I updated my crusty old Pentium G-based server—the results are worth sharing
Enlarge / Perhaps a dramatization of Jim Salter hearing about a Ryzen motherboard that explicitly and officially supports ECC RAM. (credit: RichVintage / Getty)
An awful lot of feedback from our Winter 2019 Server Build Guide wanted to see a Hot Rod version updated with a Ryzen, AMD's big comeback CPU line. Since then, ASRock has released a Ryzen motherboard that explicitly and officially supports ECC (Error-code correcting) RAM-the X470D4U. And on top of that, Ars reader dermott suggested I take a look at a Rosewill RSV-L4412 4u rackmount chassis.
At worst, that combination seemed tempting enough to convince me to finally update my own crusty old Pentium G-based disaster recovery server. But it turns out the results are good enough to share.
Closed-door front view of the Summer 2019 Server Hot Rod, all buttoned up. (Sanoid sticker not included.) [credit: Jim Salter ]
The Rosewill RSV-L4412 looked great on paper. It's a big, sturdy 4u rackmount chassis-solid without being heavy enough to require "team lift" stickers on its shipping box. It has 12 built-in hot-swap bays for SATA or SAS drives, five pre-installed system fans (three 120mm intakes immediately behind the drive bays, and two 80mm exhausts by the power supply), and a locking cage door on the front. Unfortunately, the only way to truly know if a case is any good is to buy one and use it. So, that's what I did.
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