BUILD My first FreeNas build

[Twanne]

Hi,

not long ago i decided that my 1TB external HDD had come to the end of it's useful life (it's full ;)), so i decided to go with a NAS instead, this gives me al lot more flexibility and way more options for the future.
After some research, I decided to go with a FreeNas build.
As far as hardware goes, I had to do some looking around as well, seeing as this is my first pc build.

I think that I have a reasonable hardware setup now:

• Processor: Intel Core i5 4430 Boxed: Powerfull CPU, not necessary for file serving, but I'm planning on doing some transcoding of mediafiles via the Plex media plugin.
• Mobo: Asus H87I-PLUS: mini-ITX format with 6 Sata III ports, perfect for this case without using a raid card.
• HDD's: Seagate Desktop HDD.15 (OEM), 4TB: Big drives, it's a server after all, so storage counts. I'm planning on starting with 3 drives in RAIDZ, with the option to add another 3 drive vdev later on (If what I read online is correct)
• Case: Fractal Design Node 304 Black: A small, stylish and silent case, it has to sit in the living room, next to the tv, so I don't want it to make too much noise or look too intrusively.
• Ram: Corsair XMS3 CMX16GX3M2A1333C9: I read somewhere that ZFS is quiet the Ram-hungry filesystem, so 16GB, but the cheapest set i could find of a known and trusted brand.
• PSU: Seasonic Platinum Series 400 Watt Fanless: 80Plus Platinum, so very efficient and one of the lowest power PSU's that is fully modular (The case is tiny, so i don't want too many cables in there).

One question though, I'm planning on booting from USB. Will there be an advantage if i get a USB3.0 stick, or is USB2.0 enough? Also, will the plugins be installed on the boot drive, or will they be on the storage drives? (If the latter is the case, I won't need a large flash drive of course, so that saves a little money for a beer :D )


Thanks in advance for the response and feedback in the hardware is always welcome.

 

[malcolmputer]

... seeing as this is my first pc build.

I think that I have a reasonable hardware setup now:

Let me stop you right there. You aren't building a PC. You are building a FreeNAS SERVER, which operates differently.

You should stop to read the suggestions stickies (namely the hardware and the ECC ones).

Your machine needs ECC. Must have. To do that, you motherboard, CPU, and RAM must support it. If you have to do it on the cheap (like I did) check my post on 6 drive ECC on a spousal budget.(use the MB/CPU/RAM combo I have instead of yours)

All of that said. Your case choice is fine, your PSU will most likely be ok, and your HDD's look ok.

USB2.0 is perfectly fine, and in fact sometimes USB3.0 causes instability on some motherboards because it is pretty "new" in FreeNAS age.

 

[DrKK]

Yeah I'd recommend staying with the USB 2.0 actually.

And I know it's a bitter pill to swallow, but you really *MUST* have server grade stuff. This motherboard and RAM are really not appropriate for FreeNAS. It's not AT ALL like having a kick-ass external drive, this is a FreeNAS Server using ZFS, a totally different beast.

You'll want to read all of the excellent information in here a lot of people (especially Cyberjock) have been posting. You case is great. PSU meh.

But that motherboard (consumer grade, and doesn't support ECC, I don't think), CPU (does not support ECC, I don't think) and RAM (not ECC) are definitely *NOT* good enough for FreeNAS.

 

[Twanne]

Hi guys,

First off, thanks for the comments. After the feedback that you left, I decided it was better to just start from (almost) scratch and redo the hardware setup.
Honestly I thought that going with real server hardware was going to be a lot more expensive, but with the choices that I've made, the difference is only about 100€ (130 - 150$, not sure of the current rates)
The current setup looks like this:

• Processor: Intel Xeon E3-1230V2 Boxed: Server processor with ECC support, it should be fine,but will it be powerful enough for transcoding?
• Mobo: Supermicro X9SCM-F: A micro-ATX server board that has been recommended by a lot of the people here, most importantly, as you guys already mentioned, support for ECC RAM, and up to 32Gigs of the stuff too ;)
• HDD's: Seagate Desktop HDD.15 (OEM), 4TB: Big drives, it's a server after all, so storage counts. I'm planning on starting with 3 drives in RAIDZ, with the option to add another 3 drive vdev later on (If what I read online is correct)
• Case: Fractal Design Define R4: The new motherboard doesn't fit the old case, so I chose this one in stead, I've heard nothing but good things about it, and it's foam padded all around, so noise canceling must be good. Also I find it quite a stylish case as well.
• Ram: Kingston KVR1333D3E9SK2/16G: 2 sticks of 8GB ECC RAM, so 16GB of dual channel RAM, with the option of adding another 16GB in the future.
• PSU: Seasonic G-Series 360 Watt: According to The Extreme Power Supply Calculator, This setup (with 9 HDD's) has a recommended PSU of ~316 watt, so this PSU should be fine.
• USB Flash drives: Kingston DataTraveler Special Edition 9 8GB Grey: It was recommended somewhere to go with 3 flash drives, 1 for booting, 1 for updates, and 1 for backup of the OS, so I'm going with 3 of these.

Does this look like better setup? Given the case and the motherboard, I think I have a lot more options going forward too, so I actually prefer it to the old setup.
Just a couple of questions though:

1. I don't know a lot about CPU's, I just chose something that was recommended by people, but will this still allow me to transcode movies on the fly?
2. I know the motherboard has 2 Gigabit Ethernet connections, but I've never understood the use of this, can someone explain this?
3. The previous Motherboard had Intel Integrated Graphics, I don't know if this one has something similar. do I need a basic GPU for the initial installation? Because at that part of the setup it can not run headless from what I understand.

Thanks in advance.

 

[malcolmputer]

1. I don't know a lot about CPU's, I just chose something that was recommended by people, but will this still allow me to transcode movies on the fly?
2. I know the motherboard has 2 Gigabit Ethernet connections, but I've never understood the use of this, can someone explain this?

1. I am an AMD nut, so I can't help you with your CPU questions. I can say that my old Athlon X2 was enough to transcode a 720p stream pretty well, so I would hope a intel server processor would be ok.

2. In theory you could team them up to allow more throughput to your server. In practice, it is difficult, and it doesn't achieve what you think it does.

 

[survive]

Hi Twannie,

1) The E3-1230v2 is a beefy proc. It should do just fine with whatever you throw at it. That said, I've never done any transcoding so I don't know what sort of load that actually puts on a processor. I can tell you I use an 13-2100 Sandy Bridge on my filer and I don't think I've ever come close to maxing out the proc.

2) Most server-class boards come with 2 or more network ports so you can do things like teaming them together (via LACP) for higher bandwidth or to provide a data port & a management port. Odds are this is not something you will need for home use.

3) The Supermicro X9S series has a built in graphics chip that provides very basic video that can drive a text mode display or basic windows desktop just fine. The graphics ship is "special" because it can hook into the IPMI system so you can connect to the console remotely. There's no need for a separate video card, the board has an analog vga port on the back port cluster.

Here are some random thoughts:

I would strongly advise you to reconsider doing a 3 drive raidz with 4TB drives. It will work, but raidz\raid-5 with "really big" drives is kind of a bad idea. If you can swing it, I would encourage you to get 6 drives now and do a 6 drive raidz2. The PSU you selected is fine (I'll never fault someone for choosing Seasonic) but it's not modular, so you wind up with the mess of unused cables wadded up in the case. Personally I'g consider the 450 watt G-Series which will make for a cleaner cabling job. I have a Fractal R3 and it is a fairly big case, so be sure to check your cable lengths (the PSU mounts on the bottom, the mobo power goes up the backside of the case & poke through a hole on the mobo tray) also be sure to pick up a couple of fan extension cables & an extra 12omm fan or 2 (I like Yate Loon's).

The platform you have selected is a favorite around here, you really can't go wrong with a X9S\Xeon combo, but Intel has released a new series of chips so you might actually want to consider the X10 boards. You can find a SM board nearly the exact same features (newer NICs) for about the same amount of money. Take a look in the hardware section, there are a couple of threads related to the X10 series for more info.

-Will

 

[Twanne]

After looking in to it, it might actually be à better option to go with a supermicro X10 board. Just to be a bit more up to date.

I've got two options:

- x10sae
-x10sat

Any recommendations? I don't really see much difference...

Thanks

 

[Twanne]

Alright, I've been hard at work reading up more on forumposts.
The hardware setup without drives has changed again, this time it's the final setup (I hope ;) ):

• Processor: Intel Xeon E3-1240 v3 Boxed
• Motherboard: Supermicro X10SAE-O
• HDD's: a couple of 4TB disks (See question below)
• RAM: Kingston KVR1333D3E9SK2/16G
• PSU: Seasonic G-Serie 450Watt
• Case: Fractal Design Define R4 Pearl Black
• Usb Flashdrives: Kingston DataTraveler Special Edition 9 8GB Grey

What drives do you guys suggest using? I've seen many different ones (WD RED, Seagate, ...). Recommendations are welcome, as long as they are 4TB minimum.
The case has space for 8 3.5" drives, what raid level would you suggest?
Thanks in advance

 

[DrKK]

Twanne: A large percentage of us with home FreeNAS servers use the WD reds, and have zero complaints.

I like your setup.

 

[cyberjock]

WD Red and 8 drive RAIDZ2 if for home use.

 

[JohnK]

Alright, I've been hard at work reading up more on forumposts.
The hardware setup without drives has changed again, this time it's the final setup (I hope ;) ):

• Processor: Intel Xeon E3-1240 v3 Boxed
• Motherboard: Supermicro X10SAE-O
• HDD's: a couple of 4TB disks (See question below)
• RAM: Kingston KVR1333D3E9SK2/16G
• PSU: Seasonic G-Serie 450Watt
• Case: Fractal Design Define R4 Pearl Black
• Usb Flashdrives: Kingston DataTraveler Special Edition 9 8GB Grey

What drives do you guys suggest using? I've seen many different ones (WD RED, Seagate, ...). Recommendations are welcome, as long as they are 4TB minimum.
The case has space for 8 3.5" drives, what raid level would you suggest?
Thanks in advance

Personally I wouldn't suggest that motherboard for a server build. It has too many features that you would never use on a NAS server, e.g. sound, HDMI and 1394. Those are all great things for a desktop, but it will be a waste.

I might be biased, but I will suggest the 360W Seasonic. Don't let modular be a decisive factor as you will only not use the PCI-E video power cable and that is easy to hide. I did need a SATA splitter for 6 drives.

The motherboard and CPU is capable of 1600mhz ram if cost is not an issue. Personally I found the 32gig Kingston kit to be best value for my money.

 

[Twanne]

Personally I wouldn't suggest that motherboard for a server build. It has too many features that you would never use on a NAS server, e.g. sound, HDMI and 1394. Those are all great things for a desktop, but it will be a waste.

I actually want HDMI, I don't have a display and don't want to buy one just to install a server, so I'm planning on using my TV for the install before going headless.
The rest of the features, like 1394 and sound will not be used, but that's ok.

I have changed the PSU to the 360W G-Series, it should provide more than enough power and cable management should be easy enough in this case. So that cuts another corner price-wise.

I'm going to start with 5 WD Red 4TB Drives in RaidZ2. I can add another 5 disk vdev later (3 drives internally and 2 drives in the 5.25" slots of the case).

 

[MtK]

why not use the tv's VGA input, instead of getting a board with HDMI just for 5 minutes...

or better yet, a board with IPMI.

 

[JohnK]

I actually want HDMI, I don't have a display and don't want to buy one just to install a server, so I'm planning on using my TV for the install before going headless.
The rest of the features, like 1394 and sound will not be used, but that's ok.

I will be surprised if FreeNas support HDMI and agree with MtK about going with a board with IPMI. Also if your plan is to have 10 drives it might be worth your while looking at the X10-SL7.
I also believe that 6 disk RaidZ2 might be better.

 

[cyberjock]

HDMI doesn't have to be supported by an OS. It's outputed by your video card as required.

 

[JohnK]

HDMI doesn't have to be supported by an OS. It's outputed by your video card as required.

His build included a Intel Xeon E3-1240 v3 that does not have integrated graphics.

A Graphic Integrated CPU is required to have the on-board video functioned. Examples: E3-1265L v3, E3-1275 v3.

Hmm, that was what my brain was thinking, but not what my fingers typed...

 

[cyberjock]

His build included a Intel Xeon E3-1240 v3 that does not have integrated graphics.

Right, but you don't have to have a video driver or something to enable the HDMI output. Either you plug in a monitor/TV and HDMI is outputted or you don't plug in anything and HDMI is never activated. It's strictly handled in hardware. That's why I said FreeNAS doesn't have to support HDMI. It'll "just work" because its a video card and that's what its supposed to do.

Now if you want to talk about going to a high resolution graphics mode with 3d acceleration, FreeNAS has no such driver.

 

[JohnK]

Right, but you don't have to have a video driver or something to enable the HDMI output. Either you plug in a monitor/TV and HDMI is outputted or you don't plug in anything and HDMI is never activated. It's strictly handled in hardware. That's why I said FreeNAS doesn't have to support HDMI. It'll "just work" because its a video card and that's what its supposed to do.

Now if you want to talk about going to a high resolution graphics mode with 3d acceleration, FreeNAS has no such driver.

I was thinking acceleration drivers completely forgetting that I have numerous Zotac's attached to my TV's that are all HDMI and have no problem. Brain-fart:)

My bigger concern though is someone buying a great board just to find that it has not integrated graphic/IPMI and requires a Xeon with integrated graphics that will nearly never be used. Unless you are willing to do the install blindly, something that might be possible or use a graphics card.

I wouldn't mind my current MB croaking so I could get my hand on one of those...Unfortunately it would mean new processor....

 

[Twanne]

So, from what I can tell from the technical jibberjabber, I can use HDMI if I put a xeon with integrated graphics on the board..?

Also if your plan is to have 10 drives it might be worth your while looking at the X10-SL7.

This MB has only 6 sata connectors and only 2 are SATA3, will this make a difference? And those SAS ports are for server drives which are smaller in storage and much more expensive, aren't they? Plus they spin at a lot higher RPM, so make make a lot more noise. remember, this thing has to be in my living room next to the tv :)

Thanks for the feedback.

 

[cyberjock]

So, from what I can tell from the technical jibberjabber, I can use HDMI if I put a xeon with integrated graphics on the board..?

Umm.. you make it sound like you think the HDMI only works with a CPU that has a GPU on-chip but DVI/VGA work regardless. Let me put it to you like this:

If your board has an on-board GPU(aka not on-CPU) then all of the outputs available should work.

If your board requires the CPU to have the GPU on-chip then all of the outputs available should work if you meet that requirement.

There is no situation I'm aware of where only some outputs work unless you meet some other requirements. It's an all-or-none situation.

Don't worry about SATA1/2/3. It doesn't matter except for SSDs. And even then for ZFS you aren't likely to see a difference in performance.