Unraid Build Suggestions before pulling the trigger

[Roachie]

Budget (including currency): $1500 USD

Country: USA

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Mainly Storage, plex, VM gaming (remote and onsite)

Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc): 

Hello, I'm finally getting around to building my first server and looking for suggestions/tips. I have watched many older LTT videos like 2 gamers 1 PC and a variety of NAS builds and seems like unraid is the way to go for my desires. The current partlist for the server is https://pcpartpicker.com/list/kCCjfd. The functions that I want to have in order of priority:

• parity backup for drive failure
• easy upgradable
• expandability for my growing raw gopro/insta360 footage/other files and documents
• phone backup (no more google drive backups for pics and videos)
• Noise, power, and thermals.
• windows VM for my GF to play games with me while I use my main rig. Also planning on using moonlight so I can stream to either mine or my GFs potato laptops for mobile gaming. Would be targeting 1080p high or 1440p medium. Games like BG3, ARC Raiders, CS, Hades 2, factorio, etc.
• plex/streaming
• Active storage device for my main rig. Keep 3D CAD files for my printers etc. I like to mod games like skyrim/fallout and they have really started taking up large amounts of my space that I would like to better manage.
• random game servers like factario/minecraft/GTA etc
• storage of archived data (old college stuff that I dont want to ditch)

I already have the PSU, CPU, CPU cooler from upgrading my main gaming rig over time (https://pcpartpicker.com/b/3jW48d is my current rig setup). I plan on getting manufacture recertified seagate exos from serverpartdeals, I know Ill need to 3pin mod them most likely which is easy enough to do. I figured starting off with 2x24tb was as big as I could afford to go on my budget. This should allow me to add more 24tb drives or in the mean time I do have much smaller SSDs I have gathered over the years and past rigs I can throw in (maybe even the nearly 12 year old HDD in my main rig can get swapped over for the time being). You get the idea I have spare drives around I want to utilize until I can afford more large drives. In the part list I have an Arch A380 for unraid/plex encoding. Then I was thinking of using an older RX580 8gig I have but would be willing to get a used 2070 of Ebay (question about this below). Ultimately sound control is a priority and expandability is the priority with the case. I originally wanted something small but realized that I was limiting myself in alot of ways so have decided a full atx tower would be acceptable. 

For RAM I was thinking 2x16 to start so I could upgrade to 64gig total later would be better than 4x8 now.

 

So the main questions I have are:

• I have a RX580 8gig, could I use this for VM passthrough or is it not worth the hassle with unraid? I have heard AMD GPUs can be problematic. If this is the case would a used 2070 be fine or are there other recommend GPUs I pick up for this function?
• Is the 2700x enough for all of this or should I try to get a used 3950x, more and better cores to split between everything? The 2700x with 8 cores, I was thinking 4 for unraid/plex/dockers and 4 for 1 VM.
• Is doing 2x16 and having 2 open slots fine? I know that ryzen likes to fill all the slots.
• My plan is to eventually use a M.2 SATA expansion but I think on this MOBO the second M.2 would take over 2 SATA slots, so if I got a M.2 SATA expansion would that compensate for more overall number of drives? Or could I grab an HBA and actually use the M.2 slot?
• Is there anything I can do with that M.2 wifi slot besides putting in a wifi adapter?
• Have I over thought anything and can substitute parts to lower the price or have I hit a sweetspot for what I am looking to do now and in the future?
• Is my plan reasonable? Is there anything that I havent really thought out? For example in my V1 partlist I didnt realize I would need 2 GPUs one for unraid/plex and one for VM passthrough. 

If y'all have any other input I'm all ears. Thanks for reading all this!

TLDR: I want a server that can do a lot and I am trying to make it upgradable and efficient. Please help me catch any potential hiccups that I may have overlooked before I drop alot of money on this please and thank you.

 

[porina]

1 hour ago, Roachie said:

• Is the 2700x enough for all of this or should I try to get a used 3950x, more and better cores to split between everything? The 2700x with 8 cores, I was thinking 4 for unraid/plex/dockers and 4 for 1 VM.

2700X is rather ancient now, and using just 4 cores will be enough for older/basic games, if you're ok with that. I'm not personally a fan of VM-ing a gaming setup, and have no tried it myself. I do wonder if another box might just be a better alternative than trying to multi-purpose this one.

 

1 hour ago, Roachie said:

• Is doing 2x16 and having 2 open slots fine? I know that ryzen likes to fill all the slots.

2 sticks is usually the best for performance and stability. That age Ryzen didn't have a very good IMC so you might have to drop speeds further if you ever put 4 sticks in. It was fussy enough with 2 sticks at the time.

 

1 hour ago, Roachie said:

• My plan is to eventually use a M.2 SATA expansion but I think on this MOBO the second M.2 would take over 2 SATA slots, so if I got a M.2 SATA expansion would that compensate for more overall number of drives? Or could I grab an HBA and actually use the M.2 slot?

Go HBA if you ever need to expand. SATA adapters can come with various performance problems and you'll save yourself a headache later when everything is running slowly and you try to work out why. I've been there!

[Roachie]

thanks for the reply, I know its ancient but was hoping to get some extra life out of it. I figured for now I would be fine with older/basic games off of it. Its nice that I can easily upgrade up to 3950x or 5xxx eventually if I do find its not enough. Is there a reason you dont like the VMing gaming?