NAS build for newbie

[raresoul]

Hi all!!

So i'll try to make this specific as possible. 

I'm a videographer & editor. I also run a small organisation where we create content. I've reached the point where storage is becoming an issue so one of the solutions i've been looking at is building a NAS running FreeNas. 

 

In terms of my requirements, I want to build a media server mainly for storing/logging footage/files with decent transfer speeds locally and remotely. I will eventually want to ensure editors have remote access to the files on the server to download and edit and then uploading it once done. I may also want to look at the possibility of encoding via the server but this isn't a necessity right now.

 

In terms of form factor, i've been considering the Fractal design NODE 304 so i'd like hardware recommendations around ITX boards. I've been getting mixed reviews around durability of standard motherboards vs server motherboards.. soo... I'd like come clarity on thaht if possible. 

 

I'm not limited to ITX but it's an initial preference. I'm looking to have some seagate ironwolf pros or WD reds NAS HDD up to 16TB run in a suitable raid set up. I'll probably begin with 8-12TB. 

 

I'm looking for suggestions on the type of:

PSU

CPU

MB

RAM

 

please provide rationale for suggestions. I don't want to spend a lot. I'd say my budget is £500 excl hard drives. But i'll push more if needed. 

 

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

[Ralphred]

https://www.freenas.org/hardware-requirements/

 

[raresoul]

2 hours ago, Ralphred said:

https://www.freenas.org/hardware-requirements/

 

Thanks but I'm definitely looking for some real world builds similar to my needs. it just helps me map and understand the link between my hardware and requirements

[TVwazhere]

On 10/27/2018 at 10:41 AM, raresoul said:

I'm looking for suggestions on the type of:

PSU

CPU

MB

RAM

I can at least point you to some suggested literature in the form of a Youtuber I follow. 

 

 

You'll note in the time stamped video that Paul mentions AMD R5 2400G's currently do not support ECC memory. Apparently Future AMD PRO APU's will support ECC memory. The R5 2600 and up support ECC memory but they do not have dedicated graphics, meaning you'd need a GPU to display an image. Soehting not very well suited for a NAS when you could use that PCI-E slot for more SATA ports

 

As it turns out however, only the i3's from Intel (at least the mainstream) and the R3 2200G support ECC memory. Which should theoretically be enough for a NAS (4 cores/4 threads) but I'm not sure how much processing power is really needed (If 8 cores is preferred)

 

For PSU you shouldn't need high wattage, just make sure you have enough  SATA Powers plugs which most PSU's 500W and over like a Corsair CX/CXM should have.

[Electronics Wizardy]

On 10/27/2018 at 7:41 AM, raresoul said:

s with decent transfer speeds locally and remotely.

what is decent? 1gbe? 10gbe? 40gbe? FC?

 

On 10/27/2018 at 7:41 AM, raresoul said:

I may also want to look at the possibility of encoding via the server but this isn't a necessity right now.

What do you want to encode with? If you want encoding id look at a os with much better vm support like proxmox, that will allow for a vm for transcoding, and proxmox usses the exact same zfs under the hood

 

On 10/27/2018 at 7:41 AM, raresoul said:

xed reviews around durability of standard motherboards vs server motherboards..

what about durability? All boards will fail, if you need perfect uptime, get a HA setup, but for this use any board should be fine and just keep backups if something goes wrong.

 

On 10/27/2018 at 7:41 AM, raresoul said:

I'm looking for suggestions on the type of:

PSU

CPU

MB

RAM

Id probalby go with something like a pentium here, 8 or 16gb of ram, a b360 board. You really don't need that much computing power.

 

Also look at a premade nas, it looks like a good solution for your use, id get something like this here https://www.amazon.com/TS-431X-2G-USARM-based-Hardware-Encryption-1-7GHz-10GbE/dp/B06WP2K3LM/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1541006109&sr=8-10&keywords=qnap+10gbe

[raresoul]

1 hour ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

what is decent? 1gbe? 10gbe? 40gbe? FC?

 

What do you want to encode with? If you want encoding id look at a os with much better vm support like proxmox, that will allow for a vm for transcoding, and proxmox usses the exact same zfs under the hood

 

what about durability? All boards will fail, if you need perfect uptime, get a HA setup, but for this use any board should be fine and just keep backups if something goes wrong.

 

Id probalby go with something like a pentium here, 8 or 16gb of ram, a b360 board. You really don't need that much computing power.

 

Also look at a premade nas, it looks like a good solution for your use, id get something like this here https://www.amazon.com/TS-431X-2G-USARM-based-Hardware-Encryption-1-7GHz-10GbE/dp/B06WP2K3LM/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1541006109&sr=8-10&keywords=qnap+10gbe

1gbe would be fine but if the cost of a 10gbe on the board was worth it, I'd consider it. But I'm happy with upgrading to 10gbe at a later time when needed. 

 

I read that server grade boards are more suitable for running 24/7. But if anyboard will do, I'd want one with at least 4-6 SATA cables, 1gbe or dual 1bge, ECC ram supported up to 32gb and... I think that's it. 

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, raresoul said:

1gbe would be fine but if the cost of a 10gbe on the board was worth it, I'd consider it. But I'm happy with upgrading to 10gbe at a later time when needed. 

 

I read that server grade boards are more suitable for running 24/7. But if anyboard will do, I'd want one with at least 4-6 SATA cables, 1gbe or dual 1bge, ECC ram supported up to 32gb and... I think that's it. 

Do you really need ecc here? For this use, id probably save the money seing your low budget.

 

Do you have a backup solution in place for this server?

 

Id look at a board like this one https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157817&ignorebbr=1&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-PCPartPicker, LLC-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=

 

Put a pentium in and 8 gb of ram and your good to go. Its one of the cheapest boards that supports 6 sata ports on itx.

 

 

[raresoul]

26 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Do you really need ecc here? For this use, id probably save the money seing your low budget.

 

Do you have a backup solution in place for this server?

 

Id look at a board like this one https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157817&ignorebbr=1&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-PCPartPicker, LLC-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=

 

Put a pentium in and 8 gb of ram and your good to go. Its one of the cheapest boards that supports 6 sata ports on itx.

 

 

Yeah I read that 1GB of ram is needed per 1TB in a ZFS setup which I plan to have. I don't current have a back up for wouldnt want to have my files lost or corrupted hence the ECC ram. I will be getting a backup solution off-site eventually but come to think of it, I do have a harddrive to back it up up to 4TB. 

 

I also want to explore editing off it if possible. So won't I require a better CPU with more cores - And if I plan of using Plex would more cores be better? 

 

If the MB has intel Gbe LAN, I wouldn't need an Intel Nice would I? Unless I wanted to get a 10gbe intel nic? 

 

 

[raresoul]

3 hours ago, TVwazhere said:

I can at least point you to some suggested literature in the form of a Youtuber I follow. 

 

 

You'll note in the time stamped video that Paul mentions AMD R5 2400G's currently do not support ECC memory. Apparently Future AMD PRO APU's will support ECC memory. The R5 2600 and up support ECC memory but they do not have dedicated graphics, meaning you'd need a GPU to display an image. Soehting not very well suited for a NAS when you could use that PCI-E slot for more SATA ports

 

As it turns out however, only the i3's from Intel (at least the mainstream) and the R3 2200G support ECC memory. Which should theoretically be enough for a NAS (4 cores/4 threads) but I'm not sure how much processing power is really needed (If 8 cores is preferred)

 

For PSU you shouldn't need high wattage, just make sure you have enough  SATA Powers plugs which most PSU's 500W and over like a Corsair CX/CXM should have.

Thank you for this. I definitely want to use an intel CPU so just trying to find the best MB and CPU combo. This is for some reason the most difficult part for me lol

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 hour ago, raresoul said:

Yeah I read that 1GB of ram is needed per 1TB in a ZFS setup which I plan to have.

That rule is complete BS, ignore it. Very little ram is actually needed and the rest is a read cache. MOre is better, but for your use here 8gb should be fine since your mainly doing sequentical reads where extra ram really doesn't help much.

 

1 hour ago, raresoul said:

don't current have a back up for wouldnt want to have my files lost or corrupted hence the ECC ram.

ECC is no way replaces the need for a backup. If you want cheap ecc get a used server. You still need a backup

 

1 hour ago, raresoul said:

I also want to explore editing off it if possible. So won't I require a better CPU with more cores -

Editing off the nas won't need a faster cpu, your just copying files around, the cpu won't be doing any video work.

 

1 hour ago, raresoul said:

And if I plan of using Plex would more cores be better? 

Depends on how your using plex and if you need transcoding, if your just doing one or two streams at once the pentium will be fine. If you want fast and cheap get a used server.

 

 

[Jarsky]

It would be near impossible to build a decent system brand new in ITX format with ECC that can be decent at Plex as well. 

 

e.g

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Type	Item	Price
CPU	Intel - Pentium G4560 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor	£85.19 @ Aria PC
CPU Cooler	Noctua - NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler	£43.59 @ Kustom PCs
Motherboard	ASRock - C236 WSI Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard	£190.66 @ More Computers
Memory	Crucial - 16GB (1 x 16GB) DDR4-2400 Memory	£169.90 @ Amazon UK
Case	Lian-Li - PC-Q25B Mini ITX Tower Case	£134.99 @ CCL Computers
Power Supply	Corsair - CXM 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply	£70.68 @ Amazon UK
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£695.01
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-11-01 05:45 GMT+0000

 

This would have 2 x 1gbE nic's which if you have a managed switch you could put in LACP.

It would allow for 7 large HDD's installed, and you could use one of the sata ports for an SSD if you wanted for L2ARC cache. 

It has an internal USB port for the FreeNAS OS. 

That cooler would be good enough to cool a Xeon if you wanted to upgrade to 4C/8T later on - and it has ECC which while not vital for us home users becomes more important for professional users 

[raresoul]

1 hour ago, Jarsky said:

It would be near impossible to build a decent system brand new in ITX format with ECC that can be decent at Plex as well. 

 

e.g

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Type	Item	Price
CPU	Intel - Pentium G4560 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor	£85.19 @ Aria PC
CPU Cooler	Noctua - NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler	£43.59 @ Kustom PCs
Motherboard	ASRock - C236 WSI Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard	£190.66 @ More Computers
Memory	Crucial - 16GB (1 x 16GB) DDR4-2400 Memory	£169.90 @ Amazon UK
Case	Lian-Li - PC-Q25B Mini ITX Tower Case	£134.99 @ CCL Computers
Power Supply	Corsair - CXM 550W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply	£70.68 @ Amazon UK
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£695.01
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-11-01 05:45 GMT+0000

 

This would have 2 x 1gbE nic's which if you have a managed switch you could put in LACP.

It would allow for 7 large HDD's installed, and you could use one of the sata ports for an SSD if you wanted for L2ARC cache. 

It has an internal USB port for the FreeNAS OS. 

That cooler would be good enough to cool a Xeon if you wanted to upgrade to 4C/8T later on - and it has ECC which while not vital for us home users becomes more important for professional users 

I think this combination is what I was looking for! I've had a look and can get most of the parts a lot cheaper new as well! I already have a node 304 case now. Thanks mate! 

What makes you say it'll be near impossible? What would be the limitations of the build listed? 

[Jarsky]

2 minutes ago, raresoul said:

What makes you say it'll be near impossible? What would be the limitations of the build listed? 

 

Just saying its one of those things where you can have "2 of the 3 things" when you're talking about "cheap (500gbp), powerful (plex), compact (itx)" with new parts - I completely overlooked though that the budget wouldnt require a case/psu. 

The parts i recommended though give you room to add another 16GB if needed for more ARC cache, scrubbing, etc...and you can always upgrade later with a Xeon if you need more power if you want to be able to transcode more streams on the fly with plex, or maybe run some VM's. 

[raresoul]

1 hour ago, Jarsky said:

 

Just saying its one of those things where you can have "2 of the 3 things" when you're talking about "cheap (500gbp), powerful (plex), compact (itx)" with new parts - I completely overlooked though that the budget wouldnt require a case/psu. 

The parts i recommended though give you room to add another 16GB if needed for more ARC cache, scrubbing, etc...and you can always upgrade later with a Xeon if you need more power if you want to be able to transcode more streams on the fly with plex, or maybe run some VM's. 

Right right! Would you say the Xeon E3 1241v3 CPU is a good option? This is one I'm currently looking at. 

[Settlerteo]

Well a different choice would be to go for a (one or two of them) Sandy Bridge like xeon 2670 used from ebay(which you can find at a very low cost) and build your system around that.
For PSU and since you don't need graphics power so i assume a low tier card with low wattage consumption would be your choice, then i d say go for any Tier 1 (550-750 Watt) psu you like.

[NelizMastr]

43 minutes ago, raresoul said:

Right right! Would you say the Xeon E3 1241v3 CPU is a good option? This is one I'm currently looking at. 

That's a haswell-r CPU, from 2014. You'll need a socket 1150 motherboard for that which only supports DDR3. If you want socket 1151 you can only use Xeon E3 v5 and v6 chips.

[scristaldi]

I have had experience with FreeNAS and it was not good. Before you purchase make sure you spend time on their forum and check the dates and replies. They also have a 'so called' hardware sheet that is a joke! I spent money purchasing a system and when I had problems all I would get for an answer was 'I needed to replace my flash drives. No other questions or help just replace flash drives. These people "FreeNas" have no idea what they are doing and I do not believe you will disagree once you spend some time on their web.They continue to move the goal posts. Not good at all.

 

Regards