My Budget FreeNAS plan...Will it work?

[Loren Zimmer]

I'm looking for some input on whether or not this will work, as well as some suggestions.

I am looking to build a home server for storage to backup a couple of laptops and our phones as well as some media. Additionally I'd like to be able to stream via plex (probably only one stream at a time). I've done some reading and research about building a home server. This is the list of parts I've come up with:

I have a case that I can use
Mother Board (Supermicro X6DVA-4G ATX Dual Intel Xeon Socket) $40
Memory Server RAM 4GB 2x 2GB PC2700R ECC Registered DDR 333MHz 16 gig = $68
Power Supply EVGA 500 B1, 80+ BRONZE 500W Power Supply $40
Processors Intel X7350 Xeon Quad Core 2.93GHz 8MB Socket PGA604 Server Processor $36
Drives (WD Red 2TB NAS Hard Disk Drive) = $255
SATA Card IO Crest 4 Port SATA III PCI-e 2.0 x1 Controller Card Marvell Non-Raid with Low Profile Bracket SI-PEX40064


I used this to calculate that I would have around 3TB of usable space.

Does anyone see any issues that I missed? Any thoughts or input would be appreciated as well.

Thank you!

Loren

 

[Jailer]

Yeah bad idea. Why on earth would you start a new build with ancient hardware. And yes all of it is ancient in terms of useful lifespan. I wouldn't run that hardware for FreeNAS if it was given to me.

Look at a Lenovo ts140 or Dell T30 if you want a budget system.

 

[m0nkey_]

I'd have to concur with @Jailer on both counts. Old hardware is going to be very inefficient considering there are budget pre-built systems available.

 

[joeschmuck]

Jumping on the bandwagon here...

When buying a system think about a few things:
1) What will I be doing with this system?
2) How long do I want this system to be usable/last?
3) How much money can I afford to spend?

The first two questions are critical. What will you be doing with this system? If you are building just a simple NAS then you could purchase lesser hardware, but not really old hardware. If you plan for the system to last 10 years (what I factor in) then you need something fairly new. And realize that hard drives are generally your single most expensive hardware item and they have a finite life span. The rest of the system should be expected to last through at least 3 sets of hard drive replacements (doesn't sound like long does it).

Money is always a factor but if you can, buy the best components you can afford and if you need to, spread out the purchases over a period of time leaving the hard drives for last. Drive get cheaper as time goes on and you can find some good sales if you're willing to wait.

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

Drive get cheaper as time goes on and you can find some good sales if you're willing to wait.

Further to this, consider the flexibility of striped mirrors. Even though you pay a 50% redundancy fee, you can choose to buy only the storage you need today at today's prices. When you need more storage, you can buy it at future, lower price. Same goes for RAM, up to a point.

 

[nightshade00013]

I have to agree that the hardware you are looking at is too old. The oldest I would look at is something like a xeon in the 5500/5600 era and it will still use more power than a modern cpu.

Plus by picking up the parts one at a time rather than just buying an old 2U rack server you are spending a ton more than you should. The Sata card is probably going to be a major pain as well unless someone got support straightened out for that exact version https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/marvell-88se9215-chipset-support.12414/page-2 Add to that the ram being capped at 12GB and you are only asking for problems. The Xeon 5500/5600 stuff will generally go up to 192GB and easily push 48GB in a dual CPU setup which will make for a much happier FreeNAS.

Spend a little more and you will have something that can sip the power and still stream when you need it. My dual Xeon E5640 with 48GB of Ram and seven 7200 RPM 4TB drives idles around 170 watts while five jails are running(Murmur, Syncthing, OpenVPN, Transmission, Plex). If your average power rate is higher than 10 cents per Kwh you should shell out a little more now and pay less in the long run.