Server for home, business, gaming, ...

[Degi3000]

Hi everyone! So I've been playing around with this idea for a while now and I've talked with several people and server admins, read about different OSs, brands, ... but I am at a loss!

 

I simply don't know how I should go at setting up my home server or if I should just go for a QNAP or Synology. Also, what OS should I choose?

 

Here's what it should be able to handle:

• redundant/safe bulk file storage
• web access for some folders with consumer-friendly download interface (so I can provide my clients with their data à la Dropbox)
• host my email
• Plex, though I'd be able to live without it
• host a Minecraft server (or other small game)
• host a voice-chat instance
• ShadowCopy and TimeMachine or equivalent

And here's how I envisioned it would make my life easier:

So I just opened up my own business as a photographer and I have a lot of data which shouldn't go missing. I currently have all the raw files saved on two disks in my system but when I have my server I want to throw all this data out and on to the other machine. I wouldn't have a backup but redudancy with RAID5 or even RAID1 should be more than enough. Preffered workflow would be to import new media directly on the server and work off of there. Maybe throw an SSD in there for active projects and flush them to the HDD when done.  

Finished exports are at the time put on to my dropbox and provided to my customers via a download link. I like this system and would like to keep it with my own "cloud" or even just FTP with a nice web interface.  

Email is pretty self-explanatory. Currently using zoho.  

Plex shouldn't need any introduction either but I could easily live without it if the hardware encoder needed would drive up the price of the system too much. Though I'd need one anyways if I ever want to put some video files on there.  

Game server are an important point because both QNAP and Synology don't support them. I know freeNAS does easily so I kinda like that OS.

Ventrillo, Teamspeak, whatever I have to do to get my friends to stop using Skype!  

And finally some sort of easy, automated backup for all the files on those devices that aren't saved on the server already.

 

 

I hope you can help me out here. The commercial servers are easy to set up and as shiny as those pre-installed OSs are - they lack some functionality. freeNAS is cool and all but when shit hits the fan I won't have the support I get from someone like Synology. (also the DS Apps on mobile look great!)  

Building my own system and setting it up should be no problem for me. I have already looked at something like HP microservers and thrown some components together on PCPartPicker, but freeNAS has some hefty requirements. 

 

And while we're at it: I'm also thinking about murdering the trashy router and AP that was provided to us by our ISP and replace it with something modern with better WIFI and put some custom firmware on there for network wide malware-blocking and a VPN. Maybe you know something there as well.

 

 

Thanks in advance!

[zlolslavez]

I just want to say hosting a game server+VOIP on the same place as your email sounds like an easy way to get your email hacked, so be careful on how to manage that.

[Degi3000]

Thanks for you concern. I plan on securing the email and only using the game server and VOIP with my friends. And while they might not be too dumb to get into my mail, they might just be too lazy.

[Scheer]

I'd recommend going with a Synology unit for your file/mail server, and then a Windows computer running 7/8.1/10 for your game/voice/plex server. You could even use this as an excuse to upgrade your gaming computer by re-purposing the gaming computer as your game server and building a new gaming computer.

 

Unless you buy the high end Synology units (1515+ or greater IIRC), you will have issues with them transcoding 1080p. You can still store all of your media on the Synology, and then just map it to the Windows box for plex, which would then use the faster CPU of the Windows box for your transcode.

 

This would also allow you to backup the data to each other, and should a major failure happen you would still have everything, albeit not immediately accessible.

 

 

Another option would be to virtualize both of those onto one server. Xpenology is a hacked up version of Synology DSM that can easily be ran in ESXi. I'm current running Xpenology for some testing and it is much more fluid than any Synology unit I have used due to running on much more powerful hardware. I'm still a little confused on how mass storage would work out as I don't believe you can give a VM direct access to a disk... it would have to be added as a datastore and then I don't know how RAID would work. I have not yet verified it, but it sounds like the solution is to add in a HBA card and pass through the entire card directly to the VM, without ESXi ever knowing it is there.

[denarced]

22 minutes ago, zlolslavez said:

I just want to say hosting a game server+VOIP on the same place as your email sounds like an easy way to get your email hacked, so be careful on how to manage that.

Just to provide further encouragement to leave email to the pros: How I Lost My $50,000 Twitter Username. I know I might be annoying at this point since you already replied but I had to share this because I was surprised when I read it.

[Degi3000]

@Scheer:

Ok, so basically either an expensive Synology unit which can do more but still not everything or just a regular one and use my PC for the other stuff. I like this approach from the cost perspective but I'm not sure if I want to run the game server on my PC. My current rig is not only used for my professional work, but also for gaming, so mixing work and fun wouldn't be the problem but Windows 10 isn't stable enough that I would trust it to run 24/7. Virtualization is an option but then I'm limiting my cpu and some of the badly optimized programs I use for work will slow down even more.

 

You are right, I could use it as an excuse for upgrading early but sadly this isn't possible right now. So the idea I currently have would be to put important data on the Synology unit and take advantage of their great software, all fun stuff like VOIP and game server on my current rig and deal with the slight overhead until I can modify this box to be my second server unit.

 

But how would you go about the data? Work on a project directly on the PC and then transfer it to the NAS or put an SSD in there in addition to the hard drives so I can work directly off of it? I don't know how Synology handles caching...

 

 

@denarced:

Oh yeah, I've read about this story shortly after it happened! I'll see how security would be handled if I host the email myself but my current attitude is simply "why pay others if I can do it myself".