Which build is more cost effective?

[Eniqmatic]

Hi all,

Hoping for a bit of guidance/opinion.

I've been running FreeNas on some older hardware simply as a test and to have a play around to see how it works as you do.

Anyhow, we've come to the decision that we do want to implement one however I'm just a little stuck over which hardware to go for.

It's going to be used for the obvious main storage, however it will also be used for Plex for say a maximum of 2 or 3 1080P streams, transmission client and perhaps BitTorrent Sync, although unsure if this may expand in the future.

So what's the best bang for the buck so to speak, without going overkill for its purpose of the above? What fits the bill best out of the three choices here, or do you have any other recommendations?

Common hardware across both:
Fractal Design Node 304
4 x 2TB WD Red
16GB of ECC Memory
Corsair CX430M (Or similar, don't get hung up on this)

Choices:
ASRock Rack C2750D4I with the 8-core Avoton chip at around £290

OR

ASRock Rack E3C226D2I/E3C224D2I at £178/148 respectively

with: Pentium G3258 at £50ish
or: I3 4160 3.6Ghz at £87

Any other suggestions? I'm in the UK.

I know the Avoton will be much more energy efficient and quieter as passively cooled which is kind of appealing.

I'm still very much learning the ropes so hopefully not missed anything glaringly obvious!

EDIT: Sorry forgot to mention, I understand that the Pentium will probably do fine for Plex and file sharing however more cores and a more powerful chip is recommended for running more Jails, however if I'm only running say 3 then is a better chip still recommended?

 

[Mlovelace]

With those three choices I would go with the Avoton board. You get 4 dimm slots, 12 sata ports, lower power use and less heat.

 

[Eniqmatic]

With those three choices I would go with the Avoton board. You get 4 dimm slots, 12 sata ports, lower power use and less heat.

Thanks for the response, if heat and power weren't an issue, what would you use? Sata ports aren't too much of an advantage as this case supports 6 drives maximum, and I'd probably be looking to keep it SFF/ITX anyways as it appeals to me.

Thanks for your comments so far!

 

[jgreco]

There've been some comments that the Marvell controllers used for some of the extra SATA ports on the C2750D4I might be problematic. If nothing else, at least make sure you use the chipset's primary ports before using the Marvell ports.

 

[Mlovelace]

Thanks for the response, if heat and power weren't an issue, what would you use? Sata ports aren't too much of an advantage as this case supports 6 drives maximum, and I'd probably be looking to keep it SFF/ITX anyways as it appeals to me.

Thanks for your comments so far!

Well looking at the other two boards (ASRock Rack E3C226D2I/E3C224D2I), they both support a max of 16GB of ram, which would be a deal breaker for me. So, if you are set on ITX form factor then the Avoton board is the way to go.

The Avoton board does have a PCIe 2.0 8x slot, so you can always install a HBA and avoid the sata port compatibility issue entirely. The LSI 9211-8i and the IBM ServeRAID M1015 are PCIe 2.0 8x HBAs and are fully supported by freeNAS (use the P16 firmware).

 

[jgreco]

The Avoton C2550/C2750 boards also have fairly decent performance for general purpose NAS duties, and the C2750 variant has enough CPU left over to do some extra tasks. It probably isn't suitable for heavy transcoding, but should manage light transcoding duties without trouble.

 

[Eniqmatic]

Right, I think that settles it. Avoton board seems to be the best way to go.

Out of interest, what would you use for around that sort of money? Is there anything better available UK side?

Drives came in this afternoon, so going to get to work burning them in.

Thanks again

 

[jgreco]

There's little doubt that in six months we'd have a different answer for you, which is the bad part. But given what's available and what you asked about, it is what it is.

Geekbench results for the i3-4160 and the C2750 are annoyingly close, so the bigger memory capacity becomes a major factor. Slower cores but more of them on the Avoton, mildly favorable.

No idea what's available in the UK, sorry.

 

[sremick]

If you're at all interested, I have a similar build to what you're considering and my primary purpose is Plex as well. Feel free to check out the info my sig and ask any questions.