Is a GPU necessary for a NAS?

[lazygood4notin]

I'm slowly buying parts for a NAS I'm going to build for storage and occasional media streaming and I bought a mini ITX case first and I'm currently looking for a motherboard to get next. Except I just realized that most of if not all of the mini ITX motherboards I've seen only have 1 PCIe slot and I'm planning on buying a 10GB Ethernet NIC for my NAS that will be using that PCIe slot. I was planning on just using a cheap GPU from an old desktop anyways, but is it really necessary?

[tt2468]

1 minute ago, lazygood4notin said:

I'm slowly buying parts for a NAS I'm going to build for storage and occasional media streaming and I bought a mini ITX case first and I'm currently looking for a motherboard to get next. Except I just realized that most of if not all of the mini ITX motherboards I've seen only have 1 PCIe slot and I'm planning on buying a 10GB Ethernet NIC for my NAS that will be using that PCIe slot. I was planning on just using a cheap GPU from an old desktop anyways, but is it really necessary?

Not for normal operation. It is always nice to have integrated graphics.

[Drak3]

For initial setup, one needs a GPU. In your situation, the iGPU would be ideal, as for what you need to do, you don't need much graphical power.

 

You should aim for an Intel processor with Intel HD Graphics (most, if not all, Core i3 and i5's currently sold new have this. Same does for desktop quadcore i7's).

If you're getting an X79/X99 system, you'll need to use a dedicated graphics card.

[desertcomputer]

No, it best if you have integrated gpu either within the cpu or on the motherboard side. I was able to run FreeNAS without a GPU at all but it kinda a trouble if you want to fix problems that SSH won't able to fix. You can grab a cheap GPU off ebay for ~10 dollars you don't need anything fancy, the cheapest will do. 

[lazygood4notin]

1 hour ago, Drak3 said:

For initial setup, one needs a GPU. In your situation, the iGPU would be ideal, as for what you need to do, you don't need much graphical power.

 

You should aim for an Intel processor with Intel HD Graphics (most, if not all, Core i3 and i5's currently sold new have this. Same does for desktop quadcore i7's).

If you're getting an X79/X99 system, you'll need to use a dedicated graphics card.

Do you happen to know of any i3's with Intel HD Graphics that are fairly cheap? I'm trying to get parts as cheap as possible since the drives alone is like 80% of my entire budget

[Drak3]

5 minutes ago, lazygood4notin said:

Do you happen to know of any i3's with Intel HD Graphics that are fairly cheap? I'm trying to get parts as cheap as possible since the drives alone is like 80% of my entire budget

I'm pretty sure all i3's have Intel HD Graphics. If you've got $120 for the CPU, take a look at the i3-7100.

[lazygood4notin]

14 hours ago, Drak3 said:

I'm pretty sure all i3's have Intel HD Graphics. If you've got $120 for the CPU, take a look at the i3-7100.

Alright will do, thanks

[Bakerking31]

Pentium's also have integrated graphics and are less expensive.

[Phate.exe]

On 2/23/2017 at 2:01 AM, lazygood4notin said:

Do you happen to know of any i3's with Intel HD Graphics that are fairly cheap? I'm trying to get parts as cheap as possible since the drives alone is like 80% of my entire budget

The i3-3220 in my server seems to get along just fine.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

My i3-4170 supposedly has integrated graphics but I never used those in my NAS.  I made the FreeNAS boot stick on my main PC, put it in the NAS, booted it and then completely set it up over the web interface on my main PC.  So depending on the OS you plan to use, you may never need to have any kind of graphics.