DearestDreamer
Dabbler
- Joined
- Nov 28, 2015
- Messages
- 42
Greetings fellow enthusiasts,
I'm creating my first storage/media server and I'd really appreciate a second opinion on this build from someone who has more experience, especially with Supermicro components. Here it is:
* Case:
SuperChassis 846A-R1200B
SuperChassis 846E16-R1200B
SuperChassis 846A-R920B
////////// The 24x SuperChassis are too expensive ($1000+)
NORCO RPC-4220 4U | $330
~
120mm fan wall bracket for RPC-4224, RPC-4220, RPC-4216, RPC-4116, RPC-4020, RPC-4164 | $11
3x Cooler Master JetFlo | 120mm | 95CFM/1200-2000RPM | 36dbA | $36
2x Nexus SP802512H-03PWM | 80mm | 38CFM/2800RPM | 16dbA | $20
////////// Decided against the NORCO case from all the bad things I've read about (it's just too many horror stories and I have bad luck)
SuperMicro CSE-836BA-R920B 3U | 920W Redundant 80PLUS Platinum | 5x 80mm fans (Should I switch out these fans or are they good enough?) | 16x SAS/SATA | $880
* Backplane: 3U Direct Attached Backplane, features:
3Gb/6Gb support
SES-2 Enclosure Management Support
SAS/SATA support
Four SFF 8087 connectors
Mini-I-Pass (SFF 8087) connectivity
* PSU:
Included in case. But will there be enough molex to connect everything? Is it modular? How can I make sure I won't run into problems here to connect with the motherboard?
* Mobo:
X9SRH-7F-O | $430
(As recommended by cyberjock, since I might want to expand in the future with 4-6TB drives and ZFS will need more than 32GB RAM.)
# Requires Revision K chassis, and my 836BA-R920B isn't listed under the "optimized" ones.. am I screwed? An optimized chassis would be 836E16-R500B which costs a few hundred more and only comes with a 500w PSU, what's going on here? This is my biggest compatibility concern)
* Memory:
2x 8GB Samsung M393B1K70DH0-CK008/Q | DDR3-1600 | CAS 11 | 1.5V | Registered ECC | $112
* CPU:
Xeon E5-1620v2 | HyperThreading | $275
(No CPU Cooling? So what kind of fan should I go for here? I have some stock intel i5 fan, would that be enough?)
* SAS HBA cards PCI x8:
1x SAS9211-8I 6Gbps | $200 (X9SRH-7F has onboard 8 port sff8087)
4x Monoprice SFF-8087 male-to-male cables | 36pin | $40
(I could just buy 1x 9201-16I $335, but since I already have onboard 2x sff8087 I kind of want to keep the drives separated on a hardware level too, which makes me feel safer since they won't share a SPOF. Is there an issue with the onboard LSI 2308 (firmware)?)
* Storage Disks:
16x2TB WD Reds = $1260 | 16x2TB x 1 RAIDZ-3 pools => 26TB usable
(Is there a better ZFS configuration I'm not thinking of here? If I want to change them up to 4TB drives down the road, is it dangerous to create such a large RAID (I suppose if I did a 2x8 raidz2 I'd lose usable storage but I assume rebuilding wouldn't be as dangerous since it's not such a large array)?)
* OS Disk:
SSD 840 EVO 120GB | $82
(I'd like to throw all the zfs metadata on here as well, so I end up with more storage on my zpool, does that make sense? And I'm wondering as well if I can just plug this SSD into the motherboard's SATA or would it have issues conflicting somehow with the other drives being connected to the LSI HBA cards?)
Total price tag: $3280
Before I'm going to spend that much money, I'd love to hear from the community here. I read through some guides and other first build stories, so I think I've created a scalable server that's going to keep me happy for many, many years with a good amount of expansion down the road.
For anyone taking a look at this, you have my gratitude.
I'm creating my first storage/media server and I'd really appreciate a second opinion on this build from someone who has more experience, especially with Supermicro components. Here it is:
* Case:
SuperChassis 846E16-R1200B
SuperChassis 846A-R920B
////////// The 24x SuperChassis are too expensive ($1000+)
~
120mm fan wall bracket for RPC-4224, RPC-4220, RPC-4216, RPC-4116, RPC-4020, RPC-4164 | $11
3x Cooler Master JetFlo | 120mm | 95CFM/1200-2000RPM | 36dbA | $36
2x Nexus SP802512H-03PWM | 80mm | 38CFM/2800RPM | 16dbA | $20
////////// Decided against the NORCO case from all the bad things I've read about (it's just too many horror stories and I have bad luck)
SuperMicro CSE-836BA-R920B 3U | 920W Redundant 80PLUS Platinum | 5x 80mm fans (Should I switch out these fans or are they good enough?) | 16x SAS/SATA | $880
* Backplane: 3U Direct Attached Backplane, features:
3Gb/6Gb support
SES-2 Enclosure Management Support
SAS/SATA support
Four SFF 8087 connectors
Mini-I-Pass (SFF 8087) connectivity
* PSU:
Included in case. But will there be enough molex to connect everything? Is it modular? How can I make sure I won't run into problems here to connect with the motherboard?
* Mobo:
X9SRH-7F-O | $430
(As recommended by cyberjock, since I might want to expand in the future with 4-6TB drives and ZFS will need more than 32GB RAM.)
# Requires Revision K chassis, and my 836BA-R920B isn't listed under the "optimized" ones.. am I screwed? An optimized chassis would be 836E16-R500B which costs a few hundred more and only comes with a 500w PSU, what's going on here? This is my biggest compatibility concern)
* Memory:
2x 8GB Samsung M393B1K70DH0-CK008/Q | DDR3-1600 | CAS 11 | 1.5V | Registered ECC | $112
* CPU:
Xeon E5-1620v2 | HyperThreading | $275
(No CPU Cooling? So what kind of fan should I go for here? I have some stock intel i5 fan, would that be enough?)
* SAS HBA cards PCI x8:
1x SAS9211-8I 6Gbps | $200 (X9SRH-7F has onboard 8 port sff8087)
4x Monoprice SFF-8087 male-to-male cables | 36pin | $40
(I could just buy 1x 9201-16I $335, but since I already have onboard 2x sff8087 I kind of want to keep the drives separated on a hardware level too, which makes me feel safer since they won't share a SPOF. Is there an issue with the onboard LSI 2308 (firmware)?)
* Storage Disks:
16x2TB WD Reds = $1260 | 16x2TB x 1 RAIDZ-3 pools => 26TB usable
(Is there a better ZFS configuration I'm not thinking of here? If I want to change them up to 4TB drives down the road, is it dangerous to create such a large RAID (I suppose if I did a 2x8 raidz2 I'd lose usable storage but I assume rebuilding wouldn't be as dangerous since it's not such a large array)?)
* OS Disk:
SSD 840 EVO 120GB | $82
(I'd like to throw all the zfs metadata on here as well, so I end up with more storage on my zpool, does that make sense? And I'm wondering as well if I can just plug this SSD into the motherboard's SATA or would it have issues conflicting somehow with the other drives being connected to the LSI HBA cards?)
Total price tag: $3280
Before I'm going to spend that much money, I'd love to hear from the community here. I read through some guides and other first build stories, so I think I've created a scalable server that's going to keep me happy for many, many years with a good amount of expansion down the road.
For anyone taking a look at this, you have my gratitude.