BUILD FreeNAS rookie; looking at HP N54L

[TheCrud]

Greetings,
I started looking at FreeNas when I wanted to replace my SAS. Currently, I'm looking at getting an HP N54L since it appears it'll doing everything I want:
SAB, CP, SB, HP,
use 4TB HDs (looks like I can use 5 or 6 drives in this setup?)
IP cameras (will have to do some research on this)
That's my intro. I welcome any suggestions you may have.
Crud

 

[gpsguy]

Crud, welcome to the forum!

While the N54L has a nice form factor, you might be better off with a case [Lian Li or Fractal Design] designed for 6 drives, along with a motherboard with a bit more horsepower and RAM capacity. To cram 6 hard drives into a case designed for 4, you'll need to stuff 2 of them in the area reserved for a ODD and run an alternative BIOS.

According to HP, the maximum RAM it'll take is 8Gb. But, some folks have been able to get 16Gb to work.

Now, you want to stick 6-4Tb drives in a N54L running FreeNAS. If you put 16Gb of RAM in it, will you have enough RAM for ZFS [see section 1.4.2 of the manual]? Or will you need more - which will necessitate a new system. If your system passes the RAM test, will the CPU be adequate for your needs?

I too, am contemplating a purchase of a N54L. Not for FN, but the issues above, still apply to me as well.

 

[TheCrud]

Crud, welcome to the forum!

While the N54L has a nice form factor, you might be better off with a case [Lian Li or Fractal Design] designed for 6 drives, along with a motherboard with a bit more horsepower and RAM capacity. To cram 6 hard drives into a case designed for 4, you'll need to stuff 2 of them in the area reserved for a ODD and run an alternative BIOS.

According to HP, the maximum RAM it'll take is 8Gb. But, some folks have been able to get 16Gb to work.

Now, you want to stick 6-4Tb drives in a N54L running FreeNAS. If you put 16Gb of RAM in it, will you have enough RAM for ZFS [see section 1.4.2 of the manual]? Or will you need more - which will necessitate a new system. If your system passes the RAM test, will the CPU be adequate for your needs?

I too, am contemplating a purchase of a N54L. Not for FN, but the issues above, still apply to me as well.

It appears that RAM may be an issue for me. I've read that some people have 32GB in their N40L systems but I haven't read anything for the N54L.
I've tried to build a core i3 and even a celeron NAS. When I was done, the price is at least $150 (US) more depending on the setup. And, I couldn't find a motherboard with more than 4 SATA slots so I would have to get a controller card to meet my requirements.
My main issue is gonna be RAM if I want to run ZFS. I was planning on doing a ZFS1 but I may not be able to if I can only run 16GB of RAM.

 

[cyberjock]

For home use, 16GB is typically very acceptable. If I were building a home server for a family with FreeNAS I'd put 16 GB in it and never think twice about it.

 

[TheCrud]

For home use, 16GB is typically very acceptable. If I were building a home server for a family with FreeNAS I'd put 16 GB in it and never think twice about it.

Would you say the same if you wanted to run sab, cp, sb, hp, torrent? That's the only reason I'm looking at these boxes so my tower isn't running 24/7.

 

[cyberjock]

Would you say the same if you wanted to run sab, cp, sb, hp, torrent? That's the only reason I'm looking at these boxes so my tower isn't running 24/7.

I haven't used those in a jail, but I'm pretty confident 16GB will still be plenty. Honestly, for most home users, 8-12GB is the range where you start seeing diminishing returns. 16GB is easy because it divides into 2 or 4 sticks easily.

 

[Caesar]

I run sab, cp, sb, and mysql on my nas server and I only have 8GB RAM. Also my motherboard support 16GB RAM and has 6 sata ports MSI A55M-P33

so far everything runs great. I adv around 80-90/MBs transfer which is plenty for my needs. The server never crashes and I haven't seen any performance issues. I am only running 8GB of ram bc my pool is only 4.5TBs I plan on upgrading to 16 if/when capacity grows to 10+TB

Oh one more thing. I used an old case and I have my 6 HDDs crammed into ODD bays so I am planning buying a Fractal Design case. I really like the sound dampening features and design of these cases.

 

[TheCrud]

I run sab, cp, sb, and mysql on my nas server and I only have 8GB RAM. Also my motherboard support 16GB RAM and has 6 sata ports MSI A55M-P33

Thanks for replying. If I don't get an N54L, I will want to stay in the ITX form factor. I did find an AMD board with 7 ports so it may work. What CPU are you using? I'll be running the same apps that you currently use.

 

[Caesar]

AMD F1 A4-3400 2.7GHz

 

[KydDynoMyte]

I just got a N54L the other day, love it. I would think it'd be more than enough for SAB, CP, SB, HP etc…
I run SAB, CP, SB, HP, & ZNC on my little ReadyNAS DuoV2 with it's little arm processor and low 256MB memory and it works great.

 

[Ames]

I run sab, cp, sb, and mysql on my nas server and I only have 8GB RAM. Also my motherboard support 16GB RAM and has 6 sata ports MSI A55M-P33

so far everything runs great. I adv around 80-90/MBs transfer which is plenty for my needs. The server never crashes and I haven't seen any performance issues. I am only running 8GB of ram bc my pool is only 4.5TBs I plan on upgrading to 16 if/when capacity grows to 10+TB

Oh one more thing. I used an old case and I have my 6 HDDs crammed into ODD bays so I am planning buying a Fractal Design case. I really like the sound dampening features and design of these cases.

Based on your post, and a leap of faith, I bought the same motherboard+CPU+16Gb DDR3 1600 from Tigerdirect last week, the BIOS seemed to auto-configure the RAM for 1333. At the time that I read your post, the CPU wasn't listed, but the A4 3400 turned out to be my most obvious choice given the price. MB+CPU came in at under $100. The 16Gb RAM was the most, orig. I scoped for 8Gb, but the MB only had 2 slots, so getting 16Gb in ahead of time saves having to throw away two 4Gb sticks later, the MB was rated for 16Gb max. I considered the HP N54L but I'm glad I didn't, I reused an existing 7 bay mini-tower case. The major difference between the HP 54L and this setup is the ECC RAM and the nicer case. I bought 3 drives and have capacity to grow more later as needed.

 

[TheCrud]

Well, I didn't get the N54L. I got the N40 for $256 shipped. I went ahead with 16GB of ram, cables for additional hard drives, the Nexus Double Twin, and a usb flash drive. Altogether, I'm in this toy for under $400. I looked at going the custom build route but for me, a small footprint was a 'big' factor for me. I couldn't see anything that matched it.
I just picked up 4x4TB Seagate hard drives last night. I can't wait to get this thing working.

 

[Caesar]

... The 16Gb RAM was the most, orig. I scoped for 8Gb, but the MB only had 2 slots, so getting 16Gb in ahead of time saves having to throw away two 4Gb sticks later, the MB was rated for 16Gb max...

Yeah I was thinking the same thing about throwing away two 4GB sticks so I picked up 1 8GB sick for now and will add another later on.

Well, I didn't get the N54L. I got the N40 for $256 shipped. I went ahead with 16GB of ram, cables for additional hard drives, the Nexus Double Twin, and a usb flash drive. Altogether, I'm in this toy for under $400. I looked at going the custom build route but for me, a small footprint was a 'big' factor for me. I couldn't see anything that matched it.
I just picked up 4x4TB Seagate hard drives last night. I can't wait to get this thing working.

I am curious what do you mean by small footprint. Your only talking about size and not power savings right? Because if your looking for a small case for a custom build you may want to try LIAN LI PC-Q25B It's just over 10cm longer than the N54L but it supports 7 HHDs and you can find ITX boards that support 16GB of ram too. I personally prefer custom builds over pre-built box so I maybe a little bias ;)

 

[TheCrud]

Thanks but I've looked at doing a custom build and it was going to cost me more than if I could get a Microserver for $250. I almost did it anyway but I decided on the HP instead.

 

[tjo]

Thanks but I've looked at doing a custom build and it was going to cost me more than if I could get a Microserver for $250. I almost did it anyway but I decided on the HP instead.

Check this deal out might be a solution.

http://www.extremetech.com/deals/155318-et-deals-xeon-powered-dell-poweredge-t110-for-489