Parts suggestions for "Quiet" rackmount home server

[Majoram]

Hi, I am very comfortable with PC hardware but a newb to server and rackmount hardware.

I have looked at the used enterprise server market and I realized the obvious, they would be way too noisy.

 

Usage:

- Location of rack: In my home office in the basement

- Plex server

- Video recording for about 3-4 cameras (2K resolution)

- Storage of personal videos, documents, pictures etc

- Printer server

- FUTURE: Home automation server (homekit?)

 

My requirements are:

- Used or new. Ebay, kijiji. Doesn't matter to me.

- Rack mountable: My network hardware is rack mountable and I would like to keep all of it in an enclosed rack.

- Fairly quiet: Think air cooled PC with 6-9 120mm fans.

- Budget (minus the hard drives): I really don't know. My guess is $500 to $800??

- Hard Drives: I am starting with about 4 WD Red Plus 12 TB drives and maybe get up to 8 drives in the future.

 

My Questions:

1) Are there any better used solutions that are "quiet" and I don't need to build?

2) For building my own, any suggestions on the parts? CPU, mobo, coolers, chassis, ??

3) Rack: I was thinking a 9U should be enough to house: Bell modem, router, switch, patch panel, home server and hopefully UPS.

4) Rack: I have seen 450MM and 600MM listed with rack enclosures. Is that the depth? What depth should I get?

5) UPS: I've read to look for working enterprise ones and just replace the lead acid batteries. Any brand or model suggestions?

 

6) For my usage, can I just use TrueNAS or should I go with something else?

7) Tips or suggestions or tell me what I am doing wrong is appreciated.

 

Edited July 31, 2022 by Majoram

[emosun]

most of your issues appear to be from trying to use a rack case instead of a normal one. I'm not seeing any listed reasons for using a rack mount case that outnumber the issues you've created from it

[Electronics Wizardy]

If your willing to mod and fan swap, used servers and get fairly quiet, Ive done ths a few times without issue.

 

3 hours ago, Majoram said:

3) Rack: I was thinking a 9U should be enough to house: Bell modem, router, switch, patch panel, home server and hopefully UPS.

 

Yea seems dooabale, but Id plan what each spot will be used for.

 

3 hours ago, Majoram said:

4) Rack: I have seen 450MM and 600MM listed with rack enclosures. Is that the depth? What depth should I get?

 

The server will probably be the deepest thing, so id pick that after you pick the server case. It can be hard to fit servers in the network racks as there normally much deepter.

 

3 hours ago, Majoram said:

5) UPS: I've read to look for working enterprise ones and just replace the lead acid batteries. Any brand or model suggestions?

 

Swapping the batteries will get them working again, but they can be pretty power hungry with the online ups.

 

3 hours ago, Majoram said:

7) Tips or suggestions or tell me what I am doing wrong is appreciated.

 

For the list of stuff you need and how a lot of it(modem, router) won't be rack mount, Id be tempted to skip the rack here.

[Majoram]

On 7/31/2022 at 10:02 AM, emosun said:

most of your issues appear to be from trying to use a rack case instead of a normal one. I'm not seeing any listed reasons for using a rack mount case that outnumber the issues you've created from it

I get your point but I do have the rackmount switch and the Ubiquiti dream machine and I haven't built my NAS yet.

I haven't thought of a neat layout for these and a NAS in a PC case.

 

What do you suggest?

[Majoram]

21 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

If your willing to mod and fan swap, used servers and get fairly quiet, Ive done ths a few times without issue.

Is there such a thing as quiet 80mm fans? Suggestions welcome
That's the size normally used in rackmountable systems right?

 

21 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea seems dooabale, but Id plan what each spot will be used for.

 

The server will probably be the deepest thing, so id pick that after you pick the server case. It can be hard to fit servers in the network racks as there normally much deepter.

Excellent. thanks for the suggestions.

21 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Swapping the batteries will get them working again, but they can be pretty power hungry with the online ups.

Not sure I understand. Enterprise UPS's are power hungry?

Other than when they are charging, I assume they would just draw what power they need.

 

21 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

For the list of stuff you need and how a lot of it(modem, router) won't be rack mount, Id be tempted to skip the rack here.

Thanks, would you have another suggestion for some way to keep them all neatly together?

[Lurick]

I would seriously look at building it yourself, used enterprise stuff can be had for cheap but you're trading off either power or noise or both without modding it and sinking in more money into it for potentially small gains depending on what you're using. You can get a good 4U case for $250 give or take and then toss in whatever you want really. I'm using this one linked below and it's been great, easy to build in and while the 2x80mm and 1x120mm stock fans aren't whisper quiet when ramped up they are all PWM and can be controlled and don't need to run that fast to be very quiet while still delivering good airflow.

 

https://amazon.com/dp/B07MKSH1B8

Yes it's on the pricey side but it's great quality and provided you're not tossing in heavy GPUs or anything you don't really need the rail kit. You could just support it with the switch or something plus screwing it into the rack without issue, I've got mine setup similarly and it's great.

[Electronics Wizardy]

25 minutes ago, Majoram said:

s there such a thing as quiet 80mm fans? Suggestions welcome
That's the size normally used in rackmountable systems right?

Depends on the exact unit, there are lots of different sized fans used. Ive seen many 2u servers using 60mm fans

 

Yea noctua makes some quiet fans, and if you spin the stock fans slowly it can get pretty quiet.

 

26 minutes ago, Majoram said:

Not sure I understand. Enterprise UPS's are power hungry?

Other than when they are charging, I assume they would just draw what power they need.

 

A lot of the online UPS will pull a good amount of power(ive seen 50+w) just idling with almost no load due to the losses of conversion

 

28 minutes ago, Majoram said:

Thanks, would you have another suggestion for some way to keep them all neatly together?

Id try the plywood method. A lot of home network equement can easily be mounted to a desk with screws, so get a piece of plywood, screen the switch + router on, and run the server in a desktop case in a corner.

[Takumidesh]

You can also get trays for a rack that can get a rackmount feel without being truly rackmount. this allows a lot more freedom in case and fan design.

Its an older picture, but here you can see a lot of components that are not a traditional rack mount design, fitting very nicely on the rack.

[Blue4130]

1 hour ago, Takumidesh said:

You can also get trays for a rack that can get a rackmount feel without being truly rackmount. this allows a lot more freedom in case and fan design.

Its an older picture, but here you can see a lot of components that are not a traditional rack mount design, fitting very nicely on the rack.

 

But then why not get something that actually looks good? You are not using the main thing that a rack is made around, the mounting bars and sliding rails.

[Takumidesh]

because rack mount stuff offers limitations, it is just a suggestion for an alternative.

a black box will on a tray will look just as nice as a black box on rails.

You still get a lot of benefits, such as verticality, and space savingness. a lot of traditional rack mounted devices already do not have rails anyway.

[Blue4130]

6 hours ago, Takumidesh said:

because rack mount stuff offers limitations, it is just a suggestion for an alternative.

a black box will on a tray will look just as nice as a black box on rails.

You still get a lot of benefits, such as verticality, and space savingness. a lot of traditional rack mounted devices already do not have rails anyway.

But the black rack and trays look like crap. What I am suggesting is to get a nice wood shelf and use that. Or a hifi rack. Something less "industrial" 

[Takumidesh]

2 hours ago, Blue4130 said:

But the black rack and trays look like crap.

I think it looks cool, but whatever. personally I think stacking a bunch of rack mountable electronics on a wooden shelf just because one part of it isn't rack mountable would be weird.

On 7/31/2022 at 9:26 AM, Majoram said:

 

My requirements are:

- Rack mountable: My network hardware is rack mountable and I would like to keep all of it in an enclosed rack.

 

OP is asking for a rack mount solution, I think the trays are a good way to fit other items with rack mounted items.

[Majoram]

On 8/4/2022 at 8:32 PM, Takumidesh said:

I think it looks cool, but whatever. personally I think stacking a bunch of rack mountable electronics on a wooden shelf just because one part of it isn't rack mountable would be weird.

OP is asking for a rack mount solution, I think the trays are a good way to fit other items with rack mounted items.

Thanks! Those trays sound like a good idea.
I may not need them though. I have decided to just buy an empty rackmount case and build a "normal" PC inside it.
Just normal used consumer hardware.

For OS, based on research, it seems UnRAID is my best option.

 

I am just figuring out what hardware to go with now.

No clue what to do there. Building a gaming PC is no issue but I don't know what factors to take into account for a server.

My server needs are:

- SATA ports for 6 WD Red Plus 14TB drives

- Plex server
- 2.5 Gbps local network
- Minecraft server and any other game server for my kids

- Steam cache (just because)

- Homeassistant

- PVR? recording for camera (only 2-3)

- NAS Storage for all our digital data. I hope to automate offsite backup syncing with ?? some online service.

 

Any suggestions on the hardware are welcome.

[Needfuldoer]

15 hours ago, Majoram said:

Building a gaming PC is no issue but I don't know what factors to take into account for a server.

For the kind of home server you're aiming for, they're not that different. It would just lean more toward CPU performance than GPU performance. (Even onboard Intel graphics ould be fine for your use case, since you'd get Quick Sync for video encoding.)

 

You could do everything on your list with a reasonably modern i5.

[voyager_]

I have two servers running both reside on a rack in my living room and unless I told you that they were there you wouldn't hear them. For both builds I went with a rosewill 4u chassis, you can get them in several configurations and I paid less than 200 a case. Toss the fans that come with it, they are worthless. I swapped everything to Noctua along with the cpu cooler. The fans on both systems are controlled by an external fan controller that mounts in an unused pci slot on the case and are set to roughly 70%. One of my servers handles 11 cameras, unifi controller, vpn, file syncs between the machines. I have it running a ryzen 2600x and a gtx950 for decoding the cameras as well as deep stack for object recognition. Colling has never been an issue leaving the fans at a constant speed.

 

Unless you are dead set on commercial hardware going consumer and mounting it in a server chassis may be the way to go for price/performance/noise concerns.

 

Fractal has a tower case that you might like if you are okay from moving away from a server chassis.

[Majoram]

6 hours ago, Needfuldoer said:

For the kind of home server you're aiming for, they're not that different. It would just lean more toward CPU performance than GPU performance. (Even onboard Intel graphics ould be fine for your use case, since you'd get Quick Sync for video encoding.)

 

You could do everything on your list with a reasonably modern i5.

I was going for on-chip or on-board graphics if I get a CPU or mobo that has it.

Any specific generation i5 you would recommend?

Mobos are particularly my biggest concern.
I want something that has the required SATA ports and the bandwidth isn't shared with anything else.

[Majoram]

1 hour ago, voyager_ said:

I have two servers running both reside on a rack in my living room and unless I told you that they were there you wouldn't hear them. For both builds I went with a rosewill 4u chassis, you can get them in several configurations and I paid less than 200 a case. Toss the fans that come with it, they are worthless. I swapped everything to Noctua along with the cpu cooler. The fans on both systems are controlled by an external fan controller that mounts in an unused pci slot on the case and are set to roughly 70%. One of my servers handles 11 cameras, unifi controller, vpn, file syncs between the machines. I have it running a ryzen 2600x and a gtx950 for decoding the cameras as well as deep stack for object recognition. Colling has never been an issue leaving the fans at a constant speed.

 

Unless you are dead set on commercial hardware going consumer and mounting it in a server chassis may be the way to go for price/performance/noise concerns.

 

Fractal has a tower case that you might like if you are okay from moving away from a server chassis.

I am definitely not going with commercial hardware. Sticking with consumer.

That Rosewill case looks nice. I want something rackmount, so I won't get the Fractal.
Anyone have any opinions on this case?
https://www.myelectronics.nl/us/19-inch-2u-mini-itx-case-short-depth.html

Yes I definitely plan on getting Noctua fans.

What do you mean by: "a gtx950 for decoding the cameras as well as deep stack for object recognition."
Do you have your own software for package, person, animal detection?

 

[voyager_]

1 hour ago, Majoram said:

What do you mean by: "a gtx950 for decoding the cameras as well as deep stack for object recognition."
Do you have your own software for package, person, animal detection?

 

I use Blue Iris running in a windows Vm with the GTX950 passed into it. Deepstack is a open source AI that can be passed frames from blue iris on alerts and can identify people and send me alerts when they have been detected. I have several of the cameras configured to do this that way if someone approaches my door/garage/ of the gates on the side of my house I will be notified. Deepstack can run either on the GPU or CPU for processing. 

 

[Majoram]

So I've finally gotten a case and a rack.
Middle Atlantic RCS-1824
Chenbro 4U Case (RM41416) with 16 DriveBays

A bit more than what I had in mind but the prices were way better than anything else smaller.
- Got a "sit-on-the-floor" rack (wheeled) and not wall mounted.

- Got a nice 4U with lots of drive space and I hope can handle most air coolers.

- Decided on using Proxmox instead of Unraid with docker.

 

Now I have to find the mobo and CPU. Any suggestions are welcome.

Based on feedback and reading so far, this is what I have summarized:
- get v2 or v3 Xeons
- get as much RAM as I can. 64 GB to 128 GB. ECC if possible

- get components that can idle at 20-30 watts or less. The system will be in an idle state about 50% of the time anyway. BUT I do want something with power when it needs to be in use.

 

I have been back and forth on whether to use consumer or enterprise components.
Anyone with any thoughts on my questions below?

1) Any suggestions on a specific Xeon (or Intel consumer) CPU and/or motherboard and/or chipset to look at?

I am thinking Intel because:

- On-board intel graphics on most of options (not sure how AMDs 5600G series compares but I THINK Intel has better performing USED options at cheaper price?)

2) I am thinking 8 cores minimum (or a dual CPU with at least 4-6 cores each?) with at least a 2.5 Ghz base clock?

3) Based on my research, for best idle performance I should look for components (mobo, CPU, power supply) that support at least C8 to C10 states. Any thoughts on this?

4) I was planning on reusing my Scythe Fuma 2 cooler AND a Corsair power supply.
Does anyone know if these are compatible with Enterprise based hardware?

5) Would anyone suggest any components from the list below?
It's a list of various users with their systems are their idle power draw.
I found this datasheet from a German site but reading up on each board and searching used prices for each is going real slow.
Low idle power components

[Blue4130]

4 hours ago, Majoram said:

So I've finally gotten a case and a rack.
Middle Atlantic RCS-1824
Chenbro 4U Case (RM41416) with 16 DriveBays

A bit more than what I had in mind but the prices were way better than anything else smaller.
- Got a "sit-on-the-floor" rack (wheeled) and not wall mounted.

- Got a nice 4U with lots of drive space and I hope can handle most air coolers.

- Decided on using Proxmox instead of Unraid with docker.

 

Now I have to find the mobo and CPU. Any suggestions are welcome.

Based on feedback and reading so far, this is what I have summarized:
- get v2 or v3 Xeons
- get as much RAM as I can. 64 GB to 128 GB. ECC if possible

- get components that can idle at 20-30 watts or less. The system will be in an idle state about 50% of the time anyway. BUT I do want something with power when it needs to be in use.

 

I have been back and forth on whether to use consumer or enterprise components.
Anyone with any thoughts on my questions below?

1) Any suggestions on a specific Xeon (or Intel consumer) CPU and/or motherboard and/or chipset to look at?

I am thinking Intel because:

- On-board intel graphics on most of options (not sure how AMDs 5600G series compares but I THINK Intel has better performing USED options at cheaper price?)

2) I am thinking 8 cores minimum (or a dual CPU with at least 4-6 cores each?) with at least a 2.5 Ghz base clock?

3) Based on my research, for best idle performance I should look for components (mobo, CPU, power supply) that support at least C8 to C10 states. Any thoughts on this?

4) I was planning on reusing my Scythe Fuma 2 cooler AND a Corsair power supply.
Does anyone know if these are compatible with Enterprise based hardware?

5) Would anyone suggest any components from the list below?
It's a list of various users with their systems are their idle power draw.
I found this datasheet from a German site but reading up on each board and searching used prices for each is going real slow.
Low idle power components

If you want low power (20w), v2 and v3 xeon are out. As well as not having integrated gpu. Also do not get a dual cpu setup if you are going for low power. 

[Majoram]

2 hours ago, Blue4130 said:

If you want low power (20w), v2 and v3 xeon are out. As well as not having integrated gpu. Also do not get a dual cpu setup if you are going for low power. 

Ah, so that's what the v2 and v3 mean? higher clocks or higher power envelope?

 

I'm looking at idle power, though. The v2 and v3 don't have low power idle states?

[Needfuldoer]

10 hours ago, Majoram said:

Ah, so that's what the v2 and v3 mean? higher clocks or higher power envelope?

v0 = Sandy Bridge

v2 = Ivy Bridge

v3 = Haswell

v4 = Broadwell

 

Intel introduced the "Scalable" Silver, Gold, Platinum etc branding on the "big" E5 processors for Skylake, but E3s carried on with v5 (Skylake) and v6 (Kaby Lake). Beyond that, they're still pretty expensive on the secondhand market.

 

There are two lines of Xeon processors you should be shopping for:

 

Xeon E3 CPUs are basically just regular desktop i5s and i7s with support for ECC RAM. They only support a single socket. Chips with model numbers that end in 5 have integrated graphics, chips with model numbers that end in 0 do not.

 

Xeon E5 CPUs are the HEDT/workstation/server line. This is where the fun starts, with multiple sockets, quad channel registered ECC support, more PCIe lanes, and high core counts. None of them have integrated graphics, but you've got PCIe lanes for days so adding a low power GPU isn't a problem.

 

There are also E7 CPUs that look temptingly cheap, but they're designed for extremely high end, quad- and octa-socket behemoth servers. They won't work in 'regular' server motherboards because they use off-chip memory controllers and unique sockets.

 

Don't buy anything that uses Socket 771 or 1366 (Any Xeon with a five-character model number that starts with an E or X). Those are ancient history at this point.

 

On E5s, the thousands digit of the model number tells you how many processors can coexist in a multi-socket machine. (You can only have one E5-16xx per PC, up to two E5-26xx, or up to four E5-46xx. Note that these aren't minimums, so there's generally nothing stopping you from running a single E5-26xx.)

 

E5 v0 and v2 CPUs use DDR3 RAM on the LGA2011 socket. E5 v3 and v4 CPUs use DDR4 on the 2011-3 socket. They are not cross compatible, you can't put a v4 CPU into a 2011 socket. However, you can usually upgrade a v0 machine to v2, and a v3 to a v4, with just a BIOS update.

 

10 hours ago, Majoram said:

I'm looking at idle power, though. The v2 and v3 don't have low power idle states?

They do, and the idle power is about the same across the board in a given generation. 

 

There are "low power" CPUs in most Xeon lines, you can spot them because their model numbers end in "L". They idle as low as all the "full power" Xeons, they just have lower base clocks and don't boost as high to keep their TDPs in check. Depending on the workload, they can actually draw more power in the long term because they have to work longer to accomplish the same task their big siblings quickly burn through so they can get back to idling. They're mostly for applications that are thermally limited.

[Blue4130]

4 hours ago, Majoram said:

Ah, so that's what the v2 and v3 mean? higher clocks or higher power envelope?

 

I'm looking at idle power, though. The v2 and v3 don't have low power idle states?

They are low"ish". The idle power and IPC will get trumped by newer generations. 

 

But you really need to re-evaluate your power expectations. Your 6 harddrives alone will take a good chunk of that power limit. And each stick of ram adds to that. 

 

My v1 server is not as efficient as a v3, but it shouldn't be too far off. It has a single e5 2650, two sticks of ecc ram, one ssd, two 5400 rpm harddrives and a gtx750. It idles at 77watts.

[Majoram]

12 hours ago, Needfuldoer said:

v0 = Sandy Bridge

v2 = Ivy Bridge

v3 = Haswell

v4 = Broadwell

 

Intel introduced the "Scalable" Silver, Gold, Platinum etc branding on the "big" E5 processors for Skylake, but E3s carried on with v5 (Skylake) and v6 (Kaby Lake). Beyond that, they're still pretty expensive on the secondhand market.

 

There are two lines of Xeon processors you should be shopping for:

 

Xeon E3 CPUs are basically just regular desktop i5s and i7s with support for ECC RAM. They only support a single socket. Chips with model numbers that end in 5 have integrated graphics, chips with model numbers that end in 0 do not.

 

Xeon E5 CPUs are the HEDT/workstation/server line. This is where the fun starts, with multiple sockets, quad channel registered ECC support, more PCIe lanes, and high core counts. None of them have integrated graphics, but you've got PCIe lanes for days so adding a low power GPU isn't a problem.

 

There are also E7 CPUs that look temptingly cheap, but they're designed for extremely high end, quad- and octa-socket behemoth servers. They won't work in 'regular' server motherboards because they use off-chip memory controllers and unique sockets.

 

Don't buy anything that uses Socket 771 or 1366 (Any Xeon with a five-character model number that starts with an E or X). Those are ancient history at this point.

 

On E5s, the thousands digit of the model number tells you how many processors can coexist in a multi-socket machine. (You can only have one E5-16xx per PC, up to two E5-26xx, or up to four E5-46xx. Note that these aren't minimums, so there's generally nothing stopping you from running a single E5-26xx.)

 

E5 v0 and v2 CPUs use DDR3 RAM on the LGA2011 socket. E5 v3 and v4 CPUs use DDR4 on the 2011-3 socket. They are not cross compatible, you can't put a v4 CPU into a 2011 socket. However, you can usually upgrade a v0 machine to v2, and a v3 to a v4, with just a BIOS update.

 

They do, and the idle power is about the same across the board in a given generation. 

 

There are "low power" CPUs in most Xeon lines, you can spot them because their model numbers end in "L". They idle as low as all the "full power" Xeons, they just have lower base clocks and don't boost as high to keep their TDPs in check. Depending on the workload, they can actually draw more power in the long term because they have to work longer to accomplish the same task their big siblings quickly burn through so they can get back to idling. They're mostly for applications that are thermally limited.

Thanks @Needfuldoer this is exactly the info I needed in one place.
I appreciate the write up!

[Majoram]

8 hours ago, Blue4130 said:

They are low"ish". The idle power and IPC will get trumped by newer generations. 

 

But you really need to re-evaluate your power expectations. Your 6 harddrives alone will take a good chunk of that power limit. And each stick of ram adds to that. 

 

My v1 server is not as efficient as a v3, but it shouldn't be too far off. It has a single e5 2650, two sticks of ecc ram, one ssd, two 5400 rpm harddrives and a gtx750. It idles at 77watts.

Thanks. It makes sense.

The hard drives I have should be ok for idling. I believe WD Reds can idle at 3 watts and about 0.5 watts when sleeping.

 

BUT given what you've said, I shouldn't make it a primary factor for my use cases.