HP ProLiant server running NetBSD 9 setup suggestions?

[Chris Hanson <cmhanson%eschatologist.net@localhost>]

I just got an HP ProLiant DL360p Gen8 on which I plan to run NetBSD, primarily to serve files and do some light emulation. (Things like VAX on SIMH, not arcade games on MAME.) Unfortunately I don’t have disks for it yet so I can’t set things up, but I realized that gave me the opportunity to ask for advice.

So, with that in mind: Is there anything I should plan for in setting up NetBSD on this system? Which filesystem should I use? Should I set up LVM or RAID? Does NetBSD support the HP Smart Array P420i RAID controller? (I think it’s the sort of thing for which the supported Windows/Linux/ESXi versions need a driver.)

And, perhaps most importantly, is there anything I should install, configure, or tune to keep the fans nice and quiet? Booting the NetBSD 9.0 installer from a USB key, the system was plenty quiet, but I know those fans can move a lot of air if they have to.

  -- Chris

PS - For the curious, here are the specs for the system that was about US$200 including competent shipping:

- Two 2.5GHz 6-core Xeon E5-2640 CPUs
- Eight 2.5in SAS/SATA bays
- Two 146G 2.5in SAS disks
- 48GB of RAM
- Four 1GBe ports
- iLO GBe port
- Two 750W PSUs

It has native RAID but I’m not sure whether I should use it or whether it’s even compatible with NetBSD. I’m also planning to swap the 2.5in bays for 3.5in bays, booting from a large SATA SSD and serving files from a huge SATA disk, so I’m not really attached to the existing storage.