Budget NAS (Pentium, ECC, C236-Mainboard and more) - s.o. please check

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R3jected

Dabbler
Joined
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Hello,

can someone who is more into FreeNas take a look at my configuration I choose for my farther and if it would work out?
Thank you guys, so here we go:

Intel Pentium G4400
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html']Fujitsu D3417-B or[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html']MSI C236M WORKSTATION
[/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html']3000GB WD Red *3 for Raid 5[/URL][/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/16GB-Samsung-M391A2K43BB1-DDR4-2133-DIMM-CL15-Single_1023162.html']16GB Samsung M391A2K43BB1 DDR4-2133 (1 Stick)[/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/16GB-Samsung-M391A2K43BB1-DDR4-2133-DIMM-CL15-Single_1023162.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/300-Watt-be-quiet--Pure-Power-9-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_1095410.html']300 Watt be quiet! Pure Power 9 [/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/16GB-Samsung-M391A2K43BB1-DDR4-2133-DIMM-CL15-Single_1023162.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/300-Watt-be-quiet--Pure-Power-9-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_1095410.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Nanoxia-Deep-Silence-4-gedaemmt-Mini-Tower-ohne-Netzteil-anthrazit_942011.html']Nanoxia Deep Silence 4 gedämmt Mini Tower[/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/16GB-Samsung-M391A2K43BB1-DDR4-2133-DIMM-CL15-Single_1023162.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/300-Watt-be-quiet--Pure-Power-9-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_1095410.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Nanoxia-Deep-Silence-4-gedaemmt-Mini-Tower-ohne-Netzteil-anthrazit_942011.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/32GB-ADATA-Premier-Pro-SP600-2-5Zoll--6-4cm--SATA-6Gb-s-MLC-asynchron--AS_815575.html']32GB ADATA Premier Pro SP600 2.5" (6.4cm) - I heared FreeNas eats a lot of USB sticks, is there something like caching from which it would benefit from in speed?[/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]
[URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Fujitsu-D3417-B-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1097447.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/MSI-C236M-WORKSTATION-Intel-C236-So-1151-Dual-Channel-DDR4-mATX-Retail_1029838.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/3000GB-WD-Red-WD30EFRX-64MB-3-5Zoll--8-9cm--SATA-6Gb-s_806167.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/16GB-Samsung-M391A2K43BB1-DDR4-2133-DIMM-CL15-Single_1023162.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/300-Watt-be-quiet--Pure-Power-9-Non-Modular-80--Bronze_1095410.html'][URL='http://www.mindfactory.de/product_info.php/Nanoxia-Deep-Silence-4-gedaemmt-Mini-Tower-ohne-Netzteil-anthrazit_942011.html'][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]
Best regards
Jan
 

anodos

Sambassador
iXsystems
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Messages
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RAID 5? You mean RAIDZ1, right?

FreeNAS doesn't eat a lot of USB sticks. Not much benefit from an SSD for the boot medium.

With only 3 disks, you might be able to go cheaper with a Dell T20. I have no experience with Fujitsu or MSI server / workstation boards.
 

Spearfoot

He of the long foot
Moderator
Joined
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Messages
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Welcome to the forum!

Both of the motherboards you've selected support ECC memory, but the Samsung RAM you've listed is not an ECC part. You should purchase ECC RAM that meets the specifications of the board you actually buy.

FreeNAS doesn't support RAID5; the corresponding ZFS topology is called RAIDZ1. However, both RAID5 and RAIDZ1 are considered unsafe when used with large drives (>= 1TiB) and hence are not recommended. Instead, consider using 4 drives in a RAIDZ2 configuration, which would use 2 drives for parity, or just use 2 drives in a mirror (RAID1).

Some users have problems booting from USB sticks... but I ran two such systems for over a year without problems before changing to SSDs. If you choose to use a USB stick, get a USB 2.0 device such as the San Disk Cruzer Fit. Many users choose instead to boot from a small, inexpensive SSD. If you install two of these you can use the FreeNAS 'mirrored' installation feature.

Regarding caching... the entry-level system you are building won't benefit from an L2ARC; the rule-of-thumb for these devices is to maximize RAM first, and only then add an L2ARC if performance is still lacking. You didn't state how your father intends to use this system, so we can't make an informed recommendation; but chances are that it will perform quite well as-is for simple home use, i.e., data storage and a reasonable amount of video streaming, etc.

Good luck!
 

R3jected

Dabbler
Joined
May 15, 2014
Messages
17
Welcome to the forum!

Both of the motherboards you've selected support ECC memory, but the Samsung RAM you've listed is not an ECC part. You should purchase ECC RAM that meets the specifications of the board you actually buy.

FreeNAS doesn't support RAID5; the corresponding ZFS topology is called RAIDZ1. However, both RAID5 and RAIDZ1 are considered unsafe when used with large drives (>= 1TiB) and hence are not recommended. Instead, consider using 4 drives in a RAIDZ2 configuration, which would use 2 drives for parity, or just use 2 drives in a mirror (RAID1).

Some users have problems booting from USB sticks... but I ran two such systems for over a year without problems before changing to SSDs. If you choose to use a USB stick, get a USB 2.0 device such as the San Disk Cruzer Fit. Many users choose instead to boot from a small, inexpensive SSD. If you install two of these you can use the FreeNAS 'mirrored' installation feature.

Regarding caching... the entry-level system you are building won't benefit from an L2ARC; the rule-of-thumb for these devices is to maximize RAM first, and only then add an L2ARC if performance is still lacking. You didn't state how your father intends to use this system, so we can't make an informed recommendation; but chances are that it will perform quite well as-is for simple home use, i.e., data storage and a reasonable amount of video streaming, etc.

Good luck!

Wow, thank you for double checking. I somehow in a hurry just sorted for ram speed and didn't check if it was actually ecc ram. (Facepalm)

My question: Why do you consider RaidZ1 as unsafe? Because only one drive is allowed to fail, or is there a problem with bugs / the implementation.

My farther intends to use it as a media storage for his kodi media center connected to his tv (for recorded tv movies) and for savely storing emotional valuable data (photos and video's of us being little, his large music collection, etc).

He is on a tight budget, you would laugh if you looked at the hardware he uses to cut the commercials by hand and the time consuming of offloading it from a tvheadend server rendering, transcoding it with handbrake and uploading it to the nas.

I already wondered if he'd go with a core i3 instead and create a transcoding folder for that stuff and let the nas do it (he has a very old amd athlon maschine) but I worry if I can set this up for him with jail / watchfolder stuff.
Moreover he wants the maschine to be his tv recorder at the same time because a water damage nearly killed his current 1 hdd nas and destroyed his seperate tvhe machine.
However this again seems hard to realize since I found no real solution for tv recording in a freenas jail.
(And the stuff found left me question if it would work).

Thank you so much for your great support @Spearfoot
I didn't think I would get so much help.

Best regards!
 

Spearfoot

He of the long foot
Moderator
Joined
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Messages
2,478
My question: Why do you consider RaidZ1 as unsafe? Because only one drive is allowed to fail, or is there a problem with bugs / the implementation.
It's not an implementation bug, it's the risk of a URE (Unrecoverable Read Error) happening after a drive has failed and the array is being rebuilt/resilvered. See this thread for details. It's not a hard-and-fast rule with a Yes-or-No answer; it's a matter of probability. Whether to use RAIDZ1 is your decision to make based on your assessment of the risks involved. FWIW, I will state that I myself will never use it...

My farther intends to use it as a media storage for his kodi media center connected to his tv (for recorded tv movies) and for savely storing emotional valuable data (photos and video's of us being little, his large music collection, etc).

He is on a tight budget, you would laugh if you looked at the hardware he uses to cut the commercials by hand and the time consuming of offloading it from a tvheadend server rendering, transcoding it with handbrake and uploading it to the nas.

I already wondered if he'd go with a core i3 instead and create a transcoding folder for that stuff and let the nas do it (he has a very old amd athlon maschine) but I worry if I can set this up for him with jail / watchfolder stuff.
Moreover he wants the maschine to be his tv recorder at the same time because a water damage nearly killed his current 1 hdd nas and destroyed his seperate tvhe machine.
However this again seems hard to realize since I found no real solution for tv recording in a freenas jail.
(And the stuff found left me question if it would work).

Thank you so much for your great support @Spearfoot
I didn't think I would get so much help.

Best regards!
I understand the issue of cost constraints! Again, you might consider a simple mirror instead of a RAIDZ1 configuration; you'd end up with roughly the same amount of available storage, and a pair of larger 4TiB drives might be less expensive than three 3TiB units.

Also, you might follow @anodos' suggestion and look into the Dell T20 server; they are reasonably priced and are better suited to building a FreeNAS server than the 'desktop'-type boards you are considering. I've surmised -- perhaps mistakenly? -- that you live in Europe; while Dell equipment is available there, you would have to do some research to find out if this particular model is sold there.

Hopefully a forum member more experienced in transcoding and such will stop by and help out. I don't use my FreeNAS systems for anything but data storage. :rolleyes:
 

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
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I also am of the mind that data storage is an end in itself, and is intrinsically entertaining and rewarding.
I'm sure washing machine engineers also derive satisfaction from watching washing machines work.
 
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