Need Help with NAS Config [fast :)]

[whattoplaynext]

So i need help Guys!

Wanna build a NAS in Time for Christmas as a Family-Data Storage Solution!

Was just configurating parts and wondered if i am right that this stuff should work, so i want your guys's advice!

I am considering an Intel Pentium G3220 Haswell Boxed on an ASrock H81M-ITX Wifi with 8gb ddr3 Adata RAM! (Boxed cooler for CPU)

As a Bootdrive i would use a Flashdrive  for FreeNas to not block a valuable SATA-Port on the Mobo (It has just 4)

As Mass-Storage i wanna get 2 WD Red 3TB NAS Optimized BLA-Marketing drives! (In RAID 1 of course)

All this in a tiny Fractal Design Node 304 with a 400W LC-H LC-Power PSU

Would this config even work with FreeNAS? (Were talking Dual-Core CPU)

Is there maybe even Hardware missing?

Would love to here Suggestions from u guys!

with best regards from Germany

[TonyStark]

Welcome...I have built a freenas system, custom build of course and I've used the following parts

 

Gigabyte i945 mini ATX mobo

Intel Celeron 1.8 Ghz 64bit CPU (has only 35W TDP)

4GB DDR2 @ 800MHZ Corsair XMS2

2 x 1.5 TB Seagate drives

30GB OCZ SSD for boot drive (believe me its way faster for system operations than the USB drive)

onboard 1GBit Intel NIC.

Dell PERC 5i RAID controller

 

I'm pretty happy with my system.. In your case let me point out some things that you'll probably find useful.

• If you wish for the entire family to stream from the NAS (movies, music, multimedia in general) then you'd better get a 4-port gigabit LAN Card (you can find them cheap on ebay...and DO NOT, AND I MEAN NOT get anything else than Inte, unless you want to have a good probability to face some sort of networking issues in the future)
• make sure than the above card, should you purchase it, must be configured with a Link Aggregation and a managed gigabit netowrk switch is a MUST, otherwise it will simply not work.
• If you wish to place the drives on software RAID (ZFS that freenas uses) then the rule of thumb is to have 1GB of RAM per 1TB of storage, for performance
• a raid controller like the one I'm using will provide you with even better overall performance since there is no software workload due to software raid. (Its cheap and again its on ebay. the cables need to be purchased separately, together with a battery pack for the controller, finally the controller needs active cooling, so you'll have to forcefully fit a fan on the controllers CPU. It has an ARM CPU on board by the way ! )
• furthermore, each self-respecting NAS, ought ot have ECC memory modules, assuming that the motherboard supports it, in order to avoid data corruption.

 

If  the above seem frustrating to you, then a good solution is to get an Asrock mobo with Intel Avoton

This board packs a heavy punch for its size and cost and can save you a lot of frustration and dollars in electric bills, while providing you with a good performance on what you need.

It has 12 SATA ports, 4-core or 8-core CPU depending on the model, onbaord hardware RAID controller, supports dual gigabit LAN cards, EEC RAM and has passive cooling, so its quiet. An avoton is basically an Intel atom processor, but with hardware raid there is no performance issue.

WD reds are a very good choice for hard drives, I'd go with WD RE (Raid Edition) yellow drives, since they are even more reliable than WD REDs.

The above with the PSU and the case you mentioned, make a pretty good NAS system.

 

There are tons of stuff I can give you details on NAS systems and especially freenas. So feel free to contact me If you wish me to clarify to you anything that you might have questions .

[Captain_WD]

~snip~

 

Hey there and welcome to the community do follow your own topics so you see when someone replies 

 

The plan generally looks great and should be good for a regular NAS file storage setup. WD Red are great drives for this. I would, however, reconsider the option to have the OS on a thumb drive because it would be easy to accidentally unplug it and cause the whole system to crash, corrupting data with it. I would consider how much space you'd need and get a small SSD for the OS. If you find a board with a M.2 slot, that would be even more convenient. 

 

Do post a build log so we can see how it's going and feel free to ask if you happen to have questions

 

Captain_WD.