Looking for recommendations to go with parts I already have.

[jfreggie]

Hello Community!
Hoping someone can help out a storage server n00b on recommendations on hardware to purchase for a TrueNAS SCALE build.

I currently have the following parts:

2x Xeon E5-2630 v3
16x 16Gb DDR4-2400 RDIMM ECC - https://www.serversupply.com/MEMORY/PC4-19200/16GB/SAMSUNG/M393A2G40EB1-CRC0Q_284916.htm
Intel dual 10Gb NIC - https://www.ebay.com/p/1528523591
12x 10TB HGST HDD - https://www.serversupply.com/HARD D...PM/WESTERN DIGITAL/HUH721010ALE600_317176.htm

I'd like to get a 12 or 16 bay rackmount server. Do you guys have any recommendations on a chassis, motherboard, CPU Cooler, HBA?/backplane and cables, that would all be compatible. I also have a couple of 500GB SSD drives that could be used for OS as well.

Mostly planning on using this for family photo back up, BlueIris Server, a couple Ubuntu VM's and potentially a plex server as well.

Located in the US if that helps!

 

[Arwen]

I can't answer most of your questions.

For the HBA, LSI chip based ones that support IT, (Initiator/Target), mode are the go to cards. I think Evil-Bay seller "Art of the Server" is well thought of here, search the forums. Plus, Intel SATA ports that are built into motherboards are good too.

You can use 500GB SSDs for boot drive(s), though in general TrueNAS Core or SCALE will fit on 32GB ones just fine. The 500GB SSDs might make a better ZFS Mirror pool for your VMs. If you do buy or otherwise acquire new boot drives, I would go for 64GB ones today, only because that would let ZFS keep lots of old boot environments around. Which you can make as a partial backup method.

 

[DigitalMinimalist]

Mainboard: used Supermicro X10DRH-I series

HBA: 16port HBA with Broadcom SAS3008 with 4x SFF-8643 connector -> SFF-8643 to SATA cable

If you want to go rackmount, I would go with something with built-in backplanes for the 3.5 storage drives: e.g. Fantec SRC-4120X08, 4HE (go for 4U, as you will have less issues with CPU coolers)

Tower format: e.g. Fractal Design Define 7 XL

Cooler: Noctua NH-U9DX i4 fits perfectly into 4U case - in case of tower, you could even go to Noctua NH-U12DX i4

Hope that helps

BUT: dual E5 seems like a huge overkill for your described use-case and the mainboard might get expensive (even used).
Alternative could be another single CPU platform, which supports DDR4 RDIMM, e.g. Supermicro X10SRi-F (only 8xDDR4 RAM), or EPYC: e.g. ASRock Rack EPYCD8

 

[jgreco]

Integrated Target

*cough* Initiator/Target. Every device on a SCSI (or Serial-Attached SCSI ... i.e. SAS) bus can act as either an initiator (like an HBA) or a target (like a HDD). Or possibly both at once. As SCSI devices are moderately intelligent, it is technically possible for each device to adopt either role. An "IT mode HBA" means a host bus adapter which is devoid of more complex RAID-like functions, and functions exclusively as either an initiator or a target.

This implies that if the driver and software supported it, you could make TrueNAS act as a SAS target and offer out your pool or zvols as a block storage over a SAS bus. I don't know that this is supported by the SAS cards in the driver, but it is supported by the Fiber Channel cards by the driver.

This deep dive into arcane crap is now over, and we now return you to your regularly scheduled show.

 

[Arwen]

*cough* Initiator/Target.
...

I don't know what you mean... my response was perfectly fine, (after I edited it for your correction .

 

[jgreco]

I don't know what you mean... my response was perfectly fine, (after I edited it for your correction .

And so it is, I retract my nit-picky correction. ;-) ;-)

"Bureaucrat Conrad, you are technically correct. The best kind of correct." - Futurama

 

[Arwen]

Now that I think about it, I was confusing the "I" in IR with the "I" in IT, because we all know that IR means Integrated RAID. (I looked it up to make sure I was right!)

 

[jgreco]

we all know

For values of "we all" <= maybe 5% of users on this forum. But other than that you are correct.

The interesting thing is that the IR firmware is very similar to the IT firmware in how it works. It is basically a superset of the IT firmware, and is generally compatible with TrueNAS because of it. An IR-mode virtual disk is actually something I suggest as a possible solution to ensure more reliable booting in my article:

Highly Available Boot Pool Strategy

I've pounded a few versions of this out over the years, but I hate explaining over and over. TrueNAS allows a ZFS boot mirror pool to be created to increase the reliability of the NAS. This sounds great in theory, but there's a flaw. Due to...

www.truenas.com

which explores this rabbit hole in some depth, for anyone who cares. There is also the cautionary warning in the mpt(4) manpage,

The Integrated RAID Mirroring available for these controllers is poorly supported at best.

which in my opinion hasn't been a fair assessment of the status quo in any time. The driver dates back 20 years (summer 2002) at which time that quality assessment was probably true.