FreeNAS Build Help

[JAM3RzZ]

Hi All!

 

I'm looking to build myself a new NAS, The absolute maximum i'll spend is £700 (Already have some WD red Drives)

 

Main uses will include

• Plex Media Server
• Backup for Windows Machines
• Photo,Music and Document backup backup
• Mass Storage for my home network
• Couch Potatoe Server
• SickRage Server (SickBeard Fork)
• Torrent Box
• LightWeight VirtualMachines (Linux /Windows)

 

And Some Hardware i've been looking at:

 

• Corsair SF series SF450 450W
• Crucial CT102472BD160B 8GB x2
•  

 

I've been looking into some MOBO's with CPU's Soldered on to them i.e ASROCK C2750D4I but have heard a mixture of good and bad things would love to get everyones thoughts and experiences aswell with free nas.

 

Thanks in advance!

 

James

 

[NTDaws]

PCPartPicker part list: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PmVq6X
Price breakdown by merchant: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PmVq6X/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel - Xeon E5-2609 V4 1.7GHz 8-Core Processor  (£281.43 @ BT Shop) 
CPU Cooler: Noctua - NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler  (£43.59 @ Kustom PCs) 
Motherboard: ASRock - X99 Extreme4 ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  (£176.21 @ Amazon UK) 
Memory: Crucial - Ballistix Sport LT 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  (£80.17 @ Amazon UK) 
Case: Silverstone - GD09B HTPC Case  (£69.95 @ Overclockers.co.uk) 
Power Supply: Corsair - CXM 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£68.79 @ Alza) 
Total: £720.14
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-02-05 17:57 GMT+0000

[Windows7ge]

I can verify that FreeNAS will do at least 1/2 of the system tasks you just listed. Although in my experience Bhyve (FreeNAS included VM software) is a bit iffy with anything linux. My efforts to run Ubuntu on one have proven futile. Windows runs well with appropriate tweaks but Ubuntu had issues I couldn't solve.

 

The ASRock C2750D4I is a board I previously ran with FreeNAS. Worked very well but it only has one PCI_e x8 slot so you have very limited expansion. However it has MASS SATA ports and FreeNAS will RAID them regardless of controller without a care.

 

You will want ECC memory and a CPU with ECC support. Which the board you picked it's CPU does support ECC and uses Unbuffered DIMMs which you picked so you're good there.

 

If you have any more specific questions I might be able to help further like with configuring RAID, partitioning, zvol, using Bhyve, setting up SSH, user accounts, groups, file shares, enabling services, SMB3.0 Multichannel (if you ever want network speeds beyond 1Gbit without going 10Gbit).

[Thermosman]

The fractal design node 804 is great for a nas becuase it can hold a lot of drives

[dalekphalm]

47 minutes ago, Being Delirious said:

PCPartPicker part list: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PmVq6X
Price breakdown by merchant: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PmVq6X/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel - Xeon E5-2609 V4 1.7GHz 8-Core Processor  (£281.43 @ BT Shop) 
CPU Cooler: Noctua - NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler  (£43.59 @ Kustom PCs) 
Motherboard: ASRock - X99 Extreme4 ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  (£176.21 @ Amazon UK) 
Memory: Crucial - Ballistix Sport LT 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  (£80.17 @ Amazon UK) 
Case: Silverstone - GD09B HTPC Case  (£69.95 @ Overclockers.co.uk) 
Power Supply: Corsair - CXM 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£68.79 @ Alza) 
Total: £720.14
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-02-05 17:57 GMT+0000

Seems a bit excessive to go with an X99 build, and then not go with ECC RAM. While not entirely necessary, FreeNAS very much prefers ECC RAM. That's because this is how FreeNAS ensures data integrity.

 

Essentially, if there is a discrepancy between data in RAM and on disk, it will ALWAYS assume that RAM is correct.

 

So that means if the Data in disk is totally fine, but you encounter a random bit-flip in memory (admittedly fairly rare), then FreeNAS will actually OVERWRITE the good data with a corrupted file.

 

Unfortunately, there's not much other cost savings to be had in that build, without dropping down to the consumer chipset. But if you're not going with ECC RAM, you might as well save $90 Pounds and get a Z series MB + an i7-8700 non-K (Or go for a K series, but the price savings drops significantly).

 

The good news is you can get ECC RAM for basically the same price (Kingston Value ECC RAM 1x8GB = $80 Pounds)

 

The 8700 (K or non-K) has 6c/12t, which is totally sufficient for the OP's needs, including light virtualization.

 

@JAM3RzZ I would suggest going with @Being Delirious's build, but swap out the RAM for ECC RAM. If you don't want ECC RAM, drop the CPU and MB, and go with an i7-8600 + the cheapest Z370 board that suits your needs.

[JAM3RzZ]

Thanks for all the help Guys!