Server

[ddbtkd456]

So heres the thing, i'm on a mission to make my pc have as little noise as possible with the exception of the GPU and the pump on the AIO. For purposes of my build I would like my stroage on my network kind of like a nas, what would you guys recommend? I'd like at least 6TB with backup, I was originally thinking the western digital My Cloud 6 TB drive with an external drive, but those seem shady on the reviews no matter where they are from. Mainly its going to be used as 3 things.

1. To stream movies/music over plex to my ps4's, phones, tablets, laptops, ect.
2. To centralize important files in my house so I can access them on different devices.
3. To centralize backups in one place for everything.

I thought about a 4 bay one.

1. Bay 1 - 3 TB for media files
2. Bay 2 - 1 TB for important files
3. Bay 3 - 6 TB Backup for first two bays (plus two 500 gb ssd)
4. Bay 4 - 6 TB back for the first backup.

Ideas recommendations?

[higgs01]

So as I see, you aren't going for RAID's. I would recommend it because then a drive failure wouldn't be a big problem and u wouldn't need the fourth Bay. I would suggest the following thing:

 

1. Bay 1 and 2: 2x6TB RAID1 -> Files and Media(perhaps different Partitions)
2. Bay 3 and 4: 2x6TB RAID1 -> Backup

I know that it would be more expensive and I don't know if your WD Cloud supports RAIDs on different volumes.

[ddbtkd456]

2 minutes ago, higgs01 said:

So as I see, you aren't going for RAID's. I would recommend it because then a drive failure wouldn't be a big problem and u wouldn't need the fourth Bay. I would suggest the following thing:

 

1. Bay 1 and 2: 2x6TB RAID1
2. Bay 3 and 4: 2x6TB RAID1

Thats roughly $1000 (USD) for that, if thats the case I'll through 2x6TB drives in my computer and have the second backup the first. I thought there would be a cheap way to do this.

[higgs01]

2 minutes ago, ddbtkd456 said:

Thats roughly $1000 (USD) for that, if thats the case I'll through 2x6TB drives in my computer and have the second backup the first. I thought there would be a cheap way to do this.

 

 

Well, your way definitely works. Mine was just an idea how you could do it in an other way.

[ddbtkd456]

3 minutes ago, higgs01 said:

Well, your way definitely works. Mine was just an idea how you could do it in an other way.

Well thank you for the idea, but I was trying to keep it under $100, what about a diskless 2 bay drive? One for storage and the other for backup? I just need one with enough processing power for plex is the problem.

[higgs01]

1 minute ago, ddbtkd456 said:

Well thank you for the idea, but I was trying to keep it under $100, what about a diskless 2 bay drive? Would that support raid?

It really depends on the Bay Drive u get, but since you want to keep it under 100$, I would do it the same way as you suggested and renounce the redundancy since I haven't really experienced any drive failures at home without warnings before it failed.

[ddbtkd456]

7 minutes ago, higgs01 said:

It really depends on the Bay Drive u get, but since you want to keep it under 100$, I would do it the same way as you suggested and renounce the redundancy since I haven't really experienced any drive failures at home without warnings before it failed.

I meant $800, hard to type this morning I do apologize. I was thinking about something like this:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Storage: Western Digital Red 6TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($242.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 4TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Other: Seagate STDD100 Diskless System NAS Pro 2-Bay Network Storage ($349.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $742.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 11:32 EDT-0400

[higgs01]

4 minutes ago, ddbtkd456 said:

I meant $800, hard to type this morning I do apologize. I was thinking about something like this:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Storage: Western Digital Red 6TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($242.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 4TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Other: Seagate STDD100 Diskless System NAS Pro 2-Bay Network Storage ($349.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $742.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 11:32 EDT-0400

 

Should work fine

[ddbtkd456]

6 minutes ago, higgs01 said:

Should work fine

Or

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

External Storage: Seagate Backup Plus 8TB External Hard Drive  ($228.99 @ Amazon)
Other: WD WDBCTL0060HWT-NESN 6TB My Cloud Personal Cloud Storage ($266.82 @ Newegg)
Total: $495.81
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 11:46 EDT-0400

 

which do you recommend for Plex Streaming?

[higgs01]

6 minutes ago, ddbtkd456 said:

which do you recommend for Plex Streaming?

At first: I haven't got experience with any of those devices. 

 

But as I have read from reviews and the specs, I would say that the STDD100 would be the better solution, but I can't guarantee.

[ddbtkd456]

5 minutes ago, JaredM54 said:

I would take a look at the HP Microserver gen8. Has 4 3.5" drive bays and you can get them for around $300, to me that makes more sense than a prebuilt nas. However if you don't want upgradeability and want simplicity then a Synology would be better. I have one of the Microservers and they're very nice little machines.

Most of them I looked on Newegg and Amazon were going for $700 dollars...could I build my own Nas Server for that? Like with a decent processor decent ram decent case...

[ddbtkd456]

2 hours ago, JaredM54 said:

They're very expensive on Newegg but (and I'm assuming you're in the US) on eBay you can order them from the UK for much less. For $300 including shipping I got one brand new without any problems. Building your own is also an option.

Alright it took me a while, but I worked out the different options I might have for a custom server, keep in mind this is for mass storage, backups, and transcoding movies/music for plex on the fly. I will be installing Amahi (Linked to description & requirements) on the things that require an operating system.

 

Option #1:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD A10-7850K 3.7GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($115.98 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  ($107.99 @ Best Buy)
Motherboard: MSI A68HI AC Mini ITX FM2+ Motherboard  ($81.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Beast 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory  ($79.38 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($87.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 6TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($242.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 4TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair 250D Mini ITX Tower Case  ($74.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA G2 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($85.98 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer  ($19.99 @ Micro Center)
Total: $1047.26
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 15:19 EDT-0400

 

Option #2:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Storage: Western Digital Red 6TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($242.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 4TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Other: Seagate STDD100 Diskless System NAS Pro 2-Bay Network Storage ($349.99)
Total: $742.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 15:23 EDT-0400

 

Option #3:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

External Storage: Seagate Backup Plus 8TB External Hard Drive  ($229.49 @ Amazon)
Other: WD WDBCTL0060HWT-NESN 6TB My Cloud Personal Cloud Storage ($266.82)
Total: $496.31
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 15:24 EDT-0400

 

Option #4:

Buy a HP Microserver gen8 for a server, for around €179.99 which equals about $250 (USD).

 

Which would be the best solution for this operation?

[ddbtkd456]

2 minutes ago, JaredM54 said:

I don't know if the Seagate or the WD MyCloud will be able to handle transcoding for PLEX. The Seagate only has a dual core CPU and 2gb of memory, and the MyClouds are designed just for storage. I do think that Option 1 even though it is the best is overkill, and in my opinion it makes the most sense to buy the Microserver, upgrade to a Xeon if you find that you need it, and upgrade the memory.

Would you be able to recommend me a system that wouldn't be complete overkill? How quiet is the server you recommended? And how tall/wide/length of it?

[ddbtkd456]

1 hour ago, JaredM54 said:

The Microserver is about 20dB at 3m away, very comparable to any other NAS and similar to my nearly silent pc (the hard drives clicking are normally louder). As for the size, it's about the same as my Corsair 250d, a little bit less than a 1' by 1' cube. The build that you have is actually pretty good, but you could slim down the memory, PSU, SSD, and use an air cooler (in my 250d I have a Hyper tx3). There are also other small prebuilt servers like the HP ML10v2 and the Lenovo TS140 that you can look at and see if they interest you. 

Alright I removed the SSD, downsized the PSU, downsized the memory, downsized the cooler as well. I did however add a keyboard, and a couple of other things. Theory is to have it sitting on the floor under my desk, or on my desk who knows, along with my main rig (one will be on the floor and one will be on the desk), and have both systems connected to the same monitor, and to plug in the wireless adapter into my server and off we go. All it will take is a press of the button to switch back and forth, also both will be Etherneted which is why the switch is there. Noob question time Will a wireless keyboard and mouse work with the Amahi software installed?

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD A10-7850K 3.7GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($115.98 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Phanteks PH-TC12LS_BK 53.3 CFM CPU Cooler  ($34.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI A68HI AC Mini ITX FM2+ Motherboard  ($81.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Kingston Beast 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($39.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 6TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($242.01 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Red 4TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair 250D Mini ITX Tower Case  ($74.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: XFX XTR 550W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($82.98 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer  ($19.99 @ Micro Center)
Keyboard: Logitech Wireless Combo MK270 Wireless Standard Keyboard w/Optical Mouse  ($20.95 @ Amazon)
Other:  Cat7 Ethernet Cable Flat, jadaol® Shielded (STP) with Snagless Rj45 Connectors - 25 Feet Black (7.62 meters)  ($12.99)
Other:  Belkin 12 Outlet Home/Office Surge Protector with 10-Foot cord and Phone/Ethernet/Coaxial Protection plus Extended Cord, BE112234-10  ($25.76)
Other:  TP-LINK TL-SG1005D 10/100/1000Mbps 5-Port Gigabit Desktop Switch, 10Gbps Capacity  ($15.99)
Other:  Safebao (4 in 2 out) 4K x 2K HDMI Matrix Splitter/Switch with L/R Audio Output, Selector/Converter Box with IR Remote and Power Adapter  ($59.90)
Other:  AmazonBasics High-Speed HDMI Cable - 9.8 Feet (3 Meters) Supports Ethernet, 3D, 4K and Audio Return  ($6.49)
Total: $984.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-04-12 17:43 EDT-0400

[kirashi]

7 hours ago, JaredM54 said:

I would take a look at the HP Microserver gen8. Has 4 3.5" drive bays and you can get them for around $300, to me that makes more sense than a prebuilt nas. However if you don't want upgradeability and want simplicity then a Synology would be better. I have one of the Microservers and they're very nice little machines.

Where does one buy them for $300 US, let alone $450 CAD? I'm assuming eBay, because they start at $700 USD brand new.