Capabilities of the T105 server

If you're in the UK this box is on a great deal at the moment. £99 for the basic config.

There doesn't seem to be an option for V in the bios but it's probably supported by default. The specs say the 1 sata controller will support optical devices and tape storage and the other controller the 2 disks. You could always bung in a sata card. You could squeeze a disk into the spare optical bay and maybe slide one in where the floppy should go. Things are quite tight for space in this box. You could always use an E-Sata card and go for external storage.

A third party nic should be fine, Dell list them as options for the customers that can't be bothered with a bit of DIY.

I was going to get one of these for my windows home server but as i couldn't fit 6 hdd's i decided against it.

It sounds like you're saying that there 4 ports are split between two different controllers, and that one of them is crippled.  That seems like an odd thing to do, am I understanding correctly?

My issue is that I already have several disks that I would like to use.  I could add a SATA card, but that bumps up the cost a bit, and this box has known issues with non-Dell SATA controllers.  Going the eSATA route defeats the purpose a bit...I'd prefer to have less cables and parts laying around if I can manage, and not to buy external storage.

The biggest appeal of the T105 is that it's inexpensive.  If I have to spend a couple hundred dollars more to get the functionality I need, then I could just pay more for an entirely different server to start with.  So if anyone here actually owns or has used a T105 and can tell more about it I would appreciate it.

The T series stands for tower, a different naming convention. Basically it's an update to the SC range of PE servers. So it's designed to work out of the box with minimal configuration. straight from the manual, It's designed for 2 disks and 2 other SATA devices. There are other threads on the forums about the T105 and hard disk add on's. If you need larger capacity then either build a desktop that can handle things or buy a larger server (not spec but case size).

online manual is here: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/pet105/en/index.htm

Or even look at vmware server, it's free and you can build any os and run it from your desktop. 4gb ram recommended.

I don't say this to be argumentative, but you're not telling me anything that I don't already know.

I've looked through the manuals for the T105 and I've searched this support forum for threads on having more than two hard disks in the T105.  The manual says that it supports two hard disks, but it doesn't state whether that is a chipset, BIOS, or physical space limitation.  There are many similar threads in this forum, but I have yet to find one that states definitively one way or the other if it is in fact possible to have more than two hard disks in a T105.  All of the threads that I have read end with someone who doesn't actually own one saying that "the manual says..."  If it turns out that it is simply a matter of case design I can engineer around it, if it is a BIOS or chipset limitation then I'll find something else.

I am well aware of the alternatives in the forms of slightly more expensive servers from Dell and HP.  But as I said in my previous post, the primary appeal of the T105 is price.  I can pick up a T105 for around $350, but moving up to the next tier of "server" costs about twice as much.  If I can meet my needs and the T105's low price point, then why would I pay more?  If it turns out that I can't get what I want for $350, then I'm not opposed to paying more.  I just don't want to waste money if I don't have to.

Regarding VMWare Server, I do run that on my desktop and laptop but it unfortunately does not fulfill my requirements in this case. As I mentioned in my original post I need a system that is compatible with Microsoft's Hyper-V, and you cannot run a virtualization platform inside a virtual machine.

So once again, is there anyone out there who has a T105 and knows for sure whether it will support more than two drives and/or Hyper-V? 

Well, I decided to roll the dice and buy a T105.  I figured that in the worst case I'd just have to return it and pay a restocking fee.  It looks like I won't have to though.

The server arrived yesterday, and the first thing that I did was to install two additional hard disks, for a total of three.  No problems.  I moved the hard disks around to various controllers/ports, and they were recognized on all of them, no problems.  It seems that the only reason that this box is "limited" to two hard disks is that there are only two hard disk bays in the bottom of the chassis.  However, a third 3.5" hard disk will fit in the 3.5" floppy disk location, with the only problem being that the 3.5" bay cover won't fit once the drive is installed.  You can also get a cheap 5.25" to 3.5" bay converter/bracket and mount the drive in the spare 5.25" bay, no problems.  One thing to note is that if you choose to install it in the 3.5" floppy bay, the power cable is about 2 millimeters to short to reach from the back of the DVD-ROM in the very top bay to the back of the 3.5" bay, so you will have to move the DVD down a bay to make it fit.

Regarding the support for hardware-assisted virtualization in the BIOS, I didn't see anything about it in the system setup screens, but Hyper-V did appear to install correctly.  I'll have to do more testing to be sure, but it appears that this inepensive server is exactly what I was looking for. 

In regards to "hardware-assisted virtualization in the BIOS... but Hyper-V did appear to install correctly".

Did Hyper-V run on the T105?

I am interested in doing the same thing, install Windows Server 2008 x64 with Hyper-V but the BIOS does not indicate that Hardware Virtualization is supported.

Yes, I am successfuly running Hyper-V within Windows 2008 server w/o issue.