General FreeNAS + Plex

[DeadIntermediate]

Hello, I have got all of the parts except for the Hard Drives.

I saw on a YouTube video that you can run a FreeNAS from a USB drive, instead of taking up one hard drive slot. So I have created a Dedicated USB for the FreeNAS OS. Before continuing it further, I am wondering if it would work with all of the parts that I have.

USB Drive
Generic USB 8GB Thumb/Stick Drive

Motherboard
MSI 760GMA-p34 FX

CPU
AMD FX 4300

RAM
2x 8GB Crucial Ballistix 1600MHZ DDR3

Power Supply
EVGA 500W

 

[SavageAUS]

I personally wouldn't trust my data on that machine.
Generic USB drives have a terrible rep.
I see nothing that has or supports ecc ram and ecc is recommended.
Just my opinion.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

 

[DeadIntermediate]

I personally wouldn't trust my data on that machine.
Generic USB drives have a terrible rep.
I see nothing that has or supports ecc ram and ecc is recommended.
Just my opinion.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

Yeah, I know, how I got them for free. I have like... 18+ of them, so I don't cloning a few of them, if one dies.

I know I don't have ECC RAM at the moment, but in time I do plan to replace them with ECC RAM.

 

[StephenFry]

Don't worry about the USB drive, you'll be fine. Just back-up your config once it's set-up, so you can import it on one of the 17 remaining ones, should the first USB drive malfunction.

"Will it FreeNAS?" Yes it will. I have a similar set-up as one of my testing machines. Another AMD machine (5200+ 64 X2, I actually have a bunch of those in FreeNAS-use) is my go-to "slam" system that I abuse for torrent downloads and some hard video labor. That oldie's been working for 6+ years now. A random USB stick, 8GB RAM, no ECC, a RAID-Z1 config, and Green hard drives...
I also run a fairly large FreeNAS config on the same processor and no ECC.

As long as you know what is lacking, you'll be fine. In other words: enjoy using it and getting to experiment/work with FreeNAS, but don't trust it too much.

 

[Jailer]

I personally wouldn't trust my valuable data to that system but that's a call you're going to have to make. You might be well served to get an Intel NIC instead of using the on board Realtek if you do end up using it.

 

[DeadIntermediate]

I tried to install FreeNAS, and when it finished installed, all I got is a blank screen with a blink _.

So, I didn't know if it would work properly or not.