So, I am not sure about getting a NAS

[Mihle]

So I am not sure if I should get a NAS or just HDDs for my desktop. If NAS, I don't know what NAS.

 

If I got a NAS, I don't know if more than me in this house would use it. But I would use it to store my photos/videos and the Blu-rays rips.

 

But the alternative is to just buy some HDDs and put it in my Desktop and use that. That would be cheaper.

But, my next desktop (soon probably) will probably be mATX or something, and it looks like most of those cases have max 2 HDD slots. So to not limit cases very much, going 2x8 (Raid 1) would have been the only option to try to be sort of "future proof". 

 

I wouldn't need Raid 1 prob just for the rips, but for my videos and photos it would be good to not need to manually keep copies on both drives. 

 

But when it comes to NAS, there would be more options. I could go both 2x8TB and 4x4TB, and even get a 4 bay NAS with 2x8TB and if I for some reason managed to fill it up, I could just add more 8TB drives. But NAS is an exstra cost.

 

I don't currently watch does rips other places than my desktop, but who knows what I will do in the feature when I move out or whatever. No one else here watches them, but who knows, maybe they would if I got a NAS and knew how?

 

My photos and videos is currently 300 GB but will grow. Most of it is actually not edited yet and stuff (because I have problems with myselves)

My rips is 1TB saved on my desktop, but also have some that I haven't because I had to remove them because space. From the past 1-2 years or so.

 

Maybe I would run VPN on it if I had it for those times where I am other places? I don't know if there are some use cases I don't yet know that I would do with it.

 

Is NAS safer for the data than just having HDDs in my Desktop? Other things I haven't thought about?

 

If I went for NAS, what should I get 2 bay? 4 bay? 2x8TB? 4x4TB? How powerful do I need? How much RAM? Is build one myself with it? Or just go with Qnap/Synology/whatever else?

 

Just a note, I haven't really compressed the rips much because I am afraid of loosing quality when watching on my desktop.

 

Might write more tomorrow, I am going to bed now.

[SkyHound0202]

RAID is not backup, you still risk accidental deletion, ransomware, theft etc. Using NAS instead of desktop has its pros and cons, but since it's only a relocation of data to a network location, the usual risk involving data storage still persists.

 

Off the shelf NAS are specially designed and proven products that are great for beginners or someone that does want much trouble messing around with hardware, but they offer comparably less expandability and have a high price tag. You can always buy one if you think it's worth it for you.

 

Build a NAS yourself is not hard, but it requires some knowledge outside Windows (if you are not going JBOD on an always-on desktop, which IS an valid option).

 

Even an embedded CPU board can handle basic NAS usage, but you can always go  higher (though a NAS was meant for efficiency not power).

 

RAM configuration depends entirely on what OS and file system you will use, some prefers large RAM as cache, others demands ECC for stability. Ideal scenario is a huge ECC memory pool, but this requires server grade stuff and are not cheap.

 

I personally would not go above 8TB since if one failed in a RAID, the time to rebuild would be longer and in none RAID environment, losing a large drive full of data is catastrophic. NAS drives like WD Red or Seagate IronWolf are great choices, you can also use desktop drives if you want. 

 

I am currently using a Unraid home server with a QQC0 (35 W "i9-9900T" ES) with 32 GB RAM with a six 8TB drives for storage, two 10TB Helium drive for parity, two SSD for write cache. Everything wraps nicely in an NZXT H440 case with room for more drives. Also has a 1050 ti installed in case I want to use a VM on the system.

[Mihle]

13 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

RAID is not backup, you still risk accidental deletion, ransomware, theft etc. Using NAS instead of desktop has its pros and cons, but since it's only a relocation of data to a network location, the usual risk involving data storage still persists.

I know, but it's protection from hardware failure. 

Is there any pros and cons I did not mention, in if you where me, would you get a NAS or just add HDDs to the desktop?

Quote

Off the shelf NAS are specially designed and proven products that are great for beginners or someone that does want much trouble messing around with hardware, but they offer comparably less expandability and have a high price tag. You can always buy one if you think it's worth it for you.

Well, I don't know if it's worth it for me. I have no idea what hardware is needed for what I want and what the alternatives cost. You know, there exist both weaker and more powerful NAS and computer parts.

 

My choice would be much easier if I just knew exactly what kind of hardware/Nas is needed and it's price.

Quote

Build a NAS yourself is not hard, but it requires some knowledge outside Windows (if you are not going JBOD on an always-on desktop, which IS an valid option).

I have no knowledge outside windows right now, but how hard is it? 

Quote

Even an embedded CPU board can handle basic NAS usage, but you can always go  higher (though a NAS was meant for efficiency not power).

 

RAM configuration depends entirely on what OS and file system you will use, some prefers large RAM as cache, others demands ECC for stability. Ideal scenario is a huge ECC memory pool, but this requires server grade stuff and are not cheap.

I know nothing about that.

 

I ment on for example if I where to go Synology or Qnap or whatever, there exist both 1, 2, 4 and 8 GB versions.

Quote

I personally would not go above 8TB since if one failed in a RAID, the time to rebuild would be longer and in none RAID environment, losing a large drive full of data is catastrophic. NAS drives like WD Red or Seagate IronWolf are great choices, you can also use desktop drives if you want. 

8TB per HDD or in total? If per drive, I did not plan on it. As I said, in NAS, 4x4TB or 2x8TB would be the options. In my desktop, 2x8TB would basically be the only option and I don't know if that got filled up. (I don't know if that would happen)

Quote

I am currently using a Unraid home server with a QQC0 (35 W "i9-9900T" ES) with 32 GB RAM with a six 8TB drives for storage, two 10TB Helium drive for parity, two SSD for write cache. Everything wraps nicely in an NZXT H440 case with room for more drives. Also has a 1050 ti installed in case I want to use a VM on the system.

That would be much  more than I need.

 

An option would be to wait untill I get a new desktop and use the old one as NAS, (i5 3570k) but it's old and I am not sure I want a ATX sized NAS. 

[KirbyTech]

Agree with what the other guy said mostly. 

 

I'd say build a NAS, they are not hard to build and you could do a FreeNas install. I currently run a non critical NAS with 4x6TB on FreeNas. I am using a server case but you could use a Fractal Define R something and that would work for your needs. No need to go all out for what you have. My main network storage is about ~90TB across multiple servers in a way more complex and unneeded setup than you have. 

 

If you want to a prebuilt NAS go for Synology they rock but as super basic software wise compared to Linux or FreeNas

[SkyHound0202]

6 minutes ago, Mihle said:

would you get a NAS or just add HDDs to the desktop?

I would choose a NAS. It can better consolidate the storage into one place.

12 minutes ago, Mihle said:

My choice would be much easier if I just knew exactly what kind of hardware/Nas is needed and it's price.

A J3455 based Synology DS718+ dual bay NAS with 2 GB RAM costs 429 EUR without drives on Amazon.

For the same price, you can get an Asrock J3455 board (85 EUR), a SilverStone CS01 (105 for non hot-swappable, 150 for hot-swappable), an SF450 PSU (85 EUR), 2 x 4 GB DDR3 RAM (50 total) and run Synology DSM on Synology DSM (free*). These costs 370 EUR in total and will beat the Synology unit hands down. You could save more if you cheap out on the case or PSU.

(Do note, that there are even Ryzen 7 based professional NAS out there, but for home storage, an embedded Gemini Lake CPU like the J3455 is a well-suited choice.)

*Works similarly like "Hackintosh": running a proprietary software on an unsanctioned device.

32 minutes ago, Mihle said:

but how hard is it? 

Most modern NAS os like Unraid, FreeNas or DSM all have a WebUI which is somewhat easy to use. Just follow the on screen prompt/wizard and it will be fine.

Some minor setting after setup could take some trail-and-error to find the best config.

37 minutes ago, Mihle said:

I know nothing about that.

I ment on for example if I where to go Synology or Qnap or whatever, there exist both 1, 2, 4 and 8 GB versions.

Synology or Qnap runs their own custom build of Linux, which is stripped down to its bare minimum to function as a NAS, thus they would not require much more RAM, so even 1 GB is OK.

Custom NAS os has more flexibility and expandability compared to the commercial ones, it means they would need a fair bit more RAM to run. FreeNAS want at least 8 GB of RAM.

To ECC or not: ECC is more for data integrity and can protect from RAM related file corruption, especially for ZFS file system. But that requires moving up to Xeon (or down to i3, Pentium, Celeron). which costs more (or performs worse in some case). Generally speaking if your budget allows it and your platform supports it, go ECC for extra protection.

49 minutes ago, Mihle said:

8TB per HDD or in total?

8 TB per drives, it offers the best storage density to price. Large Helium drives are still to expensive as main storage, but very good for parity. Smaller drives are just not "large" enough to be worth placing in the NAS.

1 hour ago, Mihle said:

That would be much  more than I need.

An option would be to wait untill I get a new desktop and use the old one as NAS, (i5 3570k) but it's old and I am not sure I want a ATX sized NAS. 

The case I suggest in the quick list above, the SilverStone CS01, is actually a stylish 6 drive ITX metal case with optional hot swapping support. Pair it with any embedded CPU board (Intel J-series or Xeon-D) it will be super efficient for NAS and looks great on desk or in the corner.

ATX sized NAS offers better expandability, but it just feels "too big" even for me from time to time. Plus your 77 W processor isn't great for 24/7 use either, that's pretty high power usage if you think of it.

[Mihle]

47 minutes ago, KirbyTech said:

Agree with what the other guy said mostly. 

 

I'd say build a NAS, they are not hard to build and you could do a FreeNas install. I currently run a non critical NAS with 4x6TB on FreeNas. I am using a server case but you could use a Fractal Define R something and that would work for your needs. No need to go all out for what you have. My main network storage is about ~90TB across multiple servers in a way more complex and unneeded setup than you have. 

 

If you want to a prebuilt NAS go for Synology they rock but as super basic software wise compared to Linux or FreeNas

Fractal Define R is a big case.....

26 minutes ago, SkyHound0202 said:

I would choose a NAS. It can better consolidate the storage into one place.

A J3455 based Synology DS718+ dual bay NAS with 2 GB RAM costs 429 EUR without drives on Amazon.

For the same price, you can get an Asrock J3455 board (85 EUR), a SilverStone CS01 (105 for non hot-swappable, 150 for hot-swappable), an SF450 PSU (85 EUR), 2 x 4 GB DDR3 RAM (50 total) and run Synology DSM on Synology DSM (free*). These costs 370 EUR in total and will beat the Synology unit hands down. You could save more if you cheap out on the case or PSU.

That case, the non swappable one has space for 2 3,5" drives while the hot swappable one is no 3,5" only 8x 2,5" drives. Here it would cost almost exactly the same as the Synology one. It would be cheaper with Lian Li PC-Q25 or node 802 (is larger tho, maybe too large, not sure) or something tho. 

26 minutes ago, SkyHound0202 said:

(Do note, that there are even Ryzen 7 based professional NAS out there, but for home storage, an embedded Gemini Lake CPU like the J3455 is a well-suited choice.)

*Works similarly like "Hackintosh": running a proprietary software on an unsanctioned device.

Most modern NAS os like Unraid, FreeNas or DSM all have a WebUI which is somewhat easy to use. Just follow the on screen prompt/wizard and it will be fine.

Some minor setting after setup could take some trail-and-error to find the best config.

Synology or Qnap runs their own custom build of Linux, which is stripped down to its bare minimum to function as a NAS, thus they would not require much more RAM, so even 1 GB is OK.

Custom NAS os has more flexibility and expandability compared to the commercial ones, it means they would need a fair bit more RAM to run. FreeNAS want at least 8 GB of RAM.

To ECC or not: ECC is more for data integrity and can protect from RAM related file corruption, especially for ZFS file system. But that requires moving up to Xeon (or down to i3, Pentium, Celeron). which costs more (or performs worse in some case). Generally speaking if your budget allows it and your platform supports it, go ECC for extra protection.

I don't think I will go there to ECC.

26 minutes ago, SkyHound0202 said:

8 TB per drives, it offers the best storage density to price. Large Helium drives are still to expensive as main storage, but very good for parity. Smaller drives are just not "large" enough to be worth placing in the NAS.

The case I suggest in the quick list above, the SilverStone CS01, is actually a stylish 6 drive ITX metal case with optional hot swapping support. Pair it with any embedded CPU board (Intel J-series or Xeon-D) it will be super efficient for NAS and looks great on desk or in the corner.

ATX sized NAS offers better expandability, but it just feels "too big" even for me from time to time. Plus your 77 W processor isn't great for 24/7 use either, that's pretty high power usage if you think of it.

Someone else recommended to instead get a non soldered CPU  and mono and get something that is 2 core but higher clocks instead, and a PCIe 16x slot or more sata ports, what do you say about that? I think it would become more expensive.

 

 

Or just Synology or Qnap, I don't know...

[SkyHound0202]

19 hours ago, Mihle said:

That case, the non swappable one has space for 2 3,5" drives while the hot swappable one is no 3,5" only 8x 2,5" drives. Here it would cost almost exactly the same as the Synology one. It would be cheaper with Lian Li PC-Q25 or node 802 (is larger tho, maybe too large, not sure) or something tho.

Sorry about that incorrect recommendation, try searching for Lian Li MS-04 or the other Silverstone DS380, they are built for 3.5 inch drives with ITX motherboards. Or even look up NAS chassis on ebay, there are some ITX sized NAS chassis available for less than 80 EUR.

19 hours ago, Mihle said:

Someone else recommended to instead get a non soldered CPU  and mono and get something that is 2 core but higher clocks instead, and a PCIe 16x slot or more sata ports, what do you say about that? I think it would become more expensive.

I am not against socketed CPU. As a matter of fact, I am using QQC0 (i9-9900T Engineering Sample), a socketed 35 W Coffee Lake CPU with 8C/16T. It handily outperforms a 65 W Ryzen 7 1700 in most cases, an overkill for your everyday NAS really. This chips powers my Unraid home server with additional VMs nested on it, thus the need for some additional cores.

But the problem with socketed CPU is that these efficient 35 W chips are really hard to find for end users, and those 65 W or even 95 W chips are just too power hungry for an always-on NAS.

In reality, a pure NAS (storage only, no Plex or other add-ins) will not requires much computational power, so a soldered quad-core Pentium Silver is enough to handle the job. Plus they are only rated for 10 W, making them cooler and more power-efficient than their socket counterparts. (Get an Asrock J5005 ITX and put it inside the above-mentioned small case and you get an amazing storage box.)

If you want to have better Plex transcode functionality or run docker containers, then the socketed CPU is the way to go. Any modern Processor paired with a decent board should do the trick. This also gives you better expandability and upgradability than the soldered CPU and the off-the-shelf NAS as well.

20 hours ago, Mihle said:

Or just Synology or Qnap, I don't know...

Bottom line:

-Unlimited budget and want no hassle: get an off-the-shelf NAS.

-Slightly tighter budget and willing for some DIY: socketed CPU with HBA card.

-Tight budget: SoC board with native chipset controller.

-Even tighter budget: convert old or second hand machine

-Just enough money for a drive: connect to desktop and deal with it.

[Mihle]

On 4/28/2019 at 4:35 PM, SkyHound0202 said:

Sorry about that incorrect recommendation, try searching for Lian Li MS-04 or the other Silverstone DS380, they are built for 3.5 inch drives with ITX motherboards. Or even look up NAS chassis on ebay, there are some ITX sized NAS chassis available for less than 80 EUR.

Seems to me that in my country, seems like these ones is the ITX I can find:

Lian li PC-Q25

FD node 304

Supermicro CSE-721TQ (more expensive)

Seems like stores here stopped having DS380 a while ago.

Quote

I am not against socketed CPU. As a matter of fact, I am using QQC0 (i9-9900T Engineering Sample), a socketed 35 W Coffee Lake CPU with 8C/16T. It handily outperforms a 65 W Ryzen 7 1700 in most cases, an overkill for your everyday NAS really. This chips powers my Unraid home server with additional VMs nested on it, thus the need for some additional cores.

 

Quote

But the problem with socketed CPU is that these efficient 35 W chips are really hard to find for end users, and those 65 W or even 95 W chips are just too power hungry for an always-on NAS.

In reality, a pure NAS (storage only, no Plex or other add-ins) will not requires much computational power, so a soldered quad-core Pentium Silver is enough to handle the job. Plus they are only rated for 10 W, making them cooler and more power-efficient than their socket counterparts. (Get an Asrock J5005 ITX and put it inside the above-mentioned small case and you get an amazing storage box.)

If you want to have better Plex transcode functionality or run docker containers, then the socketed CPU is the way to go. Any modern Processor paired with a decent board should do the trick. This also gives you better expandability and upgradability than the soldered CPU and the off-the-shelf NAS as well.

Bottom line:

-Unlimited budget and want no hassle: get an off-the-shelf NAS.

-Slightly tighter budget and willing for some DIY: socketed CPU with HBA card.

-Tight budget: SoC board with native chipset controller.

-Even tighter budget: convert old or second hand machine

-Just enough money for a drive: connect to desktop and deal with it.

Btw, can unraid Nas be set up and forget unless I want to change things?

 

Internet says the one you posted earlier J3455, should be able to transcode a single 1080p stream if I end up wanting to. Don't know what that with tho.

 

Is there really any benefit of J5005, it's more expensive.

 

If I end up needing to, that PCIe 1x can have a 2x data for a total of 6. 

 

There is one Biostar A10N-8800E, but because only two Sata, and if 5 is ver required a PCIe card with 4 sata would be required and that seem to be quite a lot more expensive than one with just 2 from what I have seen. But I don't know if I would ever actually use more than 4 or even 2 so I don't know.

 

Seems like if you go mono with socket and a CPU it adds at least 100€ exstra.

[SkyHound0202]

8 minutes ago, Mihle said:

Btw, can unraid Nas be set up and forget unless I want to change things?

Yes, after initial installation and setup, there's not much need to mess around with the software and hardware.

Even if you do need to tweak parameters, it can be done through its WebUI.

11 minutes ago, Mihle said:

Internet says the one you posted earlier J3455, should be able to transcode a single 1080p stream if I end up wanting to. Don't know what that with tho.

Is there really any benefit of J5005, it's more expensive.

If I end up needing to, that PCIe 1x can have a 2x data for a total of 6. 

Some server plugins like Plex can transcode the video to be played back on it app. This might not be necessary if you are directly accessing the storage and decode the stream on the client device.

J5005 is only marginally faster.

The expansion option on Intel embedded processors are fairly limited to be honest. But they excel in low power applications like NAS.

23 minutes ago, Mihle said:

There is one Biostar A10N-8800E, but because only two Sata, and if 5 is ver required a PCIe card with 4 sata would be required and that seem to be quite a lot more expensive than one with just 2 from what I have seen. But I don't know if I would ever actually use more than 4 or even 2 so I don't know.

Haven't see an AMD embedded board for a while, this one looks very promising.

Since this one has a PCIe x16 slot, you can actually find a cheap LSI RAID card and flash it to IT mode to function like an HBA following this guide.

[Mihle]

19 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

Yes, after initial installation and setup, there's not much need to mess around with the software and hardware.

Even if you do need to tweak parameters, it can be done through its WebUI.

Good.

19 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

Some server plugins like Plex can transcode the video to be played back on it app. This might not be necessary if you are directly accessing the storage and decode the stream on the client device.

If nothing changes and none else in the house wants to use it, transcoding probably wont happen, but who knows if things changes or not.

19 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

J5005 is only marginally faster.

The expansion option on Intel embedded processors are fairly limited to be honest. But they excel in low power applications like NAS.

 

19 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

Haven't see an AMD embedded board for a while, this one looks very promising.

Since this one has a PCIe x16 slot, you can actually find a cheap LSI RAID card and flash it to IT mode to function like an HBA following this guide.

Some said to me that that solution is slower when it comes to writes, is that true? And would it matter you?

[SkyHound0202]

7 hours ago, Mihle said:

is that true? And would it matter you?

I didn't notice any appreciable difference between my LSI 9300-8i card in IT mode and the native chipset ports during my original testing phase in Windows.

And it certainly wouldn't matter much for me in Unraid either, since I have two SSD as a mirrored write cache. The incoming data is now first written to the cache and then moved to the hard drives at certain point.

I observe a sustained ~450 MB/s write to server over network using an aggregated link, which is slightly slower than the rated speed of 530 MB/s of SSD due to the NIC bottleneck, but still much higher than the speed of an individual hard drive (~220 MB/s).

And in the end, most people will be bottle-necked by their gigabit (125 MB/s max) network in the first place anyway.

[Mihle]

7 hours ago, SkyHound0202 said:

I didn't notice any appreciable difference between my LSI 9300-8i card in IT mode and the native chipset ports during my original testing phase in Windows.

And it certainly wouldn't matter much for me in Unraid either, since I have two SSD as a mirrored write cache. The incoming data is now first written to the cache and then moved to the hard drives at certain point.

I observe a sustained ~450 MB/s write to server over network using an aggregated link, which is slightly slower than the rated speed of 530 MB/s of SSD due to the NIC bottleneck, but still much higher than the speed of an individual hard drive (~220 MB/s).

And in the end, most people will be bottle-necked by their gigabit (125 MB/s max) network in the first place anyway.

I would be limited to 125, but some said write on that LSI cards would be 60 while reads are speedy. Don't know if true.

I bet your cache drives are connected directly to the mobo while the ones that is on the card is only HDDs?

I probably wouldn't get cache.

But would it be bad to only have one cache SSD? (250 GB) i dont know what I will do with it when I get a new desktop.

[SkyHound0202]

5 hours ago, Mihle said:

some said write on that LSI cards would be 60 while reads are speedy. Don't know if true.

There are many factors affecting the speed of the HBA card of any brand: the card model, the firmware installed, the data encryption method, drive type, CPU/motherboard combo, PCIe slot version and lanes, OS choice, etc.

Thus, there's no straight answer to you question.

6 hours ago, Mihle said:

I bet your cache drives are connected directly to the mobo while the ones that is on the card is only HDDs?

The SSD and parity disk is connected to the motherboard directly, while the main storage is connected via the LSI card.

6 hours ago, Mihle said:

But would it be bad to only have one cache SSD?

If the single cache drive fails before the mover script can move the data to the hard drives, then the cached data will be lost. Mirrored cache can prevent this from happening.

But given the current endurance and lifespan of a single SSD (a 250 GB Samsung 860 EVO is rated for 150 TBW), this scenario is very unlikely, but sill possible.