BUILD Sanity check on a new build

[one800higgins]

I'm new to the FreeNAS world, so I've been digging around the forums, the documentation, the helpful guides, and whatever blog posts I could find on the individual aspects that I want from my build. At this time, I have about half of the hardware already and the other half is expected in the mail in the coming days. I realize now that I should have made this post before finishing up my ordering, but I guess doing an unopened return now is better than making a critical error and discovering it down the road.

Background
For the last few years I've been running a RAID5 setup -- and yes, I've read your links to why that was dumb now -- in an external enclosure connected to an HTPC running Windows. The HTPC basically handled all operations and the enclosure just gave me a, um, dumb large array with basic redundancy.

During a recent storm I lost power and that enclosure's power supply bit the dust. I replaced the enclosure and for 2 days things seemed to go smoothly. On the 3rd day, it seems that something in the device chain seemingly forgot where data was stored and started overwriting existing data with new data... Corruption was obviously the next step. After running some data recovery tools, I could have salvaged a bit but since it was primarily a media server, it just wasn't worth the hassle.

Instead, I figured if it's time to start fresh, it's also time to upgrade. So, here I am.

The Needs
As a starting point, my immediate needs are pretty ordinary and I see that FreeNAS has plugins to handle all of my immediate needs:

• Generic storage for OSX, Linux, and Windows machines
• Back-ups primarily for OSX, but potentially for Linux and Windows machines as well
• Plex video server
• Music server
• CouchPotato and torrent seeding

A future need might include the ability to spin up VMs, like Digital Ocean or Linode, and host dev environments. I see that there is a plugin for Virtualbox, so I'll probably play around with that... But it seems a lot of guides kind of advise against trying to use FreeNAS in that manner. So, in all likelihood, I'd probably end up building a cheap 1U server with 2 SSDs to handle this need (or want) as it arises.

The Build
Now's the part where you can tell me that I screwed everything up!

• Mobo: SuperMicro MBD-X10SLH-F-O
• CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231V3
• RAM: (4) Kingston 8GB DDR3 1600 Unbuffered ECC KVR16LE11/8HB *
• RAM: (4) Crucial 8GB DDR3 1600 Unbuffered ECC CT102472BD160B
• HDDs: (6, RAID-Z2) WD Red 3TB WD30EFRX **
• Case: ARK 4U-500-CA
  • Front fan: Noctua NF-F12 120mm
• PSU: Rosewill SilentNight-500
• PSU: EVGA 220-GS-0550
• UPS: CyberPower CP1500PFCLCD
• USB: (2, mirrored) SanDisk 16GB Ultra Fit

* Yes, I have seen the warnings about Kingston and SuperMicro. It seems that these warnings are primarily from 2 years ago and have seemingly gone quiet since. I've also found SuperMicro's site to be out of date with memory support (understandable, as this mobo is older) but Kingston's website has updated and added back modules that were previously removed from their site. I'm crossing my fingers that this means the issues have been resolved.

** 2 of these drives are brand new and the other 4 are 2 years old. I'll be putting these drives through the tests mentioned in the FreeNAS manual.

Alright guys, thoughts on the build?

Edit (3:28pm): Replaced the SilentNight PSU with EVGA one since the PSU will be sideways in the case. Added second USB drive for mirrored boot drives.

Edit (7/20): Replaced Kingston memory with Crucial, per @Ericloewe's guide.

 

[DifferentStrokes]

Are you going to get 2 of the USB drives and mirror them?

 

[one800higgins]

Are you going to get 2 of the USB drives and mirror them?

This is something I either missed or haven't read up on yet.

My understanding was that you need 2 drives on your initial setup -- one with the install image and one for the OS to install onto -- but from that point on you only needed the single USB that the OS is on. Is having 2 drives a requirement or just a cheap upgrade? I'd love to read up more on that topic.

Edit: Just saw your signature. Reading the guide now... I hadn't gotten that far into the manual yet!

 

[Ericloewe]

* Yes, I have seen the warnings about Kingston and SuperMicro. It seems that these warnings are primarily from 2 years ago and have seemingly gone quiet since. I've also found SuperMicro's site to be out of date with memory support (understandable, as this mobo is older) but Kingston's website has updated and added back modules that were previously removed from their site. I'm crossing my fingers that this means the issues have been resolved.

Actually, Supermicro occasionally adds some new DIMMs to their QVLs. Micron/Crucial was added about a year ago, and more recently they started validating some Innodisk DIMMs.

I'd definitely recommend getting something from Supermicro's QVL. If they ask what RAM you're using and you say "Kingston", they'll use that as an excuse not to escalate the issue until it's solved. It's understandable, but also a pain in the ass. If you haven't seen it yet, check out the Supermicro X10 RAM guide (link in my sig).

My understanding was that you need 2 drives on your initial setup -- one with the install image and one for the OS to install onto -- but from that point on you only needed the single USB that the OS is on. Is having 2 drives a requirement or just a cheap upgrade? I'd love to read up more on that topic.

Well, you need the install drive. Then you need the drive(s) that will make up the boot pool.

FreeNAS 9.3 moved to a ZFS boot device, which means you can mirror the boot device for added reliability and uptime. Definitely recommended for USB drives, a nice to have on DOMs and probably overkill on real SSDs.
It's trivial to setup during installation: just mark several drives and you'll have a mirrored set of boot devices.

 

[Ericloewe]

PSU: Rosewill SilentNight-500

By the way, stay away from fanless PSUs. They're not worth the hassle and they still need airflow.

If you want something 80+ Platinum, consider a Seasonic Platinum 660. Though you'd be fine with even a Seasonic G-550. Seasonic X-650 if you want a better fan, but the difference to the platinum units is small at that point.

 

[DifferentStrokes]

Well, the board you have picked out has IPMI. With this you can just send the ISO for FreeNAS over the network to it and not have to burn the image to a CD or USB drive.

2 boot drives isn't required, but is a good idea. Having 2 boot drives puts them in a mirror. If you lost a USB drive you could still run okay. For an extra ~$10 it seem worth it.

However you should still backup your config file just in case.

 

[Ericloewe]

Well, your board you have picked out has IPMI. With this you can just send the ISO for FreeNAS over the network to it and not have to burn the image to a CD or USB drive.

Right.

But I never said it had to be a physical device. :p /Lame attempt at sounding omniscient

However you should still backup your config file just in case.

Always good practice.

There are scripts on the forum that automate saving a copy to the pool. You can also manually save it on your client computers or whatever. Easy and saves you a lot of potential future trouble.

 

[DifferentStrokes]

Right.

But I never said it had to be a physical device. :p /Lame attempt at sounding omniscient

Or you can have one for the ISO and one to install to. After installing reboot and add the one with the ISO in as a mirrored boot device.

 

[one800higgins]

I'd definitely recommend getting something from Supermicro's QVL. If they ask what RAM you're using and you say "Kingston", they'll use that as an excuse not to escalate the issue until it's solved. It's understandable, but also a pain in the ass. If you haven't seen it yet, check out the Supermicro X10 RAM guide (link in my sig).

And this is why I kicked myself today when I realized, "Man, I should have posted long before ordering." The threads I found covered about 2/3 of the same information you did, but didn't provide helpful model numbers for comparable sticks like the Crucial ones. When I was hunting for the ones from the QVL, the prices were kind of nuts.

By the way, stay away from fanless PSUs. They're not worth the hassle and they still need airflow.

If you want something 80+ Platinum, consider a Seasonic Platinum 660. Though you'd be fine with even a Seasonic G-550. Seasonic X-650 if you want a better fan, but the difference to the platinum units is small at that point.

If it weren't for my case choice, I would disagree with you and stick with a the SilentNight based on all the tech tear-downs and tests I found before buying. However, as I was thinking through my reply to this post something hit me. I walked over to look at my case again and realized a glaring issue... Whatever PSU I buy, it has to be mounted on it's side.

Well, there goes any advantages the massive heatsink provides! I'll check out the Seasonic's you mentioned. Platinum wasn't a requirement, but getting such a highly rated Platinum graded PSU for $80 was too good to pass up.

2 boot drives isn't required, but is a good idea. Having 2 boot drives puts them in a mirror. If you lost a USB drive you could still run okay. For an extra ~$10 it seem worth it.

Yea, good to know. $10 for extra peace of mind is well worth it. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[one800higgins]

Updated original post with some changes. Going to have to return that PSU and I think I'm going to go with the EVGA 220-GS-0550 in it's place. Also went ahead and ordered a 2nd USB drive for mirroring.

 

[Ericloewe]

Updated original post with some changes. Going to have to return that PSU and I think I'm going to go with the EVGA 220-GS-0550 in it's place. Also went ahead and ordered a 2nd USB drive for mirroring.

That's a new Seasonic platform, apparently. I wonder how they're going to position it...

 

[one800higgins]

I know it's off-topic... But anyone have any insight into this question I posted to /r/homelab?

Basically, I'd like to repurpose my HTPC into a very basic server build for a couple simple Linux environments. Not sure if that's possible or advisable.

I figured I'd post it here instead of creating a new thread since it's related to my overall build.

 

[DifferentStrokes]

I've seen some 2U cases out there that will work with desktop PSUs.

 

[cyberjock]

I have that motherboard in my HTPC. :P

I may be mistaken but I don't think i3s in the 3xxx series support the vanderpool instruction sets, so VMs will run noticably slower than you may be used to.

 

[Ericloewe]

I have that motherboard in my HTPC. :p

I may be mistaken but I don't think i3s in the 3xxx series support the vanderpool instruction sets, so VMs will run noticably slower than you may be used to.

i3s support VT-x but not VT-d (or the other way around), I think.

 

[one800higgins]

Updated my build and took @Ericloewe's Crucial memory recommendations to heart.

Thanks for that guide! Seriously. I was able to snag the 2x 8GB kits thanks to your guide and it saved me about $15 over individually buying 4x 8GB sticks. In the end, it only cost me $40 more for 4 sticks over the Kingston memory I originally ordered. This is FAR better than the $100+ more that I was originally seeing when trying to follow the QVL.

I just happened to have a $25 NewEgg gift card too, so it was almost a wash. Now I don't have to cross my fingers anymore though.

I have that motherboard in my HTPC. :p

I dig the mobo. Honestly, the whole setup has served me well as an HTPC, but it's just overkill now that I'm offloading a bit of the work to the NAS. I'm still torn on having a separate server or not though. Really comes down to the performance I'd get out of my HTPC components.

I've also thought about getting a SATA controller so I can add 2 more drives (256GB SSDs) to this build and setting up a jail to run Virtualbox out of. With 32GB RAM and 12TB of RAID storage, I've got quite a bit of excess to work with. I could dedicate around 4-8GB to 1-2 Ubuntu server VMs and still be okay.

Plus, I'd prefer to part out the HTPC completely and sell them so I can try to make back a few bucks...