Lolight

Doesn't really mean much that they're manufacturer re-certified. Yes, they have passed whatever qualifying tests in order to be put back on the market. What is unknown is their prior history. They could be old new stock, nicely packed and stored under controlled environment and near ideal conditions. Or be some unwanted returns that were never properly stored, packaged and handled.

Yeah, but how about the hard drives' temperatures?

Did you install the drives? What are the running drives temps? The box seems to have a strangely arranged, limited air flow, that is mostly reserved for M.2's.

This time they bundle motherboards with incompatible memory in a combo deal! 🤔 Starts at 3:00

Thanks for posting your results. I was also shocked by my Patriot Flex number - 500mA. Five times as much as the Kingston and Transcend, both of which tested at 100mA. The Flex is more than a decade old. I was using it extensively for a couple of years after the purchase. I remember it running exceedingly hot, much more so than any other of my USB 2.0 drives. At the time I've attributed the hot running temperatures to the drive's minuscule physical dimensions. But now think that the demanded current design might be the culprit.

Not quite. It should work as two 7TB hard drives.

I'd guess it's impossible to say for sure until someone actually tries it. Do you plan to purchase one?

No need.

That was a quick and easy answer! Nice to have a real guru around! 👍

Interesting that you've mentioned that. The same thing had happened on my recent new build - an immediate reboot after selecting Memtest from the Unraid boot options. I don't have an HBA card so it's unrelated. i also didn't bother troubleshooting and simply booted from another USB stick with Memtest on it.

Glad you've solved the problem. I just want to point out that the best way to make sure that the are no memory related problems, on any system, old or brand new, is to run several passes of Memtest86+ (at least 4). If finished without a single error only then you can consider your memory (or configuration if multiple sticks) to be NAS worthy.

USB 2.0 flash drives Kingston DataTraveler SE 8GB Mushkin Prospector 16GB Patriot Flex 32GB Sandisk Cruzer Edge 8GB Sandisk Cruzer Fit 16GB Transcend JetFlash 8GB Transcend JetFlash 16GB

That's the same drive that I've originally purchased for my Unraid based on its small profile, but then decided to place it on the inside of the case, connected to the motherboard via an adapter. Therefore switched to the much bigger, all metal Kingston DataTraveler. Just out of interest, I run a little app called USB Device Tree Viewer, just to see how those two drives compare to each other on specs. The one thing that got my attention was a difference in the demanded current metric, with the Sandisk consuming twice as much current, as Kingston. Then, just as in the Spaceinvader's test, I left them both sitting for a couple of hours, idling. The Cruzer Fit turned out to be much warmer to touch compared to the DataTraveler. I don't know if the higher demanded current design leads to higher running temperatures. My observation leads me to that conclusion but it's all speculative at this point. I also don't know if and how any particular drive's controller handles the sleep mode. A big difference in idling temps in the Spaceinvader's test might be indicative of a sleep mode failure. It would be nice if Spaceinvader would update his test by altering the test parameters, e.g. USB 2.0 vs USB 3.0, low demanded current vs high. The results might allow to establish some patterns on how those two metrics relate to idling temperatures (important to Unraid in case if the USB drives do indeed spend the vast majority of their time in the idle state). Pulled out my small "collection" of old USB drives. It's a very small sample, skewed towards the older USB 2.0 standard. On the demanded current metric alone, some of the USB 2.0 drives showed the lowest numbers, but the spread among the brands is huge!!! 100-500mA As applied to Unraid, the idle state management is probably much more meaningful to the drive's overall temperature and maybe longevity. In conclusion. The USB flash drives are so cheap and easily replaceable, it's probably even silly to ask someone like Spaceinvader to run another test. For whatever it's worth...Here are the app readouts of my drives, (taken at the same USB 2.0 port): USB 3.0 flash drives Sandisk Ultra 16GB Silicon Power 16GB

Personally, I've never been brave enough to purchase and install any of the refurbs into my systems. But I'd be genuinely interested to learn about your findings.

IMHO (it's all relative): 1. Those smaller Seagate drives are not worth the trouble for the storage space they provide - occupy limited SATA ports and introduce additional failure points. 2. Do you really want an HBA card? With available at the moment 14-20TB drives you might not need one any time soon. 3. Free rack. Do you must use it (like really, really want) in a home environment? Asking because I don't know about your prior experience with server grade hardware (could be addictive (if becomes a hobby 😀) and many other negative things considering home use). 4. The case - seems to be very flow restrictive (related to my point about the free rack). You want to keep your drives cool. Btw the Sligers seem to have much better flowing. 5. Your USB flash drive selection is not great. Go with smaller USB 2.0 drives. They're cooler running and more reliable judging by the board's consensus, e.g. 4-8 GB Kingston DataTraveler SE (cool running, all metal case). But they're becoming hard to find, the USB 2.0 drives in general. Also beware of fakes!

More than enough for the listed usage.

Definately

As I've mentioned that particular Evga model is not great, regardless of selected wattage.

Regarding the EVGA BQ PSU.. The brand is great, but their BQ line is not: https://cultists.network/140/psu-tier-list/ Get something like this instead: https://www.newegg.com/super-flower-leadex-iii-sf-550f14hg-550w/p/1HU-024C-00008?Item=9SIAMNPAY45109

The motherboard on your list is not cheap. How many drives are you planning on using? Will you be using an HBA card? I think it would make more sense to get a much more modern and efficient $100 i3-10100 accompanied by a $150 motherboard for virtually the same price as your proposed combo.

That's right, according to the MB's manual you can only use one M.2 socket (M.2_1) without disabling any of the SATA ports:

Pretty much any current Intel (non-F) processor and 16-32 GB of any DDR4 RAM

May I ask why you want to keep such an old processor?