Hi everyone. I'm new to FreeNAS and BSD in general but I’ve been doing some reading and really like the sound of the software. I'd be very grateful for any advice you can offer me on my new build.
My use case: Mainly media storage but will also be some backups, torrents and other miscellanea. Will also be running a number of jails; a few web servers, database server, torrent server, etc.
Will be sharing media out via nfs, cifs and webserver, maybe dnla too.
Was planning on using old media server as a backup/mirroring device.
The proposed hardware:
Mainboard/case:
HP ProLiant MicroServer G7 N54L
CPU:
AMD Turion II Neo N54L - 2.2GHz dual core - not the fastest but is v low power consumption which is a plus for me. on the down side it's embedded so cannot be upgraded.
RAM:
16GB Kingston 1333MHz CL9 DDR3 ValueRAM Unbuffered ECC - KVR1333D3E9SK2/16G
HDDs:
5x WD Red 3TB - OEM - 1 raidz pool, additional hdd will be connected to sata port reserved for the optical drive which can be run at full speed using this bios patch
maybe 6x in z2, still undecided
Addtional HDD mount:
Icy Box IB-172sk-b SATA Mobile Rack for 5.25 inch Bay for 1 X 3.5 inch SATA and 1 X 2.5 inch SATA HDD
StarTech.com 3.5 inch Universal Hard Drive Mounting Bracket Adapter for 5.25 inch Bay - using this it is possible to fit 2x 3.5" HDDs into the 5.25" bay of this case.
Boot device:
CF Compact Flash Memory Card to SATA Converter Adapter - connected via the external esata port
Transcend Extreme-Speed Compact Flash Memory Card 400x 8 GB - fast and has ecc, worth it for the boot drive?
--or--
Corsair CMFUSB2.0-8GB 8GB Flash Voyager Flash Drive - connected to internal usb port
Q1. which boot option would be better? usb option would be easier and cheaper. would the cf option be worth it?
Q2. I was considering adding another sata controller to hook up one or more ssds which could be used forcache, jails or zil. Is it worth having a dedicated SSD to speed up my jails or just use it as a general cache or both?
Q3. I was having trouble finding a decent and compatible 2 or 4 port sata3 controller for a fair price (preferably under £60). Can anyone recommend anything?
Q4. Do you think the slow CPU will hamper the performance too much? on occasions it maybe serving video to up to 6 or 7 clients simultaneously over a number of protocols (nfs,cifs,http/rtmp/hls), running bittorrent, apache (serving pages to only a handful of users), php, mysql (serving media info data base and some small dbs related to web sites), maybe a few other applications as well. Will this system be able to handle that? Since it will be a small number of users at a time i was thinking it would just about be okay. thoughts?
Any other comments on this set-up would be much appreciated.
Edit: added CPU spec and related performance question.
Edit2: updated choices on hdd mount and boot device
Edit3: So I've put together an alternate build. What do you think?
Supermicro X10SLL-F Socket 1150 Motherboard
Intel Pentium Dual Core G3420 3.2GHz Socket 1150 Dual Core Haswell
2x Kingston 8GB 1600MHz DDR3L ECC CL11 DIMM 1.35V
Fractal Design Define Mini micro ATX Case
Seasonic SS-360GP 360W PSU 80+ GOLD
6x Western Digital 3TB Red WD30EFRX Hard Drive
My use case: Mainly media storage but will also be some backups, torrents and other miscellanea. Will also be running a number of jails; a few web servers, database server, torrent server, etc.
Will be sharing media out via nfs, cifs and webserver, maybe dnla too.
Was planning on using old media server as a backup/mirroring device.
The proposed hardware:
Mainboard/case:
HP ProLiant MicroServer G7 N54L
CPU:
AMD Turion II Neo N54L - 2.2GHz dual core - not the fastest but is v low power consumption which is a plus for me. on the down side it's embedded so cannot be upgraded.
RAM:
16GB Kingston 1333MHz CL9 DDR3 ValueRAM Unbuffered ECC - KVR1333D3E9SK2/16G
HDDs:
5x WD Red 3TB - OEM - 1 raidz pool, additional hdd will be connected to sata port reserved for the optical drive which can be run at full speed using this bios patch
maybe 6x in z2, still undecided
Addtional HDD mount:
StarTech.com 3.5 inch Universal Hard Drive Mounting Bracket Adapter for 5.25 inch Bay - using this it is possible to fit 2x 3.5" HDDs into the 5.25" bay of this case.
Boot device:
Corsair CMFUSB2.0-8GB 8GB Flash Voyager Flash Drive - connected to internal usb port
Q2. I was considering adding another sata controller to hook up one or more ssds which could be used for
Q3. I was having trouble finding a decent and compatible 2 or 4 port sata3 controller for a fair price (preferably under £60). Can anyone recommend anything?
Q4. Do you think the slow CPU will hamper the performance too much? on occasions it maybe serving video to up to 6 or 7 clients simultaneously over a number of protocols (nfs,cifs,http/rtmp/hls), running bittorrent, apache (serving pages to only a handful of users), php, mysql (serving media info data base and some small dbs related to web sites), maybe a few other applications as well. Will this system be able to handle that? Since it will be a small number of users at a time i was thinking it would just about be okay. thoughts?
Any other comments on this set-up would be much appreciated.
Edit: added CPU spec and related performance question.
Edit2: updated choices on hdd mount and boot device
Edit3: So I've put together an alternate build. What do you think?
Supermicro X10SLL-F Socket 1150 Motherboard
Intel Pentium Dual Core G3420 3.2GHz Socket 1150 Dual Core Haswell
2x Kingston 8GB 1600MHz DDR3L ECC CL11 DIMM 1.35V
Fractal Design Define Mini micro ATX Case
Seasonic SS-360GP 360W PSU 80+ GOLD
6x Western Digital 3TB Red WD30EFRX Hard Drive