Charles Frank
Dabbler
- Joined
- Dec 24, 2014
- Messages
- 13
Hi folks,
First time poster, though I've been reading these forums for a few weeks now, trying to make up my mind - which is where I hope some of you kind folks come in :) Please bear with me, this might get a little long-winded...
For a few years now I've been using a NAS in the form of a Netgear ReadNAS Duo - but to say it's getting a little long in the tooth is putting it mildly - I'm a big-time consumer of media and my collection outstripped it a LONG time ago (I currently have nearly 200 blu-ray disks of media burned sitting under my desk...) so I want to upgrade to something with a LOT more grunt. Initially I looked at offerings from Synology, then moved on to QNAP (I liked the fact their boxes had a lot more processing power and memory than Synology's for transcoding and plug-ins, plus HDMI out) but then I ran across these forums and you lot scared me lol - talk of potential catastrophic data loss if you weren't using ECC RAM, RAID arrays failing etc. made me look long and hard at the options (I don't have the option of replicating my data off-site or even to another NAS so data integrity and RAID robustness became my major concerns at this point).
I went back to looking at my 'off-the-shelf' options from Synology and QNAP for more Enterprise-level gear - and while they exist (I've been seriously considering a QNAP TS-EC880 Pro) they are NOT cheap - that QNAP TS-EC880 Pro is over 1500 pounds bare - add another 140 pounds for an additional 16Gb ECC RAM and 6x3Tb HGST NAS Drives for around 625 pounds and you're looking at the better part of 2500 pounds...the Synology options are even more costly. Now I have the money - but it would be a serious investment in a serious bit of kit. That's the downside (as I see it). The upside is that it IS an off-the-shelf solution - plug the memory in, plug the drives in, switch it on and away you go - all the hard work has been done for you, tech support is a phonecall or e-mail away if you run into any problems and with a major company supporting it the unit has an easy-to-use GUI-based Linux OS and there are plenty of plug-ins available and it SHOULD run flawlessly for years.
Now on to FreeNAS. The downside is that YOU need to do the work. Now I have no problems building it - I'm a computer tech by profession so I love tinkering :) - but I'm nowhere near as confident with the FreeNAS OS and software installation itself - I have ZERO *ix experience (unless you consider installing a couple Linux distros via their GUIs and typing the odd command into an Apple's terminal app 'experience') so my main concern is spending money on the parts and then NOT being able to get it up and running in a stable manner (or get it running at all...). The upside of FreeNAS is cost - it's a lot cheaper to get a decent - powerful even - server built. And with that in mind, here's what I priced up as my build machine:
Fractal Design Node 804 case £75.00
Supermicro X10SL7-F £236.00
Kingston ValueRAM KVR16LE11/8KF x2 £133.00
Seasonic S12G-500 PSU £75.00
HGST Deskstar NAS 3Tbx6 £625.00
As for the processor, I've got 2 options - both are OEM Xeon parts that I can get. The first option is an Intel Xeon E3-1240L V3 - this is a 25W(!) part that could be passively cooled. The second option is an Intel Xeon E3-1265L V3 - this is a 45W part that would need a (modest) active cooler. Price-wise there's not a lot in it - the 1240 is £213 and the 1265 is £222.
All-in (with the more expensive processor) I'd be looking at £1366. Add another £34 for bits and bobs to round it up to a nice number and let's call it £1400 - or less than that QNAP is BARE...
...So there's my dilemma - right now I've basically talked myself into an impasse - I want the QNAP for ease of use and support, but I want FreeNAS for the cost savings and the satisfaction of building my own system - and I just can't make my damn mind up - can any of you kind folks help me out here?
Merry Christmas to one and all!
Charles.
First time poster, though I've been reading these forums for a few weeks now, trying to make up my mind - which is where I hope some of you kind folks come in :) Please bear with me, this might get a little long-winded...
For a few years now I've been using a NAS in the form of a Netgear ReadNAS Duo - but to say it's getting a little long in the tooth is putting it mildly - I'm a big-time consumer of media and my collection outstripped it a LONG time ago (I currently have nearly 200 blu-ray disks of media burned sitting under my desk...) so I want to upgrade to something with a LOT more grunt. Initially I looked at offerings from Synology, then moved on to QNAP (I liked the fact their boxes had a lot more processing power and memory than Synology's for transcoding and plug-ins, plus HDMI out) but then I ran across these forums and you lot scared me lol - talk of potential catastrophic data loss if you weren't using ECC RAM, RAID arrays failing etc. made me look long and hard at the options (I don't have the option of replicating my data off-site or even to another NAS so data integrity and RAID robustness became my major concerns at this point).
I went back to looking at my 'off-the-shelf' options from Synology and QNAP for more Enterprise-level gear - and while they exist (I've been seriously considering a QNAP TS-EC880 Pro) they are NOT cheap - that QNAP TS-EC880 Pro is over 1500 pounds bare - add another 140 pounds for an additional 16Gb ECC RAM and 6x3Tb HGST NAS Drives for around 625 pounds and you're looking at the better part of 2500 pounds...the Synology options are even more costly. Now I have the money - but it would be a serious investment in a serious bit of kit. That's the downside (as I see it). The upside is that it IS an off-the-shelf solution - plug the memory in, plug the drives in, switch it on and away you go - all the hard work has been done for you, tech support is a phonecall or e-mail away if you run into any problems and with a major company supporting it the unit has an easy-to-use GUI-based Linux OS and there are plenty of plug-ins available and it SHOULD run flawlessly for years.
Now on to FreeNAS. The downside is that YOU need to do the work. Now I have no problems building it - I'm a computer tech by profession so I love tinkering :) - but I'm nowhere near as confident with the FreeNAS OS and software installation itself - I have ZERO *ix experience (unless you consider installing a couple Linux distros via their GUIs and typing the odd command into an Apple's terminal app 'experience') so my main concern is spending money on the parts and then NOT being able to get it up and running in a stable manner (or get it running at all...). The upside of FreeNAS is cost - it's a lot cheaper to get a decent - powerful even - server built. And with that in mind, here's what I priced up as my build machine:
Fractal Design Node 804 case £75.00
Supermicro X10SL7-F £236.00
Kingston ValueRAM KVR16LE11/8KF x2 £133.00
Seasonic S12G-500 PSU £75.00
HGST Deskstar NAS 3Tbx6 £625.00
As for the processor, I've got 2 options - both are OEM Xeon parts that I can get. The first option is an Intel Xeon E3-1240L V3 - this is a 25W(!) part that could be passively cooled. The second option is an Intel Xeon E3-1265L V3 - this is a 45W part that would need a (modest) active cooler. Price-wise there's not a lot in it - the 1240 is £213 and the 1265 is £222.
All-in (with the more expensive processor) I'd be looking at £1366. Add another £34 for bits and bobs to round it up to a nice number and let's call it £1400 - or less than that QNAP is BARE...
...So there's my dilemma - right now I've basically talked myself into an impasse - I want the QNAP for ease of use and support, but I want FreeNAS for the cost savings and the satisfaction of building my own system - and I just can't make my damn mind up - can any of you kind folks help me out here?
Merry Christmas to one and all!
Charles.
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