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Building a NAS from old gaming Computer

Taelmin
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Budget (including currency): USD

Country: USA

TL:DR - Checking to see if my old Gaming computer is NAS worthy or if i should just invest in a prebuilt NAS.

 

Basically, Im trying to see if it would be cost effective to convert my old gaming computer into a NAS. I recently learned about NASs and am not 100% sure about the ins and outs of building one, but from what i read it does seem like a good storage solution to cut down the storage on my family's phones without having to pay for a monthly service from google or apple or something similar. 

My old gaming Computer is an ABS MAGE H . The specs are the following.

  • Intel Core i9 10th Gen 10900KF 3.70GHz (5.30GHz Turbo)
  • NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER 8GB
  • 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
  • Windows 10 Home 64-bit
  • AORUS Z490 PRO AX LGA 1200 Motherboard

A year or so i upgraded the ram to CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 64GB, while its not the fastest i got a good deal and it was an upgrade to the ram that came in the computer. 

The motherboard lists 2 m.2 connectors and 6 SATA connectors with support for raid 0 ,1 5 and 10

Would this be worth setting up as a NAS or rather just add in More SSDs and use it as a storage machine?

Thanks All in advance!

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Posted
1 hour ago, Taelmin said:

Budget (including currency): USD

Country: USA

TL:DR - Checking to see if my old Gaming computer is NAS worthy or if i should just invest in a prebuilt NAS.

 

Basically, Im trying to see if it would be cost effective to convert my old gaming computer into a NAS. I recently learned about NASs and am not 100% sure about the ins and outs of building one, but from what i read it does seem like a good storage solution to cut down the storage on my family's phones without having to pay for a monthly service from google or apple or something similar. 

My old gaming Computer is an ABS MAGE H . The specs are the following.

  • Intel Core i9 10th Gen 10900KF 3.70GHz (5.30GHz Turbo)
  • NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER 8GB
  • 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
  • Windows 10 Home 64-bit
  • AORUS Z490 PRO AX LGA 1200 Motherboard

A year or so i upgraded the ram to CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 64GB, while its not the fastest i got a good deal and it was an upgrade to the ram that came in the computer. 

The motherboard lists 2 m.2 connectors and 6 SATA connectors with support for raid 0 ,1 5 and 10

Would this be worth setting up as a NAS or rather just add in More SSDs and use it as a storage machine?

Thanks All in advance!

This machine would be fine for a NAS.

 

I don't recommend using SSDs for NAS storage though, because your network speed will bottleneck your NAS before HDDs do.

 

How much storage do you need?

A new case with more HDD bays might be a good idea.

As for pre-built NASs: you should avoid them at all costs if your even slightly technical.

I might be experienced, but I'm human and I do make mistakes. Trust but Verify! I edit my messages after sending them alot, please refresh before posting your reply. Please try to be clear and specific, you'll get a better answer. Please remember to mark solutions once you have the information you need. Expand this signature for common PC building advice, a short bio and a list of my components.

 

Common build advice:

1) Buy the cheapest (well reviewed) motherboard that has the features you need. Paying more typically only gets you features you won’t use. 2) only get as much RAM as you need, getting more won’t (typically) make your PC faster. 3) While I recommend getting an NVMe drive, you don’t need to splurge for an expensive drive with DRam cache, DRamless drives are fine for gamers. 4) paying for looks is fine, just don’t break the bank. 5) Tower coolers are usually good enough, unless you go top tier Intel or plan on OCing. 6) OCing is a dead meme, you probably shouldn’t bother. 7) "Bottlenecks" rarely matter and "Future-proofing" is a myth. 8) AIOs don't noticably improve performance past 240mm.

 

Useful Websites:

https://www.productchart.com - helps compare monitors, https://uk.pcpartpicker.com - makes designing a PC easier.

 

Bio:

He/Him - I'm a PhD student working in the fields of reinforcement learning and traffic control. PCs are one of my hobbies and I've built many PCs and performed upgrades on a few laptops (for myself, friends and family). My personal computers include 4 windows (10/11) machines and a TrueNAS server (and I'm looking to move to dual booting Linux Mint on my main machine in future). Aside from computers, I also dabble in modding/homebrew retro consoles, support Southampton FC, and enjoy Scuba Diving and Skiing.

Fun Facts

1) When I was 3 years old my favourite toy was a scientific calculator. 2) My father is a British Champion ploughman in the Vintage Hydraulic Class. 3) On Speedrun.com, I'm the world record holder for the Dream Bobsleigh event on Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games 2010.

 

My Favourite Games: World of Tanks, Runescape, Subnautica, Metroid (Fusion and Dread), Spyro: Year of the Dragon (Original and Reignited Trilogy), Crash Bash, Mario Kart Wii, Balatro

 

My Computers: Primary: My main gaming rig - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/NByp3C Second: Hosts Discord bots as well as a Minecraft and Ark server, and also serves as a reinforcement learning sand box - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/cc9K7P NAS: TrueNAS Scale NAS hosting SMB shares, DDNS updater, pi-hole, and a Jellyfin server - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/m37w3C Foldatron: My folding@home and BOINC rig (partially donated to me by Folding Team Leader GOTSpectrum) - Mobile: Mini-ITX gaming rig for when I'm away from home -

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13 hours ago, Taelmin said:

Budget (including currency): USD

Country: USA

TL:DR - Checking to see if my old Gaming computer is NAS worthy or if i should just invest in a prebuilt NAS.

 

Basically, Im trying to see if it would be cost effective to convert my old gaming computer into a NAS. I recently learned about NASs and am not 100% sure about the ins and outs of building one, but from what i read it does seem like a good storage solution to cut down the storage on my family's phones without having to pay for a monthly service from google or apple or something similar. 

My old gaming Computer is an ABS MAGE H . The specs are the following.

  • Intel Core i9 10th Gen 10900KF 3.70GHz (5.30GHz Turbo)
  • NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER 8GB
  • 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
  • Windows 10 Home 64-bit
  • AORUS Z490 PRO AX LGA 1200 Motherboard

A year or so i upgraded the ram to CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 64GB, while its not the fastest i got a good deal and it was an upgrade to the ram that came in the computer. 

The motherboard lists 2 m.2 connectors and 6 SATA connectors with support for raid 0 ,1 5 and 10

Would this be worth setting up as a NAS or rather just add in More SSDs and use it as a storage machine?

Thanks All in advance!

these specs are honestly overkill for what youd be doing which isnt a bad thing lol

if its a purely storage server then id just use harddrives, unless you have like 2.5gb youre not going to be able to use the full speeds anyway

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2 hours ago, DJ_Jay125 said:

these specs are honestly overkill for what youd be doing which isnt a bad thing lol

if its a purely storage server then id just use harddrives, unless you have like 2.5gb youre not going to be able to use the full speeds anyway

Even with 2.5gbe, networking is still the bottleneck. That’s a 320MB/s connection. Most HDDs will do 150MB/s. So 3 drives in a raid will be bottlenecked by 2.5gbe networking.
 

Hell, even with have a 10gbe, recommending SSDs doesn’t make much sense in alot of cases, cause 10 HDDs would be enough to overwhelm the connection.

 

I think the real time to use SSDs is when you want to work off the NAS (like with video editing).

I might be experienced, but I'm human and I do make mistakes. Trust but Verify! I edit my messages after sending them alot, please refresh before posting your reply. Please try to be clear and specific, you'll get a better answer. Please remember to mark solutions once you have the information you need. Expand this signature for common PC building advice, a short bio and a list of my components.

 

Common build advice:

1) Buy the cheapest (well reviewed) motherboard that has the features you need. Paying more typically only gets you features you won’t use. 2) only get as much RAM as you need, getting more won’t (typically) make your PC faster. 3) While I recommend getting an NVMe drive, you don’t need to splurge for an expensive drive with DRam cache, DRamless drives are fine for gamers. 4) paying for looks is fine, just don’t break the bank. 5) Tower coolers are usually good enough, unless you go top tier Intel or plan on OCing. 6) OCing is a dead meme, you probably shouldn’t bother. 7) "Bottlenecks" rarely matter and "Future-proofing" is a myth. 8) AIOs don't noticably improve performance past 240mm.

 

Useful Websites:

https://www.productchart.com - helps compare monitors, https://uk.pcpartpicker.com - makes designing a PC easier.

 

Bio:

He/Him - I'm a PhD student working in the fields of reinforcement learning and traffic control. PCs are one of my hobbies and I've built many PCs and performed upgrades on a few laptops (for myself, friends and family). My personal computers include 4 windows (10/11) machines and a TrueNAS server (and I'm looking to move to dual booting Linux Mint on my main machine in future). Aside from computers, I also dabble in modding/homebrew retro consoles, support Southampton FC, and enjoy Scuba Diving and Skiing.

Fun Facts

1) When I was 3 years old my favourite toy was a scientific calculator. 2) My father is a British Champion ploughman in the Vintage Hydraulic Class. 3) On Speedrun.com, I'm the world record holder for the Dream Bobsleigh event on Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games 2010.

 

My Favourite Games: World of Tanks, Runescape, Subnautica, Metroid (Fusion and Dread), Spyro: Year of the Dragon (Original and Reignited Trilogy), Crash Bash, Mario Kart Wii, Balatro

 

My Computers: Primary: My main gaming rig - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/NByp3C Second: Hosts Discord bots as well as a Minecraft and Ark server, and also serves as a reinforcement learning sand box - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/cc9K7P NAS: TrueNAS Scale NAS hosting SMB shares, DDNS updater, pi-hole, and a Jellyfin server - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/will0hlep/saved/m37w3C Foldatron: My folding@home and BOINC rig (partially donated to me by Folding Team Leader GOTSpectrum) - Mobile: Mini-ITX gaming rig for when I'm away from home -

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