Server/Nas build reality check

[gam3ra]

I’m currently thinking about replacing my dated Hardware and building a new Server for my home needs, consolidating my current hardware into one machine and I need a reality check / your help..

My current Setup:
MacMini (Late2007) 2.0 GHz Core2Duo
Qnap TS-410 with 3x1.5TB Raid 5 (degraded since 1 HD died couple of weeks ago) 1x2.0TB

Things I want to do with it / I’m doing currently:
*Store all my media (Music/Movies/…)
*SabNZB
*Sickbeard
*Subsonic Server -> stream to iPhone/Laptop when on the road
*Plex Server -> stream to second 2007 MacMini / iPhone
*iTunes Server -> Stream to aTV3 & iPhone
*OpenVPN Server -> tap to see my iTunes library over VPN
*Apache -> mostly to do port-rewrites
*DNS Server

The components I’m currently looking at:
Mainboard: Intel DH87RL
CPU: Intel Core i5
HDDs: 4TB WD Red
SSD for OS: 256GB Samsung -> already own it
Ram: 8GB Kingston Value
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 Black


Since the server should be on 24/7 I want it (I assume like everybody else..) low power when idle but able to transcode for example an 1080p Video in Plex for iPhone use when I’m on the road… What Do you think about the components?

What I’m really struggling with is which OS to choose and how to configure the HDD’s. I’d like to start with two WDRed 4TB and add another two later on (Maybe I should start with and can afford three from the beginning…) I can’t get my head around how I should „pool“ the drives so I can later expand the storage…

If I look at my usecase I think all of this can be done with Linux (don’t really know the status of daap, yet). What do you think?

If I had money to burn I would buy a new MacMini with a fully equipped Drobo5D - but that’s out of the question…

Thanks for reading and any input is welcome

 

[Turick]

Well, I just built a FreeNAS server with the specs listed in this thread. So far I'm extremely happy with it. The main benefit of FreeNAS is arguably the ZFS file system. Out of the box, it comes with the following plugins:

• Bacula SD - Backup is a set of backup / recovery / verification scripts. 5.2.12_3
• Bit Torrent - Transmission is a cross-platform BitTorrent client 2.82
• CouchPotato - An automatic NZB and torrent downloader. 1.0
• CrashPlan - CrashPlan backs up data to remote servers, other computers, or hard drives. 3.5.3
• DLNA / UPnP - MiniDLNA server, fully compliant with DLNA/UPnP-AV clients. 1.1.0_1
• mt-daapd - FireFly media server streams digital music to Roku / iTunes servers 1696_8
• ownCloud - Owncloud is a system for the creation and management of personal cloud resources. 5.0.12
• Plex Media Server - The popular Plex Media Server 0.9.8.10.215
• SABnzbd - SABnzbd is an Open Source Binary Newsreader 0.7.14
• SickBeard - Sick Beard is a PVR for newsgroup users. 1.0

Subsonic can be installed as a stand alone installation. FreeNAS is basically FreeBSD, so you can setup dns/apache. It comes with a web interface for management, so I'm assuming it's running Apache.

You only need a flash drive for the OS, but they recommend 4GB RAM + 1GB for every TB of storage. Seems to have a pretty big following and the performance is amazing.

I was having issues when my Netgear ReadyNAS was being read from and written to at the same time. If I were watching a video, it would start buffering and acting like a jerk. On FreeNAS, at one point I was restoring a 1TB volume, copying files both directions and streaming HD videos on two different machines with no stuttering or buffering.

 

[gam3ra]

Thanks for your reply Turick,

Freenas looks really good. I think the first step is going to familiarize myself with the pros and cons and have a look at the components you used for your server..

Cheers

 

[Turick]

So here's a thread I started over at anandtech:

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2352840

I had several people telling me NOT to buy any server grade equipment or ECC RAM and it was a complete waste of money.

I went to verify these statements over on the FreeNAS forums and was pretty much publicly ridiculed. They are adamant about ECC only and buying professional grade equipment. Some of their reasoning is a little weak... like consumer grade motherboards use cheap capacitors and aren't meant to stay on 24/7 (my HTPC uses a "gaming" motherboard and hasn't been shut off in years). They also argue that a bit flip on non-ECC ram can wreck a ZFS volume, however the people on Anandtech state that the remote, rare chance that a bit flip ever happens, it is an even smaller chance it will happen during a write operation, and on a volume that mainly stores movies and tv shows, you're talking about one pixel being off for one frame.

Well, that might be true for uncompressed video, but the guys over at FreeNAS are pretty convinced you could lose your entire array over bit flips. I was about to go the non-ECC route, but had somebody offer up 16GB of ECC RAM for really cheap ($85), and the SuperMicro motherboards are actually really cheap too, so I just went the safe route with that hardware.

Good luck with your research!

 

[00Roush]

From what I have seen the FreeNAS forums can get pretty opinionated. Especially about hardware requirements. ECC topic seems to always get folks stirred up. My opinion is it all depends on how important your data is to you. In general consumer grade hardware works great until it doesn't... LOL For some the extra cost for enterprise hardware (ECC, server MB) is worth the extra insurance.

You might want to give NAS4Free a look too if you are considering FreeNAS. It is the continuation of the original FreeNAS 7 series project after Xi Systems bought FreeNAS name. I have found it provides better performance for me and is easier to use versus FreeNAS 9. Just my opinion though.

For your disks it sort of does depend on how important your data is. If more important do a RAID 1 mirror (2 x 4TB). Then down the road you can add sets of 2 x 4TB disk mirrors to add more space. If data is not as important you can do a RAID 5 or 6 (RAIDZ1 or RAIDZ2 for ZFS) setup to gain more space vs mirror setup. However that would require 3 or more disks to initially setup.

NOTE: Some OSes and file systems support adding disks to a RAID 5/6 array but ZFS does not yet support direct expansion of a RAIDZ pool like going from a 3 x 4TB RAIDZ to a 4 x 4TB RAIDZ. Instead to expand a ZFS setup it generally is recommended that a new set of disks equal in number and size to the existing setup be added. So to expand a 3 x 4TB RAIDZ (RAID 5) pool you would want to add another 3 x 4TB set. Technically you can add disks to a zpool in any manner you want to but for best performance and proper redundancy sets of disks similar to existing is recommended.

Let us know how it goes.

00Roush

 

[GTvert90]

You have to give open media vault .5 with snapraid a look as well

Sent from my LG-VS980 using Tapatalk

 

[obarthelemy]

My opinion is it all depends on how important your data is to you. In general consumer grade hardware works great until it doesn't... LOL For some the extra cost for enterprise hardware (ECC, server MB) is worth the extra insurance.
00Roush

My take on it: if your data is important to you, you need to do backups anyway. Paying over the odds for ECC on the mobo, then ECC RAM, then pro-grade HDs, you're still less safe than with consumer-grade everything plus a backup. So unless you've got a large budget and are willing to go pro-grade+backup, go consumer-grade+backup instead of pro-grade but backupless.