BUILD ASRock C2550D4I, performance, raid controllers

[Josh_the_dosh]

Hey,

Im planning on building a NAS in the near future and I would appreciate some advice.
Basically all I want is a System with 4x4TB WD Red's that doesnt consume a whole lot of power and that can saturate 1Gbit Port...

Now, is the ASRock C2550D4I good enough for this purpouse? Will the hardware raid controllers cause any trouble with ZFS? Is there something with a better Price/Power ratio?

Thanks for the help!

 

[jgreco]

What hardware RAID controllers are we talking about?

For the sake of rationality I'll assume that "saturate 1Gbit" means "has the potential to saturate a gigabit Ethernet under the right conditions" - the C2750 does, and I see no reason the 2550 wouldn't.

 

[Josh_the_dosh]

Well the sata controllers onboard are supposed to have raid 0/1/10 built in already...
And I guess 16 or 32 GB ECC RAM?

 

[jgreco]

No. They're SATA controllers that happen to have some software RAID support in the BIOS, and then if you load a compatible operating system, software RAID drivers. No hardware RAID that I'm aware of.

Start out with 16GB of RAM but do it smart by buying 2 x 8GB, not 4 x 4GB.

 

[Josh_the_dosh]

Alright, thanks for the info.
Another question: would a 120W pico PSU be enough? And what kind of power usage should I expect? Can you recommend a PSU?

 

[D4nthr4x]

I would expect under 60w max load on that system. Also you want to disable the raid controller (well in reality never turn it on in the first place).

 

[jgreco]

OH! MY! GOD! No! No!

Four drives. 2 amps spin current. That's 4 * 2 * 12 = 96 watts JUST FOR SPIN CURRENT. How the HELL do you come up with "60w max load"?

And THERE'S NO RAID CONTROLLER.

 

[Josh_the_dosh]

What about the initial spin up of the hard drives? I heard this uses alot of power...
And also for the IMPI ethernet port: do i just have to plug it into the switch?

 

[jgreco]

p.s. A 180-200 watt supply is probably fine.

 

[jgreco]

As for the IPMI, yeah, plug it in, figure out what IP address it landed on (I think ASRock may have a tool for that or just look on your DHCP server).

Those of us who have server-y fun for a living love a nice IP-KVM built in. It makes everything mostly easier, except when it doesn't. There may be a special IPMI client - don't recall offhand for the ASRock - but also can be run from a web browser. Probably need Java 7 though.

 

[Josh_the_dosh]

Ok, sounds cool! And for the 4TB WD Red, they should consume 5W at max (http://www.storagereview.com/wd_red_4tb_hdd_review_wd40efrx), or am I wrong?

 

[jgreco]

No, they'll consume more than 20 as they spin up.

When we're engineering systems, we do not trust random numbers generated through unknown means on some random website. Servers cost real money and if you cause a power supply to melt down and damage all the other key bits in the process, that's a huge liability.

Go to the manufacturer for your information. http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/SpecSheet/ENG/2879-771442.pdf

The WD40EFRX consumes 1.75 amps, plus or minus 10%, on the 12 volt rail as it spins up. That means as much as 1.925 amps at 12 volts. It also requires some power for the 5V DC to power the drive; to be conservative we figure that 1.925 * 12 = 23.1 watts and then we add in the read/write current of 4.5 watts; the drive will not consume MORE than 27.6 watts but may certainly consume up to that.

They'll take less than 5 watts once spun up, if you're looking to estimate operational costs.

 

[Josh_the_dosh]

Yes, I didnt mean the spin up with the 5W but the power it will consume once the system is started (for energy cost). But thank you alot for the detailed info! Ill let you know when I get my NAS finished :)

 

[D4nthr4x]

http://www.storagereview.com/western_digital_caviar_green_3tb_review_wd30ezrsdtl I guess I've been going off of bad information then. But thanks for the info. It's strange that only the wd red and green drives have that "peak" stat on their spec sheet.

 

[cyberjock]

http://www.storagereview.com/western_digital_caviar_green_3tb_review_wd30ezrsdtl I guess I've been going off of bad information then. But thanks for the info. It's strange that only the wd red and green drives have that "peak" stat on their spec sheet.

So? Ever heard of current limiting circuits? All they have to do is limit the starting current and then they can claim its inconsequential.

Not to mention that there's hundreds of specifications that they don't share with us. Does that mean they don't exist or should be ignored?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constant-current_diode

 

[jgreco]

Um, no. Spin current has been a standard specification line item basically forever.

It may be on the product spec sheet or on the engineering specs, but I cannot recall a drive for which this was not available...

 

[D4nthr4x]

Well if you can find me the one for the new WD Black or the WD Se or the Re from WD public documents I'll like each of your posts in here :D

 

[jgreco]

Honestly, that's the kind of research work I get paid to do. If you cannot find the information, you can always ask WD support. If you're just looking for an estimate, it isn't likely to be substantially more than 2 amps. That's all you get for free though.

 

[JKman]

The asrock is nice. Yes the ipmi client is from a web browser and also yes to java 7.

I can still access the client even by plugging in only the LAN1 port. Thought I was going to need 2 cables (ipmi/LAN).

 

[D4nthr4x]

Honestly, that's the kind of research work I get paid to do. If you cannot find the information, you can always ask WD support. If you're just looking for an estimate, it isn't likely to be substantially more than 2 amps. That's all you get for free though.

I don't actually need to know I was just pointing out that it isn't listed in the spec sheets like it is for the red/green drives, and isn't anywhere on their site.