PCIE SSD Boot Drive

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

You Guys and Gals ready for a stupid forum post?

 

I've been running a budget home NAS server in my house for the last few months and everything has been going fine thankfully. But recently I've ran into a problem with running out of space.

 

Currently, the system is an old Dell 990 (i5 2500, 10gb Ram) with a cheap 120gb SSD for boot and a WD Red 6tb for storage. I was looking at buying two extra 6tb drives but the only probably with that is that the motherboard only has three SATA connections (two currently being used).

 

Basically, I'm just wondering if it'll be an alright idea to get a small PCIE SSD boot drive and fill all three SATA connections for the storage drives. Is that a safe idea and if it is would there be any issues with it being a a headless Ubuntu (18.04) server? And also, I can't seem to find any small (like 60gb -120gb) PCIE SSD's, any recommendations?

 

BTW I would just go buy a new motherboard and chip (since there's nothing out there in 1155 anymore) but this whole project was suppose to be cheaper then buying a prebuilt NAS and that would cost ~500 AUD, then another ~300 AUD for a new case and PSU. Oh and I don't really  want to get some dodgy PCIE to SATA connector.

 

Thanks peeps.

[DoctorNick]

https://www.amazon.com/Akasa-PCIe-Adapter-heatsink-Cooler/dp/B07K9RR2ZC

Check PCI-e bandwidth

 

Don't know if this would work. You may need a BIOS update. but I can't garantee that it would work

[boggy77]

4 minutes ago, TheOneWhoKnocks said:

I was looking at buying two extra 6tb

why don't you buy one extra 10tb or 12tb drive? should be the same price as 2x6tb

[Olaf6541]

Keep in mind that booting from nvme on that sandy bridge system can be a problem. If you get a sata m.2 i dont know if that will affect other sata ports onboard (some m.2 slots disable onboard sata ports, but i dunno about pcie adapters...) but it could work.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

12 hours ago, boggy77 said:

why don't you buy one extra 10tb or 12tb drive? should be the same price as 2x6tb

Funny enough in Australia the prices are really backwards... I just bought a second WD Red 6tb for 200 AUD since 10tb / 12tb never go on sale and are always at 550+. 

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

12 hours ago, DoctorNick said:

https://www.amazon.com/Akasa-PCIe-Adapter-heatsink-Cooler/dp/B07K9RR2ZC

Check PCI-e bandwidth

 

Don't know if this would work. You may need a BIOS update. but I can't garantee that it would work

Yeah maybe! I do have a spare M.2 drive so that could work. Are there any plain PCIE SSDs out there though? I don't are about speed or size or anything, NVME or not :)

[GDRRiley]

Just use a 9211-8I or 9210-8I RAID card that come pre flashed to IT MODE.

They are about 35-55$ used.

Then use breakout cables they are about 10$ for SF8087 to 4 SATA ports.

Edited December 3, 2019 by GDRRiley

[thunder9231]

PCI-E booting (Essentially NVMe) didn't come into play until the Haswell refresh (Z97 era). NVMe drives will only show up as general storage on anything that doesn't support NVMe/PCI-E booting.

As others have said, buying a RAID card is the best option given the specs you have provided.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

On 12/3/2019 at 3:00 PM, GDRRiley said:

Just use a 9211-8I or 9210-8I RAID card that come pre flashed to IT MODE.

They are about 35-55$ used.

Then use breakout cables they are about 10$ for SF8087 to 4 SATA ports.

Ah sweet. And I'm guessing you can do all this without actually using a RAID setup? I don't really want to be messing with that...

[GDRRiley]

17 minutes ago, TheOneWhoKnocks said:

Ah sweet. And I'm guessing you can do all this without actually using a RAID setup? I don't really want to be messing with that...

the point of a card in IT mode is it is like JBOD (just a bunch of disks) but should pass smart data through.

I've got 2 of the 9211-8i in IT mode and they work great.