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My Netgear Nas just died. I'm an currently torn between buying another standalone NAS of building my own from old pc parts.

 

I have come across a part system on marketplace and was wondering if it would do the job once added extra items that are missing.

 

Motherboard - MSI Z97M GAMING

CPU - i7-4790K

Memory - 24Gb DDR3

No gpu

No psu

No boot drive(that I can see)

 

If I added a M.2 for cache and a ssd boot drive and a PSU followed by some storage drives would it be good enough for a home NAS?

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https://linustechtips.com/topic/1598198-building-a-home-nas-server/
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If you're using it for purely storage sounds fine to me. I'm using a similar Broadwell system for one of my NAS currently. Depending on what NAS software you go for, cache might not be necessary. Idle power consumption might not be as low as you could get it with something more modern, but I haven't looked deeply into that.

Gaming system: R7 7800X3D, Asus ROG Strix B650E-F Gaming Wifi, Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE ARGB, Corsair Vengeance 2x 32GB 6000C30, RTX 4070, MSI MPG A850G, Fractal Design North, Samsung 990 Pro 2TB, Alienware AW3225QF (32" 240 Hz OLED)
Productivity system: i9-7980XE, Asus X299 TUF mark 2, Noctua D15, 64GB ram (mixed), RTX 3070, NZXT E850, GameMax Abyss, Samsung 980 Pro 2TB, iiyama ProLite XU2793QSU-B6 (27" 1440p 100 Hz)
Gaming laptop: Lenovo Legion 5, 5800H, RTX 3070, Kingston DDR4 3200C22 2x16GB 2Rx8, Kingston Fury Renegade 1TB + Crucial P1 1TB SSD, 165 Hz IPS 1080p G-Sync Compatible

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Yep, that system would be completely capable for a home nas setup but depending on what nas os you go for and the goals for the system you may want to consider other options e.g is it going to be just a storage box or will you be hosting vms and/or docker containers, is power consumption critical for you application?, is future storage expansion a priority?.

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Previously I was using a Netgear 4 bay RN10400. It was fine for my usage but was looking to expand as the drives were filling up faster than I would like so expandability of storage is going to be useful in the future.

 

Mainly it will be used for just plain storage and video playback via PLEX or DLNA throughout the home. I did enjoy the Readycloud facility for remote backup of devices (photos, videos etc.) but they terminated that service so I would like to be able to secure backup from phone/tablet for convenience. I know having a nas open to the internet isn't the best security🙄.

 

I may consider using it in the future as Steam server as my son is getting older now and will want to play games at some point.

 

I was considering running Truenas as the OS and power consumption isn't a deal breaker as I was running my Netgear 24/7 for 6 years anyway (probably what caused it to die 😂) with the odd power down now and again.  I have ordered a new power supply for the Netgear just to see if it comes back to life as I would like to get my data off it, otherwise it's going to be a bit if a task to recover.

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I have also come across another system but it is just over double the cost (£180) of the first one (£85). Would this be a better option? Unsure if it has m.2 and how many Sata ports it has as I am waiting on board specs.

 

1060 gpu (would probably remove to save power consumption)

1 terabyte storage

16 gb ram

I7 6700k

473206726_28758530753745565_1395910926093781513_n.jpg

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2 hours ago, JonW2879 said:

I have also come across another system but it is just over double the cost (£180) of the first one (£85). Would this be a better option? Unsure if it has m.2 and how many Sata ports it has as I am waiting on board specs.

 

1060 gpu (would probably remove to save power consumption)

1 terabyte storage

16 gb ram

I7 6700k

473206726_28758530753745565_1395910926093781513_n.jpg

The first option is better because its more affordavle, and has more RAM. The only compelling reason to get the 6700k system would be for its improved graphics for plex transcode, although I doubt it would make any difference. Ideally, you wouldn't transcode for local (within the same network) playback of media anyways.

 

You can run a NAS off a potatoe of a CPU, it doesn't take much at all. I ran an entire homelab, with truenas as a VM, on a i3 6100 for years. I had half a dozen ubuntu VM's, one of which ran a plex server, half a dozen docker containers, windows 10 LTSC, truenas, home assistant. The CPU was never the limiting factor, I started to run out of PCIe slots and RAM (only had 32 GB).

 

You probably don't need to worry at all about an SSD cache, esepcially if you go with truenas and ZFS. I have never had any SSD's in my truenas sytem, and my 10x4TB Z2 array can read and write at ~5gigabit on average, which is 5x what normal home networking will do...

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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12 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

The first option is better because its more affordavle, and has more RAM. The only compelling reason to get the 6700k system would be for its improved graphics for plex transcode, although I doubt it would make any difference. Ideally, you wouldn't transcode for local (within the same network) playback of media anyways.

 

You can run a NAS off a potatoe of a CPU, it doesn't take much at all. I ran an entire homelab, with truenas as a VM, on a i3 6100 for years. I had half a dozen ubuntu VM's, one of which ran a plex server, half a dozen docker containers, windows 10 LTSC, truenas, home assistant. The CPU was never the limiting factor, I started to run out of PCIe slots and RAM (only had 32 GB).

 

You probably don't need to worry at all about an SSD cache, esepcially if you go with truenas and ZFS. I have never had any SSD's in my truenas sytem, and my 10x4TB Z2 array can read and write at ~5gigabit on average, which is 5x what normal home networking will do...

Thanks. Option 1 seems like it is the best option at the moment. If I take option 1 then at least i have the definite option of adding a ssd cache in the future if needed. Aside am unsure on the board in option 2.

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9 minutes ago, JonW2879 said:

Thanks. Option 1 seems like it is the best option at the moment. If I take option 1 then at least i have the definite option of adding a ssd cache in the future if needed. Aside am unsure on the board in option 2.

Don't even worry about SSD cache. Worry about literally everything else first, lol.

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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If you are looking for something to grow into I would look into the Fractal Design R5 case. I have not personally used it but I know it is the “go to” when it comes to amount of hard drive bays in a pc case.

 

 

IMG_1778.webp

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2 hours ago, HomeLabAddict said:

If you are looking for something to grow into I would look into the Fractal Design R5 case. I have not personally used it but I know it is the “go to” when it comes to amount of hard drive bays in a pc case.

 

 

IMG_1778.webp

R5 is a great option. 

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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6 hours ago, HomeLabAddict said:

If you are looking for something to grow into I would look into the Fractal Design R5 case. I have not personally used it but I know it is the “go to” when it comes to amount of hard drive bays in a pc case.

 

 

IMG_1778.webp

 I have just found a one on fb marketplace for £55. I'll add it to the list. Thanks

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Ok thanks for all your help and information. 1 last question.

 

I have come across an old PC that was in storage. Would it be good enough for what I need until I update it? I assume I will be able to switch the MB, RAM and CPU while keeping everything else intact if i'm running TrueNAS.

 

MB : Asus M5A97 R2.0

CPU : AMD FX4300 Quad Core (supports AM3+ up to 8 cores)

Memory 8GB DDR3 (supports4 x DIMM, Max. 32GB, DDR3 2133(O.C.)/1866/1600/1333/1066 MHz ECC, Non-ECC, Un-buffered Memory)

GPU : Unknown Make & Model

Storage : 480gb ssd

PSU : Corsair VS350

 

Expansion Slots:

1 x PCIe 2.0 x16 (blue)
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16 (x4 mode, black)
2 x PCIe 2.0 x1
2 x PCI

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