TrueNAS Newbie

[Kristian Philipsen]

New to This forum, and hopefully upcoming newbie to a TrueNAS Core system.
I am from Denmark, so my English could be better.

I am in the process of putting together a TrueNAS system as my new NAS/home server. I have little experience in diy NAS systems, but have after hours of reading decided that a TrueNAS system properly is the way for me. I am currently running a Synology NAS.

The system is going to be my NAS server as well as my media server for either streaming devices to my Chorme Casts and Raspberry PI´s
In the future it might as well be running some VM´s. But not at the moment.

The Hardware.
This is my biggest problem.
I have been reading alot but cant find the right answer for me, resulting in this post.
I am going to building in a Inter-tech 2U-2404S case. It will give me 4 HDD bays and plenty room for 2.5 drives also.

For mobo I am properly going with a Gigabyte C246M-WU4, it is fairly cheap and have great expandability for the future.
It can run a "standard" I3-8300/I3-8300T for now and can be upgraded to a Xeon E-2278G down the line if needed.

For now I am going to use 2X8 gb corsair ram sticks (Have them already) and is going to upgrade it to ECC memory if i switch to the Xeon CPU

I will be running 4 X 4TB HDD in raid and will be running the operating system and so on, on two 120GB 2.5 SSD´s in raid 1.

I want the system to be as quietly as possible hence the choice of CPU. The E-2278G is "only" 80 watt tdp.

I also want a 10Gb NIC in one of the PCIe slots,

So the questions.
Is this system going to work with TrueNAS Core or is there anything I have to do different than my thoughts?
Which NIC to choose?
Which RAID mode for the four HDDs?

 

[HoneyBadger]

Welcome to the forums. Your English is perfectly understandable, and certainly better than any Danish I could attempt to speak.

Your case ( https://www.inter-tech.de/en/products/ipc/storage-cases/2u-2404s ) looks like it will work, but I do have some mild concerns about cooling. With only four bays it has a lot of open space, meaning the air will be pulled only on the underside of your drives. The case fans are 3x40mm at the back - there is likely going to be very little static pressure pulling air across hot components. 40mm fans also tend to be loud. Traditional 2U rackmount cases tend to have 80mm fans located behind the drives, so that air is pulled "through" the drive sleds, and pushed across all of the components, including 10Gb NICs which tend to run warm.

Is there a requirement for it to be a rackmount? You may be able to use a tower-style case, which will allow for larger/quieter 80/120mm fans, even if you have to add an additional one to provide cooling for the NIC.

For your NIC, Chelsio cards are the vendor of choice for iXsystems official hardware, but others have been able to use Intel X520/X540/X550 series. With the latter you will have to be cautious and ensure you purchase a genuine card, as many found online are counterfeit. 10Gbps network cards also tend to run hot as mentioned previously, so they may need additional cooling in a tower-style case.

For your RAID mode, given your stated desires, I would suggest mirrors. RAIDZ2 does offer slightly better failure tolerance in that "any two drives can fail" but the desire to put VMs on there makes me trend towards mirrored devices. It is also easier to expand a pool made up of mirror vdevs in the future, simply by adding another pair of 4TB HDDs. With a RAIDZ2 you would want to add an equally-sized vdev of 4x4TB.

Your motherboard and CPU choices are good. Note that your i3 will actually run ECC memory as well ( https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...core-i3-8300-processor-8m-cache-3-70-ghz.html ) so an upgrade to the Xeon is not strictly necessary. The "T" suffix is also probably not needed, as the regular i3 will reduce power consumption when idle.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

Hey HoneyBadger
First of all, thank you very much.

The reason for the 2404S is that I am limited in building space. The maximum depth I have in my rack is around 450 mom for the server itself plus cables.
Originally I wanted the ISG M-140-ITX, but I cant seem to find it anywhere in Denmark or on a webside that will sent it to Denmark without it costing an arm or a leg.
I want a case that can handle 4 3.5 indrives, internal room for a minimum of two 2.5 inch SSD, that can run very silent, hence the low tsp CPU, so any good advise on a case is welcome?

Thank you for the advice on the NIC and raid configuration. I will look in to that.

 

[HoneyBadger]

Hello,

Region of purchase may make it challenging as well. I admit that I do not have much experience with obtaining hardware outside of North America.

That case may well be sufficient for your needs. The drives likely will stay cool just from the airflow beneath them; it would mostly be the 10Gbps NIC that could be a "hot spot" as there is no air being directly blown on the PCIe slot area. Air is drawn across them (intake is low at the front, exhaust is high at the rear) and this may be sufficient.

If you can find reviews from those who have purchased the case it should offer a clear picture of the noise level generated by the 40mm fans as well. As mentioned these fans have to spin rapidly in order to move reasonable quantities of air, and that will of course increase their noise.

 

[Etorix]

Nothing obviously wrong with your list. But "rackmount" and "silent" rarely go together. Drives and fans are the main issues with respect to noise, not the CPU.

As pointed out by Honeybadger, Core i3-8xxx/9xxx can use ECC memory. TrueNAS does not need an iGPU, and a few MHz will not make any difference. so you could use an i3-8100F or 9100F.

The second hand marker (for instance ebay.de) is also a good source of hardware. If you have not purchased yet, consider this option.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

Hello,

Region of purchase may make it challenging as well. I admit that I do not have much experience with obtaining hardware outside of North America.

That case may well be sufficient for your needs. The drives likely will stay cool just from the airflow beneath them; it would mostly be the 10Gbps NIC that could be a "hot spot" as there is no air being directly blown on the PCIe slot area. Air is drawn across them (intake is low at the front, exhaust is high at the rear) and this may be sufficient.

If you can find reviews from those who have purchased the case it should offer a clear picture of the noise level generated by the 40mm fans as well. As mentioned these fans have to spin rapidly in order to move reasonable quantities of air, and that will of course increase their noise.

I have been looking at alternatives for the Inter-tech 2U-2404S, and i have decided to go with a Inter-tech 1U-1404 instead. It have 5 fans (that will be swapped out for Noctua A4-25 PWM) the airflow is directed over the HDD and will flow over the NIC as well.

Do you have any suggestions for a Chelsio card that have 1 or 2 SFP+ ports for a 1m DAC cable that will connect/will work with my Ubiquiti Aggregation Switch?

Nothing obviously wrong with your list. But "rackmount" and "silent" rarely go together. Drives and fans are the main issues with respect to noise, not the CPU.

As pointed out by Honeybadger, Core i3-8xxx/9xxx can use ECC memory. TrueNAS does not need an iGPU, and a few MHz will not make any difference. so you could use an i3-8100F or 9100F.

The second hand marker (for instance ebay.de) is also a good source of hardware. If you have not purchased yet, consider this option.

I know that TrueNAS will not need the iGPU, but dont i need it for transcoding, or is the iGPU only for direct connecting monitors?

 

[ChrisRJ]

@Kristian Philipsen , welcome to the forum!

My usual question to people who start with TrueNAS, like you, is whether you have looked at used enterprise gear. If you can wait until a good offer comes along on eBay, you can get something with a fantastic price/performance ratio. I personally like the Supermicro X9SRi-F boards (have 4 of them) because you can put in loads of cheap DDR3 ECC RDIMMs (20 Euros for 16 GB) and the power consumption (I pay 27 Eurocents per kWh) is sort-of ok. With an 8 core Xeon E5 2670, 128 GB and 1 TB SSD running 10 VMs on XCP-ng I have an average power consumption of 50 W. There are many other option out there and do not want to endorse my setup in general. But many newcomers don't know this and therefore don't even look in that direction.

What I realized after a while is that there are two types of sellers for used enterprise gear. Those who have made a living out of this, and those (like e.g. colocation provides) that just want to get rid of stuff. The second group is where you find bargains. The first usually offers way more flexibility, additional warranty and services, etc. So, depending on your needs, either one can be a source for good hardware.

 

[Etorix]

I have been looking at alternatives for the Inter-tech 2U-2404S, and i have decided to go with a Inter-tech 1U-1404 instead. It have 5 fans (that will be swapped out for Noctua A4-25 PWM) the airflow is directed over the HDD and will flow over the NIC as well.

Beware! Quiet fans may not move enough air to properly cool a 1U rackmount case. You risk spending a not insignificant amount on Noctua fans only to find that only the original fans can keep your HDD below 50°C.

A Chelsio T520-CR would do for networking.

I overlooked that the C246M-WU4 has no BMC. The iGPU would only serve to plug a monitor for setup. If you have not yet bought the board, please consider getting a proper server board with a BMC instead, new or second hand as suggested by ChrisRJ.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

@Kristian Philipsen , welcome to the forum!

My usual question to people who start with TrueNAS, like you, is whether you have looked at used enterprise gear. If you can wait until a good offer comes along on eBay, you can get something with a fantastic price/performance ratio. I personally like the Supermicro X9SRi-F boards (have 4 of them) because you can put in loads of cheap DDR3 ECC RDIMMs (20 Euros for 16 GB) and the power consumption (I pay 27 Eurocents per kWh) is sort-of ok. With an 8 core Xeon E5 2670, 128 GB and 1 TB SSD running 10 VMs on XCP-ng I have an average power consumption of 50 W. There are many other option out there and do not want to endorse my setup in general. But many newcomers don't know this and therefore don't even look in that direction.

What I realized after a while is that there are two types of sellers for used enterprise gear. Those who have made a living out of this, and those (like e.g. colocation provides) that just want to get rid of stuff. The second group is where you find bargains. The first usually offers way more flexibility, additional warranty and services, etc. So, depending on your needs, either one can be a source for good hardware.

Thank you very much for the motherboard suggestion. But it does only have 2 SATA3 ports and i need at least 6.
Any suggestions on a more suitable legacy boards and maybe one that fits a M.2 ssd as well?

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

Beware! Quiet fans may not move enough air to properly cool a 1U rackmount case. You risk spending a not insignificant amount on Noctua fans only to find that only the original fans can keep your HDD below 50°C.

A Chelsio T520-CR would do for networking.

I overlooked that the C246M-WU4 has no BMC. The iGPU would only serve to plug a monitor for setup. If you have not yet bought the board, please consider getting a proper server board with a BMC instead, new or second hand as suggested by ChrisRJ.

I will test it out before swapping out fans, so I hope that it will be sufficient with the Noctua fans. Noise and cooling seems to be the biggest concern when choosing a 1U chassis.
Any suggestions on a more suitable legacy boards and maybe one that fits a M.2 ssd as well?

 

[Etorix]

With current offerings, I'd go for a Supermicro X11SCH/SCM/SCL (and your choice of Core i3/Xeon E-2xxxx).
With older boards, the X10SDV series with Xeon D-15xx are popular for NAS. They are not cheap but everything is on board, CPU, BMC and often 10GbE. The low wattage Xeon-D is very easy to cool.
I am not familiar with the X9 generation which runs on DDR3 so I leave that to ChrisRJ.

 

[ChrisRJ]

Thank you very much for the motherboard suggestion. But it does only have 2 SATA3 ports and i need at least 6.
Any suggestions on a more suitable legacy boards and maybe one that fits a M.2 ssd as well?

Well, for a conventional hard disk a SATA 2 with 3 Gbps should be sufficient. I have 8 Seagate Exos 16 TB on the SATA 2 ports and 2 SSDs as boot devices on the SATA 3 ports. For me the price difference compared to a Supermicro X10 series board was big enough to accept a small potential dip in performance.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

With current offerings, I'd go for a Supermicro X11SCH/SCM/SCL (and your choice of Core i3/Xeon E-2xxxx).
With older boards, the X10SDV series with Xeon D-15xx are popular for NAS. They are not cheap but everything is on board, CPU, BMC and often 10GbE. The low wattage Xeon-D is very easy to cool.
I am not familiar with the X9 generation which runs on DDR3 so I leave that to ChrisRJ.

The X11SCH looks interesting. It have all the SATA ports needed and room for some expandability. In the specifications it says that it supports E-2100, E-2200 and 8th/9th gen I3. But also says that it supports cpu TDP up to 95 Watt. Do you (or anyone else) know if it supports say an. I9-9900 with a tdp of 65 Watt? Is the limiting factor of CPU software or a tdp thing?

 

[HoneyBadger]

Is the limiting factor of CPU software or a tdp thing?

"Software" - the BIOS/firmware support on the board specifically. It likely won't boot at all with an i5/i7/i9, and if it does it won't support ECC memory.

Bear in mind that the 8th/9th gen i3 processors are quad-core now, so they aren't as weak as they were in the past.

 

[Etorix]

65 W < 95 W
95 W is also the highest TDP in this generation, so all CPU could(*) run but i5/i7/i9 do not use ECC, so for TrueNAS you really want a Core i3-8xxx/9xxx or Xeon E-2xxx.

(*) The C246 chipset is compatible with all Core i3/i5/i7/i9-8xxx/9xxx. Whether Supermicro has actively disabled that support, or merely does not advertise it because it doesn't appear to make sense for a pure server plateform, is an open question.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

65 W < 95 W
95 W is also the highest TDP in this generation, so all CPU could(*) run but i5/i7/i9 do not use ECC, so for TrueNAS you really want a Core i3-8xxx/9xxx or Xeon E-2xxx.

(*) The C246 chipset is compatible with all Core i3/i5/i7/i9-8xxx/9xxx. Whether Supermicro has actively disabled that support, or merely does not advertise it because it doesn't appear to make sense for a pure server plateform, is an open question.

So if I wanted to tryout an I9 it would be hit or miss. Think I am sticking with either an I3 or some Xeon chip then.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

I have been looking at 10 Gbe NIC.

I have found the following:

Intel X520-DA1 10 Gigabit 10Gbps PCI-E E10G42BTDA Server Network Adapter | eBay

1 pcs X520 DA1 Network Adapter. Work seamlessly with existing Fibre Channel and iSCSI storage. Are compatible with existing Fibre Channel and iSCSI drivers, and. SFP+ Direct Attach Copper or SFP+SR, SFP+LR.

www.ebay.com

Intel X520-DA2 10 Gigabit 10GBe SFP Dual Port Ethernet Server Network Adapter | eBay

1 pcs X520 DA2 Network Adapter. SFP+ Direct Attach Copper or SFP+SR, SFP+LR. Work seamlessly with existing Fibre Channel and iSCSI storage. Are compatible with existing Fibre Channel and iSCSI drivers, and.

www.ebay.com

Chelsio T520 CR T520-CR 10GbE 2-Port PCIe Unified Wire Adapter Card 110-1160-50 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Chelsio T520 CR T520-CR 10GbE 2-Port PCIe Unified Wire Adapter Card 110-1160-50 at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Will all of these work?
Is it possible to to link aggregation on the two two port NIC's?

I assume that the Intel NIC's are genuine when there is printed Intel on the PCB?

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

Forgot one

Chelsio Dual Port T520-CR 10GbE Ethernet Unified Wire Adapter | eBay

ETA 3 to 8 busines.

www.ebay.com

 

[ChrisRJ]

I have been looking at 10 Gbe NIC.
[..]
Is it possible to to link aggregation on the two two port NIC's?

Why would you want to do this? You will have a hard time to saturate just one 10 Gbps line.

I assume that the Intel NIC's are genuine when there is printed Intel on the PCB?

No.

Because you mentioned TDP a couple of times: If that happened under the assumption that TDP is more or less an indication of the power consumption of that CPU in your NAS, then you should be aware that it is not.

 

[Kristian Philipsen]

Why would you want to do this? You will have a hard time to saturate just one 10 Gbps line.



No.

Because you mentioned TDP a couple of times: If that happened under the assumption that TDP is more or less an indication of the power consumption of that CPU in your NAS, then you should be aware that it is not.

Thank you for your feedback.

It was just a question if it is possible or not? Not saying that I am going to do it.

The most important question in the post was, will any or all of the suggested NIC's work, and are the Intel NIC'c genuine?