Cheap NAS - i3 4150 Dell MS0520 8GB DDR3 - any good ?

[PanNas]

Hi all,

Have dabbled with FreeNAS then TrueNAS Core in the past but think it's about time i actually made a proper NAS :)

Won't be doing any streaming so would just be for home backups from 3 pc's and storage instead of having multiple external HD's

Have put together the following hardware from various parts -

Intel i3 4150
Dell MS0520 Motherboard
8GB DDR3
(the above is an old dell SFF - was from an old arcade project that as since been upgraded)

60GB vertex SSD sata2
2 x 4TB Toshiba X300 HD's - from a mate, very little use and cheap.
Kolink Classic 700watt PSU
Deepcool matrexx 30 case with 2 arctic 120mm fans

The motherboard only as 4 sata ports so it'll be 1 for the SSD and 2 for the 4TB's, would i be better getting a HBA LSI card now for future expansion or could that be added at a later date, have done some research but getting mixed answers to other peoples similar questions.

Would this be a suitable card as i know some people have had fake cards from China -

DELL H310 6Gbps HBA FW:P20 LSI 9211-8i IT Mode ZFS FreeNAS unRAID 2* SFF SATA

DELL H310 6Gbps HBA FW:P20 LSI 9211-8i IT Mode ZFS FreeNAS unRAID 2* SFF SATA | eBay

We keep our promises that we will provide you with the best solution within 24 hours.

www.ebay.co.uk

Would this be a good setup for a basic NAS or need something better to start with ?

Thanks in advance for any useful replies :)

 

[oxyde]

Hi! In my experience with "old cheap NAS", just take care about:
- 8GB of ram are a bit poor, 16gb will be a lot better (even for an only storage NAS), due to the low price they have (16gb around 20€, and they are easy to find )
- the integrated NIC must be an Intel or Chelsio one, if is not better replace with a pci-ex one (quite cheap), or you can might across system instability due to lack of driver

 

[PanNas]

Hi! In my experience with "old cheap NAS", just take care about:
- 8GB of ram are a bit poor, 16gb will be a lot better (even for an only storage NAS), due to the low price they have (16gb around 20€, and they are easy to find )
- the integrated NIC must be an Intel or Chelsio one, if is not better replace with a pci-ex one (quite cheap), or you can might across system instability due to lack of driver

Hi, Thanks for your reply, already looking for 16gb on eBay, hopefully should get some cheap :)

Will check the NIC but think it is intel.

 

[oxyde]

Sorry but i didnt find the exact motherboard spec links :D
Anyway, If you dont find anything on ebay, search on aliexpress.. 16gb around 18-20€, Puskill and Tecmyo are good choice IMHO ;)

 

[PanNas]

Just looked at the specs for the old pc, I've made a mistake it's actually a Intel Core i3 3225, the i3 4150 was in another arcade i gave to my nephew, D'OH so they got the better spec

Motherboard
Manufacturer Dell Inc.
Model 042P49 (CPU 1)
Version A02
Chipset Vendor Intel
Chipset Model Ivy Bridge
Chipset Revision 09
Southbridge Vendor Intel
Southbridge Model H61
Southbridge Revision B2

NIC
Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller

Might be flogging an already dead horse, will see what eBay throws instead for a cheap base.

Oxyde, thanks for your help anyways

 

[PanNas]

UPDATE

The slightly better PC i used to upgrade my arcade is now removed and in the tower. it's only a dell 7010 i5 3470 SFF board, fits the matx mounting holes BUT is slightly wider so doesn't fit flush in the case, I have to some more standoffs so will just higher it up a little so it can be fully screwed down and wouldn't stress the board for now its only loosely fitted while testing, good thing about the board is it has 4 ram slots compared to the 2 on the other board

Truenas CORE installed like a dream, found the intel NIC easily , setup a test pool and get on average 113mb transfer speeds which is the max for 1 gigabit, which at the moment is more than enough for my needs.

Still need all the wiring tidying up but at least it works as expected, also need to put back the pc i tried to use back into my arcade, maybe should have made sure it had a intel NIC to start with

 

[oxyde]

the 4 ram slot are a dream on matx board! Otherwise, with ddr3, is really hard get more than 16gb (if you don't wanna use virtual machine, 16 are good!)
My previous cpu on nas was a 3550s, so really similar to yours, old but work
Cable management is really important, consider the fact less temp = more life for component.
The only dubt now is... are your disks smr? They are cheap but with zfs they can die really fast

 

[PanNas]

The Toshiba drives I have are CMR from a quick check on google

Got my eye on eBay for some cheap ram so hopefully should pick some up soon.

Any thoughts on the hba card I mentioned in my first post

Thanks again for your quick reply

 

[oxyde]

The Toshiba drives I have are CMR from a quick check on google

Perfect, think were SMR but better!

Got my eye on eBay for some cheap ram so hopefully should pick some up soon.

Search on aliexpress too, if nothing come from ebay (puskill, tecmyo are good choice)

Any thoughts on the hba card I mentioned in my first post

Im not sure, but think will be good, let's wait someone else more experienced about HBA

Thanks again for your quick reply