Need advice for custom NAS

[RedaSaiko]

Hi here,

 

First of all, I want to say that I am a total noob in everything server related. I always been using a lot of storage, mainly external, but I am tired of having my files spread between all of my HDDs, plus I have a second computer, so it's time to start using a better solution. I am not interested in pre-built NAS like Synology, the prices/specs of these devices aren't appealing to me. I want to build my own custom server and have absolute control on the hardware/power/heat/noise.

 

- My actual setup (nothing fancy):

2 computers - ps3 - old laptop - smartphone - tablet

- What I want to use the NAS for:

File server only, no VMs, no plex (at least for now). I want to be able to listen to music, read ebooks and watch videos from any of my devices.

 

Since like I said before I am a total noob in network storage, I have a some remaining questions even after a lot of researches. I live in Morocco where electronics are expensive as hell (plus basically I have to import everything) so I want to be sure to do things correctly. I am apologizing in advance for every dumb question ^^. Please correct me if something is wrong.

 

 

1 - Hardware:

Let's start with the hardware. ECC memory is a must have, I do care about my files. I also want to keep power consumption as low as possible. Finally, my budget is low so I want to spend it on the important stuff. After a lot of readings/videos, I have opted for something like this:

 

1.1 - CPU: Ryzen 3 3100 / 3300x / Ryzen 5 3600* (*too expensive here). These are all 65w, pack enough horse power for what I need and support ECC (all of Ryzen CPUs and Pro APUs support ECC). What do you think? Any reason to not go with the cheapest one?

I can also get the Ryzen 5 2600 for the same price as the 3100, it's also 65w, What do you think? Worth it or not? (Since Ryzen 2xxx wasn't as good as the 3xxx series).

 

1.2 - Motherboard: Some Asrock/Asus b550/x570 with listed support of ECC. Should I go for a board with a lot of SATA ports or get a PCI card? I have seen some cards in ebay, but they are at least 100 usd and I am concerned since it adds another possible component for failure.

 

1.3 - RAM: How much do I need? I have to find a good ECC sticks compatible with my motherboard, it's always possible to add more so I don't want to spend a lot here. For now I am considering a single 16gb stick, should I go with 8 instead? The prices aren't that different.

 

1.4 - Intel route: Another possibility is the i3 9100 + GIGABYTE C246-WU4 motherboard (10 sata ports). What do you think, compared to my first option?

 

1.5 - Case: This is the most troubling part. As I said before the options here in Morocco as basically inexistent, and importing a case is f*** expensive!! Something like $400 for shipping. I want a case with at least 10 HDDs, for now I can get:

• COOLER MASTER MASTERCASE MC500P (10 x 3.5") for $200 (but I can find the additional HDD brackets anywhere).
• COOLER MASTER COSMOS C700P (seems to support 12 x 3.5") for...$370 (+ $60 for importing 7 more brackets). the C700M costs $600 here haha what a joke (murdering the store owner is legit in this case or not? ^^)
• BeQuiet Silent Base 802 (excellent case but supports only 7 x 3.5") for $280 (+ brackets)
• Phanteks P600s (10 x 3.5") for $300 (+ brackets) - Not even sure if I still can get it.

Any idea here? Also concerned about the noise/temperature since it will be in my room.

 

1.6 - PSU: A 550W Gold is enough here right?

 

1.6 - GPU: Some cheap fanless one just for setup. I should get a motherboard that boot without a GPU right?

 

1.6 - Network: dumb question here. My router (ZTE F660) ethernet ports are 1GB, this is my absolute limit right? Or does adding a switch or any other device change something?

 

 

2 - Software:

The eternal dilemma: Unraid vs Openmediavault vs Freenas...fight!

I am considering Unraid as my first option. A few things to say:

• I have never used Linux.
• I don't want to have all of my disks always spinning.
• I have a lot of drives of different sizes, speeds and even form factors. I want to be able add/mix/replace drives easily, without configuring from scratch.
• I am afraid of losing files and want a safe parity, even if everything will be still backed in my cloud.

From all of my researches Unraid seems to be the perfect system for me, but again I am a noob here so maybe I'm wrong. My plan is to start with the biggest parity disk I can afford and use all of my drives at first, then start adding new drive(s) every few months and hopefully replace the old ones. A few question:

• Can I add parity disks anytime I want ?
• Is my plan realistic (I mean is this possible with Unraid/other OS) ?

 

 

3 - Storage :

Any recommendation/advice here? Concerned about noise/power/heat.

From what I have seen 10/12 tb 5400 rpm helium sealed drives seem to be the best bang for the buck right now, is that right?

Since I am in Morocco there will be no warranty when purchasing from US/EU, so I am planning on getting some WD 12TB elements and shucking them. What do you think? Especially concerned about quality/durability.

Any advice will help.

 

-----------------------

 

Finally done! Hope this was detailed enough and not too long! Thanks for reading.

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, RedaSaiko said:

 

Let's start with the hardware. ECC memory is a must have, I do care about my files. I also want to keep power consumption as low as possible. Finally, my budget is low so I want to spend it on the important stuff. After a lot of readings/videos, I have opted for something like this:

Id argue ecc probably isn't that needed here, and its better to focus on backups to keep data safe, but really up to you.

 

2 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

1.1 - CPU: Ryzen 3 3100 / 3300x / Ryzen 5 3600* (*too expensive here). These are all 65w, pack enough horse power for what I need and support ECC (all of Ryzen CPUs and Pro APUs support ECC). What do you think? Any reason to not go with the cheapest one?

I can also get the Ryzen 5 2600 for the same price as the 3100, it's also 65w, What do you think? Worth it or not? (Since Ryzen 2xxx wasn't as good as the 3xxx series).

Can you go used, something like a used xeon e3 would be cheaper, support ecc and more than enough speed.

 

Performance won't matter, it takes almost nothing to make a nas cpu wise.

 

2 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

Motherboard: Some Asrock/Asus b550/x570 with listed support of ECC. Should I go for a board with a lot of SATA ports or get a PCI card? I have seen some cards in ebay, but they are at least 100 usd and I am concerned since it adds another possible component for failure.

 

Id go with the pcie hbas for most uses, there pretty high quality, and well supported in software.

 

4 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

3 - Storage :

Any recommendation/advice here? Concerned about noise/power/heat.

From what I have seen 10/12 tb 5400 rpm helium sealed drives seem to be the best bang for the buck right now, is that right?

Since I am in Morocco there will be no warranty when purchasing from US/EU, so I am planning on getting some WD 12TB elements and shucking them. What do you think? Especially concerned about quality/durability.

Any advice will help.

Yup id shuck external drives.

 

How many tb do you need? Do you need 80+TB? Id probably get a case with like 6 bays as there much cheaper.

 

4 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

 

2 - Software:

The eternal dilemma: Unraid vs Openmediavault vs Freenas...fight!

I am considering Unraid as my first option. A few things to say:

• I have never used Linux.
• I don't want to have all of my disks always spinning.
• I have a lot of drives of different sizes, speeds and even form factors. I want to be able add/mix/replace drives easily, without configuring from scratch.
• I am afraid of losing files and want a safe parity, even if everything will be still backed in my cloud.

From all of my researches Unraid seems to be the perfect system for me, but again I am a noob here so maybe I'm wrong. My plan is to start with the biggest parity disk I can afford and use all of my drives at first, then start adding new drive(s) every few months and hopefully replace the old ones. A few question:

• Can I add parity disks anytime I want ?
• Is my plan realistic (I mean is this possible with Unraid/other OS) ?

 

 

Id go unraid. Easy to expand, easy to use, lets you mix drive sizes easily.

 

You can add parity disks later, 2 max.

 

Yea that should work fine on unraid.

 

5 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

.6 - GPU: Some cheap fanless one just for setup. I should get a motherboard that boot without a GPU right?

 

Id get a gpu, makes it much easier to troubleshoot. Id get a board with a igpu or a cpu with one if you can.

 

6 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

 

1.6 - Network: dumb question here. My router (ZTE F660) ethernet ports are 1GB, this is my absolute limit right? Or does adding a switch or any other device change something?

You can add a 10gbe switch for higher speeds, but unraid is known for being slow so you probalby won't get much more than like 200mB/s here.

 

 

[BondiBlue]

Are you sure you need something that powerful for a simple file server? If you could get some older used hardware you'd save a bunch of money. A file server that isn't running any sort of VMs or Plex type services doesn't need much power at all. My 14 year old Core 2 Duo file server maxes out my gigabit network.

[RedaSaiko]

3 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id argue ecc probably isn't that needed here, and its better to focus on backups to keep data safe, but really up to you.

 

I am afraid of silent copy error, so for my peace of mind I would prefer going with ECC.

 

4 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Can you go used, something like a used xeon e3 would be cheaper, support ecc and more than enough speed.

 

Too old, too power hungry (95w), ddr3 rams, old motherboards...I don't know in other countries but this is not an option here, these components cost more than newer and better ones since people just know the word "xeon" and think it's the top (even if it's from 10 years ago). My friend hp z400 just died a few months ago and I tried to find spare parts for him (the mobo): NOTHING!! and the few sellers who have it wanted 150 usd for it...

 

8 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

How many tb do you need? Do you need 80+TB? Id probably get a case with like 6 bays as there much cheaper.

 

 

Yes I actually have 45 tb of data without any parity, so as you said I need more than 80TB. I am adding about 5TB per year.

9 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

You can add parity disks later, 2 max.

 

Do you mean the maximum parity is 2 or 3?

 

10 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id get a gpu, makes it much easier to troubleshoot. Id get a board with a igpu or a cpu with one if you can.

 

Noted, thanks a lot.

10 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

You can add a 10gbe switch for higher speeds, but unraid is known for being slow so you probalby won't get much more than like 200mB/s here.

 

2.5 gigs should be plenty I think.

 

Thank you for all of your answers much appreciated. 

[RedaSaiko]

2 minutes ago, BondiBlue said:

Are you sure you need something that powerful for a simple file server? If you could get some older used hardware you'd save a bunch of money. A file server that isn't running any sort of VMs or Plex type services doesn't need much power at all. My 14 year old Core 2 Duo file server maxes out my gigabit network.

 

Now that I asked here and in reddit, I am starting to have and idea: my second computer is used only for 2 thing: digital art a few hours per day for work/hobby (I only use Clip studio paint) and sometimes reading/playing visual novels (cough...+18...cough). All of my other activities are done in with my main computer (gaming rig). Can I use a vm inside the nas for those stuff and sell the secondary computer ?

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 hour ago, RedaSaiko said:

Too old, too power hungry (95w), ddr3 rams, old motherboards...I don't know in other countries but this is not an option here, these components cost more than newer and better ones since people just know the word "xeon" and think it's the top (even if it's from 10 years ago). My friend hp z400 just died a few months ago and I tried to find spare parts for him (the mobo): NOTHING!! and the few sellers who have it wanted 150 usd for it...

 

THe cpu tdp doesn't matter here, its the idle power. Those old e3 xeons are pretty power efficent(idles at less than 20w, the cpu will use less power than the drives)

 

1 hour ago, RedaSaiko said:

Do you mean the maximum parity is 2 or 3?

2 parity drives max

 

1 hour ago, RedaSaiko said:

 

Now that I asked here and in reddit, I am starting to have and idea: my second computer is used only for 2 thing: digital art a few hours per day for work/hobby (I only use Clip studio paint) and sometimes reading/playing visual novels (cough...+18...cough). All of my other activities are done in with my main computer (gaming rig). Can I use a vm inside the nas for those stuff and sell the secondary computer ?

Id keep the systems seperate if you can, but you can just put all the drives in your desktop and use soemthing liek storage spaces to manage the storage space.

[RedaSaiko]

9 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

THe cpu tdp doesn't matter here, its the idle power. Those old e3 xeons are pretty power efficent(idles at less than 20w, the cpu will use less power than the drives)

 

Thanks for correcting me, I was just considering tdp. But as I said before anything ddr3 isn't an option for me, too expensive in my country.

 

9 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id keep the systems seperate if you can, but you can just put all the drives in your desktop and use soemthing liek storage spaces to manage the storage space.

Can you please explain? Is there any inconvenient to using a vm inside unraid?

[Electronics Wizardy]

7 hours ago, RedaSaiko said:

Thanks for correcting me, I was just considering tdp. But as I said before anything ddr3 isn't an option for me, too expensive in my country.

 

Can you get used parts on ebay? They should be much cheaper than the new ones.

 

7 hours ago, RedaSaiko said:

 

 

Can you please explain? Is there any inconvenient to using a vm inside unraid?

Yea running a vm with passthough causes a lot of potiental issues, and you need board support, usb hot swap can be a pain, iommu groups can be a pain.

 

 

 

If you want the system to be workstations as well, id just run windows on the host and use storage spaces.

[RedaSaiko]

13 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Can you get used parts on ebay? They should be much cheaper than the new ones.

 

Unfortunately still not an option. People in the US and EU just can't imagine how things are in Africa , for example this motherboard costs 30 usd, but shipping is 85 usd. Plus I have to expect random customs fees.

 

18 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea running a vm with passthough causes a lot of potiental issues, and you need board support, usb hot swap can be a pain, iommu groups can be a pain.

 

Thank you, now I understand especially since I want to use a wacom cintiq pro on it, it's not an option.

 

19 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

If you want the system to be workstations as well, id just run windows on the host and use storage spaces.

 

Windows does use physical raid right? You can't mix various sizes from my understanding is that right? 

[Electronics Wizardy]

5 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

Unfortunately still not an option. People in the US and EU just can't imagine how things are in Africa , for example this motherboard costs 30 usd, but shipping is 85 usd. Plus I have to expect random customs fees.

 

Thank you, now I understand especially since I want to use a wacom cintiq pro on it, it's not an option.

 

 

Windows does use physical raid right? You can't mix various sizes from my understanding is that right? 

Storage spaces in windows lets you do software raid with various sized drives and get most of the full capacity. THats probably what Id use here.

 

Do you already have desktop parts you want to just add drives to? Thats probably the easiest way here.

[RedaSaiko]

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Storage spaces in windows lets you do software raid with various sized drives and get most of the full capacity. THats probably what Id use here.

 

Do you already have desktop parts you want to just add drives to? Thats probably the easiest way here.

Going this route will save me a LOT of money, since it will be 2 computers instead of 3. I already have a second computer, spare rams, spare cpu coolers, and other stuff. I only will need a new case. Another option is to build a new secondary/nas pc and sell this one. 

 

In this case, how expendable is the system? Is there any redundancy? What's the difference between using windows 10 pro and unraid?

[Electronics Wizardy]

12 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

Going this route will save me a LOT of money, since it will be 2 computers instead of 3. I already have a second computer, spare rams, spare cpu coolers, and other stuff. I only will need a new case. Another option is to build a new secondary/nas pc and sell this one. 

 

In this case, how expendable is the system? Is there any redundancy? What's the difference between using windows 10 pro and unraid?

Yea windows storage spaces lets you do parity or mirror. You do need to use powershell for some advanced features, the gui in control panel sucks.

 

Its a different ui, and some different features, but both should work for you here. M

[RedaSaiko]

25 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea windows storage spaces lets you do parity or mirror. You do need to use powershell for some advanced features, the gui in control panel sucks.

 

Its a different ui, and some different features, but both should work for you here. M

Thanks a lot I will explore this route and see what I can/can't do.

 

Have you some experience with it? Is it as easy as unraid to add/replace drives?

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, RedaSaiko said:

Thanks a lot I will explore this route and see what I can/can't do.

 

Have you some experience with it? Is it as easy as unraid to add/replace drives?

Yea ive used it a good amount.

 

Probalby not as easy to use, but still fairly easy to add and remove dirves.

[RedaSaiko]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea ive used it a good amount.

 

Probalby not as easy to use, but still fairly easy to add and remove dirves.

For example let's say you have a 4 drives pool with 1 being parity,1 data drive dies, what happens? 

And if for example your motherboard or system ssd fail, what will happen to all of your hdds? do you need to format them and then create a new pool in the new system (since you have to reinstall windows) of are they are recognized automatically? 

[Haraikomono]

For a simple home NAS system I wouldnt really recommend going all out on Hardware like this. Why not just buying a J1900 board from Ebay, the cost new like 50$, many consumer NAS systems use a board like that. Its 4 Cores 4 Threads, good Passmark score for adequat filetransfer speeds, and has a 2 Pcie slots depending on the Board form factore (itx or matx).

The Board is also very low power hungry.

[Electronics Wizardy]

12 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

For example let's say you have a 4 drives pool with 1 being parity,1 data drive dies, what happens? 

And if for example your motherboard or system ssd fail, what will happen to all of your hdds? do you need to format them and then create a new pool in the new system (since you have to reinstall windows) of are they are recognized automatically? 

Storage spaces doesn't have a deticated parity drive like unraid, so parity is on all drives.

 

The system works fine in a degraded state until you repalce a disk. You can add a new disk, and it will run the rebuild in the backgroud. The virtual disk with your data will work the whole time.

 

If you reinstall windows it will detect the drive pool

[RedaSaiko]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Storage spaces doesn't have a deticated parity drive like unraid, so parity is on all drives.

 

The system works fine in a degraded state until you repalce a disk. You can add a new disk, and it will run the rebuild in the backgroud. The virtual disk with your data will work the whole time.

 

If you reinstall windows it will detect the drive pool

Thank you for the info, so, if I understand correctly, the files and parity are spread between all disks is that right? Can you control how much disks you can loose before starting to lose data?

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, RedaSaiko said:

Thank you for the info, so, if I understand correctly, the files and parity are spread between all disks is that right? Can you control how much disks you can loose before starting to lose data?

Depends on how you set up the array, but normally either 1 or 2 disks for parity.

 

Unraid is file based, so the parity is done on the files, not blocks, while storage spaces is all block based.

[RedaSaiko]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Depends on how you set up the array, but normally either 1 or 2 disks for parity.

 

Unraid is file based, so the parity is done on the files, not blocks, while storage spaces is all block based.

Hum...if I understand correctly, with Unraid since it's using files, in the worst case scenario you can still have readable files on the working drives. With win10, since it's all blocks, if something goes bad there is only unreadable blocks in the working drives. Is that right?

 

Watching a few videos now to better understand how it works and the main differences.

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, RedaSaiko said:

Hum...if I understand correctly, with Unraid since it's using files, in the worst case scenario you can still have readable files on the working drives. With win10, since it's all blocks, if something goes bad there is only unreadable blocks in the working drives. Is that right?

 

Watching a few videos now to better understand how it works and the main differences.

Yup thats right.

 

You can get a unraid like file level raid on windows with drive pool, and snapraid if you want a parity disk.

[RedaSaiko]

2 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yup thats right.

 

You can get a unraid like file level raid on windows with drive pool, and snapraid if you want a parity disk.

I have been reading about snapraid and it seems very good for my usage. Any experience with it? It's still updated? It seems a lot like unraid, after some researches, storage spaces isn't adapted for what I want due to the the need of spinning all of the drive to read a single file. I am trying to decide between snapraid and unraid now.

[Electronics Wizardy]

35 minutes ago, RedaSaiko said:

I have been reading about snapraid and it seems very good for my usage. Any experience with it? It's still updated? It seems a lot like unraid, after some researches, storage spaces isn't adapted for what I want due to the the need of spinning all of the drive to read a single file. I am trying to decide between snapraid and unraid now.

Yea ive used snapraid a good amountl Works pretty well.

 

Id still go storage spaces if it was me due to the extra speed, and realtime redundancy. Your not using that many drives here it seems.

[RedaSaiko]

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea ive used snapraid a good amountl Works pretty well.

 

Id still go storage spaces if it was me due to the extra speed, and realtime redundancy. Your not using that many drives here it seems.

Up to 10 drives. Nor from he start, but I will be adding drives every couple of months.

 

Unfortunately snapraid doesn't have a gui on windows, being command line based is a huge turn off for me.