Home File Server/Back for 2 pcs

[Longbow1]

I have a quick question for everyone here and I would like some opinions.  I have a old Shuttle XPC (SA76G2 AMD Socket AM2+ / AM3 AMD 760G Barebone) with 8 gb (Patriot Gamer Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) with a AMD Phenom II X2 550 Callisto Dual-Core 3.1 GHz.

 

I want to set this up for file serving and backup of 2 home pcs.  The motherboard says it only supports RAID 0/1.  I would like to have a total of 8TB of storage.  

 

My questions to the forums are:

 

1.   Is this pc have enough horsepower to be a file server?

2.   Should i buy a separate raid control that can do raid 10?

3.   Or will raid 1 be enough to handle the data security, since raid 10 can rebuild.  (My parents had a mybook live that died and it has 15 years of pictures.  My father has ALS and I want to preserve the memories for my mom and the family.  I want to make sure i minimize the risk of data loss as much as I can)

4.   Should i try to find a old quad core, or will dual core @3.1 work?

5.   Is 8GB ddr2 800 enough ram?  Since it will only be used for basic file serving.

 

It already has windows 10 on it.  Remember there will be no streaming from it.  Just hold pictures and documents, so i am assuming that this box will have more than enough power, right?  Throw 2 8TB in and be done, or is the Raid 10 option really worth the expense?

 

Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated. 

[Windows7ge]

Yes.

 

I'd look into software raid. It'd save you some money. RAID is not a proper backup so if you just want general pool redundancy RAID1 will suffice.

 

If you can find something with more horse power down the road it's always a plus.

 

Yes. All you need is an lightweight OS that can operate well with it.

 

If W10 works well currently I'd use Storage Spaces. It can handle your RAID1 without a hardware RAID controller. Still, RAID is not a proper backup. It just maintains the integrity of the array.

[Radium_Angel]

13 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

I have a quick question for everyone here and I would like some opinions.  I have a old Shuttle XPC (SA76G2 AMD Socket AM2+ / AM3 AMD 760G Barebone) with 8 gb (Patriot Gamer Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) with a AMD Phenom II X2 550 Callisto Dual-Core 3.1 GHz.

 

I want to set this up for file serving and backup of 2 home pcs.  The motherboard says it only supports RAID 0/1.  I would like to have a total of 8TB of storage.  

 

My questions to the forums are:

 

1.   Is this pc have enough horsepower to be a file server?

2.   Should i buy a separate raid control that can do raid 10?

3.   Or will raid 1 be enough to handle the data security, since raid 10 can rebuild.  (My parents had a mybook live that died and it has 15 years of pictures.  My father has ALS and I want to preserve the memories for my mom and the family.  I want to make sure i minimize the risk of data loss as much as I can)

4.   Should i try to find a old quad core, or will dual core @3.1 work?

5.   Is 8GB ddr2 800 enough ram?  Since it will only be used for basic file serving.

 

It already has windows 10 on it.  Remember there will be no streaming from it.  Just hold pictures and documents, so i am assuming that this box will have more than enough power, right?  Throw 2 8TB in and be done, or is the Raid 10 option really worth the expense?

 

Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated. 

Are you certain the system will support those large hard drives? 

[Longbow1]

I will check to see about the large hard drives.

 

Why is hardware raid not good?  I always though software raid was crap?  I am just looking for a pc to hold a bunch of files basically.

 

Why is that not a good backup solution?  We used to back up both pc's to the my book live and it worked fine.  Sorry for my ignorance.  Could someone explain it in laymen's terms?

Then what would be a good back up to make sure this never happens again?

 

 

Thanks

[Longbow1]

I just figured that since raid one will protect the data, it would be basically a backup and prevent data loss......or that was my though process

[Jarsky]

13 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

I just figured that since raid one will protect the data, it would be basically a backup and prevent data loss......or that was my though process

Depends how important the data is..

 

RAID1 is resilient but it wont protect against:

- Theft of the computer

- Power surge damage to the drives

- Fire

- Cryptolocker

- Accidental Deletion

- File Corruption (unless its setup with ZFS/ReFS/BTRFS filesystem)

 

Personally I have a 1TB volume (about 500GB full) which is crucial data on my PC, which I backup to my RAID6, and I have an offline external drive that I sync that backup too occasionally. The other 50TB is non important so RAID6 is fine. 

[Windows7ge]

14 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

Why is hardware raid not good?

I did not say it is not good. I'm just offering a good money saving option.

 

15 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

I always though software raid was crap?

I would like to know who taught you that. There are pros & cons to both. Which you go with depends on your use case. For your application hardware raid really isn't necessary so I'm just offering to save you some change.

 

17 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

Why is that not a good backup solution?  We used to back up both pc's to the my book live and it worked fine.  Sorry for my ignorance.  Could someone explain it in laymen's terms?

Although for a home user RAID1 will probably suffice if you have data you truly do not want to risk losing I would not put my trust in it. At the software (or hardware) level things can go wrong that corrupt the drives and ruin the data on it.

 

A proper backup would be a second system with its own storage that has a copy of the first systems data. If the unpredictable happened and the primary system went out in a blaze of glory you'd still have all your information on the second system.

[Longbow1]

So this PC will be locked in a media room, so theft is not a issue.  They live in a gated retirement area.  

 

The board supports raid 0/1, so since its already on the board, shouldn't i used it?  (again sorry for sounding ignorant)  

This pc will be backing up the 2 primary systems, but i should have a backup of the backup?

 

Or should i just use a cloud service since it will only be 8TB max?

 

Thanks again folks.  Sorry for sounding like a idiot

 

[Longbow1]

is there a version or raid that can rebuild itself if a drive goes bad?  All i know of is 0,10,5,10    Dont know anything about the other forms of raid.  I want to minmize the risk as mush as possible and have about $700 to spend

[Windows7ge]

2 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

The board supports raid 0/1, so since its already on the board, shouldn't i used it?

For such an old system I think software RAID (like ReFS, ZFS, or BTRFS) would offer much better resiliency.

 

3 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

This pc will be backing up the 2 primary systems, but i should have a backup of the backup?

That is based on how important the data is to you. If the 2 PCs maintain their own copy and the backup went down then I'll assume this is fine. However if the backup is going to hold data where the only copy is on the backup then I'd recommend backing up the backup.

 

7 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

Or should i just use a cloud service since it will only be 8TB max?

8TB would be kind of expensive on the cloud. Personally I wouldn't but that puts all the responsibility in your own hands so it's up to you as to how much you trust your ability to keep the data intact.

[Windows7ge]

10 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

is there a version or raid that can rebuild itself if a drive goes bad?  All i know of is 0,10,5,10

The most common versions of raid include 0,1,5,6,10,50,51,60,61.

All of them can technically rebuild the array however RAID0 cannot rebuild the data. If a disk is lost in a RAID0 ALL the data is lost.

[Longbow1]

does the software raid cost money?  Any guidance you could give would be most helpful.  I was looking around and the board support sata 2 but sata 2 drives cost way too much, so i could just use sata 3 drives right?  they are backward compatible? 

[Windows7ge]

8 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

does the software raid cost money?  Any guidance you could give would be most helpful.  I was looking around and the board support sata 2 but sata 2 drives cost way too much, so i could just use sata 3 drives right?  they are backward compatible? 

If you have to buy the OS it would. Since you have W10 and it comes with Storage Spaces there is no additional cost. That's one reason why I was recommending it. If it offers ReFS when it asks what file system use that. Otherwise NTFS should suffice.

 

Although if you're open to it you could try a NAS (Network Attached Storage) based OS. There are many free ones.

 

They are backwards compatible. Quite frankly you shouldn't see any performance loss either.

[Longbow1]

Are they complex? (NAS OS)  are they easy to use like windows?

[Jarsky]

35 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

is there a version or raid that can rebuild itself if a drive goes bad?  All i know of is 0,10,5,10    Dont know anything about the other forms of raid.  I want to minmize the risk as mush as possible and have about $700 to spend

RAID 5, 6,10 & 50 can do that depending on the controller. As can many of the software solutions. 

What you're referring to is a GHS (Global Hot Spare). It's a spare drive that will automatically get added to the pool for a rebuild if you configure the hot spare. 

10 minutes ago, Longbow1 said:

Are they complex? (NAS OS)  are they easy to use like windows?

Most NAS operating systems are based on Linux, so if you're new to Linux permissions there can be a bit of learning there, otherwise most of them have fairly user friendly GUI's. Most of them have pretty comprehensive support documentation on their websites for Install & Configuration such as Rockstor: http://rockstor.com/docs/

[Windows7ge]

1 minute ago, Longbow1 said:

Are they complex? (NAS OS)  are they easy to use like windows?

The best analogy I could offer is it's like learning how to drive a car for the first time. Some are automatic. Some are stick.

 

It's just something I'm letting you know you can do if you want. If you stick with Windows you can use Windows based software which is really useful. If you want to explore other possibilities (All Linux) there's FreeNAS (uses ZFS), RockSTOR (uses BTRFS), there's Ubuntu Server (older versions like 14), 16.04/.10, 18.04/.10 (You can pick the file system), many, many, others

 

Trying to not overwhelm you but you have a borderline infinite number of options at your disposal. All those Linux options are free. Redhat & UnRAID are not. Those cost money.

[Longbow1]

I would like to use something very simple.  So i might stick with windows.  Have 0 experience with linux.  I am trying to dig around and find out in the motherbaord supports large hard drives but i cant find and info   Thanks for all the other info.  It was very helpful.  

[Longbow1]

Another quick question.........this windows storage spaces.........the file server has windows 10 already, but they pc's that will be backed up are both win 7 (1 pro & 1 home).  Will that cause any issues?  I was thinking about using the standard windows backup and just point it to the file server?  Thoughts?  I know home edition will have to be upgraded to save to network location.

 

Thanks again guys for all the info

[Longbow1]

Also i was looking into some raid info...........for my simple setup, would you go for raid 1 or maybe raid 5 so i can rebuild?

 

Thanks again

[Longbow1]

storage spaces is basically Raid 5 (parity option), correct?  Are their pros/cons to this in terms of speed?

[soulreaper11207]

On 2/20/2019 at 7:06 PM, Longbow1 said:

storage spaces is basically Raid 5 (parity option), correct?  Are their pros/cons to this in terms of speed?

W/R speeds for a NAS are a factor of multiple items that can limit the bandwidth. These can range from the cleint LAN speeds, the physical medium of the network, the server's LAN speeds, the server's access speeds to that data via a protocol (usb, pcie, Scsi, etc), to the speeds of the drives themselves. 

On 2/20/2019 at 4:24 PM, Longbow1 said:

Another quick question.........this windows storage spaces.........the file server has windows 10 already, but they pc's that will be backed up are both win 7 (1 pro & 1 home).  Will that cause any issues?  I was thinking about using the standard windows backup and just point it to the file server?  Thoughts?  I know home edition will have to be upgraded to save to network location.

 

Thanks again guys for all the info

Give urBackup a try. I can tell you enough how easy it is to use for a back up solution. 

 

And another tip: Create user accounts for accessing the file share and dont save the creds on the client machines. This will help combact potential crypto attacks from the client machines if they get infected. If that local user has access to it at all times, so does that nasty bug.