New Media Server

[0Cypher1]

Hey All,

After reading through the guidelines and doing a bit of research I am pretty confident in the build I am proposing, but wanted a sanity check. I plan on just running the RAIDZ mainly because its not going to be used as a backup so I am not too worried about redundancy though that may change by the time I build.

Mobo: SUPERMICRO MBD-X11SSM-F-O - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813183013
CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1240 v5 SkyLake 3.5 GHz 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1151 - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117614
RAM: (2x) Crucial 16GB Single 2133MT/s DDR4 PC4-17000 Dual Ranked x8 ECC DIMM - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017UGK94S/?tag=pcpapi-20
Storage: (6x) WD Red 4TB NAS Hard Disk Drive - 5400 RPM - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236599
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 - https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352048
PSU: Seasonic SSR-450RM ATX 12V/EPS 12V 450-Watt 80 Plus Gold certified - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00918MQ8G/?tag=pcpapi-20

The only thing that concerns me is that the ram is not on the tested list for the mobo, but the guidelines stated that you really couldnt go wrong with Crucial memory. I chose the newer supermicro board because I would like to futureproof it as much as possible by giving myself the ability to add up to 64gb of ram if i decide to push the drives past 24TB. I will also be buying a cheap SSD that will hold the FreeNAS install.

Thanks in advanced for any tips/advice on this!

Cheers!

 

[melloa]

Case: Fractal Design Define R5

Very similar to one I got for my test box and I've noticed that my HDDs (10x2TiB) are getting hot. The CPU (i3) is also getting a little hotter than I like. I do prefer rack chassis, but if that's not possible plan your cooling well.

Seasonic SSR-450RM ATX 12V/EPS 12V 450

That might be enough for now, but you might want to go with some room for the memory and HDDs you'll be adding. Check: https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/proper-power-supply-sizing-guidance.38811/.

 

[Stux]

A E3-1230 is slightly better bang for buck than the 1240. Worth checking out.

 

[0Cypher1]

Very similar to one I got for my test box and I've noticed that my HDDs (10x2TiB) are getting hot. The CPU (i3) is also getting a little hotter than I like. I do prefer rack chassis, but if that's not possible plan your cooling well.

The other option I was considering would be the Fractal Cube Box: https://www.amazon.com/Fractal-Design-Supply-MicroATX-FD-CA-NODE-804-BL/dp/B00K6OVG0I/

This one looks like it has a bit more room for cooling organization, but maybe its just me. I'll look into beefing up the PSU to 750 then to just keep everything else in check. Thanks for the tip!

As far as the E3-1230, unless I'm mistaken I would also have to change the mobo to support the socket right?

 

[melloa]

This one looks like it has a bit more room for cooling organization, but maybe its just me

It seems like.

I would also have to change the mobo to support the socket right?

Yeap. Also only supports 32GRAM. I thought I saw you mentioning plans to go 64?

https://ark.intel.com/products/52271/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1230-8M-Cache-3_20-GHz
https://ark.intel.com/products/88176/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1240-v5-8M-Cache-3_50-GHz

 

[0Cypher1]

It seems like.



Yeap. Also only supports 32GRAM. I thought I saw you mentioning plans to go 64?

https://ark.intel.com/products/52271/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1230-8M-Cache-3_20-GHz
https://ark.intel.com/products/88176/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1240-v5-8M-Cache-3_50-GHz

Yeah thats what I saw as well, I was just responding to Stux's comment on looking into it. I still plan on sticking with my original CPU to future proof it. But it looks like my build should be set to go then. Now just need to order the parts and worry about stress testing everything before moving to perm NAS :)

 

[RodyMcAmp]

The other option I was considering would be the Fractal Cube Box: https://www.amazon.com/Fractal-Design-Supply-MicroATX-FD-CA-NODE-804-BL/dp/B00K6OVG0I/

This one looks like it has a bit more room for cooling organization, but maybe its just me. I'll look into beefing up the PSU to 750 then to just keep everything else in check. Thanks for the tip!

As far as the E3-1230, unless I'm mistaken I would also have to change the mobo to support the socket right?

you need to get the v5 version of the e3-1230 https://ark.intel.com/products/88182/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1230-v5-8M-Cache-3_40-GHz supports the x11 board and 64 gb ram

 

[melloa]

You're looking at CPUs from 2 different generations. @Stux is talking about the E3-1230 v5.

https://ark.intel.com/products/88182/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1230-v5-8M-Cache-3_40-GHz

Thanks for clarify. That one works.

 

[Arwen]

One comment. If you are making a straight forward media server without any other
services, (or very minor services), then perhaps you should consider these options;

• Use simple ZFS stripping for data, no RAID-Zx or Mirroring
• Use much larger disks, for example 2 x 10TB stripe gives the same space as 6 x 4TB in a RAID-Z1
• Don't worry about the memory as much. 16GB should be fine.
  
• Leave one disk slot free for disk replacement
• Have a backup, (or 2), that uses the cheapest disks per GB for your media, (also using ZFS for scrubs)
  
• Do consider a Mirror for the OS, especially if using USB, (so you get better up times)

Basically re-design the server for Media Services only. You can dump temporary things
on the server to keep additional copies. Even in a dataset with "copies=2". My media
server is a miniture PC, without RAID-Zx or Mirroring of the media data, (OS is Mirrored
though). It is backed up to my FreeNAS main storage pool, (which does use RAID-Z2).

Note that you CAN perform disk replacements in a ZFS stripe. It simply requires the old
disk to be present until the replacement is complete.

Because the above design is striped, any data block errors require file restoration. Not
too much of a problem for a media library. Especially if you have easy access to the
original media, (CD, DVD, Blu-ray, etc...). Or a decent backups. Last, full disk failure
would require full restoration.

 

[Amu W Ramappa]

Don't forget a small UPS that'll help clean shutdown for power failures

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

 

[Bhoot]

One comment. If you are making a straight forward media server without any other
services, (or very minor services), then perhaps you should consider these options;

• Use simple ZFS stripping for data, no RAID-Zx or Mirroring
• Use much larger disks, for example 2 x 10TB stripe gives the same space as 6 x 4TB in a RAID-Z1
• Don't worry about the memory as much. 16GB should be fine.
  
• Leave one disk slot free for disk replacement
• Have a backup, (or 2), that uses the cheapest disks per GB for your media, (also using ZFS for scrubs)
  
• Do consider a Mirror for the OS, especially if using USB, (so you get better up times)

Basically re-design the server for Media Services only. You can dump temporary things
on the server to keep additional copies. Even in a dataset with "copies=2". My media
server is a miniture PC, without RAID-Zx or Mirroring of the media data, (OS is Mirrored
though). It is backed up to my FreeNAS main storage pool, (which does use RAID-Z2).

Note that you CAN perform disk replacements in a ZFS stripe. It simply requires the old
disk to be present until the replacement is complete.

Because the above design is striped, any data block errors require file restoration. Not
too much of a problem for a media library. Especially if you have easy access to the
original media, (CD, DVD, Blu-ray, etc...). Or a decent backups. Last, full disk failure
would require full restoration.

Even for data I would recommend a RaidZ2. Its not easy ripping disks and copying them to the server, not to forget the limited life of disks. Moisture/elements get the better of them. You could replace the disk if it's recognised in the system. A lot of people including me have got a disk UNAVAIL temporarily and boy was I glad I had a raid. Before switching the disk I changed the ports and replaced the cables. VIOLA.. Everything was fine. 46.0 GB resilvered. With a raid it would be a 20tb server having 0 tb of data
This and This are threads started by me where a disk just dropped out of the array without any warning.
I am sure a lot of people have experienced it before. A Raid5 (raidz) went out of fashion in 2009 and Raid6 (raidz2) is gonna go out of fashion by 2019 (from various sources in this forum. I would also like maximum space for my media but I am glad I made a pool with raidz2 when I did.

 

[Arwen]

Even for data I would recommend a RaidZ2. Its not easy ripping disks and copying them to the server, not to forget the limited life of disks. Moisture/elements get the better of them. You could replace the disk if it's recognised in the system. A lot of people including me have got a disk UNAVAIL temporarily and boy was I glad I had a raid. Before switching the disk I changed the ports and replaced the cables. VIOLA.. Everything was fine. 46.0 GB resilvered. With a raid it would be a 20tb server having 0 tb of data
This and This are threads started by me where a disk just dropped out of the array without any warning.
I am sure a lot of people have experienced it before. A Raid5 (raidz) went out of fashion in 2009 and Raid6 (raidz2) is gonna go out of fashion by 2019 (from various sources in this forum. I would also like maximum space for my media but I am glad I made a pool with raidz2 when I did.

Your points are valid. If you can, make it a Mirror or RAID-Zx. But I also suggest backups, even of the
media files, (I have 2 backups, and the original optical discs).

When a disk in a stripe becomes temporarily un-available, the pool drops off-line. Simply fix the problem
and re-import the pool. No re-silvering required.

In my case, I wanted a small, quiet and low power media server. I choose something that would have a
long life. The last I bought from a company, lasted 6 years, (which only had a hard disk upgrade). The
old one was slow for OS updates and had only 100Mbps Ethernet. So when I was looking for a replacement,
I looked at their current offerings. Found one that seemed good, but it would not allow enough storage to
Mirror or RAID-Zx. (But neither did the prior one...) So my FreeNAS was designed to allow Media backups
from my non-FreeNAS media server.