build NAS/torrent Seedbox build advice

[Overlrod_Laharl]

before i start i must say thanks to linus and your team for wonderfully informative videos.

 

im considering building a new seedbox for myself.

heres my current box

the photo is old

because the original PSU failed i rigged it with a minibox PSU

 

the hardware its using is a sans digital Raid tower

a banana pi m1

a minibox pico PSU 150.

two 4TB HDDs

one 1.5TB HDD (that's not connected)

im also using some case mount cables to give access to the needed ports on the pi.

 

the software im running is

the distro is simplenas (formerly called "bananas")

i have compiled a kernel to enable SATA PM support for the pi

and i am running r/rutorrent for the seed box

 

okay now to my goals.

like the above my concerns are as follows

 

in order of priority (most to least)

1. low power consumption of the system (the lower the better)
2. low cost
3. build quality needs to be decent

 

heres what i will be doing with the system (in order of occurrence, l most to least)

1. seeding torrents (currently a few a little over 1700)
2. downloading torrents 
3. accessing the web UI, shares, and SSH from inside my network.
4. backing up files
5. accessing my shares, web UI outside my network.

 

i will not be using it as a plex server or doing any media streaming with it.

 

now i have no idea on where to start for my build so i need some advice

what hardware specs should i worry about for a seedbox. CPU speed, memory capacity, or somthing else. i searched but all i found were seedbox hosts/resellers.

a good CPU (not discontinued, because i buy my hardware form stores like microcenter, FRYs, and newegg.)

a good motherboard (not discontinued, because i buy my hardware form stores like microcenter, FRYs, and newegg.)

how much memory would be good, and too much.

 

i don't need advice on what memory to buy, or HDDs as i will be reusing my 4TB disks in this system.

no need for raid. as i'm not concerned with data corruption.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

May I ask what these torrents are for?

[Overlrod_Laharl]

you may ask. but i don't want to violate the community standards.

it is very broadly worded.

Quote

Talking about piracy in general, broad details, is acceptable however the posting or discussing pirated/hacked/cracked or otherwise nefariously obtained content is not. This includes Windows content, games, hackintosh, etc. Also discussions regarding ways to avoid or block legitimately installed monitoring/tracking software or the like is also not allowed.

assume im seeding linux distros.

 

also i finished my edits above.

[AshleyAshes]

10 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

May I ask what these torrents are for?

I don't think that's relevant to the thread and the OP is not required to answer that question.  More over, the OP not answering that question doesn't mean that he can't be given advice on setting up his seedbox.  Everything is within the rules so long as we only talk about the machine running torrents, not from where the torrents come from or their content.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

Permission to continue without being prosecuted. @Ryan_Vickers? Seems like a grey area to me. If it was pirated content, you could argue we're enabling him on how to violate Canadian Copyright laws, etc.

[AshleyAshes]

Just now, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

Permission to continue without being prosecuted. @Ryan_Vickers? Seems like a grey area to me. If it was pirated content, you could argue we're enabling him on how to violate Canadian Copyright laws, etc.

How is this a grey area?   Without discussing what content is being tormented, you have no idea if any kind of copyright violation is going on.  The box could be used to seed Ubuntu distros for all you know.  This is just about configuring software or hardware.

 

We've had plenty of discussions on torrents, UseNet, media servers, Plex and Kodi, all without discussing the nature of any media content, all without issue.

 

You just seem to be interested in stalling this thread.

[Overlrod_Laharl]

first off im not asking you how to pirate anything.

i do realize canada has some archaic laws (as does the US, where im located)

im not saying im pirating anything. your inferring that.

im only asking for hardware advice.

 

and according to community standards

Quote

Talking about piracy in general, broad details, is acceptable however the posting or discussing pirated/hacked/cracked or otherwise nefariously obtained content is not. This includes Windows content, games, hackintosh, etc. Also discussions regarding ways to avoid or block legitimately installed monitoring/tracking software or the like is also not allowed.

as AshleyAshes said this is in line with the rules

 

also grey area ≠ illegal

[Electronics Wizardy]

So id reuse the drives, no reason to replace them

 

For the board, id get something like a intel celeron and a board like this one https://www.amazon.com/GIGABYTE-LGA1151-Intel-Motherboard-GA-H110M-/dp/B0165YUDTM?psc=1&SubscriptionId=AKIAILSHYYTFIVPWUY6Q&tag=duckduckgo-ffab-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B0165YUDTM

If you need more sata ports, add a card like a dell h200 later on.

 

For cpu, id get the cheapest celeron for that socket, its more than fastenough here and is very low power. look at a g3900

 

Get 4gb of ram.

 

Case is where i gets interesting, id just get a basic desktop case, normally you can put 4 3.5 drives in it and then you have some 5.25 bays for some 3.5 adapters. You can also just get a nas case like the unas, or something like a node 3.04.

 

For os install drive, id just use a usb stick, or 2 in raid 1 if your conserned about reliabity.

 

For os, if you comfortable with linux, id just run centos(insert favorite linux distro here) and configure it to your liking. If you want a easy to use nas os, id run openmediavault.

[Overlrod_Laharl]

thanks for the first actual on topic reply.

 

i was planning on re using the drives. (and moving the 1.5TB to another computer.)

and simplenas uses openmediavault for disk management.

 

judging by your post basicly your saying memory capacity is more important than CPU speed for a seedbox?

then 1 question left.

how much memory would be considered overkill for a NAS/seedbox?

 

PS: i was thinking of getting a mini itx mobo because:

a) can be a cpu/mobo combo, (and they usually come with celerons) and many times are passively cooled. however then i cant upgrade/replace the CPU if i need.

b) less components usually = less power

[vanished]

With no other information we have to assume you are indeed seeding Linux distros or something of that sort, which is fine.

 

1 hour ago, Overlrod_Laharl said:

you may ask. but i don't want to violate the community standards.

This comment is awfully suspicious though, since, if that is all you were doing, announcing what you were doing would in no way violate the standards...

[AshleyAshes]

1 hour ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

This comment is awfully suspicious though, since, if that is all you were doing, announcing what you were doing would in no way violate the standards...

I'd argue that it was BlueChinchillaEatingDorito who decided to ask what was being torrented.  If a user is building a seedbox, it's no place for a user to attempt to interrogate the OP and then cry for the mods when there was nothing wrong with the thread's OP.

[vanished]

3 minutes ago, AshleyAshes said:

I'd argue that it was BlueChinchillaEatingDorito who decided to ask what was being torrented.  If a user is building a seedbox, it's no place for a user to attempt to interrogate the OP and then cry for the mods when there was nothing wrong with the thread's OP.

At the end of the day, it's the intent that matters, not how or when OP decided to reveal it.

[LetMeGoogleThatForYou]

What the * is wrong with you people! Seriously I only registered to tell @vanished and @BlueChinchillaEatingDorito that they are just lame and retarded. What do you think, the freaking RCMP will come and hunt you down cause you gave someone some advice on how to build a seed-box? Canada is not China, not yet anyway (slowly getting there)

 

And I am reviving this thread just because I am actually building a new seed-box and if someone else lands on this thread I would like them to have more relevant information than a bunch of scared **nts worrying about what will be shared.

 

Ok, now that my ranting is done here is the good stuff.

 

My priority were the pretty much the same:

1. low energy consumption && remote connection only
2. high bandwith
3. 99.99999% uptime
4. fast reboot

To reduce the power consumption I will be using a 1TB NVMe drive that will serve as a buffer. This means that no single torrent can be over 1TB. All the seeding will be done from a remote cloud mounted drive. So the box will serve only as a buffer between the other users and the content that will be stored on a cloud with "unlimited" storage capacity.

 

So when downloading a torrent, you want to store it locally until it's done, then move it to the mounted cloud storage (upload) and then seed from there. You want to configure your client properly with the correct buffer sizes as well as the the buffer of what you will use to mount the remote cloud storage drive (rclone, plexdrive, etc)  If your torrents are smaller in size, you can actually get away with an even smaller NVMe drive such as 250Gb that will be much cheaper.

 

https://www.newegg.com/western-digital-blue-sn550-nvme-1tb/p/N82E16820250135 100$ for 1TB

 

I would recommend a minimal server disto of Ubuntu or CentOs with Deluge and Deluge Web for easy remote access. You will want to throw between 4 to 8Gb or RAM in there.

 

As for the CPU i would recommend something that does not use too much power and does not need much cooling. Stick to the low Watt consumption (below 65)

 

AMD Athlon 200GE 2-Core, 4-Thread, 3.2 GHz Base, Socket AM4 35W - https://www.newegg.com/amd-athlon-200ge/p/N82E16819113544?quicklink=true   70$

GIGABYTE B450M DS3H AM4 AMD B450 SATA 6Gb/s Micro ATX - https://www.newegg.com/gigabyte-b450m-ds3h/p/N82E16813145083?quicklink=true 82$

 

Add an extra 50$ for RAM and another 50$ for power supply and case and you have yourself a seedbox at about 350$ that will not cost much in power and should last a good decade if not more.

 

Now, I would recommend having this setup in a country where ISPs are dirt cheap and fast and your monthly cost for power and internet will be under 20$.

 

Then, you can mount your cloud drive to any other server in any other region and use that with a media server (plex/emby) etc.

 

Also, if this is too much trouble and you are just lazy (kind of like I'm about to be) you can just pay as low as 10$ per month and have yourself a remote cloud stored seedbox with 10Gbps speeds. There are hundreds of seedbox providers out there.

. https://dediseedbox.com/index.php -> I like these guys.

Plus they offer 1click install for most common apps. Probably worth it in the long run.