mmastera
Cadet
- Joined
- Mar 8, 2022
- Messages
- 1
Thanks in advance, I have been in technology for over 30 years and used to deal with hardware regularly but it's been years. I'm a bit out of touch and have been trying to get caught up. What I'm finding is a lot of valuable information/recommendations for a build that are likely overkill for my situation.
To set the stage, I almost bought a Synology DS220+. This should give you an idea of what I mean when I say a lot of what's discussed here is likely to be overkill for me...
I don't currently have a NAS. We generally don't deal with a lot of data... I do have a Plex server but it's in the cloud... My home server is currently a repurposed Samsung Chromebox Series 3 (i5, 4 GB RAM, 128GB SSD) running Ubuntu and only used as a Docker host. The server has been adequate so far but there are a couple of requirements that have popped up that are causing me to look for something new. The main one is that I've starting adding IP cameras which use Frigate running in docker but due to lack a adequate disk space I can only have it record as part of detection and we need to be able to have always on recording. I also need to start using iSCSI to network book some rpi's but it's not straightforward to setup iSCSI within docker and I'd prefer not to install it on my existing host (not to mention back to having a disk space issue).
I've thought about adding an external drive to address the storage, maybe upgrading the RAM but the idea of moving to a NAS appliance which can also run docker and replace the existing server is appealing to me. I don't anticipate ever needing complex storage... I have a 4TB drive that I would intend to use, possibly just that one drive for now and probably not grow beyond the need for a second (4 would be a stretch) which is why I was looking at a 2-bay NAS. Re: the safety of the data... I can see adding a second drive for mirroring but not likely that I'd go beyond that. I am more likely to reply upon cloud backup.
So... I could still buy the DS220+. It would meet the storage need and make iSCSI easy, but the specs for running docker are just so-so in my opinion. Since it ended up being on backorder, I starting looking at TrueNAS Scale... So to recap:
- I need a NAS to address the storage needs for my IP cameras, easy iSCSI support and for storage for the docker's (images and persistent filesystem storage)
- I will start with a single 4TB drive (but probably get a separate boot drive), may add a second to mirror in the future but don't expect to ever have more than 4 drives
- Quick Sync or equivalent would be nice to help offload Frigate's use of ffmpeg
- Reasonable performance for docker. Today 10 docker images are in use, most very small, light in terms of hardware requirements. Frigate is probably the biggest fish
- I like the idea of ample cores/threads for the docker workloads but again none of them are very hitters
- My switch supports 10 GBE but I don't really feel that I need it... So it doesn't make sense to me to spend on a board that has 10 GBE, as long as I can add via PCIe down the road if the need pops up
- This will be a headless machine and efficiency would be nice, so I don't want a separate GPU. Either on-bard video or even just IPMI would be fine
So please help me out.... I understand Quick Sync means Intel (please let me know if there is an equivalent for AMD, I think there is but I don't see anyone talking about it). I'm thinking 16 or maybe 32GB of RAM. Open to suggestions on motherboard/processor based on my comments above. Since I don't need a lot of drives I was thinking of staying small (mITX). I haven't focused on a case yet but less deep rackmount would be very interesting.
I do need to be careful about experimenting, which is why I', seeking your advice. We live in Costa Rica and it's not straightforward to buy this stuff here so I want to make sure I have a well thought out shopping list before buying in the US and transporting the stuff down here
Thank you!
To set the stage, I almost bought a Synology DS220+. This should give you an idea of what I mean when I say a lot of what's discussed here is likely to be overkill for me...
I don't currently have a NAS. We generally don't deal with a lot of data... I do have a Plex server but it's in the cloud... My home server is currently a repurposed Samsung Chromebox Series 3 (i5, 4 GB RAM, 128GB SSD) running Ubuntu and only used as a Docker host. The server has been adequate so far but there are a couple of requirements that have popped up that are causing me to look for something new. The main one is that I've starting adding IP cameras which use Frigate running in docker but due to lack a adequate disk space I can only have it record as part of detection and we need to be able to have always on recording. I also need to start using iSCSI to network book some rpi's but it's not straightforward to setup iSCSI within docker and I'd prefer not to install it on my existing host (not to mention back to having a disk space issue).
I've thought about adding an external drive to address the storage, maybe upgrading the RAM but the idea of moving to a NAS appliance which can also run docker and replace the existing server is appealing to me. I don't anticipate ever needing complex storage... I have a 4TB drive that I would intend to use, possibly just that one drive for now and probably not grow beyond the need for a second (4 would be a stretch) which is why I was looking at a 2-bay NAS. Re: the safety of the data... I can see adding a second drive for mirroring but not likely that I'd go beyond that. I am more likely to reply upon cloud backup.
So... I could still buy the DS220+. It would meet the storage need and make iSCSI easy, but the specs for running docker are just so-so in my opinion. Since it ended up being on backorder, I starting looking at TrueNAS Scale... So to recap:
- I need a NAS to address the storage needs for my IP cameras, easy iSCSI support and for storage for the docker's (images and persistent filesystem storage)
- I will start with a single 4TB drive (but probably get a separate boot drive), may add a second to mirror in the future but don't expect to ever have more than 4 drives
- Quick Sync or equivalent would be nice to help offload Frigate's use of ffmpeg
- Reasonable performance for docker. Today 10 docker images are in use, most very small, light in terms of hardware requirements. Frigate is probably the biggest fish
- I like the idea of ample cores/threads for the docker workloads but again none of them are very hitters
- My switch supports 10 GBE but I don't really feel that I need it... So it doesn't make sense to me to spend on a board that has 10 GBE, as long as I can add via PCIe down the road if the need pops up
- This will be a headless machine and efficiency would be nice, so I don't want a separate GPU. Either on-bard video or even just IPMI would be fine
So please help me out.... I understand Quick Sync means Intel (please let me know if there is an equivalent for AMD, I think there is but I don't see anyone talking about it). I'm thinking 16 or maybe 32GB of RAM. Open to suggestions on motherboard/processor based on my comments above. Since I don't need a lot of drives I was thinking of staying small (mITX). I haven't focused on a case yet but less deep rackmount would be very interesting.
I do need to be careful about experimenting, which is why I', seeking your advice. We live in Costa Rica and it's not straightforward to buy this stuff here so I want to make sure I have a well thought out shopping list before buying in the US and transporting the stuff down here
Thank you!
