looking to build m.2 only server

[ZaziNabu]

Hi all!

I'm looking to build a really small m.2 server with up to 6 drives in raid 5 or raid 0 (no important data there)
I would love help figuring out how to do basically everything lol.

The server will be used as a stremio server/steam cache server for all my games.

as it's the first time doing it I would love help choosing the right os, pc specs, and how to set it all up.

I know it's a huge subject, but I am willing to learn if the guides are there. 

 

Thanks in advance for all the help! 

[Vishera]

9 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

steam cache server

Why would you need that?,

Are you organizing a LAN party?

[ZaziNabu]

Just now, Vishera said:

Why would you need that?,

Are you organizing a LAN party?

tbf, for the fun of it and to learn more about small nas servers, and I uninstall and reinstall games a lot on the pc's at home so it will save a lot of time if I'll have them all in a server.

for the movie streams, well, we have a movie night all the time, it would be epic to just have a huge endless library of movies we can watch on demand.

[Blue4130]

7 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

tbf, for the fun of it and to learn more about small nas servers, and I uninstall and reinstall games a lot on the pc's at home so it will save a lot of time if I'll have them all in a server.

for the movie streams, well, we have a movie night all the time, it would be epic to just have a huge endless library of movies we can watch on demand.

There is zero reason to go all m.2 for this unless your pockets are too full of money and you need some way to get rid of it. There is not a really small or cheap way of getting 6 m.2 in a server.

[ZaziNabu]

1 minute ago, Blue4130 said:

There is zero reason to go all m.2 for this unless your pockets are too full of money and you need some way to get rid of it. There is not a really small or cheap way of getting 6 m.2 in a server.

OK, I stand corrected, so ssd server with m.2 cache? 

[Vishera]

10 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

tbf, for the fun of it and to learn more about small nas servers, and I uninstall and reinstall games a lot on the pc's at home so it will save a lot of time if I'll have them all in a server.

Wouldn't a NAS be more suitable for this?

11 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

for the movie streams, well, we have a movie night all the time, it would be epic to just have a huge endless library of movies we can watch on demand.

Jellyfin is the answer.

 

You can easily setup a NAS and a Jellyfin server with TrueNAS.

[Vishera]

3 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

OK, I stand corrected, so ssd server with m.2 cache? 

NVME are cheaper than SATA SSDs where i live...

I can get a 240GB NVME drive for $23 from known brands.

[ZaziNabu]

1 minute ago, Vishera said:

Wouldn't a NAS be more suitable for this?

Jellyfin is the answer.

 

You can easily setup a NAS and a Jellyfin server with TrueNAS.

I have 0 knowledge about NAS so I'm looking for guides and help to set it up

[ZaziNabu]

1 minute ago, Vishera said:

NVME are cheaper than SATA SSDs where i live...

I can get a 240GB NVME drive for $23 from known brands.

Oh wow, that's amazing.
here it's far from the same

[Vishera]

2 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

I have 0 knowledge about NAS so I'm looking for guides and help to set it up

I recommend using TrueNAS, It's easy to setup and use.

[ZaziNabu]

Just now, Vishera said:

I recommend using TrueNAS, It's easy to setup and use.

googling it now

[Electronics Wizardy]

9 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

OK, I stand corrected, so ssd server with m.2 cache? 

M.2 is a type of ssd. So all m.2 drives are SSDs. 

 

Also don't cache ssds with ssds, doesn't make since as there all about the same speed class normally. You would normally cache SSDs with something like optane or ram, and cache HDDs with SSDs.

 

How much usable storage space do you need?

 

Do you have a budget in mind?

[ZaziNabu]

6 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

M.2 is a type of ssd. So all m.2 drives are SSDs. 

 

Also don't cache ssds with ssds, doesn't make since as there all about the same speed class normally. You would normally cache SSDs with something like optane or ram, and cache HDDs with SSDs.

 

How much usable storage space do you need?

 

Do you have a budget in mind?

about 6 drives of 2tb at raid 5 so about 10tb of storage (if I got my raids right) 
budget? about 1200$ for it all, but I can spare more if needed.

[Electronics Wizardy]

5 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

about 6 drives of 2tb at raid 5 so about 10tb of storage (if I got my raids right) 
budget? about 1200$ for it all, but I can spare more if needed.

What network speeds are you working with here? Id probably just get a single large hdd unless you have a 10gbit network.

 

Otherwise Id probably go sata ssds as finding a system that uses them all will be much cheaper, and the speed is basically the same.

 

Or just get a small system and put 1-2 8tb m.2 drives in it and you have have a tiny system do this job.

 

I'd probably install proxmox/truenas here and install vms/containers for the different jobs it needs to do.

[LIGISTX]

12 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

about 6 drives of 2tb at raid 5 so about 10tb of storage (if I got my raids right) 
budget? about 1200$ for it all, but I can spare more if needed.

If 1200 is your budget, you are in the entire incorrect galaxy. 
 

The only reason to run an SSD based storage server is if you

1) have a need for the speed (you don’t)

2) you have the network infrastructure to use it (you don’t…. This would require at least multi 10gigabit per second connections all being hit at the same time) 

3) an ROI that makes it make sense. 
 

The thing to remember here… a single harddrive can more than saturate gigabit LAN. A few of them in RAID EASILY can. 10TB can be easily done with 2 10TB harddrives in a mirror for example. Also, to actually use the speeds of an SSD array, you need A LOT of RAM, and A LOT of CPU. So assuming you have s multi thousand dollar network setup, you would need a multi thousand dollar cpu, And equally as much money in RAM, which means a very expensive mobo as well. If you don’t do any of this, your just wasting money on expensive SSD’s when harddrives would end up performing the exact same in the hardware your putting them in. 
 

All of this to say, you probably, actually, don’t want to go SSD for this. 
 

I would look into either unraid or truenas, and then lancache (or whatever it’s called now?), and a few harddrives. 

[ZaziNabu]

11 hours ago, LIGISTX said:

If 1200 is your budget, you are in the entire incorrect galaxy. 
 

The only reason to run an SSD based storage server is if you

1) have a need for the speed (you don’t)

2) you have the network infrastructure to use it (you don’t…. This would require at least multi 10gigabit per second connections all being hit at the same time) 

3) an ROI that makes it make sense. 
 

The thing to remember here… a single harddrive can more than saturate gigabit LAN. A few of them in RAID EASILY can. 10TB can be easily done with 2 10TB harddrives in a mirror for example. Also, to actually use the speeds of an SSD array, you need A LOT of RAM, and A LOT of CPU. So assuming you have s multi thousand dollar network setup, you would need a multi thousand dollar cpu, And equally as much money in RAM, which means a very expensive mobo as well. If you don’t do any of this, your just wasting money on expensive SSD’s when harddrives would end up performing the exact same in the hardware your putting them in. 
 

All of this to say, you probably, actually, don’t want to go SSD for this. 
 

I would look into either unraid or truenas, and then lancache (or whatever it’s called now?), and a few harddrives. 

OK, that's really good to know
I have 2.5gb network at home so I'll go with the hdd as suggested. 
There is no need to backup the data (as nothing important will be there, just games, shows and the suce) but I think it's still a good idea to have 1 hdd as a backup so I wont need to rebuild it all if one hdd will fail (and it will one day).

What raid will be the best option for it? 

One last Q, the NAS will need to stream 4k hdr when possible, I saw that it might be an issue with some aio nas products, is there one for a reasonable price that can do the steam cache and the streaming? or will I need to build one on my own? 

If I need to build one, what specs will be enough with a bit of extra breathing room (in case of future degradation of parts).
Will i5\r5 with 32gb ram will be enough?  

[Needfuldoer]

1 hour ago, ZaziNabu said:

One last Q, the NAS will need to stream 4k hdr when possible, I saw that it might be an issue with some aio nas products, is there one for a reasonable price that can do the steam cache and the streaming? or will I need to build one on my own? 

That depends. 

 

If the playback device can decode the files natively, then the NAS doesn't have any more work to do than it does for any other file transfer. (And even a full res 4k HDR Blu-Ray is only about 128 megabit/sec, which any NAS with a gigabit network port should be able to handle without pauses for buffering.) It just has to grab the file and shove it down the network to the client.

 

If the playback device needs the server to transcode the video files into a format it can handle, then you can start running out of server resources fast. Most low-end NAS appliances can't handle more than one or two full HD streams if they have to transcode.

[ZaziNabu]

10 minutes ago, Needfuldoer said:

That depends. 

 

If the playback device can decode the files natively, then the NAS doesn't have any more work to do than it does for any other file transfer. (And even a full res 4k HDR Blu-Ray is only about 128 megabit/sec, which any NAS with a gigabit network port should be able to handle without pauses for buffering.) It just has to grab the file and shove it down the network to the client.

 

If the playback device needs the server to transcode the video files into a format it can handle, then you can start running out of server resources fast. Most low-end NAS appliances can't handle more than one or two full HD streams if they have to transcode.

The NAS will need to decode it all, so I'll need to build one to spec.

Any recommended specs for a server like that? 

[LIGISTX]

3 hours ago, ZaziNabu said:

The NAS will need to decode it all, so I'll need to build one to spec.

Any recommended specs for a server like that? 

Why does the NAS “need to decode it all”? Ideally, you never want to transcode media when you play it locally. 

 

Store your media in the correct codec and resolution for the devices you will stream to. This will 1) give you the best quality playback 2) reduce the requirements of the NAS S transcode will be a rare thing for it to do vs an “it always has to transcode everything”

 

I watch a good amount of things via my Plex server, as do family members in geographically different locations. My Plex VM almost never transcodes anything (it can, it has plenty of CPU power to do it when needed, but it’s very rare it’s required). 

[ZaziNabu]

1 hour ago, LIGISTX said:

Why does the NAS “need to decode it all”? Ideally, you never want to transcode media when you play it locally. 

 

Store your media in the correct codec and resolution for the devices you will stream to. This will 1) give you the best quality playback 2) reduce the requirements of the NAS S transcode will be a rare thing for it to do vs an “it always has to transcode everything”

 

I watch a good amount of things via my Plex server, as do family members in geographically different locations. My Plex VM almost never transcodes anything (it can, it has plenty of CPU power to do it when needed, but it’s very rare it’s required). 

I prefer to have a one point solution if I'll need it. 

[LIGISTX]

53 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

I prefer to have a one point solution if I'll need it. 

But they doesn’t mean it needs to transcode video all the time. My Plex server hosts multiple TB’s of data, and I basically never transcode. 
 

Again, transcoding is different then “streaming”. Direct play as Plex calls it, is streaming with no transcoding; Plex server takes the file from your storage drive, pipes it over the network, and your client device then plays said file with no changes to the codec, resolution, audio format, file format, etc. Transcoding is also streaming, but Plex server reads a file from your harddrive, your client device tells the Plex server “whoa buddy, I don’t know what you’re trying to send me, I need a different format”, and then the Plex server transcodes the file into something the client can understand. This transcoding process is what takes CPU power. And depending on what exactly your doing (1080p to 720p for viewing when not on your LAN to save upload bandwidth, h265 to h264, etc) the amount of CPU power will be different.

 

But *most* (really all) of the streaming you do internal to your LAN, you should use direct play. If you require transcoding internally, you should either store the files in a different type (mp4 vs MKV, or h264 vs h265 etc) in which your client devices can directly play them. This will make a much, much more smooth experience for everyone involved, and will use effectively 0 CPU power. 

[ewitte]

The problem is the lanes.  You need Threadripper or a Xeon to have that many lanes free.  *Maybe* you can do something like a 7700 (Intel probably) and use the integrated graphics if you can get a board that supports pci bifurcation.  You can't use a true APU as they typically only have 8 lanes with the other 8 dedicated to the internal GPU.

[ZaziNabu]

9 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

But they doesn’t mean it needs to transcode video all the time. My Plex server hosts multiple TB’s of data, and I basically never transcode. 
 

Again, transcoding is different then “streaming”. Direct play as Plex calls it, is streaming with no transcoding; Plex server takes the file from your storage drive, pipes it over the network, and your client device then plays said file with no changes to the codec, resolution, audio format, file format, etc. Transcoding is also streaming, but Plex server reads a file from your harddrive, your client device tells the Plex server “whoa buddy, I don’t know what you’re trying to send me, I need a different format”, and then the Plex server transcodes the file into something the client can understand. This transcoding process is what takes CPU power. And depending on what exactly your doing (1080p to 720p for viewing when not on your LAN to save upload bandwidth, h265 to h264, etc) the amount of CPU power will be different.

 

But *most* (really all) of the streaming you do internal to your LAN, you should use direct play. If you require transcoding internally, you should either store the files in a different type (mp4 vs MKV, or h264 vs h265 etc) in which your client devices can directly play them. This will make a much, much more smooth experience for everyone involved, and will use effectively 0 CPU power. 

Hmm OK, I misunderstood what transcoding is, sorry again.
I'm really new to this and I'm still learning the ropes.

 

I heard you can do it with an old intel mac mini, just install a linux distro and it will work like a charm, is that a good idea? 

[LIGISTX]

9 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

Hmm OK, I misunderstood what transcoding is, sorry again.
I'm really new to this and I'm still learning the ropes.

No problem at all! Learning is part of the process

 

10 minutes ago, ZaziNabu said:

I heard you can do it with an old intel mac mini, just install a linux distro and it will work like a charm, is that a good idea? 

I’m sure that is possible, yes. Any old PC you have laying around would also work, but a Mac mini could be nice because of it’s very small size. 

[mariushm]

If you get a motherboard that supports bifurcation, you can use an adapter board to do bifurcation on the pci-e x16 slot into 4 m.2 pci-e x4 slots. The video card, as it's a server, it can go into a pci-e x1/x2/x4 from chipset.

So you'd have 4 + 1 dedicated m.2 connector from cpu and on boards with 2 connectors, the 2nd connector gets pci-e lanes from chipset... so you get 6 pci-e slots.

 

Keep in mind that you'll be limited by the network speed ... a 10 gbps ethernet is 1.25 GB/s ... a SATA drive can do 500 MB/s so for some steam caching, even some cheap QLC sata drives would serve a cached game at 1 gbps or 2.5 gbps no problems.

 

For fun, you could experiment with some old stuff like for example socket G34 and power hungry opterons - you can get a board and 2 cpus for $130, maybe even less, this is just one listing, random search result : https://www.ebay.com/itm/285024203344

You get 6 pci-e slots but they're pci-e 2.0 , so if you use pci-e to m.2 adapters you'd get max 2 GB/s from each m.2 ssd but it's still faster than sata. You also get a bunch of ddr3 registered slots, and ddr3 registered is relatively cheap, around 1$ per GB.

The board MAY support bifurcation on some slots, but I don't know.

But again ... these opterons are slow like i said.. the 16 cores in the listing probably do as much work as a quad core Ryzen 1200 for 5-10x the power consumption. It's only for fun, or maybe as a memcached server (shove 16 sticks of 16GB you may have around and you can have 250+ GB of content kept n ram to be pushed through the network)