First time building a nas

[Jackett17]

Hello I'm building a media server mostly for storing movies and stuff. I'm using some parts I've already have and some I need. I've got a i5 12600k with 16gb of ram and a case and power supply  but I need a motherboard and maybe graphics card as well as pcie cards to connect the hard drives to. 

[LIGISTX]

2 hours ago, Jackett17 said:

Hello I'm building a media server mostly for storing movies and stuff. I'm using some parts I've already have and some I need. I've got a i5 12600k with 16gb of ram and a case and power supply  but I need a motherboard and maybe graphics card as well as pcie cards to connect the hard drives to. 

You likely don’t need a GPU, and do you need a PCIe card or can you just connect the drives to the mobo’s SATA ports? Depending on how you plan on doing this, you should be able to just plug the drives in directly to the mobo. 

[Jackett17]

2 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

You likely don’t need a GPU, and do you need a PCIe card or can you just connect the drives to the mobo’s SATA ports? Depending on how you plan on doing this, you should be able to just plug the drives in directly to the mobo. 

The end goal is to have more drive than the motherboard I found it only has 4 

[LIGISTX]

Just now, Jackett17 said:

The end goal is to have more drive than the motherboard I found it only has 4 

It may be cheaper (and easier) to find a mobo with more SATA ports. 
 

But if you want to get a good HBA, a Dell h310 flashed to IT mode is what you want. And then some SAS to SATA breakout cables. But all of this will cost about 40-60 bucks on eBay, and “is a little more difficult” since now you have a SAS HBA.

 

But, that is enterprise grade hardware and will work forever without skipping a beat. 
 

Just make sure the HBA is flashed to IT mode already, or look into how to do that yourself (it’s not “hard”, but it’s not easy).

 

This is already flashed to IT mode:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/394094836815?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=o9wdispvsdq&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=B1xTkXm_Qfe&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

 

SAS to SATA cables:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/133117291866?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=jFynvEpdSpS&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=B1xTkXm_Qfe&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

 

If you ever need more, you can always get a SAS expander as well. 

[Jackett17]

8 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

It may be cheaper (and easier) to find a mobo with more SATA ports. 
 

But if you want to get a good HBA, a Dell h310 flashed to IT mode is what you want. And then some SAS to SATA breakout cables. But all of this will cost about 40-60 bucks on eBay, and “is a little more difficult” since now you have a SAS HBA.

 

But, that is enterprise grade hardware and will work forever without skipping a beat. 
 

Just make sure the HBA is flashed to IT mode already, or look into how to do that yourself (it’s not “hard”, but it’s not easy).

 

This is already flashed to IT mode:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/394094836815?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=o9wdispvsdq&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=B1xTkXm_Qfe&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

 

SAS to SATA cables:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/133117291866?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=jFynvEpdSpS&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=B1xTkXm_Qfe&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

 

If you ever need more, you can always get a SAS expander as well. 

Ok awesome thank you and do you know any good youtubers or websites that I can check out the best way to set it up

[LIGISTX]

1 minute ago, Jackett17 said:

Ok awesome thank you and do you know any good youtubers or websites that I can check out the best way to set it up

There are tons of videos for NAS setup. Just depends what OS you ultimately choose as most YouTubers who do homelab stuff will have their OS of choice.

 

Id look into truenas or unraid, both have pluses and minuses.