Help with NAS build

[williamli9300]

Just a bit of context first: I’m building a NAS running FreeNAS that I can use to back up photos and documents from my PC at home, and that I can use to directly save photos to when I’m on the go. There’s a little nook that I can keep it so preferably microATX mini tower or smaller. I’m from Canada and have a budget of <900$CAD (not including storage drives), preferably around 300-400.
 

I’m looking at this build right now, but I’m worried about MB/CPU/RAM compatibility. Any advice or recommendations at around a similar price point would be greatly appreciated!

 

CPU: AMD Athlon 3000G - 70$

MB: ASUS B450M A/CSM - 115$

RAM: 2x https://www.mikescomputershop.com/product/9082812 @ 78$ea

OS Drive: Kingston 120GB A400 SATA M.2 SSD - 47$

PSU: Corsair CV450 - 70$

Case: Antec VSK3000 Elite - $70

 

If you have any recommendations, i have a few “hopes” for the parts:

MB: 5+ SATA III ports, gigabit LAN, μATX or smaller

RAM: minimum 16GB, DDR4 ECC memory

OS drive: 64+ GB SATA M.2 

Case: micro ATX mini tower or smaller

 

thank you in advance!

[AbydosOne]

20 minutes ago, williamli9300 said:

AMD Athlon 3000G

Kingston KSM24ES8/8ME

CPU doesn't support ECC, so either bump up to a Ryzen 3 (for ECC support), or nix the ECC RAM (for cheaper).

 

23 minutes ago, williamli9300 said:

OS drive: 64+ GB SATA M.2 

For FreeNAS, you don't need much more than a 16GB flash drive (or M.2 SSD, in my case) for the OS. Everything else gets put on the storage array(s).

[BryanNichols10]

57 minutes ago, williamli9300 said:

Just a bit of context first: I’m building a NAS running FreeNAS that I can use to back up photos and documents from my PC at home, and that I can use to directly save photos to when I’m on the go. There’s a little nook that I can keep it so preferably microATX mini tower or smaller. I’m from Canada and have a budget of <900$CAD (not including storage drives), preferably around 300-400.
 

I’m looking at this build right now, but I’m worried about MB/CPU/RAM compatibility. Any advice or recommendations at around a similar price point would be greatly appreciated!

 

CPU: AMD Athlon 3000G - 70$

MB: ASUS B450M A/CSM - 115$

RAM: 2x https://www.mikescomputershop.com/product/9082812 @ 78$ea

OS Drive: Kingston 120GB A400 SATA M.2 SSD - 47$

PSU: Corsair CV450 - 70$

Case: Antec VSK3000 Elite - $70

 

If you have any recommendations, i have a few “hopes” for the parts:

MB: 5+ SATA III ports, gigabit LAN, μATX or smaller

RAM: minimum 16GB, DDR4 ECC memory

OS drive: 64+ GB SATA M.2 

Case: micro ATX mini tower or smaller

 

thank you in advance!

So the challenge here is going to be balancing your desire for a micro atx form factor and tower with desire to build a backup server.

 

Micro atx is small, and hard drives are not that small. It depends a lot on how much storage you need. 

 

If you are willing to budge on the micro atx desire, you'd be better off searching for an atx board that has a good number of PCIe lanes for expansion, (things like 10 gig in the future or HBA's or a GPU should you ever need it for encoding) It is also going to be tricky to find a micro ATX board that has 5+ sata ports.

 

If you don't mind me suggesting, i would look at something like this mobo, if you can find it in stock, it usually costs around 90 dollars US. It has 6 sata ports and 2 16x sized lanes and a 4x lane. 

 

It will support that CPU as well which is nice. moving to ram, you don't need ECC memory. Go for a budget kit of DDR4 ram. For a storage server you really don't need more than 8 gigs. So id suggest finding a basic 2x4 gig set and you'd be in good shape. 

 

Then we come back to the question of storage. If you only plan on two drives you might be able to get away with a micro atx case. But if you want more than that you really are going to need to look for a larger case. 

 

So here is what I would do 

  AMD Athlon 3000g

  This Ram

  This drive for boot 

  The mobo I mentioned above 

  and maybe a case like this

but this config case wise only really works if you at most want to do 2 drives

If you want to do more i could give you some more options

[AbydosOne]

11 minutes ago, BryanNichols10 said:

For a storage server you really don't need more than 8 gigs

FreeNAS is not your ordinary file server; more RAM = better, especially if you want to start playing with VMs/plugins and whatnot.

 

12 minutes ago, BryanNichols10 said:

you don't need ECC memory

Better to have and not need, than need and watch your whole array hose itself. The real trick is finding Ryzen boards with ECC support (which shouldn't be as hard as it is).

 

13 minutes ago, BryanNichols10 said:

If you don't mind me suggesting, i would look at something like this mobo, if you can find it in stock, it usually costs around 90 dollars US. It has 6 sata ports and 2 16x sized lanes and a 4x lane. 

I don't disagree with the idea. Especially if you go up to R3 (or more), you'll need a GPU (nothing fancy, just to see the display), which will use a slot, so the more slot options you have beyond that, the better. 10G networking (Ethernet or SFP+) is definitely something worth planning for.

[BryanNichols10]

1 minute ago, AbydosOne said:

FreeNAS is not your ordinary file server; more RAM = better, especially if you want to start playing with VMs/plugins and whatnot.

Yeah I get that, but i was going off of OP saying he only wanted file storage. plus most mobos these days have 4 ram slots so the OP could always buy another one of those kits to populate the other two slots to have 16 gigs.

 

4 minutes ago, AbydosOne said:

I don't disagree with the idea. Especially if you go up to R3 (or more), you'll need a GPU (nothing fancy, just to see the display), which will use a slot,

Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't the 3000g have an IGPU? If it is, that will allow the OP to get it set up and then thrown in the closet to live. But you're right if the OP decides to go r3, a dedicated GPU will be needed.

 

I appreciate you adding to my advice!