32GB RAM 20TB NAS Build Mobo & CPU Compatibility Check

[sonny81]

Couldn't see these listed on the manual's provided link to compatible hardware. I've seen other members having these items listed in their build but I want to be sure before dishing out the money.

Here's what I'm thinking:

AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb 3.4GHz Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103727

ASUS M5A99X EVO AM3+ AMD 990X SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131754

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231562

CyberPower Intelligent LCD Series GreenPower UPS CP1350AVRLCD 1350 VA 810 Watts
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16842102070

Thanks!!

 

[Stephens]

You don't mention which power supply you'll be using but be aware that it's quite likely the CP1350AVRLCD, which produces square wave power output, will not work correctly with any Active PFC power supply (seems most of them these days have that feature). If you're using an active PFC power supply, you'll need something more like the CP1350PFCLCD.

 

[sonny81]

You don't mention which power supply you'll be using but be aware that it's quite likely the CP1350AVRLCD, which produces square wave power output, will not work correctly with any Active PFC power supply (seems most of them these days have that feature). If you're using an active PFC power supply, you'll need something more like the CP1350PFCLCD.

Hey man thanks for the reply!!

This is the power supply I was looking at"

CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX750 V2 750W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC High Performance Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139021

As for the UPS recommendation is this our guy?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16842102133

 

[Stephens]

That's our guy. I know it's ridiculously more expensive than the CP1350AVRLCD, which gives the same amount of backup power, but there you go. By the way, I don't believe FreeNAS directly supports these UPS's, so you'll have to go with generic support. I get messages in my log about unknown USB device and the shutdown functionality isn't working on my 8.0.4 system, but that's something you can play with.

 

[sonny81]

Thanks brother!

I don't mind the extra cost as the AMD system is MUCH cheaper than the Intel system I was looking at. The Intel system was probably overkill anyway. So spending a little more on the UPS doesn't change the fact that overall I'm still saving $

That's a shame about the support. I did a quick search and it seems very common.

Before accepting my fate should I consider a different PSU that would work with the FreeNas supported AVRLCD?

 

[paleoN]

Thanks brother!

I don't mind the extra cost as the AMD system is MUCH cheaper than the Intel system I was looking at. The Intel system was probably overkill anyway. So spending a little more on the UPS doesn't change the fact that overall I'm still saving $

And this system isn't overkill? What exactly is your quad-core 3.4GHz 125w CPU going to be doing?

I would think about a ASUS Sabertooth 990FX motherboard. Assuming it works well with FreeBSD. I decided on a Llano CPU early on so I never checked. It comes with a 5 year warranty and supports ECC RAM.

Speaking of which, I would switch to ECC RAM as long as the motherboard supports it. Either of them will. All desktop AMD CPUs do to my knowledge.

Your PSU appears to be overkill as well or do you need 750W.

 

[sonny81]

And this system isn't overkill? What exactly is your quad-core 3.4GHz 125w CPU going to be doing?

I would think about a ASUS Sabertooth 990FX motherboard. Assuming it works well with FreeBSD. I decided on a Llano CPU early on so I never checked. It comes with a 5 year warranty and supports ECC RAM.

Speaking of which, I would switch to ECC RAM as long as the motherboard supports it. Either of them will. All desktop AMD CPUs do to my knowledge.

Your PSU appears to be overkill as well or do you need 750W.

Appreciate the input!!

1. Basically the folders I'll be transferring over to my NAS via FTP will be about 120GB-3TB in size. Huge variation yes, but I just wanted my CPU to better handle that size folder. Granted I know its mainly RAM that I should be worried about, but my concern was that I would face in the future a CPU bottleneck.

The CPU was only $109 so I figured why not? Which Llano were you looking at? With my load demands above, will I just be wasting (not utilizing) the CPU? If I could get a Llano for $60-$70 that might be worth the savings if its more than sufficient.

2. I picked this particular PSU because it had 8 SATA connectors which is the exact number, for starters, that I will have installed in my NAS; 8 3TB hard drives. Believe it or not, that will be filled in about 2-2.5yrs.

Granted, I only need about 400W of power to handle the entire system according to Newegg, but they don't have many power connectors. I know they make adaptors, but the case has 7 fans.

Is there something cheaper and just as efficient that I should be looking at?

3. Just as an FYI, this is the RAM I'm looking at:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231562

This RAM doesn't have error correction which I don't like, but from my 20min search, I didn't see any dual channel DDR3 1866 that also had ECC. Hoping I just overlooked it.

Thoughts?

 

[sonny81]

Sorry for all the posts. Here is my current Wish List.

Just trying to verify if all are Freenas 8.2 compatible:

ASUS Sabertooth 990FX AM3+ mobo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131736

AMD Athlon II X3 450 Rana 3.2GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Desktop Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103886

Kingston 8GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM ECC Unbuffered DDR3 1600 Server Memory w/TS (x4; 32GB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820239370

CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX750 V2 750W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC High Performance Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139021

CyberPower CP1350PFCLCD UPS 1350VA / 810W PFC compatible Pure sine wave
(I know there's currently no driver available for this UPS in Freenas though)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16842102133

 

[paleoN]

ASUS Sabertooth 990FX AM3+ mobo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131736

Did you search yourself to see if FreeBSD 8.2 works with this chipset? Since I suggested it I did a quick search and some people have used it successfully with FreeBSD. I didn't check to see if they were running FreeBSD 8.2 though.

AMD Athlon II X3 450 Rana 3.2GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Desktop Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103886

You could do fine with a dual-core processor. Of course I went with a triple-core one myself as I couldn't help myself and I wanted that extra core.

CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX750 V2 750W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC High Performance Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139021

How about CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX650 V2 650W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC
Or
SeaSonic S12II 620 Bronze 620W ATX12V V2.3 / EPS 12V V2.91 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC

I keep hoping survive will chime in. He usually has good PSU recommendations and often a good place to buy ECC RAM. Do a search for some of his posts and you might be able to pick up the RAM cheaper.

 

[sonny81]

Did you search yourself to see if FreeBSD 8.2 works with this chipset? Since I suggested it I did a quick search and some people have used it successfully with FreeBSD. I didn't check to see if they were running FreeBSD 8.2 though.

You could do fine with a dual-core processor. Of course I went with a triple-core one myself as I couldn't help myself and I wanted that extra core.

How about CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX650 V2 650W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC
Or
SeaSonic S12II 620 Bronze 620W ATX12V V2.3 / EPS 12V V2.91 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC

I keep hoping survive will chime in. He usually has good PSU recommendations and often a good place to buy ECC RAM. Do a search for some of his posts and you might be able to pick up the RAM cheaper.

Thanks paleoN!!

I searched for a few hours for that mobo but couldn't find any results. Basically I was googling Sabertooth 99FX and Freenas 8. Not sure where you tracked down other users using it but I'm glad you did!! Thank you!!

I hear you on the dual core, I figured with the slight price increase on a triple core why not.

Yes I actually decided to go with the 650w system after confirming a few things on my set up. I'll still be under using it by at least 100w.

I'll definitely search Survive's posts and see what I can track down on the ECC.

Thanks so much!!

 

[sonny81]

Just in case anyone else is considering buying the gear I have listed in this threat, it is working flawlessly and I'm getting 80Mbps for each two files filezilla transfers via ftp. Very nice.

 

[paleoN]

What gear exactly? There is multiple gear listed.

I'm getting 80Mbps for each two files filezilla transfers via ftp. Very nice.

I would expect you would get a bit higher assuming the client is keeping up or is it clients?

 

[sonny81]

Sorry paleoN I just updated my signature with new gear listed.

In the beginning I was struggling to just make it to 1mbps and many times I say high kbps so when I saw 80mbps I was happy.

Definitely don't mind trying to get some more juice out of it. I use Filezilla (always one client at a time doing transfers) but my transfers are very bursty frequently but they do crank out 80mbps max with 40-60mbps being the average.

The Freenas is connected to my desktop (both Intel NICs with 9000 jumbo frames enabled) via my Netgear GS108 Gigabit switch (supports jumbo frames as well).

Should I play around with anything to see what more I can squeeze out of it?

I also have the auto tune feature enabled in freenas

 

[paleoN]

Sorry paleoN I just updated my signature with new gear listed.

What happens when you upgrade again? It would be better to edit one of your last posts and list the gear in the post. That being said does it ever look good, I'm jealous. You have a typo by the way.

In the beginning I was struggling to just make it to 1mbps and many times I say high kbps so when I saw 80mbps I was happy.

Definitely don't mind trying to get some more juice out of it. I use Filezilla (always one client at a time doing transfers) but my transfers are very bursty frequently but they do crank out 80mbps max with 40-60mbps being the average.

What size files and what's your client. If you are doing small files you won't hit max speed and if the client can't keep up then it can't keep up. ;) With a MTU of 1500, using FileZilla 3.5.3, I can push 110+ uploading or downloading.

 

[sonny81]

What size files and what's your client. If you are doing small files you won't hit max speed and if the client can't keep up then it can't keep up. ;) With a MTU of 1500, using FileZilla 3.5.3, I can push 110+ uploading or downloading.

Wow that's crazy!! 110+ would save me a lot of local up time.

For smaller files it moves fast, but there's usually no time for it to even display the transfer speed.

Most of my RAW camera files are about 25-38MB. Today with everyone home on the network I'm getting about 27MB/s for two files at a time and its really "start and stop". I kinda just learned to live with that at certain points of the day. Late night transfers are much faster.

Didn't really think about the client being able to keep up. I'm on a PC so I'll do some snooping around for something that's faster than FileZilla. Thanks for pointing that out!!

But again...MTU 1500 & 110+ transfers is freaking crazy!! I'm curious to find out what others have got with MTU 9000.

As always, great hearing your input!!

 

[paleoN]

Didn't really think about the client being able to keep up. I'm on a PC so I'll do some snooping around for something that's faster than FileZilla. Thanks for pointing that out!!

I'm using FileZilla myself so I don't think that's the problem.

Wow that's crazy!! 110+ would save me a lot of local up time.

My testing is with 2GB and larger files. Smaller files flash by like you said.

Didn't really think about the client being able to keep up.

To test the network you would use iperf. If you have the RAM on your client, noobsauce80 recently recommended a fun little ramdrive program, ImDisk. I haven't tried it myself.

But again...MTU 1500 & 110+ transfers is freaking crazy!! I'm curious to find out what others have got with MTU 9000.

If you do try to fiddle around with this further, I would actually drop the MTU back to 1500 during testing. Afterwards, you can try & increase to 9000 and see if there is additional improvement.