

ODYSSEY - X86J4125800 v2 features Quad-core Intel® Celeron® J4125 and RP2040 co-processor, equipping dual 2.5GbE interfaces and multiple wireless connectivities, supporting 4K output, carrying sufficient storage capability, equipment expandability, operated by multiple OS, all of which indicate...

www.seeedstudio.com

I believe he ordered his from Amazon.

I have a mini Ryzen system. The DeskMini A300 with a Ryzen 5 3400G in it. I ordered my parts from NewEgg,
https://www.asrock.com/nettop/AMD/DeskMini A300 Series/
They also make newer DeskMini form factor PCs for Intel and for Ryzen Renoir (4xxx) but those Renoir CPUs are very difficult to find right now because of AMD only releasing them to OEMs.

Either of these are going to be too small to install a desktop HDD in, and I don't know if the Odyssey can internally have anything but the M.2 form factor. They both have USB though, once SpinRite supports that.

 

[oupi]

Ideally yes, but I am not sure those have IDE ports.

 

[gdalgliesh]

Ideally yes, but I am not sure those have IDE ports.

Yeah was thinking about that but figured for the few time I need old school IDE I might just use a USB to IDE adaptor

 

[Simon Zerafa]

Personally I'm looking forward when I can attach to USB 3.0 / 3.1 to SATA connectors to virtually any PC with two such ports and recover data from one drive to the other.

Past that I doubt that the choice of CPU, RAM or motherboard will really make that much difference

 

[Warwagon]

Go on eBay buy an old system

 

[PHolder]

Past that I doubt that the choice of ... motherboard will really make that much difference

Well other than Legacy Boot support, I would agree with you. I've been waiting a looong time to be able to really use SpinRite because I have large drives, NVMe drives and/or UEFI only hardware. Eventually SpinRite should handle all these and USB too, in version 7, but if you're buying today to plan for 6.1 then you do have to avoid the newest and greatest hardware without Legacy Boot.

 

[gdalgliesh]

Well, Steve is pointing to https://www.zimaboard.com/ for SpinRite dedicated computer. I have ordered the dev kit and will be ready for 6.1
Mentioned

https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-892-notes.pdf

https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-893-notes.pdf

 

[Tech323]

I got my ZimaBoard today. Anybody have one up and running with SR6?