Build’s Name: Solaris11 ZFS HomeFileServer
Operating System/ Storage Platform: Oracle Solaris 11 Express / napp-it
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 250E AM3 2MB 45W 3000MHZ
Motherboard: ASUS M4A88TD-V EVO-USB3
Chassis: Vintage 2000 Acer Altos Server Chassis w/ 8 Drive Caddys
Drives: 2 – Hitachi 2.5” 7200RPM SATA drives, for the root pool mirror.
8 – SAMSUNG 3.5" Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB
Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5", for the DATA pool.
RAM: 2 – (8GB Total) Crucial Memory CT2KIT25672BA1339 4GB Kit
(2GBX2) 240P DIMM DDR3-1333 PC3-10600
Add-in Cards: 2 - SYBA SD-SATA2-4IR PCI SATA II (3.0Gb/s) Controller
Card
Power Supply: Athena 350W MicroATX
Other Bits: Quiet Fans >14dBA, 8 - 1 meter round SATA3 cables, 5 fan
controller with Temp monitor.
Usage Profile: Home File Server w/ ZFS Data Pool.
Other information:I was inspired while reading about ZFS storage when trying to build a RAID storage pool on my desktop system. I decided to build an Inexpensive, Power Efficient, Solaris server with zfs.
I am a new user to Solaris/Linux so this is very much a learning experience. I read Constantin’s Blog about an energy efficient Solaris server and decided to build my server following the guidelines he described. http://blogs.sun.com/constantin/entry/a_small_and_energy_efficient
ECC Memory was the first thing to consider in the motherboard because it would be the limiting factor in finding a motherboard since few inexpensive motherboards support ECC memory. After searching for which motherboard manufacturers made boards that supported ECC. It turned out that ASUS had the broadest selection that included motherboards that weren’t server boards, but still supported ECC memory. I was told that all AMD CPUs memory controllers support ECC, it turned out that while that is true, it depends on the chip set as to whether the motherboard will support it. ASUS was very good about listing in their specs as to whether the motherboard will support ECC.
Since I have no experience with Solaris I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a home server, so I used a old floor standing server case that was discarded at work. The Idea was to save money using the Acer Altos 11000 Server case with 8 drive bays. It originally had a motherboard with dual Pentium II CPUs in it and ran Windows NT. It turned out that I spent more money modifying this case than I would have had I bought a 4U rack mount server case. Someday I plan to move the system to a rack mount server case.
The DATA pool was created in striped mirror sets with the 8 Samsung 1Tb drives. 4 Mirrors striped into one 4TB pool. The idea according to Constantin in his blog “RAID-Greed” http://constantin.glez.de/blog/2010/01/home-server-raid-greed-and-why-mirroring-still-best was that it would be faster than a RAIDz pool, but mirroring the root pool turned out to be more difficult than I imagined. I contacted Constantin about how to do this and he wrote another blog about how to mirror a root pool (rpool) http://constantin.glez.de/blog/2011/03/how-set-zfs-root-pool-mirror-oracle-solaris-11-express.
The server is now up and running. I installed napp-it to manage things. I set up the ACLs on my windows machine and they worked at first, but when I copied a lot of files to the DATA pool something happened and now the ACLs are all wrong. They won’t display in windows, but I can still read and write to the DATA pool. Somehow I have to figure this out and re-do the ACLs. I am in the process of reading the ‘Solaris ZFS Administration Guide’. Just the beginning of my Learning Experience. The server un-officially draws about 150 Watts, with all 10 7200 rpm drives running, 350 Watts is more than enough for this server, not bad. My Windows Home Server draws more than that with fewer drives.
Any Ideas?
Let me know.
Operating System/ Storage Platform: Oracle Solaris 11 Express / napp-it
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 250E AM3 2MB 45W 3000MHZ
Motherboard: ASUS M4A88TD-V EVO-USB3
Chassis: Vintage 2000 Acer Altos Server Chassis w/ 8 Drive Caddys
Drives: 2 – Hitachi 2.5” 7200RPM SATA drives, for the root pool mirror.
8 – SAMSUNG 3.5" Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB
Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5", for the DATA pool.
RAM: 2 – (8GB Total) Crucial Memory CT2KIT25672BA1339 4GB Kit
(2GBX2) 240P DIMM DDR3-1333 PC3-10600
Add-in Cards: 2 - SYBA SD-SATA2-4IR PCI SATA II (3.0Gb/s) Controller
Card
Power Supply: Athena 350W MicroATX
Other Bits: Quiet Fans >14dBA, 8 - 1 meter round SATA3 cables, 5 fan
controller with Temp monitor.
Usage Profile: Home File Server w/ ZFS Data Pool.
Other information:I was inspired while reading about ZFS storage when trying to build a RAID storage pool on my desktop system. I decided to build an Inexpensive, Power Efficient, Solaris server with zfs.
I am a new user to Solaris/Linux so this is very much a learning experience. I read Constantin’s Blog about an energy efficient Solaris server and decided to build my server following the guidelines he described. http://blogs.sun.com/constantin/entry/a_small_and_energy_efficient
ECC Memory was the first thing to consider in the motherboard because it would be the limiting factor in finding a motherboard since few inexpensive motherboards support ECC memory. After searching for which motherboard manufacturers made boards that supported ECC. It turned out that ASUS had the broadest selection that included motherboards that weren’t server boards, but still supported ECC memory. I was told that all AMD CPUs memory controllers support ECC, it turned out that while that is true, it depends on the chip set as to whether the motherboard will support it. ASUS was very good about listing in their specs as to whether the motherboard will support ECC.
Since I have no experience with Solaris I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a home server, so I used a old floor standing server case that was discarded at work. The Idea was to save money using the Acer Altos 11000 Server case with 8 drive bays. It originally had a motherboard with dual Pentium II CPUs in it and ran Windows NT. It turned out that I spent more money modifying this case than I would have had I bought a 4U rack mount server case. Someday I plan to move the system to a rack mount server case.
The DATA pool was created in striped mirror sets with the 8 Samsung 1Tb drives. 4 Mirrors striped into one 4TB pool. The idea according to Constantin in his blog “RAID-Greed” http://constantin.glez.de/blog/2010/01/home-server-raid-greed-and-why-mirroring-still-best was that it would be faster than a RAIDz pool, but mirroring the root pool turned out to be more difficult than I imagined. I contacted Constantin about how to do this and he wrote another blog about how to mirror a root pool (rpool) http://constantin.glez.de/blog/2011/03/how-set-zfs-root-pool-mirror-oracle-solaris-11-express.
The server is now up and running. I installed napp-it to manage things. I set up the ACLs on my windows machine and they worked at first, but when I copied a lot of files to the DATA pool something happened and now the ACLs are all wrong. They won’t display in windows, but I can still read and write to the DATA pool. Somehow I have to figure this out and re-do the ACLs. I am in the process of reading the ‘Solaris ZFS Administration Guide’. Just the beginning of my Learning Experience. The server un-officially draws about 150 Watts, with all 10 7200 rpm drives running, 350 Watts is more than enough for this server, not bad. My Windows Home Server draws more than that with fewer drives.
Any Ideas?
Let me know.
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