So, sort of along the same vein. I recently wanted to build a cheap 10G router. I found this SuperMicro X10SLH-N6-ST031 on ebay with 6x 10G RJ45 on it (they don’t do auto negotiation, and only run in either 1G or 10G) for roughly $60. This specific seller gave me a compatible CPU for free, already in the mobo. Of note, this motherboard is slightly longer than a micro-ATX motherboard, but still smaller than a full sized ATX board. Knowing this, I went for the safest option of finding a case that was compatible with both micro and full ATX. I ended up going with a Silvertone GD09B HTPC chassis.
After finding that, I wanted to make sure I could update the BIOS to include patches for Spectre and Meltdown. Lucky for me, users at servethehome already did this! The modded BIOS also enabled NVMe support. There’s also a lot of great info about this board and related projects in that thread.
It works perfectly for my use case. I think with the NICs, it runs at about 100W idle. More than a normal switch, but cheaper for the hardware at least compared to other 10G switches. Might be worth considering!
Yeah. My solution is to do the negotiation on my microtik switch. Basically I input 10G to the switch from the router, and then use the switch to change the speed of the connection.
Where I live 100W would cost me something like $25/mo to run, continuously, for the life of the device. I think my 8x10Gb + 24x1g switch draws around 15-20W if I’m not using PoE and I spent around $260 on it. Inside a year the commodity switch becomes cheaper to own even if I were given a whitebox equivalent for free.
If I lived somewhere with lower kWh costs I’d be happy to roll my own whitebox but it’s just not viable here.