BUILD First Build (ASRock E3C244D4I-14S / 10 HDDs)

[pernicius]

So here is the hardware list i am looking at for my first FreeNAS (home-)build. Mainly used as a media and backup storrage over NFS/CIFS.


Case / Fans / PSU:

- Lian Li PC-Q26b
- 5x Lian Li BP2SATA Backplate (not really Hot-Swap but cleaner install, one is pre-installed)
- 4x be quiet! Silent Wings 2 PWM (120mm)
- 1x be quiet! Silent Wings 2 PWM (80mm)
- be quiet! Dark Power Pro P11 (550 Watt)​

Mainboard:

- ASRock Rack E3C244D4I-14S​

CPU / Cooler:

- Intel Xeon E3-1231v3 (3.4 GHz, 4 Cores, 8 Threads)
- stock cooler (optional: be quiet! Dark Rock TF)​

Ram:

- 32Gb Unb. ECC (4x Crucial CT102472BD160B)​

Boot Drives:

- one or two USB sticks
- one cheap SSD​

Data Drives:

- 10x Western Digital Red 3TB (WD30EFRX)
8x connected to the onboard LSI 2308
2x connected to the onboard Intel C224 chipset
- all in one pool/vdev as RAIDz2​

Network:

- 2x onboard Intel i210 via LACP
- A future upgrade will be a 10GbE Intel NIC​

If anyone has suggestions or see that something is wrong please post...

 

[joeschmuck]

I will only speak to a few of these items...

1)The bequiet! fans are fantastic and can't be beat.
2) I'd use the original CPU fan, it's quiet already so no need to spend more money there (about a $75 savings). Also, I've read many reports on this CPU cooler and while it does work well, it's not the best cooler and the stock CPU cooler does a fantastic job on it's own, especially for a FreeNAS project.
3) I've never looked into the bequiet! PSU's so unless someone else chimes in, make sure you have looked into reputable reviews of the product, not just some guy saying that it worked when they plugged it in. You want to know what the voltage ripple is and the quality of the internal components. Additionally this device only comes with 8 SATA power connections (that's actually quite a few) but you will need some 4-pin Molex to SATA adapters to handle your 10 drives and any other SATA powered device you add on.
4) I'm not sure what your costs are for the hard drives, here in the USA I could have the ten 3TB drives for $1100, or eight 4TB drives for $1192, or seven 5TB drives for $1365 (all prices depend on where you purchase them). My point is that for a little more money you could drop your drive count and stick with the SAS drive connections only. It also reduces heat and power consumption and overall noise.
5) Boot device, I'd highly recommend any SSD that you can buy, or if you have an old one laying around. The size can be anything you like, 8GB to whatever but any cheap device is good enough. This beats any number of USB flash drives since SSDs are highly reliable compared to USB Flash drives. The 120GB SSDs are becoming dirt cheap these days.
6) Realize that the SAS controller will need to be reflashed to IT mode using P20 firmware. There is mention of this all over the forums so a little research on your part will find the appropriate links.

Good Luck!

 

[Bidule0hm]

2) Yep, the stock Intel cooler is perfectly fine, especially if you replace the thermal pad by some decent quality thermal paste (like the Arctic Silver 5 for example) ;)

3) The last review of a bequiet PSU I saw wasn't that good (basically: undersized and cheap capacitors (Teapo), no fuse, only one MOV, ripple isn't bad but isn't good either, ...). I recommend SeaSonic personally.

4) I agree 110 % with @joeschmuck :)

5) Once again I agree 110 % ;)

 

[pernicius]

@joeschmuck @BiduleOhm thx for your Reply

2) I'd use the original CPU fan, it's quiet already so no need to spend more money there (about a $75 savings). Also, I've read many reports on this CPU cooler and while it does work well, it's not the best cooler and the stock CPU cooler does a fantastic job on it's own, especially for a FreeNAS project ...

I will start with the stock cooler, If it is to loud I can change it later.

... Additionally this device only comes with 8 SATA power connections (that's actually quite a few) but you will need some 4-pin Molex to SATA adapters to handle your 10 drives and any other SATA powered device you add on ...

Because I use the Lian Li Backplanes I only need 5 power connectors (SATA or Molex) for the 10 drives.

4) I'm not sure what your costs are for the hard drives, here in the USA I could have the ten 3TB drives for $1100, or eight 4TB drives for $1192, or seven 5TB drives for $1365 (all prices depend on where you purchase them). My point is that for a little more money you could drop your drive count and stick with the SAS drive connections only. It also reduces heat and power consumption and overall noise.

There are multiple reasons why I chose 10x 3TB WG Reds:

I can't add additional single drives to add capacity, only additional vdev's. That means I could go with 5 HDDs in one vdev and add later another one with 5 HDDs. But that way I lose 2 additional drives for redundancy. And the higher capacity drives are way to expensive at the moment.

Planned: 10x 3TB = 24TB usable = 1100€
Option: 5x 6TB = 18TB usable = 1300€

As you see, I would pay 200€ more fore 6TB less usable storage.
I know I have to upgrade all drives to get more space, but I can live with that.

5) Boot device, I'd highly recommend any SSD that you can buy, or if you have an old one laying around. The size can be anything you like, 8GB to whatever but any cheap device is good enough. This beats any number of USB flash drives since SSDs are highly reliable compared to USB Flash drives. The 120GB SSDs are becoming dirt cheap these days.

Thx, I will look for an SSD.

6) Realize that the SAS controller will need to be reflashed to IT mode using P20 firmware. There is mention of this all over the forums so a little research on your part will find the appropriate links.

Thx, I know that.

... The last review of a bequiet PSU I saw wasn't that good (basically: undersized and cheap capacitors (Teapo), no fuse, only one MOV, ripple isn't bad but isn't good either, ...). I recommend SeaSonic personally ...

Why the be quiet! PSU:
- I like the type of cable management
- over 90% efficiency above 10% load
- really dead silent! Quieter than most fanless PSUs!
In most reviews it is one of the best PSUs. For example just one english review.

 

[Marcet]

The case is nice and compact. That's a good choice for a small NAS.
I'll use it for my backup server.

But the backplates were unavailable at the time I bought the case. I hope you will be luckier.

 

[joeschmuck]

I see that you are shooting for a quiet system. The fans are the main culprits in a noisy system so you have that covered. The WD Red drives are quiet by design.

- really dead silent! Quieter than most fanless PSUs

Seasonic PSU with a 140mm fan is dead silent too. Also a fanless system is quiet just because it's fanless. If it makes any noise then it's harmonics of a crappy design and I'd remove it before it catches fire. BTW, I do have one fanless PSU and it's very nice but I engineered my system to have a positive high pressure in the case so the exhaust had to go out the PSU thus improving it's thermal operation. Keep things like that in mind when you put this together, know your air flow.

I will start with the stock cooler, If it is to loud I can change it later.

The stock fan while not silent, it is very quiet and it will not be the item you will be replacing because of noise.

The cost for the drives is of course a concern for everyone who is building a new large system. You have to make the choice which is best for you and I fully understand it. Using both SAS and SATA controllers will of course be fine in our FreeNAS environment. Additionally I wasn't suggesting that you drop your drive count for the sake of future expansion but that is a good point. If you only have 8 drives to change to a larger size, that is cheaper than replacing 10 drives. But from my point of view if you had only 8 drives, that lowers heat buildup, and you can use a single drive controller.

I also didn't realize you were going to use the backplanes which is a nice touch. But as a word of advice, do not hot swap your drives, never ever is the best practice. And you may not had that in mind either but some folks think that because their system supports hot swaps that they can do it. It is risky and you can have a few different problems from shorting the SATA power connector to just corrupting your pool.

 

[Bidule0hm]

@joeschmuck Well, this is the most perfect post I've seen in a while ;)

Edit: oh man, this PSU is expensive, you can get a SeaSonic P-660 for almost exactly the same price...

 

[Mirfster]

Agree with @joeschmuck on everything; just having a hard time with his new avatar... :P

 

[joeschmuck]

Thought I'd try something different. Two days ago it was a weird one that I didn't really like.

 

[Mirfster]

Thought I'd try something different. Two days ago it was a weird one that I didn't really like.

What about that Farrah Fawcett one I recall you trying to recommend for me a while back? :P

 

[joeschmuck]

What about that Farrah Fawcett one I recall you trying to recommend for me a while back? :p

lol, I still have it if you want it. I could change it for you if you like? ;)

 

[Mirfster]

lol, I still have it if you want it. I could change it for you if you like? ;)

"I'm disinclined to acquiesce to your request"