Is my Hardware good for FTP & PLEX using GPU

[AOK]

Hi.

I am amazed and thrilled to build up my own TrueNAS.

Will try on TrueNAS SCALE on the following old PC hardware configuration of mine:

THE HARDWARE:

Motherboard: Asrock p67 pro3 (2xSATA600, 4x SATA300) & LAN: 1Gbit
CPU: Intel i7-6770k
RAM: 4x4 GB DDR3
GPU: Palit GTX 970 4GB VRAM
PSU: FSP Hyper 80+ 600W (12V 45A 540W )
BOOT SSD: SAMSUNG 840 EVO 500GB, SATA 600
HDDs:
TOSHIBA 3TB, 7200 RPM, SATA 600 | WD 1TB Black 7200 RPM, SATA 600 | WD 1TB Green 5400 RPM, SATA 600
LAN: 1 Gbit
Internet: 1Gbit DOWN | 600MBit UP

THE PLANNED USAGE:

FTP - I have video files from a let's say from 200MBs up to 60GB and bigger videos... The FTP users won't be more than 10. The times to be used - no more than 10- times per month... Yes - not that often at all.

PLEX - I will try to use the paid version (due to the hardware GPU utilization of the de/encoding it has to be premium). Will do again a few users and allow it mainly for me to watch on my iPhone Tutorials and make accounts for a few friends.... Might use about 500GB for that.

qBittorrent: - I have about 1TB of books that i would like to continue sharing in the private torrent I find myself in.

Do I need to mount the drive to my WIN system after the NAS creation?

As I have already read: I have to make RAIDZ1 for a little bit better speed, but everyone is on RAIDZ2. I don't need FTP to see PLEX or qBit (and vice versa) as long as I (as root/admin) can transfer files between those.

Questions:
1/ What do you think about the Hardware configuration? Is it up to the tasks?
2/ This thing with the pools... One, Two, or even Three? Sorry if I am asking the wrong questions.
3/ Scratch disk - Is the SSD good for that aside from BOOTing the TN?
4/ Since all the HDDs are SATA600 and I have only 2 SATA600 ports on the motherboard, will that be bottleneck for the rest of the SATA600 HDDs on SATA300 slots?
5/ For my case scenario is it better to be looking to upgrade the RAM to 32GB?

Thank you in advance for all the help, answers and advices.

 

[Davvo]

Hi.

I am amazed and thrilled to build up my own TrueNAS.

Welcome! I fully understand your feelings!
I suggest you reading the following resources:

Introduction to ZFS

This is a short introduction to ZFS. It is really only intended to convey the bare minimum knowledge needed to start diving into ZFS and is in no way meant to cut Michael W. Lucas' and Allan Jude's book income. It is a bit of a spiritual...

www.truenas.com

Hardware Recommendations Guide

This is the latest edition of the FreeNAS Community hardware recommendations guide. The current major version is R2, dated January 2021, with the last minor update on 2021-01-24. The format has moved away from the forum post form factor, to...

www.truenas.com

As I have already read: I have to make RAIDZ1 for a little bit better speed, but everyone is on RAIDZ2.

RAIDZ2 is safer, especially during resilver since that process stress the drives. Generally the space you save using RAIDZ1 over RAIDZ2 is more tempting than the performance (and I repeat, RAIDZ1 is risky, especially for drives over 3TB!). Please read the Introduction to ZFS for better understanding.

1/ What do you think about the Hardware configuration? Is it up to the tasks?

Now... first thing I notices is you don't want to use ECC RAM. This is not reccomended but given the nature of your hardware, as well as your use case, I can understand it. So that's (kinda) ok.
(Potentially a) Big issue is that the motherboard you intend to use has a Realtek NIC, which on CORE is known to cause issues thanks to bad drivers. I'm not a SCALE user, so I don't know if the rule of "don't go with a realtek NIC" applies there as well, but general practice is to use intel or broadcom NICs.
Biggest issue is that the mobo does not support that processor. It supports the 2nd and 3rd gen of i7 / i5 / i3 / Xeon / Pentium / Celeron CPUs, while the i7-6770k is a 6th gen. It won't work.
Then again we have an issue with the motherboard and, this time, the GPU. The P67 Pro3 does indeed have a x16 PCIE slot, but it's a 2.0 and your GPU uses 3.0: this could result in a bottleneck.
The good thing, which you asked as point 4 of your questions, is that SATA2 does not bottleneck HDDs.
Please also note that your motherboard supports only up to 32GB of RAM.
I don't know the PSU.
Don't use SMR HDDs, use CMR only. Also note that 7200 RPM disks tend to consume more (which means more noise, heat and costs).
Please read the Hardware Guide for better understanding.

2/ This thing with the pools... One, Two, or even Three? Sorry if I am asking the wrong questions.

It depends on your configuration and it's basically your choice. Please read the Introduction to ZFS for better understanding.

3/ Scratch disk - Is the SSD good for that aside from BOOTing the TN?

I don't know what you mean with "scratch disk", but SSDs make good boot drives (for this even a smaller one is good enough) as well as pool drives for applications and VMs. Please read the Introduction to ZFS for better understanding.

5/ For my case scenario is it better to be looking to upgrade the RAM to 32GB?

I haven't really fully undestood your case scenario, but SCALE is generally hungrier than CORE for RAM given its nature. It might be worth to start with 32GB, especially if you plan to use any application/plugin/docker (whatever they are called on SCALE) or VM. Please read the Introduction to ZFS, as well as the Hardware Guide, for better understanding.

In the end my suggestion is: read the Introduction to ZFS and the Hardware Guide, then chose mose appropriate hardware (especially motherboard).

 

[AOK]

Great TIPS... Thanks for the long and explanatory answer......

Unfortunately I can't be using on that CPU & Motherboard ECC RAM. As for the LAN - that is fixable if TN Scale has issues as well.
As for the GPU bottleneck. Not a big deal. After all - all these are my old components and the aim is to create it for free.

.....
Biggest issue is that the mobo does not support that processor. It supports the 2nd and 3rd gen of i7 / i5 / i3 / Xeon / Pentium / Celeron CPUs, while the i7-6770k is a 6th gen. It won't work.
....

What is mobo? Otherwise I got it wrong... My CPU is i7 3770K. I do hope that is TN SCALE compatible. I don't know if I can fix the my above mentioned post.

Thanks again, Davvo. I will read what you were so kind to provide and if I have more hardware questions related to my rig will post them here.

 

[Davvo]

What is mobo? Otherwise I got it wrong... My CPU is i7 3770K. I do hope that is TN SCALE compatible. I don't know if I can fix the my above mentioned post.

mobo (or MoBo) = motherboard. Sorry for using abbreviations.

THE HARDWARE:

Motherboard: Asrock p67 pro3 (2xSATA600, 4x SATA300) & LAN: 1Gbit
CPU: Intel i7-6770k
RAM: 4x4 GB DDR3
GPU: Palit GTX 970 4GB VRAM
PSU: FSP Hyper 80+ 600W (12V 45A 540W )
BOOT SSD: SAMSUNG 840 EVO 500GB, SATA 600
HDDs:
TOSHIBA 3TB, 7200 RPM, SATA 600 | WD 1TB Black 7200 RPM, SATA 600 | WD 1TB Green 5400 RPM, SATA 600
LAN: 1 Gbit
Internet: 1Gbit DOWN | 600MBit UP

That looks like a 6770k to me. If you have a 3rd gen CPU then it's good, it will work.
You gain editing pernissions after a few post, should be an antispam measure.

Great TIPS... Thanks for the long and explanatory answer... [...] I will read what you were so kind to provide and if I have more hardware questions related to my rig will post them here.

My pleasure. Entering this world is fascinating, proven you put in the required effort to educate yourself using the extensive material available on this forum. We (more knowledgeble users) can help pointing in the right direction and give a hand understanding some forigen concepts, since it looks a bit intimidating at first.
The resources section is your ally.