The X11SPH-NCT(P)F that ships with the fully configured HL15 includes 2 x SATA DOM ports. (the orange SATA ports at the bottom left of the below image)
SATA DOM (Disk On Module) is a small SSD that plugs directly into the SATA port. It is often used for boot drives that don’t have large storage requirements, trading off speed for space efficiency. (i.e. you don’t need to take up any valuable drive bays for your boot OS.)
Share your experiences with them and whether you are considering incorporating them into your build?
Reference pricing for Supermicro SATA DOMs:
32GB: €50
64GB: €80
128GB: €140
So they are definitely on the pricier side!
Personally, I am considering 2 x 32GB disks in RAID-1 if I decide to install TrueNAS baremetal on my HL15.
Hmmm - I was thinking about getting a board with a couple m.2 slots on it for that purpose, but, that’s an interesting idea. Do they also require power (little white socket on the right) or is that something else?
I have actually done exactly that in the past - 2x 32GB SATA DOMs in RAID 1 on a X10 board for TrueNAS. I didn’t know it wasn’t recommended to be honest, but I never ran into any issues.
Also, I don’t believe this applies to the pictured board, but for X9 motherboards, there will be a socket to provide power to the SATA DOM.
I have a couple Super Micro computers within my home lab. As the HL-15 will be my fourth, I have been thinking about getting/using SATA DOM as a replacement to the boot/install drive.
I was not sure how it would perform as the main drive, but I was hoping to use it as a installation source.
Performs about the same as a SATA SSD, the Innodisk ones typically manage ~500MB/sec reads at least on the 128GiB models. I think the smaller ones are a bit slower.
