Any one recommend AMD A4-4000 APU for a new build?

[tmacka88]

Hi,

As title states, I am wondering if anyone could recommend this APU (AMD A4-4000 - 3GHz Dual core FM2 socket, 65watt) for a new setup that I will be running.

I will have:
- 8GB DDR3 1066 RAM
- M1015 IBM Controller
- 9 HDDs with more expansion latter (although all of them are never in use at the same time. At most 5 will be used at any one time for now (usually)).

Basically, I have 2 main volumes both of which are in ZFS RAIDz1 setup. For the moment only one volume will be used at any one time and may just another single drive for something else such as time machine.

Also my freenas will be running a few plugins such as SABnzbd, CouchPotato, SickBeard, Headphone and a few others maybe.

So it will be a powerful setup, BUT it will be on most of the day, so I was wondering what peoples opinion would be on choosing my APU. I was thinking of using the mentioned APU because its cheap and is low power 65W.

Alternatively I can use a AMD A6-3670K APU (2.7GHz Quad core FM1 socket, 100watt). Not sure if I should use a more powerful APU and pay for extra power or go for something smaller/cheaper and possibly have the system run slower than its potential.

So end result, in your opinion do you think the first mention APU would hold up with my system or would it be a slower?

And what would you guys recommend of the 2?

Thanks

 

[Sir.Robin]

Fm1 and fm2 don't support ecc memory. You reAlly should go for ecc. Hence, i would not recommend any of those.

Am3+ do support ecc. Look at my sig.

A better but more expensive solution would be a server grade motherboard with ecc and xeon or opteron cpu.

 

[cyberjock]

Fm1 and fm2 don't support ecc memory. You reAlly should go for ecc. Hence, i would not recommend any of those.

Am3+ do support ecc. Look at my sig.

A better but more expensive solution would be a server grade motherboard with ecc and xeon or opteron cpu.

... and I would never build a new FreeNAS server and start with 8GB of RAM. That's the minimum just to use ZFS. Then factor in the number of drives and their sizes and you are suddenly eyeballing 16GB minimum to get good performance.

 

[technobot]

Just a little feedback, because I went the cheaper AMD FM1 route myself. I don't know the specifics of your motherboard, but two constraints made me immediately regret my purchase:
- 2 DIMM slots
- single PCI-E x16 slot, with a single PCI-E x1 slot

Can't add the M1015 without removing a dual port NIC. So upgrade paths are almost non-existent.

As Cyberjock had mentioned, I was one of those who started with 8GB. I went to 16GB (2 x 8) as I added drives and I noticed a bit of a performance increase. But now I'm stuck at 16 unless I want to up the density again (not really for non-ECC memory)

If I could do it again, there's no question: I'd bite the bullet, incur the wrath of the wife, and simply do a Xeon + ECC Memory + Supermicro.

It's been covered elsewhere but from my experience the IPMI alone is worth it.

P.S. I'm pretty sure my system is far less utilized than yours. No RAIDZ, just simple mirrors. We mostly do some CIFS sharing here between me and the wife, document (small files) backup, and a couple iSCSI targets. No plugins like you, I expect you need/want more power/RAM.

 

[tmacka88]

thanks for your input. I think I will just go all out with a supermicro. might start saving now.