Hey everyone,
I'm going to make the plunge soon to my first unRAID server.
What is your budget?
Without HDDs and the price of unRAID, I'd like to keep it under $700. Even under $600 would be great.
How many drives do you want your server to be able to support and how much capacity do you need?
I currently plan to start with two 8TB Red drives and then will expand over time. Most of my storage will be blu-ray rips. I could see getting to 6 drives total (4 storage / 2 parity) but 10 drives would be the distant future.
Is expandability important to you? If so, what's your long term goal?
I want to be able to expand for sure. But as I'm just starting, I have no clue if I'll ever NEED 10 drives of storage. I could see myself getting to 6-8TB drives with 2 being parity.
Are you interested in running any unRAID Add Ons (see here)? If so, which ones? Be specific.
I only plan on using this for file storage/backup with possible CrashPlan and as a Plex media server. I have 0 intentions of ever doing VM.
As far as plex usage. I currently live at home with my GF, parents, and brother. I can't see us ever really having 4-5 plex streams at once, plus when I move out, that server will come with me and will only every have 2 streams at once between me and the gf. The main reason for this cpu choice is I have some odd 300+ blu-rays and shows I need to rip, and I'd like to be able to drop them on the server, let handbrake detect the raw mkvs, and trancode them. I currently use my gaming rig to transcode what I can, but I don't want that left on for all hours of the day, not to mention I can't use it while it's transcoding.
Do you want to run green/low power drives or faster 7200 rpm drives? If you don't have a specific need for 7200 rpm drives, then choose green drives.
I'm pretty set on the 8TB Reds since I can get them for $500 out of the MyBook Duos
Do you have any spare parts laying around that you would like to apply towards your build? This includes drives.
No spare parts at all, will be a fresh build.
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Here is a current workup of a build I have in mind https://pcpartpicker.com/list/sNjJqk. Now with this build, my two main questions.
I was looking at a mini-ITX build with an ASRock C236 WSI https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813599009 and to put it in a Fractal Node 304 https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352027
If I stick with this mATX build and the Node 804, what are the differences / benefits of the one listed in the PCPartPicker build and this board https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182986?
Are there any other overall suggestions or changes that can be done?