Server Questions: Why do you have one and should I get one?

[JohnKing]

Hi
I been thinking about getting a server. I was originally thinking about getting a NAS for media but then my girlfriend asked if we could rent a server for a video game. Then it dawned on me I could be the guy with the server!!! (Bragging rights reserved). But I have no knowledge of servers, I can learn it but before I spend tens of hours learning something I would like to know how bad the idea is.

What I would use it for: Plex server, File server and dedicated game server. 

 

I know it´s not a good idea but.... still I kind of want a server.

 

So what do you use your servers for and should I get one?

And is it reasonable to get an ok server for under a 1000$ (I don´t mind buying used and am comfortable with building it)

P.s. I got 1 gig internet so bandwith is not an issue and I´m in Iceland so shipping is expensive.

[leadeater]

Same use case you are wanting it for, plus technical lab related to my job (IT)

 

3 minutes ago, JohnKing said:

And is it reasonable to get an ok server for under a 1000$ (I don´t mind buying used and am comfortable with building it)

Easily, you can either buy a used server off ebay which is the most cost effective but has a few downsides mainly in size and noise. The only CPU demanding thing you're looking at is the Plex server and only when transcoding, if you play everything native you can get away with a Pentium G4560.

 

How much storage you need?

[Bananasplit_00]

uu i got a shitty HP microserver as my NAS, said i was going to swap the disk in it but havent because its barely used lol

[JohnKing]

7 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Same use case you are wanting it for, plus technical lab related to my job (IT)

 

Easily, you can either buy a used server off ebay which is the most cost effective but has a few downsides mainly in size and noise. The only CPU demanding thing you're looking at is the Plex server and only when transcoding, if you play everything native you can get away with a Pentium G4560.

 

How much storage you need?

I think I need about 10 TB max. I could manage with 1 or 2 TB but if I am getting a server I would like the max capacity to be upgradable to maybe 30 TB.

[Bananasplit_00]

2 minutes ago, JohnKing said:

I think I need about 10 TB max. I could manage with 1 or 2 TB but if I am getting a server I would like the max capacity to be upgradable to maybe 30 TB.

i havent found use for even the 1TB of storage in my NAS, what are you going to be using this for?  how many damn files do you need to store?  

Edited February 4, 2018 by Bananasplit_00
because it was unclear what i ment

[JohnKing]

Just now, Bananasplit_00 said:

i havent found use for even the 1TB of storage in my NAS, what are you going to be using this for?

Media........... Realistically storing stuff I will never watch again.

[Matty2048]

just burn them onto a cd

 

 

[Bananasplit_00]

1 minute ago, JohnKing said:

Media........... Realistically storing stuff I will never watch again.

i personally could fit everything i have ever downloaded in around 3TB of storage but if you like to have a load of 4K stuff i guess. anyway good luck, im not especially good with this stuff really but a NAS was pretty easy to set up

[Lurick]

5 minutes ago, Bananasplit_00 said:

i havent found use for even the 1TB of storage in my NAS, what are you going to be using this for?  how many damn files do you need to store?  

Currently using 15.4TB of 30TB of NAS space

I have a lot of movies, TV shows, and backups

[JohnKing]

3 minutes ago, Lurick said:

Currently using 15.4TB of 30TB of NAS space

I have a lot of movies, TV shows, and backups

Yeah.. Backups damn now I am closer too "Needing" a server.  

[paddy-stone]

Storing media, files I find useful like prog installation files, backups, VM backups etc

Plex server.

 

Will hopefully be:-

 

Running ESXi as the hypervisor, have the same as above, but also a pfsense install, some VMs and other stuff I can't think of right now... when I get time after I've finished messing with my mining rig and such.

[Lurick]

To answer the question in the title:

I've got 3 servers

1 - Dell R610

1 - Dell R620

1 - QNAP TS-831X

 

Both Dell servers are for VMs like Plex, Active Directory servers, virtual firewalls, etc. and all VMs have their virtual disks on the QNAP. The QNAP itself is mostly just storage. I have a 10Gig link between all the servers and the Plex VM has tons of CPU power dedicated to it for transcoding and whatnot. Of course it's a bit more than $1000 of a solution but there are options around the $1000 price point.

 

 

OP, for your needs check out the more powerful QNAP boxes that have some beefy Core I7 or Ryzen processors. Get a couple HDDs for now and expand later.

 

 

Edit:

Another option is to get a cheap QNAP or something, maybe a 4 bay and pair it with an Intel NUC

[Salacious B Crum]

Just be careful it's like eating one potato chip I find myself constantly trying to add something else to the damn thing, mine is currently 12TB holds plex and associated video files, a few dockers and I just added 10GB peer to peer for my 2 Ryzen rigs now I'm looking at an add in sata card to add more drives but I'm out of fricken pcie slots so a motherboard upgrade is next!

[Jarsky]

Storage server for all my media and general share files (i've had a fileserver of some sort since 2000 and used to share all the media with my brother over our network. I still have files on my current raid that date back to 2002). 

 

I then have all the rest of my servers setup as a cluster for my job (IT) for doing labs and testing for certifications (MCSA/RHEL/VCP/etc...) as well as hosting my own private servers for various roles like firewall and ssh hosts, seedbox, and the occasional game servers. We have fantastic internet in NZ. 

 

Maybe you'd be good to look at what you can get from Germany? It might cut down on shipping and they have a lot of ex-lease server gear for sale 

[AshleyAshes]

3 hours ago, JohnKing said:

Media........... Realistically storing stuff I will never watch again.

I dunno about you but one day the internet will cease to exist and I'll be a hero for having every episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on hand! D:

[voyager_]

Hardware requirements will change based on what your needs are. I have two different servers running. My first server runs windows and is responsible for my ip cameras as well as a minecraft server. It uses a core i5 and 8Gb of ram. With 5 cameras and minecraft running it typically runs at 80% usage on the Cpu when remote streaming video. Ram normally sits around 50-60%.

 

My second server runs unraid and handles plex and general storage and back-ups for everything on the network. It's running 16Gb ram with a AMD 8320e. Unless it is transcoding it sits at idle and maybe uses 2-3Gb of Ram. Currently is has about 8Tb on it and runs 8 drives for bulk storage with 2 parity drives and uses 2 SSD for a cache and is my storage for plex's metadata.

 

Neither machine was expensive to build, before drives each was probably less than 400-500 hundred including the chassis. A good option is to look at used hardware most i5 should be fine and you can get an FX series chip pretty cheap. Dell Optiplex make a good starting point for a small server. Intel may work better if you plan to run any virtual machines and unraid would be another great starting point. It is very flexible with drive type and size and is fairly easy to learn.

[Dark]

If you're budget is floating around $1k then don't even bother looking a QNAP appliance, nothing in that price range will provide you enough bang for the buck.

 

My suggestion, search for a used Supermicro or Dell server (LGA 2011 and above (E5 Xeon)), even if it's bare bones.  E5 v1/v2 chips are relatively cheap as is DDR3 ECC.  Ideally you'll want to find something with 8+ drive bays to allow for some storage growth until you (hopefully) add a storage appliance.

 

An example, I recently purchased a 'new in box' 1U Tyan server for $130 + shipping, this server supports dual lga 2011 (v1/v2) and 16 dimms.  I'll be throwing 2x E5-2640v2 xeons (~$100/ea, v1's are ~$50/ea) and 128GB of memory (~$300 or ~$19/dimm at 8GB) in it.

 

So there are plenty of deals out there to be found.

[Guest]

My ML10v2/QNAP bundle runs Plex for me and my Dl380G5 and X3500 M4 are used for messing around. At the moment they're configured for Veeam Availability DR testing.

 

Storage and email and everything is O365 because it's just easier.

 

What were you wanting to learn?

[GDRRiley]

I got 2 but nether are quite up and running (1 I have given up one once or twice to do getting an OS to work on it). I have a HP prolaint DL380 G6 with dual quad cores 24gb of ram and 4 300gb+ 4 150GB 1000k SAS HDD both in raid 5s to be a compute heavy server (games, maybe render box, ec).

My 'new' is a Cisco Security Multiservices Platform server that is going to be my plex box with 6 1tb drives in a raid 6 for that and then 16+1 (2tb older Seagate constellations are 50$ each so may get some for my B-day) live spare in raid 6 for mass storage. (I wanted a disk shelf but this was cheap at my local e-recycling place). Its got a single E5420 and 12gb of ram.

This is all done for me to lean and to have something over kill.

[arnavvr]

16 hours ago, Bananasplit_00 said:

i havent found use for even the 1TB of storage in my NAS, what are you going to be using this for?  how many damn files do you need to store?  

Storing all the 4K 60fps porn.