My first DIY NAS build attempt - HELP!

[calgarychris]

Hi,

Looking to build a box that will do the following:

1. provide file storage accessable to my Boxee Box
2. run Sabnzbd
3. provide backup to my DNS-323
4. act as Time Machine backup device (if possible)
(edit) 5. ability to wake on LAN when mobile sabnzbd triggers magic packet

My current setup is:

DAP-1522 wireless A/P connecting:
Boxee Box
Panasonic TV
the new NAS

upstairs:
Billion 7800N router connecting:
iMac
DNS-323
printer, VoIP etc

I don't think I am seeking too much from this new NAS and have resisted the temptation to load it up with the latest and greatest. I am looking at the following:

ASRock E350M1/USB3 mobo
4 GB RAM
4 x 2TB Hitachi 5K3000 Deskstars
Lian-li PC-Q08
Corsair 430W psu

In spec'ing this, my key concerns were physical footprint, power consumption (it will be on 24/7) and noise. I like the ASRock as it has enough SATA connections and 16GB max RAM, I'm a bit disappointed it's actively cooled. The price point is great and it seems to stack up to the Atom boards okay. I like the Lian-li case for size and layout inside...I chose the Hitachi's based on negative RAID comments about the WD Greens. I would like 4xHDD which means the case can't get much smaller. Anyone have any idea how much power this might draw? I'm guessing around the 40-60w?

My plan is to run either Freenas 7 or Ubuntu server however I have exactly zero Linux experience. Looking for any advise on build spec's and specifically whether anything is not supported by either Freenas or Ubuntu. Can anyone make a recommendation for one over the other? The DIY article on this site seemed to suggest there's a performance gain in using Ubuntu over Freenas, can anyone else confirm? If it weren't for that, I'd probably go the Freenas route for apparent ease of use. I'm not sure if either distro will do all of the above requirements, can anyone advise?

Any help appreciated - I'm looking forward to the challenge of teaching myself a bit and hopefully learning something in the process!

Thanks guys!

 

[thiggins]

I have no recommendation but I'm sure others will. Note that the FreeNAS article you refer to is a bit old, so the conclusions may not still apply. Try searching for FreeNAS in these forums for some advice already given.

 

[GregN]

A few things:

You may want to consider a motherboard that has an Intel NIC integrated, they offer significant performance advantages. The power supply looks like overkill, can probably go smaller.

What are you looking at for Raid level? Planning on software raid or JBOD, the MB doesn't appear to have integrated RAID support, some of the ATOM boards do.

For someone that has no linux experience, I think FreeNAS is the easier solution, it is more or less turn-key and browser administered.

If using software raid and you are up to it, someone (thanks) just posted a link explaining how to use ZFS and FreeNAS. ZFS would allow the mixing of sizes of disks and is easily expanded.

 

[calgarychris]

A few things:

You may want to consider a motherboard that has an Intel NIC integrated, they offer significant performance advantages. The power supply looks like overkill, can probably go smaller.

I haven't been able to find a low power mobo that has Intel integrated NIC but also has USB 3, HDMI and 16GB of RAM. A lot of boards seem to have the Realtek 8111x NIC, does anyone know how well that's supported via Freenas or Ubuntu server? For PSU, I didn't want another little black box sitting on the floor, so I went internal but if you know of any other lower power ones, I'd love to check them out. My other concern was that I wasn't really sure how much power this system'll draw, particularly the initial load from the 4HDDs.

What are you looking at for Raid level? Planning on software raid or JBOD, the MB doesn't appear to have integrated RAID support, some of the ATOM boards do.

I thought the Atom boards only did RAID0 or RAID1...I was looking at RAID5 or ZFS, although I don't know if this mobo has the grunt for that. If I go zfs, I understand I also need significantly more RAM (i.e. 8GB minimum)? My plan was definitely to go software RAID.

For someone that has no linux experience, I think FreeNAS is the easier solution, it is more or less turn-key and browser administered.

Agreed on the Freenas - I guess I was simply looking at the smallnetbuilder article about performance of Ubuntu vs. Freenas and thinking I'd give it a crack. Thanks very much for the links by the way - once I get everything built, I'll have to look into it. I like the idea of expandability going forward, although I would probably need a difference motherboard to add more SATA ports (or deal with less than SATA3 throughput).

Thanks - any idea if SABnzbd will work with Freenas?

 

[GregN]

I haven't been able to find a low power mobo that has Intel integrated NIC but also has USB 3, HDMI and 16GB of RAM. A lot of boards seem to have the Realtek 8111x NIC, does anyone know how well that's supported via Freenas or Ubuntu server? For PSU, I didn't want another little black box sitting on the floor, so I went internal but if you know of any other lower power ones, I'd love to check them out. My other concern was that I wasn't really sure how much power this system'll draw, particularly the initial load from the 4HDDs.

FreeBSD (base OS of FreeNAS) supports Realtek, it is just not as considerate of the CPU - the intel offloads alot of the network grunt work, and works with everything.

Why HDMI?

I'd recommend eSATA over USB3 for a NAS box.

Most 1U and Mini-ITX boxes I've seen go with a 200-250W PSU, more than enough to support 4 drives. If you are concerned, check and see if the mb bios will stagger the SATA spin-up. Sata Controllers often do.

I thought the Atom boards only did RAID0 or RAID1...I was looking at RAID5 or ZFS, although I don't know if this mobo has the grunt for that. If I go zfs, I understand I also need significantly more RAM (i.e. 8GB minimum)? My plan was definitely to go software RAID.

My mistake, Atom boards will do RAID 5&10 - but under Windows, not Linux or BSD. Getting a used RAID controller off of EBay is a choice, you'll definitely get staggered spin-up, and the security of hardware raid.

Buffering is significant in any NAS, I recommend as much memory as possible ( up to your pain threshold ). The difference between 4GB and 8GB is like night and day.

Agreed on the Freenas - I guess I was simply looking at the smallnetbuilder article about performance of Ubuntu vs. Freenas and thinking I'd give it a crack. Thanks very much for the links by the way - once I get everything built, I'll have to look into it. I like the idea of expandability going forward, although I would probably need a difference motherboard to add more SATA ports (or deal with less than SATA3 throughput).

As Tim pointed out, those figures are out of date There are plans in the works to get NASPT results for all the significant DIY OSes, hopefully soon. If you are going to use this as an appliance, I recommend an appliance OS, it will make your life easier.

Thanks - any idea if SABnzbd will work with Freenas?

When checking compatibility of various packages, when looking at FreeNAS, check compatibility against the OS, FreeBSD.

http://blog.ramondeklein.nl/index.php/2010/07/25/install-sabnzbd-on-freebsd/

 

[calgarychris]

Thanks for the reply - lots of helpful info! Any specific recommendations for the motherboard? I initially spec'd out an i3 2100T but then it ended up being a bit pricey for what I want it to be - essentially a file server with SABnzbd running 24/7. I want to keep it to mini-ITX as well - something about the footprint appeals to me.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not fussed either way USB3 over eSATA - this motherboard supports both but I'm hoping to have internal drives for everything. With regards to the PSU, the Corsair seemed like it was getting good reviews, any recommendations?

I'll take your comment on RAM to heart - it's not that much more to bump up to 8GB, although I'll probably resist the temptation to go to 16, it somehow seems wrong that my little filebox gets 4x the RAM of my iMac that's running Photoshop. And by wrong I mean the wife will not be happy

Sorry to be a complete noob, I'm assuming when you refer to "applicance" and "appliance OS" you're saying, "if you want to run a NAS then run NAS specific OS"? Thanks for the posting on sabnzbd and Freenas, that might tip me over to Freenas...the simplicity is worth any reduction in capabilities? As I read through the Ubuntu server docs, I'm getting the sense that there's a ton of stuff in it that I'll never think about using - web servers, mail servers etc etc...if Freenas is easy to use, runs sab and has a gui, that's probably good enough for me! Most people I'm reading from are resisting version 8 - any opinion?

 

[GregN]

Thanks for the reply - lots of helpful info! Any specific recommendations for the motherboard? I initially spec'd out an i3 2100T but then it ended up being a bit pricey for what I want it to be - essentially a file server with SABnzbd running 24/7. I want to keep it to mini-ITX as well - something about the footprint appeals to me.

Funny, that was where I had headed, the i3's, after finding no Atom with either USB3 or RAID 5. The price of the motherboards is about the same, but not inclusive of the processor...

I'm a big fan of SuperMicro, they have mini-itx server MB's, the X9SCV-Q-O I3 board hits on all marks but price. The X7SPA-H-D525, hard to find, I used for a pfSense build and it is a champ ( 4Gig limit), good price

To be perfectly honest, I'm not fussed either way USB3 over eSATA - this motherboard supports both but I'm hoping to have internal drives for everything. With regards to the PSU, the Corsair seemed like it was getting good reviews, any recommendations?

I like the corsair modulars, 7yr warranty, great efficiency, what is not to love? I just went with a Corsair HX750 for a SAN build, but that was for dual xeon, 20 drive build. Sparkle makes a 80+ Green 250W, when doing Atom, I've generally gone with the PSU that comes with the case, so I don't have a recommendation. ( these guys do tho )

I'm assuming when you refer to "appliance" and "appliance OS" you're saying, "if you want to run a NAS then run NAS specific OS"?

I guess my recommendation here is to keep it simple, using task specific OS for that task is simplier, and limits the temptation to overload functionality. Folks have talked about running a router distro, DB server, Webserver, and NAS all on the same uberbox. Makes it significantly more difficult to maintain and support.

Have you looked at Nexentastor? Opensolaris based, ZFS, and turnkey - I hear great things about it, but haven't any hands on, but I think this is a significant trend in NASes (and... http://forums.sabnzbd.org/viewtopic.php?t=1597 )

 

[stevech]

For a DIY: Is there any freeware/cheap shareware, for Windows or Linux, that has the key features of the GUI-based software in QNAP and Synology?

 

[calgarychris]

Funny, that was where I had headed, the i3's, after finding no Atom with either USB3 or RAID 5. The price of the motherboards is about the same, but not inclusive of the processor...

I'm a big fan of SuperMicro, they have mini-itx server MB's, the X9SCV-Q-O I3 board hits on all marks but price. The X7SPA-H-D525, hard to find, I used for a pfSense build and it is a champ ( 4Gig limit), good price

Thanks for that - I'll look into SuperMicro! Just when you think the research is over....

I like the corsair modulars, 7yr warranty, great efficiency, what is not to love? I just went with a Corsair HX750 for a SAN build, but that was for dual xeon, 20 drive build. Sparkle makes a 80+ Green 250W, when doing Atom, I've generally gone with the PSU that comes with the case, so I don't have a recommendation. ( these guys do tho )

I looked at Corsair and the 430W v2 seemed to get a decent review. I took a quick buzz at the link you provided, but some of the reviews didn't seem that unbiased and some were also quite old. Useful to compare though, so thanks for that. I've never actually paid *any* attention to PSUs! It's been a fun research project actually (learning about all this stuff is at least 50% of why I'm building rather than buying a QNAP or even the HP Micro server)

I guess my recommendation here is to keep it simple, using task specific OS for that task is simplier, and limits the temptation to overload functionality. Folks have talked about running a router distro, DB server, Webserver, and NAS all on the same uberbox. Makes it significantly more difficult to maintain and support.

Sensible recommendation. I'm curious out Ubuntu server, but perhaps I should keep my first foray into Linux simple. Or relatively so...

Have you looked at Nexentastor? Opensolaris based, ZFS, and turnkey - I hear great things about it, but haven't any hands on, but I think this is a significant trend in NASes (and... http://forums.sabnzbd.org/viewtopic.php?t=1597 )

Thanks - I think I'll keep it to Freenas (which has zfs does it not?) or Ubuntu server...I thought Opensolaris was dead? Anyway, if I learn Linux well enough, maybe that'll be my next build

Thanks again for all your help - I'll check out SuperMicro and then I think it's time to go shopping!

Cheers,
Chris

 

[GregN]

Thanks - I think I'll keep it to Freenas (which has zfs does it not?) or Ubuntu server...I thought Opensolaris was dead? Anyway, if I learn Linux well enough, maybe that'll be my next build

OpenSolaris is now dead, Oracle 86'd it, but derivatives still live, and need to be maintained separately (Bummer). Nexenta and OpenIndiana are both in that category.

ZFS was a Sun innovation, and stock FreeNAS does not have ZFS. My understanding ( admittedly shallow ) is that currently the enterprise version of Nexentastor is suppose to be the best implementation ( all the bells and whistles, RAID-Z2, Deduplication, etc )

The Nexentastor community version does have limitations, like 18TB.

Let us know how you get on....

 

[00Roush]

I think the setup you listed in your first post would work great. The price of the CPU/Motherboard is very good and it should be able to offer enough performance for what you need. I should however note that the AMD Athlon II X2 CPUs and the Intel i3 CPUs also can consume low amounts of power. Idle power consumption can get fairly close to the Atom and Brazos setups. So in your quest for low power consumption remember you are not just tied to the Atom and Brazos platforms.

The Corsair power supplies are well regarded... as an alternative the Antec Earthwatts 380w and 430w power supplies also have a fairly good reputation.

Generally more memory is better but in my opinion moving from 4 GB to 8 GB is not really going to make much of a difference in your case. It can certainly help with performance but I doubt you will be moving enough data to really notice a difference.

As for an OS... NexentaStor community edition is at the top of my list for performance and ease of use. The downside is not as much hardware is supported. A close second is FreeNAS 7 which does support ZFS but based on some previous testing it does not seem to perform quite as well as NexentaStor when using ZFS. So far I have not tested FreeNAS 8 so I cannot comment much on it. It has been quite a while since I messed around with Ubuntu but after following the instructions outlined in this article to install Webmin I found Ubuntu was fairly easy to setup. One very nice thing about Ubuntu is it is popular so if you ever have any questions you can most likely find an answer online.

I should also point out that FreeNAS 7 is one of the quickest OSes to get up and running. I can download it, burn it to a CD, load up the Live-CD, build a ZFS RAIDZ pool and share it on the network in less than 15 min. I always recommend people start with FreeNAS since it requires no installation and is so easy to test out.

Hope that helps a little.

00Roush

 

[calgarychris]

I think the setup you listed in your first post would work great. The price of the CPU/Motherboard is very good and it should be able to offer enough performance for what you need. I should however note that the AMD Athlon II X2 CPUs and the Intel i3 CPUs also can consume low amounts of power. Idle power consumption can get fairly close to the Atom and Brazos setups. So in your quest for low power consumption remember you are not just tied to the Atom and Brazos platforms.

The Corsair power supplies are well regarded... as an alternative the Antec Earthwatts 380w and 430w power supplies also have a fairly good reputation.

Sweet, thanks for that! I initially was looking at an i3 build based on the 2100T but ultimately, the price ended up being $100 more and I wasn't sure if I'd really need the extra grunt for what is essentially a glorified file server. Particularly when I look at what higher spec SOHO NASes are packing, they're mostly using Atom processors, so I figured this board would be more than enough. I'll look at the Antec psu's - to be honest, I've never really researched psu's, I've always just taken what was given with the case...

Generally more memory is better but in my opinion moving from 4 GB to 8 GB is not really going to make much of a difference in your case. It can certainly help with performance but I doubt you will be moving enough data to really notice a difference.

Most of my transfers are one time large transfers of say 10-20GB and then just reading media files from my Boxee Box...I can't imagine that's too demanding, as I am currently using my DNS-323 for the same purpose and it has no problems...My problems occur when trying to do simultaneous reads and writes over wireless, which I'm sure will still be an issue with this box.

As for an OS... NexentaStor community edition is at the top of my list for performance and ease of use. The downside is not as much hardware is supported. A close second is FreeNAS 7 which does support ZFS but based on some previous testing it does not seem to perform quite as well as NexentaStor when using ZFS. So far I have not tested FreeNAS 8 so I cannot comment much on it. It has been quite a while since I messed around with Ubuntu but after following the instructions outlined in this article to install Webmin I found Ubuntu was fairly easy to setup. One very nice thing about Ubuntu is it is popular so if you ever have any questions you can most likely find an answer online.

I think based on your feedback and GregN's I'll start with Freenas. Initially I was going to try Ubuntu (for the challenge, additional functionality and performance difference mentioned in the NAS articles on the SNB site) but it sounds like Freenas has improved enough that the differences are pretty minor. I'm thinking I might give ZFS a crack, so I'll go for the 8GB of RAM...

I should also point out that FreeNAS 7 is one of the quickest OSes to get up and running. I can download it, burn it to a CD, load up the Live-CD, build a ZFS RAIDZ pool and share it on the network in less than 15 min. I always recommend people start with FreeNAS since it requires no installation and is so easy to test out.

That's now my plan, now I just need to order components and do the build! My plan is to run the os from a USB motherboard header and I'll just keep the four drives for data...Here's hoping I can get it working!

Has anyone out there ordered from pccasegear? They seem to have all my components and decent prices...

Thanks again guys!

Chris

 

[Hydaral]

The Nexentastor community version does have limitations, like 18GB.

18TB not 18GB.

 

[GregN]

18TB not 18GB.

Yep, my mistake, order of magnitude off. ( failure to proof )

 

[calgarychris]

Order sent!

Hey guys,

Just wanted to say a quick thanks - here's what I ultimately bOught:

Asus e35m1 Deluxe (couldn't wait for the Asrock boards to get in stock
8Gb of G.Skill RAM
Lian-li PC-q08b case
Corsair 430w psu
4x Hitachi 5k3000 deskstar HDDs

Here's hoping it's a smooth install - I'll keep you posted!

Thanks again!

Chris

 

[GregN]

Hey guys,

Just wanted to say a quick thanks - here's what I ultimately bOught:

Asus e35m1 Deluxe (couldn't wait for the Asrock boards to get in stock
8Gb of G.Skill RAM
Lian-li PC-q08b case
Corsair 430w psu
4x Hitachi 5k3000 deskstar HDDs

Here's hoping it's a smooth install - I'll keep you posted!

Thanks again!

Chris

Chris,

Yas gotta update for us? Put it all together?

 

[calgarychris]

Chris,

Yas gotta update for us? Put it all together?

Yes, I'm having problems! Big surprise...sorry for the delay, I've been away...

Here's what happened - the hardware's been put together and I've connected it to my 54" Panasonic via HDMI - I can access the BIOS okay.

In terms of getting Freenas loaded, sadly that's where I'm stuck. The NAS doesn't have a CD-ROM so I'm trying to install from CD to USB stick via my laptop and I'm having problems.

Firstly, a question - embedded or full O/S? I would like to be able to install SABnzbd which I think requires a full install, but I am not sure if I can do a full install on a USB stick (8GB). For the moment, I was going to try doing an embedded install with the swap and data partitions on the USB stick.

1. When I do the embedded install with swap and data I get an error (I believe it's allocating more space than available on the stick to the partitions).

2. Failing to get the above working, I have tried just doing the embedded install to the stick and I get the following after choosing source and destination locations:

Mount CDROM.
Installing system image on device da0.

gzip: stdout: Broken pipe
Error: Failed to dd image on '/dev/da0'!
Unmount CDROM
There was a problem while copying files

Press Enter to continue

Any ideas?

Thanks
Chris

 

[GregN]

Mount CDROM.
Installing system image on device da0.

gzip: stdout: Broken pipe
Error: Failed to dd image on '/dev/da0'!
Unmount CDROM
There was a problem while copying files

Press Enter to continue

Any ideas?

Thanks
Chris

Looks like the unzip is unable to pipe to another command....

First you want Full O/S not the embedded version, the very small footprint embedded version will not take full advantage of your hardware and is generally installed on a flash card.

Take a look at Dennis Wood's sticky on pfSense, it does a good job of explaining how to do an install using a mem stick. 'mem pfSense is freeBSD too.

You have to get an img file and then format the stick with it.

He explains.

Hope that helps.

 

[calgarychris]

Looks like the unzip is unable to pipe to another command....

First you want Full O/S not the embedded version, the very small footprint embedded version will not take full advantage of your hardware and is generally installed on a flash card.

Take a look at Dennis Wood's sticky on pfSense, it does a good job of explaining how to do an install using a mem stick. 'mem pfSense is freeBSD too.

You have to get an img file and then format the stick with it.

He explains.

Hope that helps.

Thanks GregN - I actually managed to get it working onto the USB stick and booting from the laptop (although I have to select the USB manually, not ideal). I chose the Install full version + Data + Swap. The issue appeared to be that the USB stick needed to be formatted to FAT not FAT32 (I believe I used 512 or default size) and also that I had to have a second USB stick in the system so that the installation CD didn't write the config file to the USB stick I was trying to install to. Confusing...? Yeah...

Anyway, here's my question - in terms of swap size, is it required and if so, what would you guys recommend? My system is as posted above, with 8GB of RAM, planning to use ZFS and run 4x2TB HDD. Thoughts?

Much appreciated!

Thanks
Chris

 

[GregN]

Chris, glad you were able to resolve the issue. I do find it handy to have a usb DVD drive around just for occasions like this ( and for fixing folk's netbooks, etc )

Anyway, here's my question - in terms of swap size, is it required and if so, what would you guys recommend? My system is as posted above, with 8GB of RAM, planning to use ZFS and run 4x2TB HDD. Thoughts?

The old rule of thumb is 2x RAM size, the current recommendation is, if memory is greater than 2GB, then 1x size of ram.

My rule is, what the hell, if I have the disk space to spare 2xRAM, if I don't I go with 1xRAM.

No it isn't required, and most modern OS's are very comfortable inside 8GB of main memory and the swap won't be used, but my feeling is better to have some swap and not use it, then need it, and not have it be there.

I forget, do you have a separate system disk ( this I do strongly recommend )