CPU and Motherboard advice

[Rory898]

Hi all,

I'm just starting out on my journey to build a freenas server and connect it to my home network.
I've been offered (what I think is) a good deal on a CPU and motherboard. I wanted to ask here what people thought of the motherboard and CPU for freenas before I pulled the trigger.

Motherboard: Supermicro X11SSL-F - I see that this is in the recommended hardware list so I'm assuming it's a safe bet
CPU: E3-1225 V5 - the recommended hardware list has an E3-1230, wondering if the 1225 is close enough

Also I know the 1225 has onboard video that I don't need but the seller doesn't have a 1220 version.

Thanks in advance!

 

[jro]

This combination looks like it'll work well. The E3-1230 just adds hyperthreading and bumps the clock speed by 100MHz. Most FreeNAS operations are single-threaded, so four non-hyperthreaded cores should be just fine for small use cases. How much storage are you considering attaching to this machine?

On-board GPU on the CPU is a good thing, you'll be able to use the VGA port on the motherboard for initial FreeNAS installation and config. Without an integrated GPU, you'd likely have to use a PCIe video card to perform these steps.

 

[anmnz]

On-board GPU on the CPU is a good thing

No it isn't, that motherboard has its own video support so the CPU video will never be needed.

 

[Rory898]

I was planning on attaching 6 3tb WD red drives to it. It's main use will be a Plex Media Server.
I've decided to pull the trigger on the deal and got the Motherboard and CPU for £170. Is this as good of a deal as I thought? Both were used but working and can be returned.

 

[jro]

No it isn't, that motherboard has its own video support so the CPU video will never be needed.

Whoops, my bad, missed that line in the specs :)

I was planning on attaching 6 3tb WD red drives to it. It's main use will be a Plex Media Server.
I've decided to pull the trigger on the deal and got the Motherboard and CPU for £170. Is this as good of a deal as I thought? Both were used but working and can be returned.

Yep, seems like a good deal. I was asking about storage capacity because that would influence how much memory you should use. If you run those 6x 3TB drives in RAID-Z2, you'll have about 12TB usable. I'd recommend 32GB of memory if you can afford it. If you can only afford 16GB now, get 2x 8GB sticks so you can buy another 2x 8GB later on.

 

[Ericloewe]

Pretty much all of Supermicro's server and many/most workstation boards have a cost-reduced ASPeed BMC that does basic video, if they don't have the ASPeed 2400/2500 with full-blown IPMI.

 

[Rory898]

According to the Supermicro spec sheet it looks like this motherboard has IPMI, I've never used it before but I'll probably look into using it when setting this up.

In terms of Memory I've ordered one 16GB DDR4 stick. I decided to go with 16GB sticks in case I decide to add more hard drives in the future. It mean's I'll be able to add up to 64GB of Memory. Plus I'm interested in running a VM or two on Freenas, it won't be doing anything major, it will be mainly for messing around on