October 1st, 2010 
Simon Seagrave 
After getting my hands on one of HP’s new AMD based Proliant MicroServers I decided to give it a good once over to gain a better understanding of it’s components, build quality and how it pieced together. As a result I have created a couple of videos, the first is a ‘hands on review’ and the second shorter clip takes a look at the size of the HP Proliant MicroServer and how it compares to other small factors machines such as as the XPC Shuttle, and the larger Proliant ML115 G5.
I hope these videos are of use to those of you out there curious about this new HP MicroServer offering or who are maybe considering buying one. The next test will be to see if it will meet my requirements of using it as a VMware ESX/ESXi host for my vSphere lab environment. Check out my previous blog post here for more information about the MicroServer and for a more detailed look into it’s specification.
A question no doubt asked by many when the HP MicroServer was announced is, “how micro is this MicroServer?”. In this clip I compare it in size to an XPC Shuttle and an HP Proliant ML115 G5.
So, as mentioned the next test for the HP Proliant MicroServer is see how practical it would be as a VMware ESX/ESXi host, especially in light of the relatively low specification CPU? I will release a post soon with my findings.
I’d be interested to know your thoughts on the MicroServer… Is this new small form factor addition to the HP’s Proliant range of servers an effective solution for the SMB space or just under powered even for those SMB environments with >10-12 users, for which it is intended?
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My name is Simon Seagrave and I am a London (UK) based Senior Technology Consultant and vSpecialist working for EMC. 
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If it works with vSpehere it will be the definitive “portable” vSphere!!!
Waiting your test Simon!!!
Ciao Fabio,
I have moved all my 24×7 VMs (8) from my lab over to the HP MicroServer and it seems quite happy, that said there isn’t much of a workload on them at the moment.
Will keep you posted.
Ciao,
Simon
[...] here to see another video which compares the size of the MicroServer with a Proliant ML115 and Shuttle [...]
Just wondering if you know what on-board graphics are included with this? I’m curious if it would be up to HD playback or not…
… also are there any noticeable connections (unused or otherwise) for HDMI / DVI / LDVS on the motherboard? This system looks like a prime candidate for the HTPC crowd since I believe it may have radeon 4200 graphics (hardware x264 decoding onboard) – annoying without digital display out though.
>SMB environments with >10-12 users, for which it is intended
I have actually seen a lot less spec machines serve 500%-600% more users.
I wonted to use these with VMWare for a site i look after, i must admit VMs were more attractive because of simple disaster recovery, however, I thinking we will still look at these even for standard win server 2003/08 set-ups.
Regarding storage do they support mirrored stripped pairs?
I recently purchased one of these (along with 4 TS200′s) because of Simon’s posts here.
The box isn’t too bad, currently deciding whether to use it as an Openfiler, FreeNas or Nexenta as a SAN solution on it (yes, I know it’s got no RAID 5 but it’s a small environment and it will have 8gb of rdimms anyway).
Can you load these with 2.5″ drives i.e. SSD with a converter?
I guess it all depends how the sata and power connectors line up..
Hi,
Homeserver is an old topic for me. The HP discussed looks very appealing. Reasonable price, low consumption, I hope some quality. Should be a nice fileserver. A project to be managed over Christmas
I am very interested to read your review concerning virtualisation. Would be happy to try nexenta, win 2008 enterprise, freenas etc. Hope to read soon!
Many thanks in advance for the review,
Christian
(Based on Lake Constance, boarder to Switzerland)
Simon
Regarding storage do they support mirrored stripped pairs?
Just bought one of these for personal use. Nice little box – wish there was an option to not have the CD drive bay so the unit would be smaller. Got Linux running on it, with a software RAID 5 running.
There is no RAID BIOS utility – it can only be configured using AMD RAIDXpert, which is available on Windows only I believe.
I had some issues with the network not coming up; flashing the new BIOS seemed to fix it.
I wish the glowing HP light was white instead when everything is fine; the blue is hideous.
Paraffin:
There is no backing plate on the drive caddies to attach a 2.5″ drive, so you would need a bracket that would attach the drive such that the connectors are at the same location as a 3.5″ drive.
Oli:
The graphics chip is an AMD Mobility Radeon HD 4200. There doesn’t seem to be any extra connectors on the motherboard.
[...] more with less. There are also still many machines appearing with 8GB max RAM capacity, such as HP’s new microserver. So I’ve looked at other [...]
Thanks for the helpful posts and videos about these. I current have an ML110 G5 for my server and I am wondering if the MicroServer would be a better choice. My concerns (apart from size) are noise, heat, and power consumption – any idea how the two machines compare? Note that my ML110 is the Celeron version, which was a deliberate choice for low power.
Hi Dave,
Thanks for reading TechHead.
If power consumption versus CPU horse power is a serious consideration for you then I would definitely recommend the HP MicroServer as this definitely draws less power than my ML110 G5 or ML110 G6. The CPU used in the MicroServer isn’t the most powerful in the world (AMD dual core 1.3GHz) though for most lab environments this is more than sufficient. Check out my post here that gives a basic demonstation on the amount of power the HP MicroServer actually draws. http://www.techhead.co.uk/video-hp-proliant-microserver-power-consumption
Hope this helps.
All the best,
Simon
[...] HP Proliant MicroServer here, since there’s plenty of information out-there already (see TechHead.com for example). Sufficient to say that it only comes with a single 1Gb DDR3 memory and a [...]
Does anyone know the procedure for installing ESXi on one of these, I tried booting from CD but the CD just goes to the dos prompt at which point I cannot load the iso ?