My first DIY NAS

[KJaneway]

Hey folks,

after lots of Reading i have decided against Qnap TS439-Pro and want to build a Nas from scratch.

Following toughts and decisions are already done:

Case: Chenbro ES34069 (120W)
HDDs: 4x WD1500EADS (500GB Platter as i hope) (Used in Raid 5 SW Mode with mdadm.
1x WD Scorpio Blue 80GB (for OS)
Ram: 2x 2GB A-DATA Vitesta Extreme DDR 800 Ram (got this one cheaply secon hand)
OS: Ubuntu Server 8.04LTS (falls dieses schon ext4 unterstützt. Ansonsten 9.10 server)

The Question is: Which CPU / Board combination should i use? I would like something like the Intel Executive Series DQ45EK with an E5400 CPU.

With that Config i should have more Power ever needed for a good Raid 5 Performance. But when it comes to cooling i got a Problem:
The Heatsink supplied with the Chenbro is crap (in my Opinion). Next posibility would be the Stockcooler from Intel, which, as i read here, should fit in the Case. The Scythe Big Shuriken with 58mm height seems to be a bit too big for the case, so i will have to return it to the local vendor.

But what would be better: An Active cooling with the Intelcooler, or a passive cooling solution with the Scythe Cooler and 2 60mm Fans installed in the Front and the Top of the Case?

Alternative would be an Atom ION Platform with an Atom N330 Dual Core processor, but I'm not familiar with the Power of that Candidate for a raid 5 SW system.

Hope you could give me some advice.

PS: The NAS should be as quiet as possible.

 

[Jay_S]

I like the specs on the Intel DQ45EK, especially the Intel NIC. You should have no trouble with it in any *nix distro. That's the beauty if Intel NICs - support everywhere.

Re: CPU, there are cheaper Wolfdales than the E5400. Even the Celerons would be fine. Anything from the E3x00 and E5x00 series is a 45nm Wolfdale and should be cool, low-powered and plenty fast for NAS.

I'd be REAL sure those WD green drives are OK with MD software RAID. There's plenty of "don't work with raid" reviews on Newegg.

 

[KJaneway]

Hey Jay,

thanks for the answer.
I Thing i will first stick to my Config. I have made very good experiences with Western Digital Drives. If the don't like the Raid 5 modus, i will try WDTLER.exe to modify the firmware to Raid Drive Firmware.

Anf of course there cheaper wolfdales. But 20EUR wouldn't make that big difference in a System which gets Fans for about 30€

I Think i will try the Thermaltake MeOrb as CPU Cooler. This one seems to be much smaller than the Scythe modell.

 

[HappyBison]

Not all WD1500EADS are 3 platters (I have 3 of WD1500EADS with 4 platters and one WD1500EADS with 3 platters).

Regarding 80GB for OS.. You will have to have 5 SATA connectors. If you need this for NAS only (and not for bunch of other stuff Linux can do), I would suggest to look into FreeNAS ( http://www.freenas.org/ ) to be installed on CF card on ATA bus. That will free up one SATA controller.

I personally use this Chenbro ES34069 case with 4 WD1500EADS, and FreeNAS installed on CF card (ATA controller).

 

[KJaneway]

Hello,

at first I want to say that FreeNAS isn't a real alternative. Here on the site is a Howto which shows that he difference between FreeNAS and Ubuntu is quite big when it comes to speed comparisons.

Also the installation on CF Card is also a nogo, because my chosen Intelboard has exactly 4 SATA Connectors and no IDE Port. So I had to chose wether to buy a PCIE-SATA Controller Card (which i did), or to install the OS on an external USB or ESATA Disk.

 

[HappyBison]

KJaneway,
CF on USB is good choice too.
If you need to put a separate drive for OS, then you could use CF card for it to save on power, noise and improve reliability at the same time.

I don't know what site you were talking when comparing Ubuntu and FreeNAS, but it all depends on how you tune it up. I'm getting good speed using FreeNAS in my own setup (up to 60-70MB/sec or so for writes)

 

[KJaneway]

I am referring to those two articles:

Atom NAS Part1 and Atom NAS Part2.

The intersting citation is "Basically, Ubuntu Server blows the doors off of FreeNAS, with at least 2X write performance in all modes." (from part two, last page).

Do you know if there are any CF to USB Adapters für Internal Usage? I Don't want my OS to be on an external drive.

 

[HappyBison]

I quickly checked those articles. I don't know what was wrong with their setup, but I got different results on my unit.
The articles are kind of old so that may be the reason. They used an old FreeNAS, no mentioning of any tune ups, or maybe something was not setup correctly with the hardware. It does not have any information about it so it may not be configured at all (just left with its defaults).
My 3-4 years old hardware (Pentium-M 1.7GHz) performs better than that with FreeNAS.

Bottom line:
This is just a software so that will be very easy for you to try both and judge it for yourself. You can check the performance and see what will be easier for your to manage (another good factor).

Regarding USB:
yes, some board has USB headers so you can connect USB cable on it and mounted somewhere internally. I still thinks this is better than having a separate mechanical hard disk for OS.

 

[KJaneway]

hello,

i have tested the managing of Ubuntu Server with an Virtual Machine, and found it quite easy to manage the System via console. At first i tried Webmin, but that confused me more that it helped. So i read a few howtos for mdadm and samba.

Until now i have simulated the failure of one single Disk in the Array, the Failure of the Motherboard and the failure of the Operating System. In all Cases it was quite easy to recover the raid.

But as Virtual Machines are extremly comfortable, i will check FreeNAS (and Openfiler to for their managablily. Perhaps i will chose one of them for my NAS.

Regarding USB: Many USB Sticks i own often Produce Dataloss after a few weeks (and i haven't got only the crap from the Discounter. Also OCZ Sticks, etc..). From that point i am a bit aware of USB Sticks in productive uses.
In contrast to that, my external HDD never lost any bit. Freenas would be an Alternative on USB because as far as i know, it is completely written into the systems RAM, but until now i haven't found a way to create a RamDisk dedicated for running Linux while restricting any writes to the USB Stick (except for user-changed Configfiles)

 

[HappyBison]

About USB:
As you already noticed, FreeNAS is loaded once into memory when booted up and works from memory all the time.
My older NAS storage is 24/7, and during 3-4 years of usage I booted my OS a dozen times or less. Normal USB Flash drive should not fail after 10-20 times of read usage only, unless it was factory defective.
If it fails anyway and you keep a backup of your configuration somewhere, it would be very easy to recover by getting a new flash drive and restoring your config.

Hard drives still have a higher rates of failure comparing to flash drives.

 

[KJaneway]

Do you know a method to run ubuntu server only im Ram, (exactly as Freenas)?

Just in case I decide againgst Freenas

 

[HappyBison]

You can check this HOWTO to get an idea on how to setup a ramdisk:
http://www.vanemery.com/Linux/Ramdisk/ramdisk.html

Please note that you may need to modify your managing scripts to save your configuration somewhere else (i.e. your boot flash drive) so it won't be lost on reboot.