Hands On: Tranquil PC BBS2 Barebones Home Server

Many thanks to WGS reader Bry Wright for allowing us to publish his review of the BBS2 Advanced Server.

Tranquil PC’s Barebones 2 server (BBS2), is the cousin to Tranquil’s SQA-5H Home Server. The key differences between the two are the lack of a supplied hard drive and operating system, no LEDs on the front of the chassis and a smaller amount of installed RAM (512Mb) by default. Designed to fill the role of a home NAS or server Tranquil’s BBS2 sits somewhere between the build your own NAS market and the pre-built, offering flexibility in solution without having to build from scratch.

Specifications

The BBS2 is built Intel’s Atom Processor, designed for low cost and low power consumption. The base specification is as follows:

Tranquil’s specification is pretty generous when you look at competitors in the pre-built market, which often support a mere 500mHz single core CPU and 256 MB RAM(generally non-upgradable) like the Qnap TS4-409.

One word of caution regarding an error on Tranquil PC’s website which states there are 2 Front USB ports on the BBS2. However, in reality you just get the 4 on the rear.

You can customise your server in one of two ways. Firstly you can specify the amount of internal RAM you require -  here I strongly recommend you spend the extra on 2GB, as although WHS will run fine on 512MB, upgrading the RAM at a later date will prove very difficult.

Secondly, you can specify the RAID options from either 4x Internal to 3x Internal + eSATA. What this means is, if you want to use RAID on your server you can either have 3 of the 5 internal drives included in the RAID array plus a drive connected to the eSata port. Or you can have 4 of the 5 internal drives on the RAID port. I recommend going for the 4 internal option but, if you are installing Windows Home Server on the box, then this does not really matter as data duplication is handled by WHS’ own drive extender technology, leaving the use of RAID redundant (no pun intended!)

Up Front

Here we can see the five internal hard drive bays. They’re colour coded and, apart from the first bay on the right, can be RAID enabled if you so choose when purchasing. This first drive bay should be used for your system drive – Tranquil recommend you fill the bays in turn from right to left as your storage needs expand.

Controls are very simple with a surface mounted power button and a power light which glows blue in operation. Each drive bay has its own LED to show which drive bays are available.

Around the Back

Looking at the rear of the unit (and unscrewing the service port backplate)we have a VGA port, a parallel port (why?) and a serial port. These seem rather odd inclusions, especially the parallel port. I would much rather see a PS2 mouse and keyboard port here as you are limited to using a USB keyboard and mouse to install your operating system.

Installing your Operating System

This was far easier than I thought it would be. Armed with a USB flash drive and a copy of Windows Home Server, I proceeded to install my home Server. Since I do not own a external USB DVD drive I decided to copy my Windows Home Server DVD to USB flash drive and make it bootable.

Once this was done, it was a simple matter of plugging in my monitor via the VGA port and connecting a USB keyboard and mouse. I plugged in my USB drive and turned on the BBS2 Server.

When installing Windows Home Server the system will automatically boot from the USB pen drive if there is one inserted. After the first reboot during the installation you will need to quickly enter the BIOS and under the boot options turn USB Booting off. Else you will be stuck in a loop of booting from the USB drive. You can disconnect and then reconnect the USB flash drive after every reboot but changing the BIOS option is a lot more convenient.

Running Tranquil PC’s Barebones Server

Noise
The Barebones 2 server is very quiet indeed. While the fan can be easily heard (I am sitting about 1-2 metres away) as it is a fairly low pitched humming noise. It is not bothersome and situating your server a little bit further away would render it almost silent.

Size
The BBS2 is incredibly small, and is currently sitting out of the way in a small corner of the room connected to a 100Mb/s router. I intend to purchase a USB wireless-N adapter and move my server into the living room – since I do not have a gigabit router I shouldn’t be hampered by wireless-N speeds (as my laptop connects at 130mb/s).

With one hard drive installed the server is currently drawing approximately 30 watts of power which I expect to go up to just under 50 watts when I fill all 5 hard drive slots. That’s only 10% of the power my home PC can draw. A massive saving.

Performance
There is more horse power here than most pre-built NAS devices combined and far outpaces the likes of HP’s original MediaSmart Server. Unfortunately, I do not own a gigabit router so I am limited to only 100 mb/s. Yet, I can play HD films on my laptop from my barebones server without any issues and minus overheads can easily max out my poor router.

Temperature-wise, everything runs nice and cool:

Verdict

With the 2GB upgrade, shipping and VAT the BBS2 server came in at a hefty £360. If we compare this to the likes of the Qnap TS-409 at around £380, the BBS2 has a far superior processor and RAM and an extra drive bay, although you also need a operating system which comes supplied with the Qnap.

If we compare to a build it yourself Atom based system -  CPU/Motherboard: £74 (same spec), RAM: £20, Case: £50 (although personally I would pay up to £150 for a very good NAS case such as this), and PSU: £50 (can be had cheaper but I prefer quality over value). All together that comes to £194 + shipping. Yet home builds are often more complicated to set up and as mentioned earlier, it’s hard to find such a small and functional 4-5 HDD bay case, at least not without extensive modding.

The HP MediaSmart Server comes in slightly cheaper at £320, yet you only get 4 drive bays, a slightly less powerful CPU, less RAM, a bigger case and higher power consumption.

Whereas the home-built option wins on price, the BBS2 comes out on top over rivals such as Qnap and Synology for spec/price ratio. In my opinion, it’s still superior to the HP MediaSmart Server although admittedly more expensive.

If you want a home server that’s small, quiet and do no mind installing your own operating system such as WHS or FreeNas then you should take a good long look at the BBS2.

Pros:

• High Spec
• Small
• Holds 5 Hard drives plus multiple external USB/e-SATA hard drives

Cons:

• Built to order (took 7 days + delivery)
• No Front USB ports as described on the official specification

Tranquil PC’s BBS2 is an affordable, quiet piece of kit that can safely sit hidden away backing up your files, hosting web sites, and streaming videos/music to your media players all without much effort involved.

It’s a reasonably priced, fast, small and quiet multi-drive system that is perfect for all home server tasks. Thoroughly recommended.

More Info: Tranquil PC

Thanks again to Bry for sending us his review. If you’d like to submit a review to WGS of a system we’ve not yet featured, then please contact us.