Is freenas something for me?

[Golden]

I just found this community/os and I'm wondering if it's something for me to build a nas.

I'm looking for a nas to backup files and pictures.
But it could be handy if I could run a server on it. ( mumble/teamspeak/minecraft/... )
And If I could download torrents on it, so I can download movies and watch it on smart tv.

And if I decide to build one , how mutch would it cost?
It's gonna be for the things I said above ( backup,small server, torrents )
and it needs a few TB usable storage ( 3-4 TB )

I'm sorry if I did anything wrong, I read the forum rules.
And I'm sorry for my terrible english

 

[madik]

Hi it can do everything you've asked for. However it sometimes requires a bit deeper knowledge and time to make it work, but pretty much for every use case scenario there are guides on the forum. Even for the Minecraft server installation. The community over here is really the best and you can always find the answers or asked for one.

For the hardware cost. Its not required but HIGLY recommanded to use a server grade components with ECC rams. This means that the PC build will be more expensive but its not all that much more. Mainly motherboard cost 2 or 3 times more than everage Asus, Gigabyte.. boards. The rest like CPU and ECC rams arent expensive.
Check the Hardware section on this forum to look for a typical build and what components does it use.

 

[Golden]

Hi it can do everything you've asked for. However it sometimes requires a bit deeper knowledge and time to make it work, but pretty much for every use case scenario there are guides on the forum. Even for the Minecraft server installation. The community over here is really the best and you can always find the answers or asked for one.

For the hardware cost. Its not required but HIGLY recommanded to use a server grade components with ECC rams. This means that the PC build will be more expensive but its not all that much more. Mainly motherboard cost 2 or 3 times more than everage Asus, Gigabyte.. boards. The rest like CPU and ECC rams arent expensive.
Check the Hardware section on this forum to look for a typical build and what components does it use.

Would it be possible to buy an cheap pc for like 30 euro = +- 50 $ I think
with 2 ghz dual core and 2 gb and try freenas on it?
If I like it I can always buy a better setup and If I don't like it , 30 euro isn't mutch and I will probably find something to do with it.

 

[joeschmuck]

If you have a reasonable computer you could install a virtual machine of FreeNAS and play with it. This means it costs you nothing to run it and test it out. You need 8GB of RAM to run FreeNAS without possible boot errors.

 

[Golden]

If you have a reasonable computer you could install a virtual machine of FreeNAS and play with it. This means it costs you nothing to run it and test it out. You need 8GB of RAM to run FreeNAS without possible boot errors.

wasn't there a post by the freenas team to NOT run freenas in an virtual machine?
and boot errors, I don't really care, is it possible to run an nas with 2 gb ram?
or do those boot errors stop it from working?

 

[Knowltey]

Would it be possible to buy an cheap pc for like 30 euro = +- 50 $ I think
with 2 ghz dual core and 2 gb

Absolutely not. Don't go below 4GB even for testing,unexpected behaviour becomes very likely to occur below 4. Minimum system requirements if you want any sort of stability though is 8GB.

 

[Golden]

Absolutely not. Don't go below 4GB even for testing,unexpected behaviour becomes very likely to occur below 4. Minimum system requirements if you want any sort of stability though is 8GB.

thanks, after reading all the comments I think it's better to just buy a prebuilt nas.
It's cheaper, But it's just storage not more.
And maybe I can buy an old pc to run a server. and download torrents at night and stuff.

 

[Knowltey]

You may want to look into a software called NAS4Free, it's a branch from an older version of FreeNAS and is a bit more friendly with hardware requirements.

 

[Golden]

You may want to look into a software called NAS4Free, it's a branch from an older version of FreeNAS and is a bit more friendly with hardware requirements.

Found that already, but thanks!
It looks perfect, not as many features , but still decent
and it only needs 1 gb ram or something to work at a decent speed

 

[joeschmuck]

You can run FreeNAS in a VM however you old want to do this for testing, not for production use. I use VMWare Workstation which is designed for testing software and you could use VMWare Player, it's free little brother.

I think if you are only looking for slow storage then a prebuilt NAS device is right up your alley. I have one running but due to the throughput I decided a FreeNAS machine was a good and fast backup storage medium.