need help with home server

[oOInSaNeGaM3ROo]

hi guys currently got an old laptop for a home server just to play with but now i think i need a more powerful server due to it cannot encode plex video for my roku's very fast and causes buffering. i was thinking of buying an ex-corprate reck server for this purpose ad well to future proof myself a little, as i game i sometimes owuld like to host minecraft and stuff really well. this is what i was thinking of geting http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dell-PowerEdge-1950-Twin-Quad-Core-Xeon-8GB-RAM-3-5-VMware-VTx-1U-Rack-Server-/141044962510?pt=UK_Computing_Servers&hash=item20d6ef54ce

 

i know it seems a bit overkill but for what i want now but i want to expand a little in the future an be prpared for 4k streaming and such.

or am i crazy i havee an old quad core phenom II and motherbord with psu would only need a case and same but would probably work out around the same price so really dont know what to do any opinion on the matter would be greatly appreciated

[dalekphalm]

You could certainly go either route. Repurposing your old Phenom II CPU would give you the flexibility of being able to decide on form factor, quietness levels, storage and expandability, etc.

 

But if you decide to buy that Dell, have you considered your storage requirements and how your overall setup will be? That dell has 2x 3.5" HDD bays. This means either:

 

1. 1x drive with OS and Data on it

2. 1x OS drive and 1x Data drive

3. RAID 1 mirror on both drives

4. Connecting to external HDD's using USB

5. Connecting to external SAS enclosure using the Dell RAID card (There aren't any pictures, so I can't tell whether the raid card uses internal or external ports)

6. Installing a new RAID card into one of the PCIe x8 slots

 

I personally run a server with 3x 3TB internal HDD's and an LSI raid card connected to a Rackable SE3016 16-bay SAS expander, which has 2x 500GB and 1x 2TB HDD's inside it.

[antoainb]

hi guys currently got an old laptop for a home server just to play with but now i think i need a more powerful server due to it cannot encode plex video for my roku's very fast and causes buffering. i was thinking of buying an ex-corprate reck server for this purpose ad well to future proof myself a little, as i game i sometimes owuld like to host minecraft and stuff really well. this is what i was thinking of geting http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dell-PowerEdge-1950-Twin-Quad-Core-Xeon-8GB-RAM-3-5-VMware-VTx-1U-Rack-Server-/141044962510?pt=UK_Computing_Servers&hash=item20d6ef54ce

 

i know it seems a bit overkill but for what i want now but i want to expand a little in the future an be prpared for 4k streaming and such.

or am i crazy i havee an old quad core phenom II and motherbord with psu would only need a case and same but would probably work out around the same price so really dont know what to do any opinion on the matter would be greatly appreciated

 

The Phenom won't be as loud and depending on the case it could have more drives and run RAID (with a dedicated card if you wan't 5 or higher). The DELL I've seen running and it's hot and loud as hell...

[oOInSaNeGaM3ROo]

i'm thinking i might just repurpose my old phenom just buy cheap ram and case. i might even just bolt everything to a shelf an install it into my cupboard with a fan at the top of the door removing hot air. also it needs to be quiet as the cupboard is 2 feet from my bed so a phenom with a bequiet cpu cooler should do it i hope, is it worth buying the wd red drives over black drives and will it cause issues with the speed of decoding for playback.

 

thanks for the heplp btw

[dalekphalm]

i'm thinking i might just repurpose my old phenom just buy cheap ram and case. i might even just bolt everything to a shelf an install it into my cupboard with a fan at the top of the door removing hot air. also it needs to be quiet as the cupboard is 2 feet from my bed so a phenom with a bequiet cpu cooler should do it i hope, is it worth buying the wd red drives over black drives and will it cause issues with the speed of decoding for playback.

 

thanks for the heplp btw

If you are using this as a media server, then there is literally no reason at all to buy WD Black HDD's. The increased performance the drives offer will not help one bit with the tasks it'll perform (including encoding and decoding of video for streaming and playback).

 

I would suggest WD Green's if you're just doing RAID 1 or JBOD (Just a bunch of disks). If you're going to go with a RAID 5 or more complex array, then the WD Red's are an excellent choice. Both are extremely quiet. The Red's also have a better warranty and a higher MTBF over the greens.

 

The Phenom would work great. Whether you use a case or mod some sort of shelf is entirely up to you, just make sure there's adequate cooling. A single fan may not be enough. Wood insulates the heat, it'll act like an oven on the inside. Get a nice big air cooler with 120 or if possible 140mm fan. It'll be quieter and more efficient, and then see if you can fit a couple 120mm low RPM fans in the cupboard itself for cooling the "case".

[Hikaru12]

Depends on the amount of the content you have. That Dell limits how many HDD's you can use. If you get your own case you have greater expandability. A Phenom should be great for Plex transcoding provided you're only transcoding for 1 or 2 clients. Xeons are the only ones that can really handle multiple clients 5+ at the same time unless you want to overclock a i7 or something.