NAS build advice 2021/2022

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s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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Hi,

I'm looking for the optimal platform for building a NAS. My criteria:
- Good efficiency
- ECC RAM
- 6 HDDs
- iGPU for transcoding

What should I target? An old Intel i3 < 10th GEN, a Xeon E-2200G or E-2300G, something else?

Your advice would be much appreciated.
 

s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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My part list currently looks like this:
- Intel i3-9100 (iGPU, supports ECC RAM)
- 2x 16GB KSM26eS8/16Me (un-buffered un-registred ECC)
- Fujitsu D3642-B (Q370 chipset)
- be quiet! BN280 PSU (450W)
- be quiet! BN030 CPU cooler
- 4x Seagate Exos X16 ST16000NM001G
- 1x Samsung 860 EVO M.2 SATA III, 250 GB
-
Fractal Design Define R5

Does it sound good? Are there avoidable mistakes?
 

BoredSysadmin

Not affiliated with Maxell
Mar 2, 2019
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Did you consider pre-built NAS machines? You get all your wishes, including one which you didn't list - enclosure management. TVS-h1288X ticks all boxes.
If you would prefer fewer drive slots (and cost) you could look into TVS-672X-i3-8G (which SHOULD support ECC memory, at least according to Intel)
 

s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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Did you consider pre-built NAS machines? You get all your wishes, including one which you didn't list - enclosure management. TVS-h1288X ticks all boxes.
If you would prefer fewer drive slots (and cost) you could look into TVS-672X-i3-8G (which SHOULD support ECC memory, at least according to Intel)
I don't find it price competitive... With everything above it comes more or less to the price of the QNAP without drives.
 

zer0sum

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2013
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That sure is an interesting/weird motherboard choice?
Why would you go with that?

It would be helpful if you would list a little more information about what NAS operating system you're going with, and what you're going to do withit :)
 

s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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I plan to run TrueNAS Scale, with at least Plex/Jellyfin, maybe a few other docker containers (Pi-hole, ...).

Why that motherboard? The cheapest I found with ECC support, 6x SATA, compatible with the CPU and sourceable in CH.
 

BoredSysadmin

Not affiliated with Maxell
Mar 2, 2019
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I don't find it price competitive... With everything above it comes more or less to the price of the QNAP without drives.
Fair point. Counterpoint: I bought on fleebay TVS-872XT for under $1k. I find value in enclosure management and ease of updates. I used QNAP's QVR Pro for my home NVR system and it works well.
I was considering Scale myself, but it's still in beta version so...
 

s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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I was considering Scale myself, but it's still in beta version so...
Apparently the target release date is Feb '22. Not that far away.

Indeed I could even get an i3 9100T for roughly the same price. Would gain 35W TDP.
 

zer0sum

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2013
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I plan to run TrueNAS Scale, with at least Plex/Jellyfin, maybe a few other docker containers (Pi-hole, ...).

Why that motherboard? The cheapest I found with ECC support, 6x SATA, compatible with the CPU and sourceable in CH.
Gotcha...can you find an 1151 Supermicro board?

I rebuilt my Unraid NAS recently and went with this hardware:
  • Silverstone TJ08 case
  • Super Micro X11SSM-F - $114 (Amazon open box)
  • Xeon E3-1270v5 , 4 core / 8 thread, 3.6-4Ghz - $85 (Ebay)
  • Mellanox ConnectX-3 - $20 (Ebay)
  • 64G ECC ram
  • Supermicro AOC-SLG3-2M2 PCIe Add-On Card (Bifurcated)
    • 1TB nvme cache drive
    • 2TB nvme share drive
  • HP H220 LSI SAS2308 HBA
    • 4 x 10TB SAS drives
  • Nvidia Quadro P400 for Plex stream transcoding
  • Icydock dual 5.25" to triple 3.5" cage
 
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zer0sum

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2013
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So far haven't seen any at a decent price. Also, your Xeon E3-1270v5 has a TDP of 80W...
TDP is a thermal specification to describe the amount of heat the casing/environment would need to be able to dissipate, in order for it not to overheat.
It's not a great metric for finding a low power cpu in my opinion.

Idle power consumption is much more relevant to the power draw a 24/7 NAS system is going to use.
 

s__C

New Member
Dec 10, 2021
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Oh, the motherboard I selected doesn't support ECC... Need something else.

Asus WS C246M PRO it'll be!
 
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Vit K

Member
Feb 23, 2017
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I'm planing another waste of money and time endeavor for multi 10 GbE router/NAS using this dirt cheap chinese LGA 2011 mining motherboard. It is look ugly but have five x8 (x16 mechanical) slots that should be directly attached to the CPU. 40 lines of pcie 3.0 in total in 80 USD motherboard taking 10 dollar CPUs!

H3c15837a4b584c54a9ec776b8baaca4bW.jpgH7d40ddae66474335b0e8fc7b86e0d6488.jpgH6c3d0882116f4127bf0d3631f50a674cV.jpg

I want to put 2 dual 10 GbE cards there(or one dual 40 Gbit with 4*10 sfp+ cable), one 16 port SAS HBA, and 2-3 PCIE dual NVME adapters, that should let me have 4 NVME drives (2-3 Gb/s read each) for ZFS FreeNAS cache. I have plenty of LGA 2011 silicons from 4 to 12 cores and piles of 8-16-32 Gb ECC ram, even seeing 64 Gb for 100 usd now on ebay. This all will allow up to 5-10 Gb/s read/write speed over network for any backup and media tasks I can imagine without bottleneck in IO or CPU, while having pool of 16 drives and ~100 Tb capacity.
The only drawback is not standard form factor, but I want to use actual mining case as it has good cooling and it should be almost silent.
 
Aug 17, 2021
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@s__C don't overlook IPMI. The iX systems guys say on their website that TrueNAS doesn't always play nice with link aggregation (LAG, LAGG, LACP, etc.) and they recommend that a machine has at least a dedicated management port.
 
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ddaenen1

Member
Jul 7, 2020
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@s__C don't overlook IPMI. The iX systems guys say on their website that TrueNAS doesn't always play nice with link aggregation (LAG, LAGG, LACP, etc.) and they recommend that a machine has at least a dedicated management port.
I would agree that TrueNAS can be a bit of a pain to set up LAGG but once it runs, it runs. I have a self-built TrueNAS box with an X9SCM-F, E3-1230, 32GB ECC, LSI HBA and 4 x 2TB HGST SAS drives and that works like charm. Stable as a rock, extremely reliable. Do agree that IPMI is a must-have if you want to run headless but i rarely had to use it for TrueNAS management via CLI. Exceptionally during the initial installation and setup but after that, just to monitor the hardware rather than anything else. For all other cases i use the shell in TrueNAS or SSH via a console.