New to FreeNAS-Critique my build please

[Cidah]

First off, I've been reading and searching on the forum a bit and want to say thanks for this great resource available to all of us new folks. I've been planning a NAS build for my home/business. Mainly for image backups for several computers as well as some bulk data storage. My wife is a photographer and keeping RAW files on the computers is far from ideal in terms of space(using SSD drives). I'd also like to rip some of the kids movies (that get watched over and over) to store on the NAS and access with a Roku or similar device.

After the initial build, I would like to build another box to take to my in-laws and have an offsite backup for some of the data that we store on the NAS. Would this build need to be identical? Or could I just use a couple of 4TB drives just to get the storage capacity up to where I need? Maybe on an old Dell Optiplex worksation? The data would never be accessed from this "backup", it would just be in case the unthinkable happened.



Here are the parts I'm looking at for the build:

Case- Fractal Design Define R4
Mobo-SuperMicro X10SL7-F
CPU-Intel Core i3 4330
RAM- 16GB total. 2 x Hynix HMT41GU7AFR8A-PB (to be fair, I'm interested in hearing about your RAM choices as well, since this isn't available at Newegg)
HDs-6 x 2TB Western Digital Red
PSU-Haven't decided yet. I want about 550 watts, 8 sata power connectors, 80 Plus Gold rating.

Still researching, but so far the plan is to run the 6 drives in Raid z2 giving me 8GB usable storage. Is this overkill for what I'm planning on using it for? Or is it about right? I would like this box to handle my storage needs for the next 5 years or so, and it'll be powered on all the time. Currently, the amount of data I have to store only adds up to about 2TB, so there is room there for growth.

Thanks for any info you can provide. The only thing I've ordered so far is 3 of the Hard drives, I'll be getting the other 3 from a separate vendor. Everything else can be changed as needed. My total estimated cost so far is about $1350 for this build.

 

[Cidah]

I've got a Dell optiplex 960 that I've been running a FreeNAS on for a couple of days just to play. I've set up a volume and permissions. Added the Plex Plugin and can access a couple of movies on the Roku. I think this is going to be a solid solution for me. I just need to pick the proper hardware for my build.

 

[Cidah]

Should I use the X9SCM motherboard instead? It saves me about $100. I only need 6 sata connectors for this build anyways, and could add more lately to add more volumes. The difference in price might be enough to push me towards 3TB x 6 WD RED.

 

[jgreco]

The X9 uses socket 1155. Older but very solid technology. The SCM is among the best of those boards.

The X10SL7 gets you the extra ports on the LSI2308. Uses socket 1150. Worth it iff you're going to need those ports, NOT WORTH IT if you do not see that possibility in your future.

Other than that, no comment other than what I've posted in the hardware suggestions thread.

 

[Cidah]

The only way I can see needing more than the 6 ports I'm planning currently are if I were to add another pool for a local data backup. I don't really see needing more space that 8-12 TB at this point.

 

[BigDave]

Looks like you've done your homework. Your future
needs for storage will help you make the choice,
but if I were you, the more spare ports I had... (X10 board)

 

[jgreco]

For someone whose needs are met with 2TB drives, though, in a few years, 10TB drives could be swapped in for a 5x increase in capacity in the same number of bays.

 

[BigDave]

It interests me to wonder how long it would take a 10TB drive to resilver................ lol

 

[jgreco]

I've been pointing out to people for some time now that we're in interesting times.

Consider for a moment if you had files that were an average of 4KB (which might not be unreasonable for, y'know, IMAP email or other types of small file data).

With a 72GB drive you could store about 17 million files, give or take a bit. Now assume that you can do 100 file accesses per second, each access requiring just a single seek. To access each file once... That's 175000 seconds, or roughly two days.

With a 10TB drive you could store about 2.4 billion files. Hard drives are still in the realm of 100 file accesses per second. That math works out to around 280 days.

This is a problem both for accessing and storing data. As drive sizes increase without corresponding decreases in seek time, the viability of storing small files on large disks diminishes.

 

[Mynorx]

Looks kinda like my build I used this memory and its 100% verified compatible by crucial tech and website for this mobo. Its available on newegg as well

Crucial 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM ECC Unbuffered DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Server Memory Model CT2KIT102472BD160B