Build VS buy an off-the-shelf ready enterprise solution for FreeNAS?

[Nmitsia]

Hello, i cant seem to make my mind about if i should buy lets say a "Dell PowerEdge R720XD", or build one rack mounted system for my case.

First of all let me tell you the use scenario of the machine im willing to build/buy. My needs lets say.

I have a small media agency with great needs of storage. 4K video mostly. So FreeNAS will run natively with the ability to run a couple VMs. [1x Windows Server (a small .NET app will run), 1x Windows 10 (For light GPU rendering when other PCs are occupied)]. I can even go to 6U if need be.

I would greatly appreciate having your help about my build. Feel free to propose other builds. If you have a proposal about a different Dell - HP - Supermicro system build i would really like to hear.

So lets see the following scenarios.

Case 1: Dell PowerEdge R720XD in this config.

I buy a ready system like Dell PowerEdge R720XD.
+ It will work out of the box
+ not much configuration needed.
+ Ability to access the machine via iDRAC
- Only 12x 3.5" SAS/SATA
- No GPU rendering ability(?)
- Not the ability to fully configure

Cost: About 1000-1500€

Case 2: Custom build that i would like your help with.
--Case: FANTEC SRC-4240X07
--Mobo: ASUS ROG Strix B450-F Gaming (Please offer alternative mobo as i find 64 GB very low for my needs - also no enterprise safety)
--CPU: Ryzen 5 3600X (Ryzen because raw power. If you believe i can find a used/new platform better suited for my needs please inform me. Intel also)
--RAM: 64 Gigabytes of DDR4
--HBA: SAS 9305-16i OR SAS 9305-24i
--10Gb/s LAN: Intel X540-T1 10G NIC (I would prefer RJ45 10Gb/s only)
--GPU: MSI NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1650 4GT LP OC
--HDD: Toshiba N300 14TB NAS (They seem VFM compared to Seagate IronWolf Pro. Also i currently use 3x Seagate IronWolf Pro 8TB where 2 of them failed after 2 months. Thankfully they replaced them)

+Ability to fully configure
+24x SAS / SATA slots
+GPU
-No iDRAC
-Not totally enterprise solution

Cost: More than Dell PowerEdge R720XD but with many strong points.

Budget: Up to 3000€ for a specific build. HDD can be partially bought when further expansion is needed.

Also ideas about the network configuration, i believe belong on another thread.

Also keep in mind i live in Greece - EU, so most probably Amazon.de will be used to buy from.

Your help is much appreciated!

 

[Samuel Tai]

For business use, it's usually better to go with a vendor SKU, as you'll have support after purchase. In neither scenario will you be able to have GPU offload for rendering on the FreeNAS server.

 

[Nmitsia]

For business use, it's usually better to go with a vendor SKU, as you'll have support after purchase. In neither scenario will you be able to have GPU offload for rendering on the FreeNAS server.

Then i guess i have to first install a VM hypervisor that will give me this ability. Then the FreeNAS.

Any ideas - suggestions on the vendor SKU?

Thanks for the reply!

 

[Samuel Tai]

Having everything in a single box isn't optimal in your use case. You'll likely have better results with a dedicated box for FreeNAS to handle the storage, a dedicated box for VMs, and a dedicated box for rendering. Try looking through Supermicro's site, and trying out their configurator.

 

[ljvb]

To expand on what Samuel posted, go with separate boxes for storage and VM. If you want to use a GPU for rendering, you will have to go with the R720, the XD does not support the GPU entitlement kit which you need for graphics cards, and I am pretty sure it will not support all graphics cards either, eletronically sure, but some modern GPUs have a ton of cooling and cladding that would prevent it from physically fitting.

Another option is a USB Type C pcie card, and then throw in an external graphics card, but not sure how that would perform rendering.