[FIRST BUILD] Home media server (now doing Pre-Clear)

*****UPDATED 5/5-14 LOOK LOWER IN THE THREAD*****

I started here in the forum about 2 years ago, when I had just bought a very serious SuperMicro motherboard, that happened to be not compatible with unRAID.

Took quite some time to get to that conclusion and I ended up giving up selling off all the parts and found another solution.

Now that solution is about to run out of space and I need something more permanent, so now it's time to get serious and unRAID!

Been hanging around in the forums from time to time and should now be ready to build.

I have a good deal of parts laying around from different projects, and many of them seems ideal for a build like this.

I want my server to take care of backups from my four other PCs/Mac's, I want it to hold all my pictures, music and movies and I want it to even backup sensitive data to the cloud (preferably Amazon Glacier as I already use that). Plex streaming is a must but transcoding is not super important as I have a pretty powerful gaming rig I could always use to make copies in various formats on.

Lastly, I need it to be a bit cheap as the wife and me are soon moving into a much bigger house and have our second child on the way, so money does not hang on the trees here.

Things I already have:

CPU: Intel i3-3225

RAM: Corsair Vengeance LP CL9 DDR3 2x4GB 1600MHz

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B75N ITX

PSU: Silverstone ST30SF 300Watt semi-fanless

HDDs: Hitachi 5K3000 2x2TB + 1x3TB

USB key: Sandisk Cruzer Fit 16GB

...and a bunch of StarTech SATA3 cables

So basically I already have all the components for a working unRAID free setup with three drives, it's just not assembled yet.

The 4TB this will give me is already 1 TB more than what I have now in my current solution so I will be set for some time. But now when I am at it I need room to expand!

Things I ordered:

Sometime last week I placed an order for the awesome case, Silverstone DS380.

I know the provided fans and they are not very silent, so I want to step the noise down a notch, therefor I also ordered 3x Noctua NF-S12A ULN fans and a better CPU cooler, the Noctua NH-L9i. I know the stock Intel cooler would have been good enough, but not when I know that something better is out there that does not cost that much extra.......

Problem is that the case was backordered so I am currently waiting till maybe mid this coming week before it all arrives

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For those who might ask, now I will just use the 4 SATA ports already on my motherboard, when I need a 5th I will figure out what expansion card to get. But there is all the time new ones coming out and upgrades in the firmware being made so more and more are supported so no need to figure it out before I need to.

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I have made a little drawing of how my machines compare in size: Gaming rig, server, media center, a soda can and a mac mini:

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Total cost according to PC Parts Picker without the USB drive and the two 2TB drives (because they are not in their list) is $739

                                                                                                                                                                                                      ______

I think that is EXTREMELY good value for a reliable 4TB server with parity and room to expand!

Now Im just waiting to receive parts...... I hate waiting

When I wait for the case to arrive, I just calculated how much power the build should in the end use (when HBA and all 8 discs have arrived sometime later on).

269 Watt recommended PSU so my 300 Watt'er should be able to handle it very well.

You might wonder why I have put 8 green drives and 1 5400RPM drive on there (the SSD is the cache drive later on). Reason is that the same machine for now actually has a Hitachi 500GB 2.5" drive installed with OS X, so it also works as a full functional hackintosh desktop when I need it to be (will disable the drive in bios when I don't need it so unraid does not get confused).

Nice setup ... although I'd buy a 4TB instead of 3 for parity (I assume you're purchasing this drive, since you indicated the 2 2TB's weren't on the list, but didn't mention this one).

Also, that system won't come CLOSE to the power figures you indicated => not sure what parameters you fed into the power estimator, or if it's just wrong, but I'd be very surprised to see that system ever go over 125w or so of power consumption, even with all 8 drives installed and spinning.

You may have gone a bit overboard on fan replacements ... but as you noted, for a few $$ you can be SURE you have the quietest fans, so why not 

Nice setup ... although I'd buy a 4TB instead of 3 for parity (I assume you're purchasing this drive, since you indicated the 2 2TB's weren't on the list, but didn't mention this one).

 

Also, that system won't come CLOSE to the power figures you indicated => not sure what parameters you fed into the power estimator, or if it's just wrong, but I'd be very surprised to see that system ever go over 125w or so of power consumption, even with all 8 drives installed and spinning.

 

You may have gone a bit overboard on fan replacements ... but as you noted, for a few $$ you can be SURE you have the quietest fans, so why not 

I already have the 3TB Hitachi drive, but yes I will swap it out for a 4TB whenever I think the price is right.

The power estimator works with a lot of pre-configured components you just pick and choose and it gives a value. But GREAT if I could keep the power as low as possible, specially also because the fan on the PSU only kicks in if it's above 55C in heat (and that could maybe happen if you are right about the wattage).

I actually just bought one more component

Makes it possible for me to mount my boot USB and my Bluetooth adapter (for when i'm running it in OS X mode) inside the case to not block the few USB ports I have outside.

Who else have a 32+TB (if it was all 4TB drives) NAS/Mac combination with build in bluetooth? ...that must be a first

I NEED ADVICE

I now have the option of either using a DualCore Intel i3-3225, a i3-2120 or a AMD A8-5500.

Personally I really like the idea about the 5500 as it seems to use give good performance compared to its price.

The biggest selling points for the Intels is that my motherboard has two NICs so I can do teaming, they offer more CPU power and that setup has 8GB of RAM.

The AMD has only 4GB RAM and gives a little less performance than the Intel - but it comes with 7 build in SATA6 ports!

Will a very basic file server running unRAID benefit from the advantages the Intel might have?

...or would it be a lot more fun to save on HBAs and just add drives (almost) as I please in my Silverstone DS380?

Depends on your priorities.  I have used both of those Intel CPUs with unRAID and have been very happy with them.  There's enough power for a bit of transcoding (probably not for multiple HD streams concurrently though) and they idle at very low power. 

I now have the option of either using a DualCore Intel i3-3225, a i3-2120 or a AMD A8-5500.

Neither of the above ... use a Haswell Core i3 (e.g. an i3-4330) and get even more CPU power while running at even lower power levels (Haswell's are VERY efficient at low CPU utilizations).    This is an excellent Haswell motherboard with 6 SATA ports:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132032

If you've already got the CPU's you listed and the motherboards to support them, then the A8-5500 would be okay, and wouldn't require any added hardware purchases.    But given a choice, I'd definitely go with the i3's ... and if you haven't actually purchased everything yet, I'd spend a few more $$ and go with Haswell components.

I now have the option of either using a DualCore Intel i3-3225, a i3-2120 or a AMD A8-5500.

 

Neither of the above ... use a Haswell Core i3 (e.g. an i3-4330) and get even more CPU power while running at even lower power levels (Haswell's are VERY efficient at low CPU utilizations).    This is an excellent Haswell motherboard with 6 SATA ports:  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132032

 

If you've already got the CPU's you listed and the motherboards to support them, then the A8-5500 would be okay, and wouldn't require any added hardware purchases.    But given a choice, I'd definitely go with the i3's ... and if you haven't actually purchased everything yet, I'd spend a few more $$ and go with Haswell components.

Sounds very reasonable but i'm trying to keep it in the spirit of unRAID and building a truly awesome low-cost media server, so no money for Haswell this time around.

I already had a Socket 1155 Gigabyte GA-B75N motherboard and the 3225 i3, but a friend had the AMD A8-5500 he is trying to sell and I could actually use the 3225 in another Pentium machine I have (that are now running on a G2030).

Anyway, I am kind of following your advice and stayed with the 3225 so thanks for that 

TODAY IS THE DAY THAT MY unRAID IS ALIVE!

I spend about 4 hours saturday and a few more Sunday this past weekend on putting my complete unRAID server together.

Right now it sits on my temporary work table (our dinning table actually) until the kids, my wife and me move into our new huge house in a month from now.

I'm so happy my wife lets me play around like this and occupy the whole living room with my techs...

The box is currently pre-clearing the three drives it's holding and omg I had not expected that would take THIS long time to do!

As the drives are brand sparkling new (or at least very close to) I decided to do 3 passes, but if anyone by any chance knows how to change that to 2 pass when its already running then please please please tell me.

The final box contains these components:

CPU: Intel i3-3225

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-L9i (yes the stock cooler would have been fine, but I don't do stock)

RAM: Corsair Vengeance LP CL9 DDR3 1x4GB 1600MHz (originally a 2x4GB pair, but split it up to save money for now)

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-B75N ITX

PSU: Silverstone ST30SF 300Watt semi-fanless

HDDs: Hitachi 5K3000 2x2TB + 1x3TB parity (for a current total of 4TB)

USB key: Sandisk Cruzer Fit 16GB as boot drive (16GB was cheaper than 4 and 8 so why not)

Case: Silverstone DS380 8bay 3.5 +4bay 2.5 ITX NAS case

Fans: Replaced the stock SilverStone fans with Noctua NF-S12A ULN with low noise adapters

...and 3 pcs of StarTech SATA3 cables with latches on both ends and angled plugs in one end.

Installed the current 5.0.5 stable release as I don't feel adventurous with my precious data.

Have installed the add-ons Screens and unMenu so I can control the whole thing with PuTTY and my browser for truly headless awesomeness.

Will add some others later on when it's fully operational.

Because it is now alive, I think its time to put it to rest in this thread and move on in the Compulsive Design department, I can speak forever about this project...

Go look here if it interests you

Thanks guys for the help for now!