MrLeek

In fact the spec listed here would probably meet my needs for years... I just want to confirm that I'm doing the maths correctly here....especially important as it's conceivable that I need to include a GPU as well (I want to run a number of VMs) Edit: since I've started paying attention to what I'm reading - this link seems important: http://outervision.com/b/BBpa0i Can I be confident that Outer Vision's site saying that 800vA UPS is recommended is good enough for my needs? I honestly can't say I've ever noticed that "UPS recommendation" bit before....

Appreciate the response. It's a good point about the routers/switches - it may be a case of hooking those up to the UPS (via a 4-way socket most likely) as maintaining the Internet means that my other half can stay on the net if/when there's a power outage. So: - run server for 1 minute of battery. Send shutdown to unraid if still on battery - maintain router(s) on battery as long as possible. Looks like 50w will be more than sufficient, so a few hours? Assuming that is even possible? I don't need power on once unraid is back on the mains - 99% availability is more than enough for my needs. I just need to make sure that the power requirements are captured correctly, especially in the advent of a server upgrade. Is anyone able to spec out what unraid server would need 900w/1500vA of UPS? Doesn't need to be exact, but it would help confirm my thinking....especially if such a UPS would easily handle a dual Xeon, 64GB ram, 15+ HDDs, extra Sata cards, a few fans...?

(On my iPad so apologies for the brevity. But this UPS decision has been dragging on way too long) I need a UPS obviously. System specs below...and it's clear that I don't need anything major. I just need one to run for 5-10 mins at the most to detect that it's on the battery, before unraid initiates a clean shutdown. Simple. Then I start over complicating things: Am I calculating my requirements correctly? Is CyberPower OK to use (I've seen conflicting reports on that front on this very forum) If I calculate that my build draws 450w at full power (allowing for HDD expansion), what does that mean for my UPS requirement? Is 540w/900vA enough? If/when I upgrade this build I'll be going for more powerful kit (current i7, 16GB ram (maybe more). Even the most outrageous builds I've experienced with so far say that 650w under load is enough.....but how much more UPS headroom do I need to allow for? I picked out this CyberPower UPS which, at 900w/1500vA should be easily enough to run any server I Can think of...and probably run my iMac on it as well (i7, 8GB ram, 512gb SSD). Then I start doubting my calculations. Tldr: my brain is hurting on this topic......help me make sense out of this? Please?

Cheers Gary - test box up and running on the network. Next stage is pre clearing (these are old drives so this may be a dumb idea in the long run. But I'd rather know these drives are going to fail now than after a few months of experimenting). First pre-clear has just been started. NB: I needed to set up a new config in unMenu first (see this forum post) before disk.cfg could see the pair of HDDs that are in this build. This is probably not a smart thing to do if you're adding a new drive to an existing setup!. I also noticed in the System Log a mention of HPA. I have set the BIOS correctly not to save BIOS data onto the HDD, but triple check to make sure before committing data onto the array. (Mods - a lot of these notes are for my own benefit, but I'd like to think they'll be useful for others thinking of getting more out of unRaid. Where's the best place to put my rambling comments? )

Yeah I know this (it's a good reminder for others new to unRaid however). This was just an initial test to see if things booted up ok - now I can remove the connection to the monitor and go headless. The rest of the configuration and testing will be via Putty and the GUI. (Including changing the tower name - as this will be a 2nd server - so the browser lookup needs to be unique?)

So I've reconnected everything, cleaned out a LOT of dust, adjusted the BIOS....and it all booted up into a command line prompt. Not put it onto a network yet (one step at a time), but I pulled back the SMART reports for the pair of 320GB drives I'm using in this experiment. As I understand them they read fine (value should always be well above threshold) but again I'd welcome a 2nd opinion - especially since one of the drives has seen a lot more action (looks like Seek Error Rate is an issue).... I need to pre-clear both drives (not done that for ages) - not sure if that's a good move or not given that these are used drives. Again, this will be a non-operational server smartsdb.txt smartsdc.txt

But that's got a black front or is it just the internals you want silver?! It needs to be a silver front as well - I meant the EX-H34A.....but I can see me sending that back as well. 145mm wide means there's an annoying gap around the edge of the cage I can see me getting a 4U case and being done with it.... Edit: although I've just spotted the EX-36

(Doesn't have to be 5 in 3) Does anyone know of a silver drive case that's available? I was going to get the Silverstone CFP51 (but long story mean that I didn't). Now that I want to add extra drives....it looks like it's no longer being made. It doesn't have to be easy to swap drives (would be a bonus) - it just has to be primarily silver since that's the case I've been using for my build. Ideally it would also have a fan to help with cooling (heat is currently not an issue). Edit: Going to try the Lian Li EX-H34S - that seems to be the only option I can find after hours of searching...

Haha - I remember that I still had the Mobo box in the loft (I had to go up to get extra Sata power cables ) and found the manual... Was planning on going through it tonight looking for just that information....and there it is on page 51.

Given that this particular board has dual Bios I'm hopeful that the HPA won't be an issue. Should be an interesting project however. There's quite a few things I want to explore with UnRaid - I've had the idea of deploying something like IPFire as a VM to provide IDS within a network - but it's obviously way smarter to experiment on a test bed.

Motherboard is a Gigabyte EX58-UDR3 - a quick Google search suggests it will support vt-d but with a BIOS update (I'd appreciate a 2nd opinion on that). (and wasn't there a problem with Gigabyte boards way back when? Something to do with the BIOS saving some info onto the Parity drive?)

Hmm, interesting. Could this form a test server for me experimenting with deploying VMs, Dockers and the like? I can set up a network with the i7 as an unRaid server (I've got a pair of 320GB drives plus an old GTX260 already installed). Deploy unRaid onto it and hook up to an old router I've got to a test laptop. One of the things I want to do is to create a VM lab within my unRaid server - my main production server clearly won't cut it. But this i7 would be a good place to test and experiment on - if it breaks....who cares. Using that i7 in production long-term is perhaps not the best idea, given that it's been overclocked for years (I used a great 3rd party air cooler). But for shorter-term testing? Not an outrageous idea to be honest...and it's not like I'm going to be able to sell it for much as it is. There's two pains to deal with: one is the MASSIVE Cosmos S case that it's currently in. The second, more serious, issue is that I'm half convinced that the PSU on this unit is starting to fray around the edges (I had a couple of BSODs before deciding to retire it). I think it'll be a case of test it and see what happens. But a very interesting idea - thank you!

Probably not - whilst the existing HDDs will remain in use, the rebuild would see a new CPU/mobo with the Ram needed to run the extra services. I read that DDR3 will work with LGA 1150, but if I end up not upgrading components until next year (entirely possible) then holding onto that RAM becomes even more pointless. Helps that my current build has been offline for quite some time so it's almost as new. Short term: add an extra 1GB of RAM, but I don't think even that will enable this build to run Dockers (a topic i need to do a lot of research on).

Long story short...I've got 3 sticks of 2GB Corsair Dominator RAM from an old i7-920 gaming rig. Is there any point in keeping/using them as part of a rebuild, or would I be limiting the choice of mobo/CPU components to the point that any cash saving would be insignificant? I can't see any gain from using the i7-920 itself as an unRaid build (due to power usage and the fact that the CPU has been worked hard over the years). But the RAM was some of the best you could buy once upon a time. The next build will be a drastic step up from what I have already - and as I understand it, a Xeon build would mean ECC RAM (and this RAM wouldn't work). But I'd appreciate some thoughts....especially as this i7 rig seems destined for the scrapheap. Quite sad really http://www.corsair.com/en-gb/tr3x6g1600c8d

So for various health reasons my unRaid build hasn't been switched on for 2 years.....I've powered on, run parity and updated the software and all is good. Data is still safe. SMART reports are good if I'm reading them correctly. Now what? Well, as you can see in my signature my build is rather lightweight. So I'd welcome some thoughts on what I should be thinking about (I'm aware I've got a ton of things to read up on and that's happening right now) - basically I'm trying to get some clarity on what I should be thinking about as I've jumped from 4.7 to version 6: - Primary use case has been NAS storage and streaming media (highly unlikely to see more than one movie being streamed at a time). Existing media is streaming fine into Windows media player and the like and tested as working fine today. Would PLEX require additional horsepower? - It's fairly easy for me to add in extra RAM. I've got a spare PC5300 1GB stick here already. How many issues would I run into given the RAM speed mis-match? I'm assuming some tweaks in the BIOS would be in order... Or would be it easier/smarter to just add in matching RAM? Future use cases could see VM use. I'm wondering if I could deploy a hacking lab via a few VMs (similar to what I've got on a standalone laptop). But it's a lower priority I think at the moment. Regardless: - I've also got 6GB of PC1600 DDR3 RAM (part of an i7-920 machine I've got that's no longer being used). Could this form part of an upgraded build? What would your suggested components look like? - What about that i7-920? I suspect that's not the best option given that a) it's seen a lot of work already and b) it uses a fair bit of power. Not to mention that it's in a Gigabyte motherboard - which I recall used to cause some problems with unRaid due to the BIOS being stored on one of the HDDs. There's probably loads of things I've not thought about, but this post is rambling enough! But I welcome any/all sensible thoughts. MTIA

Good point. My use is primarily for AV storage - so "write once, read many". Whilst I'm also storing documents and others things on there....again, that's more of a local backup solution and the data requirements are far smaller. So there's a good rule of thumb for users that are planning their first builds - or at least the outline of one! Consider how you will be accessing the server; how often will parity be changing? How often will the data be accessed? Has anyone tested these WD Red drives in UnRaid?

The whole thing of MTBF got me thinking - I looked at the WD drives (2TB) to compare/contrast: - Enterprise drive (WD RE): 1.4m MTBF, 5yr warranty, 600k load/unload cycles. source - WD Red ("designed for NAS"): 1m MTBF, 3yr warranty, 600k load/unload cycles. source - WD Green (desktop drive): unknown MTBF, 2yr warrantry, 300k load/unload cycles. source Now I've got 2 x WD Green drives (1 of them is parity so I'm covered on that front). So I think I need to consider adding a new parity drive rather then just add more storage. In terms of space usage it's not an immediate requirement - I'm only now getting close to filling 1TB worth of space. But the parity drive (I would imagine) gets used more than a typical data drive (or is that a fallacy?) - therefore it's more prudent to use a drive with the widest margin of error. Or is that yet more drivel? As a footnote the WD Red drives are not mentioned on the unRaid wiki at first glance - http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Hardware_Compatibility#Hard_Drives - is this something that needs reviewing?

Appreciate the posts (and apologies for the delay in responding) I would have thought that the MTBF figures for hard drives would mean that the more often a drive is used, the greater the chance of it failing. It's a big leap but smaller drive = less access = less chance to fail. At the same time, 10 x 200GB drives mean that there's 10 more times for a mechanical failure when compared to a single 2TB drive. So does that mean there's a balance between size of drive used and number of drive? Or is this just hypothetical drivel?? At the moment I'm just going for the "get the biggest drive you can afford" approach, whilst remembering that £5-10 more usually adds 500GB of capacity.

My signature gives it away that my unRaid box is on the small side when compared to the monoliths that some create. In fact I'm in no real need for the extra HDDs, but since I know I'm about to add a new share to store a fair chunk of data (and share levels always confuse me! ) it may be time to add a 3rd drive. But then I got thinking about the best way to proceed. Should I just buy another 2TB drive or look for something smaller? Buying many smaller drives does have economies of scale - you only buy the space you need when you need it. But then many drives = many mechanical devices that could fail. OTOH....a 2TB drive failing (especially if a user can't afford to buy a replacement for a month or so) could be quite a headache. Plus you spread out the workload over many smaller drives, meaning each drive could last longer. A subject worthy of debate? Or just a dumb question? You decide....

Thanks for the responses both. It will be a 230v UPS (over in the UK) I'm a little wary that I'll hit a snag with this, but I've read the info on testing a UPS via the wiki/forum and I should be able to tell quite quickly if the UPS will auto-shutdown the way I want it to. If there's other thoughts out there I'd welcome hearing them. As an aside, is that a reasonable UPS to go for? I don't anticipate going over 8-10 drives and as long as I'm using 1TB+ drives all should be well. The calculations I did when I build my box suggested 12 drives would be fine for the PSU....at which point I would be looking for a larger box to hold everything in!

Been away from unRaid for far too long (man - it's been a tough year!) but finally getting back to putting my unRaid box back on the network. One thing I was in the process of sorting out at the tail-end of last year was a UPS. Now, after some heavy reading, I've revealed mention of "Active Power Factor Correction", "step approximated sine waves".....I understand enough of the science to know I need to slow down and make sure I make the right selection. I was going to purchase APC Back UPS RS Pro 900VA 540W 230V, which seemed more than ample for the server I'm running (details in my signature when I create it!) - in particular using a Corsair CMPSU-450HX - 450w (discontinued it seems, but this shopping link may suffice. Also this testing report may be useful). So, do I have to worry about this sine wave....stuff? I don't need my box to run on batteries for long - just enough time to perform a safe shutdown. But I don't really know where to ask about this (could I use some other brand with unRaid to have the same effect), so I figured I'd start on the unRaid forums and go from there. MTIA

Since my media PC decided to have "issues" I've started looking at if it was possible to stream movies direct from my unRaid box to my Sony TV (which is already on the net). Bit of googling has brought me up the following: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12435.0 http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=3532.0 Now, unless I'm mistaken, these threads suggest that it is possible to stream direct to the TV.....expect there seems to be a fair bit of voodoo magic going on - and I'm struggling to keep up with what's going on. So can someone sum this up for me? I don't mind doing the leg work to make it work (and as I figure it out I plan to document it here to help others), but currently I can barely understand what I'm reading and my Linux knowledge is not the best. So a simple, non-technical, explanation (the highlights if you will) so that I've got a framework to work with the complexity - or have I totally misunderstood these threads??

Well I just tried it when connected to a different SATA port on the mobo (I've got a 320gb drive going spare which worked just fine) and got this message: "S.M.A.R.T. Command failed - press F1 to resume" No prizes for guessing this HDD is going back to the supplier...

After a previous disaster with a failing hard drive due to a power cut and no UPS (bad idea i know!). I've got a replacement drive - installed it, etc.....yet unRaid doesn't seem to be able to pick it up. Uninstalled and reinstalled (I had a suspicion over a SATA cable I was using) and was the same. Done some searching on here (switched from IDE to AHCI - nothing) and ended up plugging a monitor and keyboard in just to see what was going on. The new drive does get picked up by the BIOS (tried the IDE -> AHCI change as well) and there's a lot of error messages going past relating to an hard drive problem - and it takes a good 5 minutes to get to the root login prompt. It all feels like the new HDD needs to be RMA'd. But I'd thought I'd post the syslog in case I'm being silly. Other potential issues could be that I decided to upgrade from 4.5.3 to 4.6 whilst the server was offline (I also added unMenu but I've not got further than putting the install program on the USB stick). syslog.txt

Did all of that: - After remounting the parity drive I ended up with no errors (good start!) - Then I re-ran a parity check and picked up 150 or so errors on the UI (uh-oh....) - smartctl (short test) shows up 1265 reallocated sectors (doh!) I really don't need messages like: "SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: FAILED! Drive failure expected in less than 24 hours. SAVE ALL DATA." ...and I really don't need to post screen shots either to confirm things! So guess I'm shopping on-line in a day or two! I was quietly hoping that it would be salvagable as a data drive, but I seriously doubt that's an option either...