Final advice on Atom Denverton build - PSU and boot drive

[lightwave]

Hi again,

I've finally (mostly) made up my mind about my first FreeNAS build. I have ordered the mainboard and the memory, but would like some final input on the rest before I go ahead and place the order.

Objectives:

The main objective is to ensure that my data is safe, so top level performance is not a requirement. Energy efficiency is, however, important. I would also like to keep the build as small as and silent possible, but not if it affects reliability/longevity due to increased temperatures. A secondary objective is use the FreeNAS as a datastore for my vmWare ESXi server (mostly to make backups of my VMs a little easier). Again, performance does not need to be stellar as my VMs are not used for anything that requires high speed I/O.

The build:

• SuperMicro A2SDi-8C-HLN4F (Atom C3758 8-core 25W 12xSATA 4xDDR4 4xGbE mini-ITX) (already ordered)
• 1x Samsung 16GB DDR4 REG ECC 2666MHz x4 SR (already ordered)
• Fractal Design Node 304
• Seasonic FOCUS+ 550W Gold
• 2x WD Red 6TB (storage, ZFS, mirrored, to be upgraded to 3x at a later stage)
• Kingston UV500 120GB M.2 SSD (SUV500M8/120G) (boot disk)
• Lenovo (IBM) N2125 SAS/SATA HBA (for backup to an external SAS cabinet, possibly to be rotated off site)

Questions:

• PSU Sizing - Using jgreco's calculation model, I end up at approximately 335 W for the build (calculating on 6 drives and 2 fans) which would suggest a 335 * 1.25 = 420 W PSU. I would like to use a high quality PSU like Seasonic, but Seasonic does not make FOCUS+ models less than 550W. Would you go with the 550W PSU or select a smaller PSU from some other brand? In the latter case, from which brand?
• Boot drive - Is the Kingston UV500 a decent boot device? The case only has 6 slots for drives, so I would really like to use an M.2 device and save the slots for data drives. An option could be a SATA DOM, but I find SuperDOM drives ridiculously expensive compared to their capacity.
• Anything else I should consider?

I'm thankful for all feedback and input!

Thanks!

 

[Constantin]

My rig with 8 drives consumes about 90w when idle and around 200W max. IIRC, my processor has a TDP at around 10W more than yours. At some point I will run a comparison between my seasonics to address a similar question to yours - 500W platinum vs 650w titanium - which will ultimately draw less power on average?

There are some smaller power supplies out there with high efficiencies, but you typically will veer off into non-standard stuff like the stuff at mini box: http://www.mini-box.com/site/index.html

However, short of building a case where I need the space normally reserved for the ATX power supply, I’d shy away from using non-standard power because i don’t like to be tied to one vendor, custom solutions usually cost more, and if the vendor goes belly up, recovering from a PSU failure will be that much more difficult.

There are 450w platinum PSUs out there, the best known example is likely the sfx sized Corsair. I have one, it comes with an ATX adapter plate, and the biggest issue with that PSU is the number of power connectors for SATA drives. That’s what I’d focus on - how well all the outputs in the PSU align with your cabling needs w/o resorting to splitters and the like? See this review: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/corsair-sf450-platinum-sfx-psu,5917.html

Satadoms are ludicrous re cost but they are also very compact. One option you could consider is a bifurcating PCIe riser card or like solution to mount multiple drives (such as a slog or L2ARc in addition to the boot drive). But, that will fill your one PCIe slot in case you want to use it for something else in the future... no free lunch!

I’m no longer familiar with your series of boards once I decided that the d-15xx series of CPUs met my needs better. But any mSATA connector will do for a boot drive, should your board have one. The faster stuff (m.2 @ PCIe 3.0 x4 NVME) should be reserved for SLOG or L2ARC if you think you might need it.

 

[Constantin]

Just had a look at the board - you have 12 SATA ports. Just buy a set of inexpensive SSDs for your boot drive(s) and if they don’t have a designated spot to mount in, use heavy duty Velcro to mount it/them inside the case. They’re light, don’t consume much power, and a lot cheaper than the satadoms or other solutions.

I’d reserve the M2 slot for a potential SLOG (p4801x for example), a SATA port for a potential L2ARC, and the PCIe slot for an eventual 10Gbe Ethernet Interface. Why? Your use case may change over the years...

With only 6 HDDs currently planned, you should have no issues regarding SATA port capacity. So I’d use those!

 

[Ericloewe]

use heavy duty Velcro to mount it/them inside the case.

Or light-duty, really. 2.5" SSDs are mostly empty plastic anyway, these days.

 

[lightwave]

Thank you for all your input Constantin!

There are 450w platinum PSUs out there, the best known example is likely the sfx sized Corsair. I have one, it comes with an ATX adapter plate, and the biggest issue with that PSU is the number of power connectors for SATA drives. That’s what I’d focus on - how well all the outputs in the PSU align with your cabling needs w/o resorting to splitters and the like? See this review: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/corsair-sf450-platinum-sfx-psu,5917.html

Looks like a good PSU, but I'm somewhat concerned about the low number of SATA connectors. Based on the documentation I could find, the PSU only comes with cabling for four SATA connectors, which will be just enough for two data drives and two boot drives, but leaves no room to grow.

I also looked at the Seasonic Prime Ultra Platinum 550w, but could not find a single review that compared it to the Focus+ series. Besides the 2 extra years of warranty and the slightly better efficiency, I could not find any material differences that could motivate the +50% in price over the Focus+ Gold.

I ended up buying the Seasonic Focus+ Gold 550w and will try it out. The return policy is really good so I can still return it if I'm not happy or a better option pops up.

Just buy a set of inexpensive SSDs for your boot drive(s) and if they don’t have a designated spot to mount in, use heavy duty Velcro to mount it/them inside the case.

[...]

I’d reserve the M2 slot for a potential SLOG (p4801x for example), a SATA port for a potential L2ARC, and the PCIe slot for an eventual 10Gbe Ethernet Interface. Why? Your use case may change over the years...

I'm a little sad I didn't coming up with this idea myself. While there are no prepared mounting points for SSD-disks in the case apart from the 6 main drive slots, a decent piece of chewing gum should be able to hold an SSD to any surface (though I might still go with your suggestion of Velcro just for good form).

This raises another question: which SSD boot drive(s) to buy?

I previously got a recommendation to use Intel 545s 128Gb SSDs for boot drives. They are, however, rather expensive compared to the Kingston A400 120 Gb. I can actually get two A400 drives for the price of one Intel 545s with money to spare. I there any reason not to go with the A400?

Again, thank you so much for all your input!

 

[lightwave]

Or light-duty, really. 2.5" SSDs are mostly empty plastic anyway, these days.

 

[Ericloewe]

Looks like a good PSU, but I'm somewhat concerned about the low number of SATA connectors. Based on the documentation I could find, the PSU only comes with cabling for four SATA connectors, which will be just enough for two data drives and two boot drives, but leaves no room to grow.

For either Corsair or Seasonic, additional cables are fairly easy to acquire, so don't worry too much about such details.

For Corsair, details are available here: http://www.jonnyguru.com/forums/showthread.php?13740-Corsair-cable-compatibility-and-pinouts
(Annoying forum alert: you need to log in to see the images)

For Seasonic, around when they released the KM3 X-Series/Platinum they moved to their Type 2 cables, which they use everywhere. If you buy a new PSU it will use Seasonic Type 2 cables.

(For the sake of completeness, Seasonic and Corsair cables are incompatible, which is a shame, because they use the same connectors, and dangerous because at least some connectors will plug in where they shouldn't on the other brand.)

I also looked at the Seasonic Prime Ultra Platinum 550w, but could not find a single review that compared it to the Focus+ series. Besides the 2 extra years of warranty and the slightly better efficiency, I could not find any material differences that could motivate the +50% in price over the Focus+ Gold.

The Prime platform is slightly higher-end than the Focus Plus platform, not that it makes a real difference. It's also available in more efficiency variants, but that's easy to see. Same crappy Hong Hua fan replacing the rock-solid San Ace double ball bearing fans they used on all high-end units back in the day, unfortunately. Seriously, if the PSU with a San Ace fan was the loudest thing in the system, something was very wrong. Sure, Hong Hua is willing to spec their fans for longer lifetimes than San Ace would, which some people in the industry feel is necessary for the insane warranties on offer these days, but I have a very hard time believing that a glorified sleeve bearing is going to last longer than a top-quality double ball bearing.

This raises another question: which SSD boot drive(s) to buy?

I previously got a recommendation to use Intel 545s 128Gb SSDs for boot drives. They are, however, rather expensive compared to the Kingston A400 120 Gb. I can actually get two A400 drives for the price of one Intel 545s with money to spare. I there any reason not to go with the A400?

I strongly dislike Kingston due to their sometimes shady business practices, but the requirements for the boot device are really simple: Do not be obviously buggy, return mostly good data, don't grind to a halt after a year in operation. Any vaguely-reputable SSD can pull that off (with the notable exception of the ultra-low end WD Green and equivalent SanDisk SSDs, which have a controller bug that makes them not play well with FreeNAS).

 

[zenon1823]

Regarding your question on the Kingston SSD's. While its completely fair Kingston has had its less then optimal moments, and are not known for leading performance in their SSD's, they have tended to use tried and true controllers and NAND, and have therefore been safe bets and IMO great value when looking for reliable cost effective SSD storage.

I have been using kingston UV*** for several years is desktop builds primarily for use in office and CAD workstation environments. I've probably used 25-30 of them in the last 6-7 years and never had any give me issues. Some systems are daily use others have been running 24/7. I did however recently purchase a couple of the A400 (the UV500 was out of stock) to use in a workstation as a Raid1 pair on intel IRRT. The array was unstable and kept dropping drives while I cant say it was the fault of the A400 I have not had that happen with UV500's previously. Unfortunately I never had time to investigate the actual cause and ultimately I broke the array and setup a daily disk image task as backup (the purpose of this machine changed and this ended up being a better solution, but I digress).

I don't know what the price difference in in your local, but for me the UV500 is ~$10 more. I don't flinch to pay the extra $10 for a drive that has been 100% reliable in my albeit limited but well tested scenarios. Also for what its worth the UV500 has a 5yr warranty vs 3yr on the A400, It also has better R/W performance then the A400 and is OPAL2.0 compliant. Not that any of those matter much as a freenas boot device, but I thought I'd include it for anyone reading who is curious on the differences.

PS. Chewing gum or light duty velcro will serve as excellent mounting hardware for the Kingston ;)

 

[lightwave]

For either Corsair or Seasonic, additional cables are fairly easy to acquire, so don't worry too much about such details.

I've been able to find additional Corsair cables at several dealers, but so far I've not found a single place that sells additional Seasonic SATA cables (apart from some customised cables that cost almost as much as the PSU itself). I'm a little surprised that these are so hard to come by. Isn't the whole point of a modular power supply that you should be able to spec it to your needs by adding cables? Anyhow, do you know of any place that sells additional Seasonic cables at a decent price?

The Prime platform is slightly higher-end than the Focus Plus platform, not that it makes a real difference. It's also available in more efficiency variants, but that's easy to see. Same crappy Hong Hua fan replacing the rock-solid San Ace double ball bearing fans they used on all high-end units back in the day, unfortunately. Seriously, if the PSU with a San Ace fan was the loudest thing in the system, something was very wrong. Sure, Hong Hua is willing to spec their fans for longer lifetimes than San Ace would, which some people in the industry feel is necessary for the insane warranties on offer these days, but I have a very hard time believing that a glorified sleeve bearing is going to last longer than a top-quality double ball bearing.

I've seen a lot of complaints about he switch to the Hong Hua fans, but not really understood whether the new fans are a real problem or just not as excellent as the San Ace fans. Is the Hung Hua fan reason enough to go for a different PSU brand?

I strongly dislike Kingston due to their sometimes shady business practices, but the requirements for the boot device are really simple: Do not be obviously buggy, return mostly good data, don't grind to a halt after a year in operation. Any vaguely-reputable SSD can pull that off (with the notable exception of the ultra-low end WD Green and equivalent SanDisk SSDs, which have a controller bug that makes them not play well with FreeNAS).

OK. Thanks! Then I think I'll go with the Kingston SSD.

 

[lightwave]

Regarding your question on the Kingston SSD's. While its completely fair Kingston has had its less then optimal moments, and are not known for leading performance in their SSD's, they have tended to use tried and true controllers and NAND, and have therefore been safe bets and IMO great value when looking for reliable cost effective SSD storage.

I have been using kingston UV*** for several years is desktop builds primarily for use in office and CAD workstation environments. I've probably used 25-30 of them in the last 6-7 years and never had any give me issues. Some systems are daily use others have been running 24/7. I did however recently purchase a couple of the A400 (the UV500 was out of stock) to use in a workstation as a Raid1 pair on intel IRRT. The array was unstable and kept dropping drives while I can't say it was the fault of the A400 I have not had that happen with UV500's previously. Unfortunately I never had time to investigate the actual cause and ultimately I broke the array and setup a daily disk image task as backup (the purpose of this machine changed and this ended up being a better solution, but I digress).

I don't know what the price difference in in your local, but for me the UV500 is ~$10 more. I don't flinch to pay the extra $10 for a drive that has been 100% reliable in my albeit limited but well tested scenarios. Also for what its worth the UV500 has a 5yr warranty vs 3yr on the A400, It also has better R/W performance then the A400 and is OPAL2.0 compliant. Not that any of those matter much as a freenas boot device, but I thought I'd include it for anyone reading who is curious on the differences.

PS. Chewing gum or light duty velcro will serve as excellent mounting hardware for the Kingston ;)

Thanks! UV500 it is!